Monday's Fabulous Moment:
I definitely had every intention of blogging about this on Monday, but as the day progressed and it started feeling less and less fabulous, I lost my motivation. Luckily I have people to hold me accountable to these things.
So this actually started on Sunday evening when I was leaving Charlotte's apartment at around 10:00 p.m. I had parked in my favorite visitor spot that afternoon, the same spot I had hoped to snag every single day when I lived there for nearly 3 months. As I walked down the steps with a gigantic bag of laundry on my back and 3 other bags on my arms (looking nearly homeless) I noticed that my car was not in the spot I had parked it in. Interesting. So, I walked up and down the area, and no car. I stopped for a moment, looking what I'm sure was completely and utterly dumb and muttered, "Dude, where's my car?" I thought back on the day, trying to remember if someone had driven me over to the apartments and I had just forgotten, but I distinctly remembered pulling in and parking in my favorite spot. I took off walking around again with my car remote up in the air, pushing the panic button. That little guy is so sensitive and I've set it off so many times on accident I figured if my car was anywhere in a 50 mile radius, I would hear it. But again...nuthin. Upon realization that my car definitely wasn't in the parking lot I thought about the next step. I was a bit concerned about going to get Charlotte out of bed only to find out that I was just completely blind and the car had been in front of me the whole time, but I didn't really have any other logical option. Back I went up the steps, knocked on the door a few times and then sent Char a text that said, "Are you still awake? I'm standing outside your apartment door." She opened the door looking concerned, to say the least, and I said, "I think my car is gone, but I'm not really sure." And off we went together to scour the parking lot again.
Long story short, my car was not there and we knew that one of two things happened. Either, it was towed or it was stolen. If it had been towed, there was no number to call to tell me how to get it back. We considered calling the police in case it was stolen, but I couldn't remember my license plate number. I didn't think that conversation would make me feel much better..."Uh yes officer, you're looking for a little scrappy 99 Saturn that looks black but it's actually purple. It needs washed really bad and there's little kitty footprints all over the roof from my neighborhood strays but no I don't know the license plate number. Okay, find it."
I had a pretty strong feeling that it had not been stolen so instead we resolved to call the office in the morning, assuming that it had been incorrectly towed, and spent the rest of the evening cracking up about the ridiculousness of my car just disappearing. (Insert "these things don't happen to normal people" comment here). We also laughed so hard we cried when Charlotte recommended I shoot off a text message to Em to ask for prayer for my car's salvation since it was "lost." At that time of the evening...everything was hilarious. Who am I kidding. It still cracks me up. Anyway...
The next morning I dropped Charlotte off at work and took her car to work with me. I called the apartment office and spoke with my new best friend who I'll call "S" to protect the ignorant...uh,I mean innocent. The conversation went a little something like this...
Me: "Hi I need to know if my car was towed out of the parking lot last night."
S: "I don't know but I can give you the number of the towing company."
Me: "Um, alright. And who should I talk to about the fact that I was incorrectly towed from visitor parking. Would that be you or the towing company?"
S: "Where were you parked?"
Me: "Just inside the gate."
S: "On the left or right side?"
Me: "What? Oh, on the left."
S: "That's resident parking only."
Me: "Really? And where does it say that?"
S: "It's in the lease."
Me: "Yes right, but I don't have a lease because I was a VISITOR."
S: "Well it's in the lease and we've sent out multiple letters to our residents."
Me: "Right, again, I don't get those since I'm not a resident."
...PAUSE for a moment for S to get really irritated...
Me again: "So whose job is it to inform me where I can and can't park if you're not going to mark it?"
S: "The resident you were visiting."
Me: "Really? That doesn't really make much sense to me at all. Well, I guess I'll call the towing company and will be back in touch with you later..."
CLICK
Alright then. Thank you for your help friend. What I really wanted to say was if you're going to do something as stupid as have the left side be resident parking and the right side be visitor, than you REALLY need to mark that. But whatevs. I maintained composure.
I spent the next two hours calling a towing company that wouldn't answer the phone.
So...back to the apartment number to talk to my second best friend "J"...
Me: "So, I've been trying to call your towing company for hours and they're not answering the phone so I'm going to need a name and location."
J(think Valley girl): "Yeah, we've been trying to get ahold of them too and they're not answering for us either."
Me: "Um, is that normal?"
J: "No, we've never really had this happen before. So, I don't know..."
Me: "That's a problem. Like a BIG problem. Like, a company you hired just took off with my car and now won't answer the phone so I can get it back."
J: "Yeah, I don't know what to tell you."
Me: "How about you give me the name and location of the company."
J: "Well, it's J&J Towing but I don't know where it is. I think it's like, behind the airport or something. You'll have to look it up."
Fabulous. Your customer service skills astound me. Although, at least she was polite and I didn't get hung up on. I googled this company only to find some scathing reviews from people who used words like, BEWARE, criminals, thieves and comments like, "These people stole my car." Up to this point I had remained relatively calm and was still laughing about the whole thing but now...*Cue a little nervousness and anxiety on my part aaaannndd...go.
Right about then I decided a little phone call to the police department would do me well. I talked to a wonderful woman who actually seemed to care that I was struggling with all of this. She told me that even though it's not really fair, the apartment does have the right to have me towed even if their parking lot was not marked, BUT, they definitely had to tell me if my car had been towed, which they didn't, and the towing company definitely had to answer the phone, which they wouldn't. She gave me the number of the sargeant in the area where my car was taken and told me to get in touch with her. I was feeling a lot more confident after speaking with her that something would be done so I quickly called the sargeant only to find out she was at lunch. So, I called the sargeant's secretary...who was also apparently at lunch. *Cue return of frustration aaaannnnddd...go.
I had a meeting scheduled at 1 which I went ahead and went to. It was REALLY encouraging and completely what God used to keep me from becoming entirely homicidal that day. He's good like that.
When I got back to work I decided to try calling the towing company one more time and quite surprisingly, someone answered the phone. She confirmed that in fact my car was there and if I picked it up by midnight it would only be $214.95. ONLY? I went and got Char who had printed off all kinds of paperwork from the Better Business Bureau, who this company has an F with, shock and surprise, and after a bit of getting lost, finally found my poor little car looking all sad in a dirty impound lot with lots of other sad little kidnapped vehicles. I wish I could have taken them all home with me. But alas...
We walked through this totally janky gate and up to a bullet proof window with a little speaker and a drawer that you exchange money through. So ghetto. Both of us were dressed up from being at work and Charlotte put all of her paperwork down on top of the drawer. The man who came to the window quickly looked down at it and then said, "Which car is yours?" After I told him he disappeared for a second and then came back. I asked him how much it would be and he said, "$193.95." I said, "Oh that's good. That's less than I was told it would be but it is how much you're actually supposed to charge." Just before that Charlotte had headed over to my car and was looking it over. Between her looking like a lawyer, and my comment, this guy started like sweating bullets. I'm not totally convinced he didn't pee himself but I wouldn't know since the wall of Jericho was between us. Apparently I'm not the only one who gets homicidal thoughts in dealing with these people.
After paying my car's jail bond, I drove it off the lot. It's functioning properly and doesn't seem too traumatized. Although, if it wasn't already dirty enough before, the poor little thing is really suffering now. I'm thinking this weekend I'll give it a bath as consolation, right after I go spraypaint "VISITOR" in my favorite spot.
