Continuing the tradition, Frank and I decided to take Nellie apple picking at Smolack Farms, as we did last year *linktopost.

Initially we planned to go a couple weeks ago, but a mixture of rain and an excruciating sinus headache made us reschedule to Monday, Columbus Day and therefore a holiday from work. We’d rented a Zipcar beginning at 8:30am so we could swing by Pearl Vision to get Frank’s glasses adjusted before heading off to the country.

As soon as I started up the car, a warning light came on to check the tire pressure. I got out and checked but the tires looked and felt full, so I drove around the block, thinking the light would turn off. I pulled over about 30 seconds later because it hadn’t and called Zipcar.

The woman I spoke to told me to just put more air in the tires. When I said I wasn’t really comfortable with this, she told me just to find someone at the gas station to help me. So Frank and I went to the glasses place, then went to a gas station and I filled the tires up.

Instantly the front left tire deflated completely. So we backed into the parking space and I called Zipcar again. The woman I spoke with this time (who was possibly the same woman) asked if I could have a friend drive me to pick up a tirejack so I could change the tire myself. When I asked if there was any way to extend my reservation, she said I could do that if I wanted to, but didn’t offer to extend it for me the way Zipcar usually does if there’s any problem. At first she told me the car was booked right at 2, but then figured out she could extend my reservation because it was only going in to be serviced. Oh, but the extension was on my dime. I went ahead and told her just to book it for 24 hours then since it would cost the same.

No. Dummy. If I had friends with cars, I wouldn’t be renting a car.

So she called roadside assistance and said they’d be out in about 45 minutes. Of course, she also gave them the wrong address, telling them I was in Boston instead of Cambridge. The guy arrived and was extremely nice and helpful. He struggled at first to get the lug nuts off, complaining that they were on WAY too tight (there’s no way I would have been able to get them off if I’d even tried; this guy was HUGE and struggled). He put the donut on and checked the tire, finally figuring out that it was the valve itself, meaning someone (probably the driver before me) got hit or scraped it against something.

I immediately called Zipcar and told them what he’d said, as well as explained that I didn’t hit anything and I called immediately to report the damage because the last thing I want to do is pay for a new tire thanks to the previous driver. This guy said that was fine and apologized for the inconvenience and gave me two hours of free driving credit. It’s something.

Talked to the roadside assistance guy a little more and he reminded me that you can’t drive with a donut on the highway, and really you shouldn’t even drive with a donut on in Somerville’s  crappy streets. So I called Zipcar again and told them I needed a new car because the whole reason I rented this was to go out into the country. Finally, someone who seemed genuinely empathetic that this whole thing was ruining my day and wasn’t even my fault. Because of the idiot driver before me, I spent 2 hours sitting in a hot car with a flat tire and had to pay to extend my reservation because of it. She asked if I needed to extend and I explained that I’d already paid to extend since that cost the same. She also discovered that the nearest car that would be immediately available was 2.6 miles away, which would mean we’d have to cab there and back.

But get this. She seemed to have read Zipcar’s “How to be a nice customer service person” manual and actually demonstrated the above and beyond customer service I expect from Zipcar. She comped me half of my reservation (apparently the most they can comp) and also said they’d comp me for the cab rides if I just emailed them pictures of the cab receipts –both to the car and home from the car. I thanked her profusely and accepted. We then carefully drove the car back to its original location and set off for Smolack Farms, 2.5 hours after we’d intended to.

The thing is, it’s not Zipcar’s fault that I reserved a car that had a flat tire. This sort of thing is bound to happen, particularly with this style of out-in-the-world automobile rental. This sort of delay is the inherent danger of being a customer. It’s all in how the company handles delays like this that make a customer who’s experienced an inconvenience come back. When I talked to that first woman, she should have said, “If you’re uncomfortable driving the car, I can see if I can change your reservation to another car.” Then the flat tire would have been discovered since the car was getting serviced that day anyway. The second time I called, the person played by the book but offered only the bare minimum. The third person was finally offering to help and the final woman was the one who finally nailed it and had me leave a really annoying, crappy morning feeling a bit better.

So . . . at long last, off we drove to Smolack Farms. And, to be honest, Nellie was pretty awful.

I don’t mean she misbehaved, but whereas last year she was content to stay by us and hunt for apples, this year she wanted to go run and play with kids. While Frank bought us a couple Apple Cider Donuts from the Farm Stand, I stood out with her while one kid after another came to pet her, and she loved it. But by the time we got into the orchard and were picking apples (off the trees this year! not the ground!), she wanted to just go run around. It probably didn’t help that it was actually pretty hot outside.

We picked from the Antique Orchard (which has 25 varieties of apples!) instead of the Standard Orchard this year, and got a ½ bushel basket because I wanted the basket (it’s going to hold my scarves in the porch room!) We got WAY better apples than last year, but Nellie wasn’t that interested.

We got pumpkins this year too! I’d meant to last year but for whatever reason we didn’t. This year we wandered around the patch, let some more kids fawn over Nellie (she definitely preferred this to hunting apples this year), then packed up and headed home, swinging by the Sonic in Peabody.

It would have been nicer if the day was a little cooler and Nellie was a little more interested in the apples and a little less interested in trying to tug us along to go chase kids. But we got better apples, awesome big pumpkins, and the picking from trees was more fun than scavenging from the ground.

Got home too late in the day for me to do any baking yet, but next weekend I’ll probably make apple chips, applesauce, apple bread and maybe apple butter? We still have quite a bit of apple butter left over from last year, though; we rationed it way too successfully!