I got finished with class at 9:45 this evening. On the way to my car, I notice a woman by a vehicle next to mine pacing about nervously. As I am unlocking my door, she asks, “Do you have a day parking pass on you?”. I don’t- I have a semester permit sticker on my windshield. But I’m kind of curious about why someone would need a day parking pass at 9:45 at night… :dubious:
So I ask her what she needs it for. She explains that she got a ticket…for not having a parking permit, and she was wondering if I could give her my permit so that she could contest the ticket and weasel her way out of paying it by claiming she had a permit all along :eek:
At the time, I was at a loss for words at how weaselly this was. Why the hell didn’t she fork over the six bucks for the permit in the first place? On the drive home, I was in kind of a cranky mood anyway, and I thought of all the things I could have said/done in front of her. Like if I did have a permit, I could have ripped it up in front of her and then left. Or said some snarky remark while driving off. Or say “Do you know who I am?” and put my Crossing Guard hat on, which has the San Jose Police Department patch just to see the :eek: look on her face.
I dunno. I think there’s a difference between people giving away tickets or permits that are still valid but that they’re not planning to use anymore, and somebody trying to cadge a permit after the fact in order to lie their way out of a fine that they fully deserved.
Maybe the former is technically as illegal as the latter, but the latter somehow just seems a lot sleazier to me.
Appologies for this small hijack, but I stopped and stared at this post for almost a minute before realizing what had stunned me so…
Someone used “you’re” correctly.
I’m not sure what to do with myself now. My whole day is now off-kilter.
Quick, someone “axe” me a question…I can’t cope with this much faith in humanity!
Except that you used the word “lie” when clearly the word “weasel” was called for here.
My first thought, upon reading the OP, was, “Back slowly away from this person and hope she isn’t packing.” Mugged for a parking permit? Hey, it happens.
My second thought was, How did she think she was gonna prove she had the permit all along? Was she gonna claim the cop was blind?
And surely the school must have records of who was issued what permit number. (Are there numbers on the permits?) What would prevent the cop from asking the judge for a continuance (or whatever), and then coming back with a computer printout, “Ah ha, it says here that this permit was actually issued to Incubus, what are YOU doing with HIS permit?”
And then that drags Incubus into it…
Nah, you gave precisely the correct response, except that in a perfect world, you would have had a Chick Tract on you, which you would have pressed upon her, “No, sorry, I don’t have a day-pass, but I do have this ‘Four Spiritual Laws’, which I really wish you would take home and read…” while staring deeply and earnestly into her eyes.
Duck Duck Goose, she was asking for a day permit, which are printed out via these machines in the parking garage. You shovel in 6 bucks, and it prints you a pass with the date/time the pass was issued. She was hoping I had one of these pieces of paper, so she could say that the police officer must not have noticed her pass.
However, it would have been lose-lose for her, because you are supposed to prominently display the pass on your dashboard. Her defense wouldn’t fly because they can give tickets to cars that have permits that aren’t visible (how is the cop to know you bought one in that situation?) so she is a weasel through and through and deserves a very preachy chick tract about dishonesty or something
Six bucks is a helluva lot of money- more than my daily budget right now. I can see the temptation to try to avoid it if for some reason I had to park on campus.
You just don’t know other people’s circumstances. There could be some compelling reasons why parked without a pass and some compelling reasons why paying the fine would be a disaster for her. A parking fine would mean I couldn’t eat for a few days, and I am lucky enough not to have any dependents. I think it’d be good to tone down the self-rightousness a bit.
Man, if you’re that hard up then you probably shouldn’t be wasting money on a car. A flat tire would throw you into bankruptcy.
Just kidding, but really, if six bucks or a $20 dollar parking ticket throws your nutrition cycle out of whack, then you may need to consider alternate means of travel.
sven:I can see the temptation to try to avoid it if for some reason I had to park on campus.
Yeah, but if you gave into the temptation and got caught, would you try to lie your way out of it, and ask strangers to help you lie your way out of it?
I definitely sympathize with people who are in straitened circumstances, but I don’t think they should expect to be shielded from criticism when they’re being dishonest.
