Still Loved

So any given day, there are about 200 cars on the facility at work. However, there are only about 150 ‘legal’ parking spots. The remaining 50 milk the fire lanes, and ADA/Universally Accessible spots, sidewalks and walkways to scrape out an extra 49 spots. There’s always ‘That Last Motherfucker’ who can’t park anywhere (only because it’s now physically impossible to park somewhere without seriously running the risk of finding your sweet ride in the path of something really, really, big, heavy, sharp and metal-ly).

Everyone here gets to work extremely early that by the time I get there (which I personally think is a very early 8:00 a.m.) all but a few spots are gone. I can always take solace in knowing that I will never be “That Last Motherfucker” because of the fact that Roxanne (the secretary) will always show up later than I do. (Roxanne sometimes pushes 10:00 a.m. … SERIOUSLY) – come to think of it, she never finds a hard time parking because by that time, the people who get here at 5 or 6 a.m. are leaving for lunch!

I’ve already explained how crappy the tar to tire ratio is, so why is it that yesterday, every car on ONE entire side of the parking lot had a sign on the windshield ‘PLEASE MOVE YOUR CAR BY 2:30 P.M.’ … This wasn’t even a friendly reminder … it was more like comply … or else … (I can think of a couple of train-related ‘or else’ scenarios that I would NOT want my car to participate in).

Hi, we’re testing brakes, and you know, sometimes the train cars don’t brake like they’re supposed to … Ooh what a pretty car you have there.

Hi, Yeah we have this thing that aligns the track and it just happens to be BIGGER than the actual building … Does your car want to play?

Hi, There’s a fuckzillion volts of live wire right above your car … and well … yeah, they’re RIGHT above your car. (This one comes with a grin)

Needless to say, such a ‘reminder’ on your windshield was to be taken seriously. So wait, WHERE THE HELL ARE WE SUPPOSED TO GO? That had to be the most non sense-making thing I have ever heard. In my panic turned optimism … I started to realize that we only had 3 logical options:

a) Go Home.
b) Go drive in circles around the town
c) Go Home.

It sounded too good to be true and it was. That FANTASY was cut short because it was jogged (scolded) back into my memory (by my boss) that 80% of the people who work here leave this place at 2 p.m. so ‘NO you can’t, because you don’t have to go home in order to save your car.’

Crap.

For some reason I was just ITCHING to get out. I know it’s so unprofessionally high-school of me to say that I wanted to get out of work but don’t lie … who doesn’t ‘WANT’ to get out of work early? I would probably have to call it out unless of course you’re that guy who applies Rebecca Romijn’s (notice how I also dropped the Uncle-Jessie-ish ‘Stamos’?) ‘MYSTIQUE’ costume… Speaking of, in an unrelated topic: I was under the impression that XMEN 3 was coming out this summer, and looking forward to it … but no, it’s actually summer of 2006 … Do you know how far away that seems?

Back to point, I eventually moved the car (along with everyone else) but then spent the rest of the day being nervous about it. You see, this thing kicked in … I am VERY superstitious. Remember when my tire got ‘maliciously slashed’? Well, what I had neglected to mention (or maybe I did) was that the particular incident took place on THE ONE AND ONLY day that I parked on the side where we were supposed to move our cars to. Seriously, I have NEVER parked on the ‘close’ side of the building, and the ONE day I deviated, some shit had to go down.

I just kept replaying scenarios in my head of how my engine was going to erupt in flames as I’m about 100 feet from my apartment or how my windshield is just going to shatter into a million pieces and I in turn become the most hated man in the tri-state area because of the magnitude of traffic jam I caused.

Well nothing happened (at least not yet) and the tri-state still loves me.

Note: All of this could really turn into one vicious cycle of hate and tire slashing. Tire Woes – Cause Traffic Jam – Become Hated – Get your tire slashed again – Cause more traffic Jams – Become Hated – Get your tire slashed again – Cause traffic jam and so on