Wednesday, February 27, 2008

Timing

I just got into work. It's 11:30am. I came from picking my car up at the impound.

I completely slept through my alarm today. After groggily rolling over to look at the clock, I sprang out of bed like I had received an adrenalin shot to the heart when my eyes beheld the time 9:30... because that meant I was already a half hour late for work. Luckily, my bosses aren't coming into the office today, so my tardiness would squeak by unnoticed. I proceeded with an abridged version of my morning routine, which only afforded me three songs on my current 'wake up' soundtrack (also known as Leaves in the River).

I was out the door by 9:50. The day had been going great so far: it was already 75 degrees by 10am, there wasn't a cloud in sight, I was dressed in my casual (comfortable) clothes since my bosses aren't coming into the office, I was having a good hair day, and let's face it, I got an extra 1.5 hours of sleep. I rounded the corner onto the residential street behind my apartment building, where I park my car every night. I'll give you one try to guess what wasn't there that should have been.

I stopped dead in my tracks when, instead of my car, I saw an orange cone with a sign, in the gutter in front of the second house in. I've seen this cone before. I walked over to that lonely chunk of the block where no cars dare trespass. Turns out the house is having some sort of extermination done and no one is allowed to park in front of it this whole week. I placed a call and caught a friend right as she was leaving for work, and being that she works for her parents, her schedule is flexible.

At the impound I forked over $187, which did not include the $50 ticket that was on my windshield. After I'd signed all the paperwork and was directed across the street to the wrong lot, a spirited man wearing a nametag that said "Ben" hopped on his walkie talkie and tracked down my car. We chatted as he escorted me to the correct lot. "What'd they get you for?" he asked. I explained the situation - that because the gutters on that block often overflow with water, the residents put cones near the curb to alert people of the hazard zone, so I didn't think twice when I saw the cone last night. We proceeded to share some mutual complaints about the system.

As we approached my car he looked down at my paperwork. "Looks like you just missed us," he observed. I stretched my neck to see what he was referring to. "Says here we towed you at 9:28am."

9:28am. I'd be $237 dollars richer if I hadn't slept through my alarm today.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow. That sucks.
Good story though...although the park about the guy saying "looks like we missed you" doesn't quite make sense to me...You got towed, how'd they miss you?

-Marissa

Stepiphany said...

i guess I meant 'looks like you just missed us.' Will correct now, thank you :)