24 April 2007

Small Town Police Work

I hardly ever drive to the train station, but once in a while, it's necessary. Because I do it so seldom, I don't have a resident sticker for my car so I park at the meters. Once last year, I got a ticket when parked at a broken meter. I successfully fought the ticket, but it's a hassle going to court.

One day last week, I had to be somewhere at the end of the day, so I took the car. The first meter I tried was broken, so, good girl trying to avoid traffic court that I am, I moved the car. The second meter was broken. This time, I scrounged some paper out of my bag and left a note on the dashboard as well as a note taped to the meter with a Bandaid. Then, belt and suspenders, I called the police station when I got to my office.

When I got off the train at the end of the day, I found the note that had been stuck to the meter now amended and stuck under my windshield wiper. "All better now!" And, they'd set the meter so that there was still 3 hours left on the meter when I got there. Small town. Nice.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Awww, honesty does pay (sometimes). I live in a small town within a big town, and it definitely has its perks. I went to the grocery store and tried to buy over $80 in groceries but forgot my wallet. They recognized me, let me take the food home, and trusted me to return later with my money.

Anonymous said...

P.S. Love the bandaid. Way to improvise. Had it been my bandaid, I'm sure it would have had Hello Kitty on it.

Mayberry said...

Sounds like Mayberry! The bandaid was a nice touch.

S said...

I love this story. We too have our small-town stories, like the time Ben at three was all agog over seeing a policeman at the supermarket. Later that evening, when we were just about to bathe Ben, the doorbell rang. The selfsame policeman was at the door with a collector's card of himself, a badge, and an iron-on. The cop was seriously overweight, but to Ben, it was as if Superman himself was at our door.

Another sign that we live in a small town? By the time the policeman left, all of our neighbors were out on their lawns gawking, trying to figure out what criminal deed we had masterminded.

Liz Miller said...

Excellent!