Tyre Service...round 2

You would think after my last little "tyre service" issue I would figure out exactly what to do, who to call, etc when I had a flat tire, but no. Never thought lightening would strike twice in one month. Yesterday L and I were driving back from his away basketball game, in the "other" car. We were on the Motorway in rush hour traffic. Suddenly a little light starts flashing and dinging really loud. I thought that something needed immediate attention! L was trying to find and read the manual about the indicator because at first, he and I didn't even know what it was. Could have been a "top up your engine oil" light for all we knew. It was the "runflat" indicator. I am absolutely floored that I have to deal with this again. In rush hour...on the motorway. Why don't these things happen in your neighborhood when you can pull over and walk home?
Anyway, the indicator was on, but I couldn't "feel" the flat tire yet. This little Mini Cooper is smart. It tells me when my tire is flat.
I had L call DA because it is illegal for a driver to talk on the phone, and I felt like I should have 2 hands on the wheel in case the tire made the car hard to control. DA told me to get off the motorway and onto a small road immediately. Ok, for any of you who have read my blog rantings, there are NO frontage roads in England. You are on the motorway, you exit to the next motorway and then you exit onto the 2 lane road into your village. NO extra, small roads. No exits at all!!!! No gas stations beside the road, no drive through restaurants, no little shops beside the road attracting customers. nothing. So I take the next exit hoping just to stop on the ramp, but unfortunately, there was no safe place to pull over, it was a curve and immediate entrance to another motorway and there wasn't an exit for 5 miles! Can you imagine driving along a busy section of LBJ in Dallas and there not being an exit of any type for 5 miles. crazy.
DA was telling me something about safety tires, but with L translating between us, it was a mess. Finally there was a set down place which is kinda like an extra lane where you can pull over. I couldn't open my door because it was too close to traffic. L got out and couldn't tell if either tire on his side was flat. I finally was able to read the manual myself about safety tires, and there is this little button you can push to balance the car so that you can drive home. How cool is that. It took a few tries to figure out how to do it, but finally the light went OFF and we drove the rest of the 5 miles, turned around and drove back 5 miles to our original road and got home without incident. whew. L thought he and I were going to have to change a tire ourselves.
DA must not have been too worried though, or else he felt like he had earned enough goody points for rescuing me last time because at the end of the phone conversation where he told us to pull over and deal with the safety tires, he said, "I think I'm going to run over to the British Museum after work and look at the Babylon exhibit." HELLO, your wife and child are panicking on the side of the road with the car dinging at them about a flat tire and you are going to go read about King Nebucanezer!!!!!!
After all that drama, I call the dealership this morning to figure out what to do today - and to get my tire fixed. Their response, "go put air in all of your tires and check to make sure there is even pressure between them all then reset the balance correct button and that's all you need to do." I have no idea about how these safety tires work, but that seems entirely too easy. They dont even need to examine the tire? makes me a little uneasy, but we'll give it a go.

Now I just need to figure out if any gas stations have air pumps.
Does the culture shock ever end?????