Oct24

‘i do like artfully breaking rules.’- alton brown

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(not the actual rule-enforcer with a watch, but similar)  

—

went to park in a structure

across the street

from where i was having my hair cut at 10:00

 it was 9:55 when i arrived

pulled into a spot on the ground floor

knowing the lower floors open to the public at 10:oo

to leave room for customers

yes, i am a customer

assumed it would take a couple of minutes

to grab my things and leave my car

so the timing should work out

not thinking it would be an issue

when i turned my car off

an officer on foot

waved and rushed up to my car

as soon as i looked at him

i guessed

it would indeed be an issue

he told me i couldn’t park there

because it wasn’t yet 10:00

i said that i planned

on it being 10:00

by the time i gathered my things

and left my car

no, that is not the rule

if you do this, everyone is going to do this

when i had pulled in, most all of the floor was empty

other than a few people at the ev chargers

while he was chatting with me

others pulled in

 parked all around me on the ground floor

he insisted that i move up to a higher floor

then began rushing over to each car

to say the same thing to them

i moved up to the next floor

 lo and behold

there he was again

saying we all would have to move

to at least the 4th floor as the sign said

i continued winding around

moving up to the higher floors

which were packed from the workers

 who had to arrive early

along with

my fellow parkers

who he had forced to move to the top

so the only place left to park was on the roof

at that point some people who had been forced to move up

had started driving down to lower floors

now that it was officially past 10:00

it had turned into a french farce

 left my car on the roof

met up with a uni student

who also had been pushed up to the top

he gave me a nod

‘that guy’s like a mall cop.’

yep.

we took 7 flights of stairs

down to the ground where we’d started

 little bit late for my appointment

i’m sure all of us who had driven to the top

had made it out of

the early curfew time at that point

so it had really been a ridiculous exercise

i got the feel he might not be a person

who was flexible

 felt more comfortable

with hard and fast rules

i imagine

he must have been exhausted

chasing after all those cars

the salon

booked a 10:15 slot for my next appointment.

—

‘one had followed the rules, and one had not. but the problem with rules… was that they implied a right way and a wrong way to do things. when, in fact, most of the time they were simply ways, none of them quite wrong or quite right, and nothing to tell you for sure what side of the line you stood on.’

– Celeste Ng

—

*Alton Brown (born 1962) is an American tv personality, food show presenter, author, voice actor, YouTuber, and cinematographer. He is the creator and host of the Ford Network show Good Eats as well as other shows on the network. Brown is also a best-selling author of several books on food and cooking.

*Celeste Ng (born 1980) is an American writer and novelist.Her short stories have been published in a variety of literary journals. Ng’s first novel, Everything I Never Told You, won the Amazon Book of the Year Award. Her second book, Little Fires Everywhere, was made into a TV miniseries.

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38 responses »

  8. first of all ‘congrats’ are spoken for you keeping your calm.
    i’ve read both of Celeste Ng’s books – she is a absolutely marvellous writer and i can only recommend her to everybody. don’t have a tv, and of course couldn’t watch american tv anyway – but go for her books!

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  17. Wow what an annoying parking officer, but some people are like that. It is a great story that was fun to read. I started thinking about the police officer in Sweden (my native country) who arrested his bride on their wedding day for DUI. She started driving their car after drinking champagne. He took her to jail before the wedding was over. She filed for divorce from the jail the same day. The marriage lasted less than one day. However, they got back together again.

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  22. We have a name for people like those in England, Beth. Best wishes, Pete.
    Jobsworth
    A jobsworth is a British informal, disapproving term for a person in authority who rigidly and unreasonably enforces rules, red tape, or bureaucratic procedures at the expense of common sense or helpfulness
    It comes from them saying, “More than my job’s worth to let you do that”.

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