Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Parking Garage Rage


Last week Paul and I got back into our routine of working out together. I really enjoy working out with Paul because he pushes me to do more and exercises that I would not normally do on my own at the gym. We both benefit from the extra push.

I drove to the gym from work yesterday to meet Paul and I decided to park in the parking garage. I had to get a parking stub to use when leaving the gym. When leaving the gym you have to get the ticket stub stamped by the gym and the parking would only cost $3.00. After you get the ticket validated by the gym you go to a machine, insert the ticket and then pay the $3.00. The ticket is supposed to then come out of the machine and be your proof of payment, well nothing came out and I really didn’t think about it and just went to the car to leave. Now, what I was not thinking about was I needed something to prove I paid the $3.00. I forgot that tiny little bit of important information. UGH!


So, when we arrived at the bottom of the garage Paul was driving and he asked where the ticket was and I was like, “what ticket?” and then I realized oh shit, nothing came out of the machine. We explained to the parking garage guy what happened and he told us to go back up stairs to see if the ticket may have spit out after I left. We did that – no ticket. So we drive back down to the main floor of the garage and tell the parking garage guy, no ticket. The guy was an asshole and was like – “you’re going to have to pay $20.00 then for a lost ticket!”

Ok, now this is the part where things start to get a bit crazy. Paul and I are both irate at this point – we just worked out at the gym for over an hour, we are starving and we are tired from working all day and we just want out of the garage. So Paul is yelling at the guy and I am also yelling saying I never got a ticket. The guy basically tells us to eat shit. At this point we are blocking the exit so no one can get out and the guy decides to go upstairs to see if the ticket got stuck in the machine. Now, we are just waiting downstairs while cars are trying to get out of the garage and are going around through the entrance. After waiting a good 10 minutes, we hear the guy downstairs but he never came over to us to tell us if the ticket was stuck into the machine or not. So Paul yells, “Was the ticket there? Was it stuck in the machine?” And the guy says, “No.” and just continues to direct cars out the entrance.
So we are both irate at the thought that this guy was not going to tell us AND the fact that we are still sitting in the parking garage blocking the exit so no one can get out. So now we are both pissed and Paul just lays on the horn.

EL GATO!

The horn is echoing though the entire garage so loudly it’s piercing everyone’s ears, people are walking by the garage holding their ears and a few of them flipped us the bird. I am laughing my ass off trying to get Paul to drive through the paper thin barrier that is keeping us confined to this garage prison!

After a few minutes of noise pollution, we then decided to block both sides of the parking garage so no one can exit or enter and there’s a huge line of cars backed up on either side – it’s complete chaos. I am screaming “Just drive through the gate!!” Finally the police come!! We were happy they arrived because the Asian parking attended had no intentions of letting us out of the garage unless we paid the $20.00. That I am sure he was just going to pocket.


The police listened to the story and tried to talk to the parking attendant saying that these two guys were obviously at the gym, they have their gym cards, can’t they us pay another $3.00 instead of paying $20.00. Eventually the cops got the attendant to come down to $8.00. Absolutely ridiculous!! We did get a receipt for this and we will be complaining. Beware of the Central Parking System on 1200 Van Ness!

We drove off both laughing hysterically at the events, we were crying we were laughing so hard. My fave part of the whole thing was Paul blasting the horn – it sounded like a bomb was being dropped and the looks on people’s faces were priceless! HA!

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

See, this proves my point...working out is just far too much trouble! - LOL! Pity Paul didn't just ram the gate. That would have been like some cool action movie:

"Gym Breakout" starring Paul and Neil - LOL!

Michelle

PJ said...

For the record, there was a sign on the gate that said: "Do not pass through this gate. Violators will be subject to a $1,200 fee to repair the gate." Clearly other people had run through that gate.

Also, the guy never went up to check the machine. At least not until the police came and told him to go check (and there was no way he was going to admit if there was anything there).

Finally, I love the picture of El Gato laying on the horn. I don't even remember when that picture was taken :-)

After all was said and done, it was quite amusing.

La Fiancée disparue said...

That is hilarious, and crazy! I love it.

Anonymous said...

EL GATO IS GOING TO GET YOU!

It took me a second to realize that it wasn't actually Paul laying on the horn in that picture!