how a $20 ebay buy cost me over $100
No, this wasn’t a scam I from a bad ebayer. Instead, it was a lot of bad luck (?) all at the same time that made my ebay item cost an extra $100 and 2 hours of my time, plus gas. You see, I don’t have a home mailbox, so instead I use a PO Box in the city (NYC, that is). I decided to take a trip there to pick up the item and then work at my studio a couple blocks away. Since the post office closes at 6pm, and I had to do something in New Jersey at 4pm, I thought I’d have just the right amount of time to make it to my mail.
I got to the city quickly, around 4:30pm($6 to cross Lincoln Tunnel). My idea was to park nearby and then walk to the post office and my studio. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find parking, so I thought, ‘why not drive to the post office, double park with blinking lights, run in and out, and then find parking?’ That way I’d save a trip and kill time before finding 2 hour parking that ends at 7pm (I could park at 5pm, pay $2 and be good, right?).
Well it was a bad idea. They didn’t stuff my ebay package into my box (which they could have), and left me a card instead, for me to retrieve it upstairs. I was told to go to window #8 or 9 and not wait. So I did that. Imagine though, slow and stupid federal employees. A simple task ended up needing 3 people to accomplish. And too much time. By the time I made it to my car (right outside the door), I had a $95 ticket. ARRRRRGHHHH!
But it wasn’t over. I still had to find parking. I drove ’round and ’round my usual area (the best for finding parking relatively close to my studio), until I decided I’d wait on one street for 5-10 minutes to see if I’d get lucky. If not, I told myself, I’m going home in the middle of rush hour (???). Anyways, within about 5 minutes, a man came walking, on the street, as if going to his car. Guess where that was? Right diagonally behind me. Perfect! I didn’t even have to move my car, just put on my signal, wait for him to maneuver out, then 3-point-park right in. But no, it couldn’t be that easy, right? Well, a car, waiting way way behind me on the street, drives up like it’s his spot and puts on his signal like he was claiming it. Can you believe that?!! I yell, make signs for him to back off, but he just beeps back. The man leaving gives me this look like, this spot is yours, don’t let him take it. I try to back up to let my man leave. The other car doesn’t move. My man has almost no space to make it out, but he does. The guy behind me still doesn’t move - we are in gridlock. Then he decides to come out and talk to me. A Chinese guy(no, his nationality is not important, just descriptive here), with a trench coat, he tries to act superior. His words were something like this: “I saw you drive by, you don’t know how long I’ve been waiting, and you were in front of the car, not behind it”(what???). He doesn’t care I’ve been looking for parking for a while too, or that I got a ticket, and he says so. What an asshole. And when I raise my voice, he tells me to “be nice.” And when I tell him I don’t care anymore and I’m going to let him take the spot, he almost doesn’t hear me because he’s still talking. And when a guy is about to leave the space right behind the space we’re fighting about(so there’d be space for the both of us), I’m so heated I don’t care, and so I drive off anyway. Into the rush hour traffic to go home mad as hell.
