Car Karma

Picture me….sitting comfortably on the Hertz shuttle bus at Boston Logan airport…a comfortable hour and ten minutes before takeoff…having just returned Miss Sally’s Toyota Corolla (read yesterday’s blog) to Hertz ….when…I realize… I. Don’t. Have. My. Wallet. I had it a MINUTE ago when I got gas at the EZFuel and Pay (they felt like they had to add that last part) in that completely dodgy part of Boston....Have you ever seen a fellow traveler jump from a moving Hertz shuttle bus? Not pretty.

What’s the FIRST thing you have to do in those situations? Okay – AFTER you call Nicola? That’s right, You. Have. To. RE-RENT your car to drive back to the crack house/EZ fuel emporium to search for your wallet. Did I mention I rented this car at the Wings airport? With NO reservation? And….ummmmm….NO. I. DON’T. have my driver’s license – weren’t you listening when I was crying hysterically about my lost wallet??? THAT re-rental transaction didn’t take long.

Finally…as I am trying to find the now re-rented Corolla for my panicked, quitoic quest for the lost wallet in Cracktown… some poor Hertz worker saw my flustered self and asked me if I needed help. I threw him the keys and replied…"thank you Jeeves…YOU drive”. So whether it was an approved absence or not…"Brian” and I are careening through East Boston trying to find EZCrack and Fuel where I last saw my wallet. [NOW I wish I had tidied up Miss Sally’s corolla a bit more before I returned it…"Sorry Brian, don’t mind those 35 diet coke cans on the floorboard. Next to the 3 USA Todays and a week’s worth of soda water bottles." {sigh} ]

More desperate than mortified, I got acquainted with Brian over THIS priceless ice-breaker:
Brian: “what gas station was it?”
Maeve: “Ummmm…. I don’t know?”
I am sure Brian was wondering what the hell he had gotten himself into with the crazy lady sitting next to him like some psychic trying to pick up a reading on the exact location of the gas station “I remember a bridge…and a Dunkin Donuts…I am picking up illegal activity nearby.”

When we finally pulled into Crackie McCrackie’s House of Gas, the guy behind the bullet proof glass (!) of the outdoor teller booth looks up with his 100% toothless smile and directs me inside the store. Get the $%#^ outta here…someone turned in my wallet???

When I asked the guy behind the counter at Amy Winehouse’s Discount Plaza if anyone had turned in a wallet, he asked me for the name on the license. After I told him…he asked me where I’m from so he could verify the location. Seriously? How many OTHER a) white girls b) who are looking for their lost wallets c) who are named Maeve McC come through here??!!?? Thank you for saving my wallet, asshole?

But there it was…the whole thick wallet. I went to tip Mr. Funnypants…but while my good Samaritan had no use for my Southwest credit cards (what…no miles?) the cash had had been picked clean. 150 bucks Stupid Tax. And in THIS neighborhood? $150 cash counts as a stimulus package. I know I’m taking a tax deduction for it.

AND I made my flight with 6 minutes to spare. I even had time to buy a NY Times (can you charge that $1.50 to my Southwest credit card?)

The moral to this story? Prepay the gas.