Sunday, February 07, 2010

Nature of Humanity and parking spots


It's now about 6am on a cold snowy morning. The day after a record setting snowfall in the area.
I write this now, because I can't get back to sleep - for fear of worrying about my truck.
Let me explain...
I live in an apartment complex with a parking lot.
When it snows of any reasonable amount, the parking lot becomes a mess.
The reason being, is that the complex sends a plow around to clear the streets - that sounds good right? Well, what it does is - it plows the snow up and blocks in every person parked in the parking lot. Now here's the thing... when you have to dig out your car (or pick-up truck in my case), there's no place to throw the snow. You have to walk the length of your car for every shovelful and dump the snow in front of (or behind) the vehicle. It's a real pain.
In the years that I've lived here, I've seen people, who are either lazy, or inconsiderate, or just plain both do the following... rather than walk that car length, to dump the snow, they simply throw the snow behind (or in front of) the car next to them! I don't see it happen often, but at least once every major snowstorm.
Now, this brings me to why I'm writing this...
I woke up around 4:45am and couldn't get back to sleep, so I happened to get up, and look out my front window. Wait... let me back up here a minute... I dug out my truck early in the morning yesterday. I have a 4x4 truck - aka 4-wheel-drive. So as a benefit of that, I don't have to spend too much time clearing out the snow behind my truck. I'm able to drive over most of it - within reason. So that's what I did. I cleaned off the sides, the snow actually on my truck, and most of the snow behind my truck.
Ok back to this morning...
I glance out the window, and see that someone has dug out the back of my truck, almost clear down to the pavement! Wow! Was someone that nice to me? helping out a fellow neighbor? As I was sitting here, trying to figure out who that neighbor was... it hit me... The SUV/Van next to me, is completely plowed in - and I realized... They didn't dig ME out to be nice and neighborly, they dug ME out for REVENGE!
I remembered as I was digging out, my neighbor came out too and was digging out his car (I think it was a Prius). I put 2+2 together and saw that the vehicle next to me was a blue/black SUV. That's when I realized... the guy who dug his car out this morning, came back to "his" spot, and someone had taken it. I know, I know... it's not HIS parking spot, but it's like an unwritten rule in apartment complexes that if someone digs out their car, it's "their" spot. Some people put up folding chairs, to "mark their territory" as their spot.
As someone who has been in that exact situation, I've been pissed off too! The nerve of someone taking your spot, after you spent hours digging it out, is beyond frustrating.
So that's when I realized what happened. He's a younger guy, I think there might be a couple of roomates there, and while I didn't see this happen, I can garauntee you they probably were angry, and decide to teach the guy a lesson, and RE-shovel him back in.
So now, I put 2+2+2 together and think - wait a minute... IF the guy comes out later today and sees MY spot empty, and his spot full - he's going to think that I was the inconsiderate person who just moved my snow to behind his vehicle! Would he take some sort of revenge now on my vehicle?! Would he "key it" with a nice long scratch?! Would he smack his snow-shovel into the side and possibly dent it?! Ugh. So these are the thoughts now running through my head, and preventing me from getting back to sleep.
Now, I'll have to try and keep a 24 hour watch on my vehicle to see how the guy reacts, and possibly confront him and try and explain, "It wasn't me!"

The joy's of living in an apartment complex.

Update: All was fine. I decided to go back to bed and not worry about what might happen. In the end, nothing happened, and when I checked out my window around noon, there was a different vehicle parked there, and some heavy equipment had been brought in to actually remove the snow via a backhoe.

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