Stupid half full glass...

I was pondering something the other day. I had heard about this baseball pitcher that "threw a perfect game". Which basically means, they pitched 9 innings, without a single person hitting one of their pitches. This is a very rare event, and takes a great deal of skill. An event like this is quite praiseworthy. This is a good thing! ...Now, if a pitcher was to "throw a game", that event has an entirely different meaning. This means that they purposely lost the game for their team.

Which brings me to the subject of "Tickets"...good or bad?

Today, I went to take advantage of an employee benefits program here at work. Even though technically I am a contractor, we get discounted event ticket rates. So I went to the employee programs department downtown to buy "Tickets" for my family to go to Disneyland in a couple of weeks.

This is where the interesting events unfolded that inspired today's post.

Parking was scarce, I had to climb to the 9th floor of the parking garage to find an empty space. I took my "Ticket" in for validation, so I could get out of the parking lot at no cost. After the first elevator failed to make it all the way to the 9th floor...I found myself making my way to the less convenient elevator at the opposite end of the rooftop. I made my way to ground level and walked to the adjacent building, where after numerous security checks to verify that I was indeed who I said I was. I was then allowed to speak to another security guard who assigned me a 'guest pass' to go to the 4th floor. After an efficient trip up to the 4th floor I acquired these fantastic goodies, for pennies less cost than what I could have bought a new plasma TV with.

Happy with my recent purchase I took these valuable little diddies down to the ground level where I gave the guest pass back to the anorexic security guard. I then reached in my shirt pocket for my parking "Ticket" so I could have them validate it. ...after checking all of my pockets twice... I held both hands to my chest pockets and twisted back and forth from the hip while looking at the ground around my feet. (The international sign for "Oh $#!%, I lost my {blank} " ...this could be an ID, Passport, concert ticket, etc.). Then a glance up at the security guards let me know, they've seen that move before. Without saying a word, the thin lady in her 60's wearing the badge responded to my dance with "You have to have the ticket for validation, or you'll have to pay the $40 LOST "TICKET" fee."

I was shocked... How in a blink of an eye, could my wonderful little 'free parking ticket go from a good thing, to a bad thing!? It was still a ticket, all that was different was that it was missing. I could validate its existence only by the fact that my car was now trapped behind a striped 2x4 mechanical arm... "I had to take a ticket to get in here... you can verify I have only been here for 5 minutes... Can't you call security at the garage and tell them to just 'let me out'?"
"No, you must have a ticket to get out, or pay the fees." she replied.

So, I reclaimed the guest pass and held my hand up in the stop position for the guard wearing the rubber gloves. I walked around him and toward the elevator in the office building to retrace my steps. I pushed the single button surrounded by 2 rows of 4 elevators...and waited. "Bing" a light came on... but it was over a different elevator than I originally took. I had to take the same elevator to accurately retrace my steps. What if I dropped it IN the elevator? By only the 3rd button push, the correct elevator was summoned, and my luck was already improving. I could have waited for all 8, or worse, hit the button and have a repeated one show up again.

After checking the floor and verifying it was clean, I shot up to the 4th floor and looked through the glass door to the office I had just been in. No luck. I saw no ticket.

I made my way back down, and ran across the courtyard to the parking garage, where I waited for the correct elevator again. After a leisurely ride to the 9th floor. I then ran across the parking garage rooftop, only to find this little gem right by my truck.
Filled with joy I picked up my valuable ticket (back to being a GOOD ticket), and made my way back down 9 floors, so I could go across the courtyard and receive my validation. I even received a few congratulatory comments from people in the lobby that had watched my entire ordeal. I made my way back over to the parking garage, and up to the 9th floor again, only to drive back down to ground level. Fortunately, my validation was accepted, and I didn't have to test to see if the truck I was in was capable of knocking that striped stick out of my way.

I was done.

Now, if I can only make it to California and back, with 4 kids, in May, and still think of my Disneyland tickets on a positive note, I'll be good. The warmer it gets outside, the more likely these "tickets" are going to become the bad kind.

(By the way... I do apologize for the long winded discourse. I will try to be more illustrative through creative pictures on later posts. This was one where my creative storytelling skills came in handy, because of the plethora of minuscule events begging for enthusiastic recollection. I hope this was as entertaining for you as it was frustrating for me. Therapeutically, the anticipated ability for me to tell this story here, eased the frustration during and after the event. It was quite nice...Right when my first instinct was to grab the skinny guard and run him through the validation machine was it's strongest...I stayed calm with the thought "This is going to be a good thing to blog about." Yes, I've been bitten by the Blug. )