Why It's Important To Be Nice To Government Workers

I work downtown. Unfortunately, part of working downtown is paying the meters. I usually park in a ramp but if I have to run errands during the day that just doesn't make sense, so sometimes I meter it. And I always lose track of time. So I get tickets.

Every time Jamie rides in my car she reminds me to pay those tickets but I never seem to have that at the top of my priority list.

At work today, leaning against the bar, I look out the window and see the little meter maid truck pull up behind my car. So I ran out and tried to see if he could maybe not write me a ticket and here, look, I have quarters. No, he said, very nicely, sorry. And by the way, I have to tow your car, you have too many unpaid tickets (six is the limit I guess).

Oh no! Well, he was very nice and apologetic about it and I have a hard time being mean to people who aren't mean to me, so I just had a little problem solving session with him to see if we could avoid a towing. In the end, no. No options. So I grabbed some stuff out of the car and went inside.

Some of the stuff I grabbed were the tickets, just in case I needed them. And I'm looking at the tickets and I remember - you can pay these on line! So I ran downstairs, paid my five parking tickets online, printed off the receipts and ran back upstairs to the guy waiting in his Geo Metro or whatever the government gives these poor bastards.

Here! Look! I just paid! Can you call off the tow truck? No, he said, but how about you just drive away and we'll call it even. So I ran back down into the dungeon of the bar and frantically tried to remember where I'd put my keys FIVE MINUTES AGO and after what seemed like forever but was probably 30 seconds I ran back out and there was the tow truck, just backing up with it's bed starting to go down.

I ran across the street, through traffic, dodging cars, yelling thank you at the meter maid guy and dove into the passenger side of my car, jumped in the drivers seat and peaced the fuck out of there.

I'm lucky I'm such a nice guy because if I cussed that dude out there's no WAY I'd be at home blogging right now but I would be stuck in the courthouse all day tomorrow and then have to deal with the beautiful people at the city impound lot and pay their garbage fees plus an overnight charge.

The moral of the story is, you were right Jamie and I should have paid those tickets a long time ago.