Have you ever just had one of those days? You know the kind; a day where everything you touch just falls apart in your hands. Well my wife Ashley certainly had one of those days on Monday.

To set the scene a bit for how bad piled on top of bad, my week was already off to a less-than-stellar start.

If you’ve even casually read any of my previous columns, you probably know what a huge fan of the Nashville Predators I am. Don’t worry, this isn’t going to turn into another Predators column. I just feel I need to set the mood for the sports-induced funk I was already starting Monday under.

As I’ve said before, I have attended every home playoff game in Nashville Predators history, so of course I was there for game four of the first round on Sunday. The Predators were dominating the game, leading 3-1 with less than four minutes remaining, on their way to tying the best-of-seven series at two games each against a heavily favored opponent.  If you paid attention to the news this week, you know the Predators had a historic collapse, surrendering two goals to force overtime and then losing just over a minute into overtime.

So, the week was off to a fantastic start. Then Ashley called me around 5 p.m. as she was leaving work to say, “My car broke.”

Now that can mean any number of things, and none of it is good. She informed me she was currently blocking the ATM drive thru for Citizens Tri-County Bank on Main Street and she couldn’t move the car. I told her I’d come help push it out of the way. That’s when she informed me the steering didn’t work, so any moving would have to be straight forward or straight back, and unfortunately her car wasn’t parallel to the curb at the time. 

Upon my arrival, I discovered she wasn’t exaggerating. The steering wheel was spinning freely with no effect whatsoever on the wheels. After moving the car back as far as we could to not block the ATM drive-thru while also trying not to stick out into the street any more than necessary, Ashley called AAA, which she had luckily just renewed her membership to. Ashley’s parents happened to be driving past during our predicament, and my father-in-law took a look under the hood and discovered the U-joint was broken. I don’t know much about cars, but that didn’t sound good. Anyway, after the initial drama was over, a very nice tow truck driver came after being summoned by AAA and we got the vehicle successfully delivered to Gateway for repair.

After a more eventful day than we expected, we decided to treat ourselves to Mexican for dinner. As we were leaving and thinking maybe the day was finally taking a turn for the better, I got into the driver's side of my car and, as Ashley goes to get in the passenger side, I hear a horrible rattling. Then she said, “I think I broke your car.” Indeed, the passenger-side door handle literally fell off in her hand. It was definitely one of those days.

Standard Managing Editor Seth Wright can be reached at editor@southernstandard.com