A Parking Misadventure

This one is for fitting, who tells me she is undergoing "frogg files" withdrawals, because I haven't written anything for the last couple days. What can I say--when my fans need me, I'm there. Anyway I hope you like...

Trying to find parking in crowded places is one of my pet peeves. It's a surefire way to make me cranky and annoyed. This was a big problem when I lived near San Francisco, which is notorious for several things: 1) Steep streets. 2) Jaywalkers. 3) No parking. I loved going in to the city, because I thought the city was cool, but I absolutely hated the inevitable driving around for ages while looking for parking. You really need like three independent eyes to drive successfully in SF--one to watch the road, one to make sure you don't kill any jaywalkers, and one to find the ever-elusive parking spaces.

One time I was supposed to meet friends for dinner in North Beach at 7pm on a Friday night (haha). I got to the city just about right on time, but ended up driving around for 45 minutes looking for a spot on the street because I didn't want to pay $20 for a lot. By the time I finally found one (about five blocks away), I was starving, irritable, and a tad road ragey. I don't know if my friends were too pleased to hang out with me that night. I don't remember much about the evening except for not finding parking, which is kind of sad really.

But I actually have a funny parking story which happened in San Francisco, not too long ago. It was in May and my kiwi friend Tash was visiting. We were meeting my friends Mark, steveforpresident, and the Beccanator for dinner (North Beach again!). I turned down this narrow, steep little street, and there was this perpendicular parking space that I thought I just might be able to back into (even though I was driving an unwieldy Toyota Previa). Tash didn't think it was a good idea. "Nonsense," I said. "When you see a parking space in SF, you don't ask questions, you just snag it."

Well.

I pulled ahead of the space, and prepared to back up. The car wouldn't back up. It apparently did not have enough power to reverse UP the very steep street. To make matters worse, the front end of the car was now up against a pole that was stuck into the sidewalk. So I could not go forward anymore either. No backwards, no forwards. I was STUCK. I mean, really and truly stuck. I tried putting a piece of wood underneath the back tires to provide some grip or something. When I spun the wheels, the piece of wood went shooting off somewhere far away (thankfully not killing anyone). The car did not budge at all, except maybe to settle more firmly against the pole in front of it.

In no way could this situation be considered good. I was starting to feel just a teensy bit desperate. And then our savior appeared...a little old lady who came out of her apartment just then and showed us THE WAY.

According to this woman, our predicament was not all that uncommon. She said she saw this sort of thing happen "all the time." She said we needed to get some weight in the back of the car. So she and Tash climbed into the back, and a random guy on the street was persuaded to climb into the trunk. I was trying very hard not to roll my eyes in total cynical disbelief. I also was struggling with whether I wanted to laugh or cry. The whole thing was so ridiculous, and yet so incredibly typical of the sort of thing that happens to me. Welcome to my world.

Anyway, it worked (or I might still be there!!). We were able to back the car up far enough that we got clear of the pole. We didn't get the space though. But we had learned our lesson, which was this: Some parking spaces just aren't meant to be had. You gotta know when to fight for 'em, and when to let 'em go.

Also, little old ladies are helpful to have around in parking emergencies. I suggest keeping one in your car at all times. You never know when she might come in handy.