Not a good morning . . . or was it?

[This article was written on August 2, 2010 but for some reason never was published.]

My morning didn’t go well at all. Having said that, it was all inconveniences – nothing more. I didn’t have anybody call me saying that they were in an accident or that so-and-so is sick or any other bad news. It was just stuff that got my blood pressure up.

I parked in the parking garage about quarter to eight and walked to the Social Security office. The guard there told me that they didn’t open until 9:00 (I would swear the person I talked to said 8:00) and the earliest he could let me go up was 8:50. Grrrr #1!

So, I walked to the Reading Area Community College and had a cup of coffee in the cafeteria. I got out my iPod and (#1), I forgot my earbuds; (#2), the battery was dead. Grrrr #2! But, I did take a book (The Renegade Writer) and started reading and sipping.

At 8:20 I walked back to the SS building, expecting a line of people waiting at the elevator, there was none (Yeah!) I joked with the guard about beating the crowd and he told me that there were already a bunch of people up there. At which point I reminded him that he told me less than an hour before nobody could go up before ten of nine. He pointed to his watch and said, “It’s ten of now.” I pointed to my watch and said, “No, it’s quarter of now!” It was a moot point, when I got up there I saw there were already 40 people seated in the room and I was in a line of another ten people to just get in the door. Grrrr #3! I tried to make the best of it and joked around with the people in line with me. My kidding would have been more effective had it been in Spanish.

By the time I got inside it was about 8:55. Just inside the room there was a gentleman screening everybody, asking them why they were there. He would then touch a number on a computer screen to print a position number in line and a number for a particular window, there were only three windows, and hand the ticket to the client. Finally, my turn! “Sir, why are you here today?” I told him I wanted to apply for SS retirement benefits.” Hmmm,” he responded, “you’re going to have trouble with that.” (WTF?) “Why”, I said? He then told me he didn’t have the personnel available to handle that right now and if I waited I’d be there most of the day; I should call the 800 number and get an appointment. I replied sharply that I already did that and was told it would take two months to get an appointment; it would be faster to just show up. He told me that wasn’t true, if I called they could get me an appointment this week yet. “Well that’s not what I was told” I retorted with the wit of a five year old (not sure if I stomped my foot or not). So, that should be Grrrr#’s 4 through 10, but we’ll just leave it at #4! Hey, he couldn’t control what others said to me, so I tried my best to be polite, took the card with the phone number on it he handed to me, thanked him, and headed back down the elevator; only after someone already in the elevator allowed the doors to close almost catching my nose. OK, truth be told, it more likely came closer to catching my stomach. Anyway, I had to wait for the next one. Grrrr #5!

So I walked past the guard that doesn’t know how to set a watch and out into the fresh morning air. It was a few minutes before nine and even in downtown Reading the air was still crisp and fresh. The cool air reminded me of the Rocky Mountains and my frazzled brain flashed back to the wonderful time we had there. Ahhhhhh. The lower floors of the parking garage had vacant store fronts. I thought about how nice a location that would be for a coffee/pie shop. It’s directly across from the Imax theatre, a block away from RACC, next to the Goggleworks, and within a few blocks of numerous office buildings. Hmmmm. I took down the 800 number for the rental agent. The sign said “no investment required;” how can that be? I’ll call and find out.

Well, maybe this morning wasn’t so bad after all. I climbed the garage staircase with a bit of a spring as I thought about the possibilities I had just uncovered. Since the garage was almost empty when I got there, my car was at the top of the steps. I hopped in and began the twisty route to the exit – coming close to getting hit only once, by a petite blonde in a way-to-big Escolade. I got to the gate, inserted my ticket, and . . . nothing! The readout in the little window on the ticket/fee taker said “Invalid Card” (again, WTF?). I pressed the red button with a diagonal slash across it and the machine spit my ticket back at me. Hmmm. I re-inserted it. Now the window read, “Fee $10.00.” WTF! (again and again), I looked at my watch, it was exactly 9:00, the ticket showed that I came in at 8:43; that’s $10.00 for 73 minutes? Impossible! Grrrr #6!

It was then that I noticed that the gate in the lane next to me appeared to be open. I backed up the car slightly to get a better look at it. When I did I heard the machine with my ticket in it make some mechanical noises, and that wasn’t good. The gate next to me actually was not open so I coasted back to where I had been, pressed the red button to retrieve my card and start this thing all over again, only to find out the machine had swallowed my card and I could not retrieve it. Grrrr #7!

Ahhhh, good luck, there is a call button, I’ll press that. I could hear a phone ringing (great!) after four rings an answering machine came on the line, “You have reached the Reading Parking Authority, we’re sorry, but we can’t take your call right now. Please leave a message and we will get back to you as soon as possible.” I grumbled a few four-letter words and hit the shiny chrome button really hard to hang up. Grrrr #8

After the breeze coming in the open window cleared away the steam that filled the car after I erupted, I calmly pressed the shiny button again. Ring, ring, ring, “Hello, Parking Authority.” Hoooray! A real person. His voice carried with it the caring and gentleness of a guy named Bruno or maybe Guido. I explained my situation to which he responded, “Ahh, OK.” His tone was as if I had just run over his dog. Hey, it’s your garage Bruno, let me out, I didn’t do anything wrong! In the background I could hear him talking on the walkie-talkie (are they still called that or are they just “radios” now?). Then all was quiet, he said nothing to me. I said “Should I move my car or just sit and wait here?” He told me to leave it there somebody would be there is a few seconds. Well, he didn’t lie. In a few seconds I saw Slim sauntering down the hill from another garage a block away. This guy was about six feet two and weighed maybe, on a rainy day, 125 pounds. He reminded me of the character Bill Cosby used to talk about. They would hold him by his heels and lower him through the sewer grate to get the quarters in the bottom of the sewer. Oh, sorry, I digress. Slim was actually a nice guy: polite and friendly, not like Bruno at all. When I told him it wanted to charge me $10.00 he said, “Yep, this garage is $5.00 an hour.” Fortunately he followed that with, “Ahh, don’t worry about it, I’ll let you out;” and he did just that. After going through the key ring on his hip that any maintenance man would be proud to own, he opened the panel on the side of the gate, flipped a switch, and the gate whirred up out of my way. I was free! Whoopee! Thanks Slim! Thanks for putting an upper on an otherwise downer of a day.