One of my older relatives was having cancer removed, so I took off work for 3 days to be with him. My sister came along for the ride. It was a 5 hour trip to get down there.
You know how sometimes, you keep expecting to have to do something, but it doesn’t happen in the manner you expect it to?
Driving down I-75, I kept expecting some piece of shrubbery disguised as a human to do something stupid, like try to merge on top of me, or tailgate me. None of that happened. Not on the way to Tampa, or on the way back. I never had to honk my horn.
Instead, the fun began on the morning after we had slept in the hotel for the night. My sister and stepmom had left very early in the morning to get to the hospital, and they took my car. Me and my dad woke up and walked to the hotel’s “continental” breakfast cafeteria a couple hours later. By that time, my sister and stepmom had gotten back and were waiting on us, along with some of my aunts and uncles. My sister told me what had happened.
At the hospital, they have this thing they call “Gold Valet Parking”. Basically, you pull your car up, and some kid fresh out of highschool or whatever parks your car in the parking garage for you, while you walk into the hospital. The parking garage is attached to the hospital building, but obviously separate.
Apparently, it is some sort of protocol to honk the horn when they go and get your car when you’re ready to leave, so you’ll be able to tell that your car is on its way or something. Also, my sister had forgotten to mention to the valet to not honk the horn. I had no idea how the trip to the hospital was going to go, so I didn’t think to remind my sister to be careful with the horn. At least this first time, it was very early in the morning, so my sister didn’t think too many people were affected by it.
After breakfast, me, my sister, my dad and stepmom all piled into my car to go back to the hospital so we could wait in the waiting room until the surgery was over. My sister made sure to warn the valet manager about the horn, as we thought there would have been a shift change since the morning. Around lunchtime, we all went to get lunch. I learned of the valet protocol firsthand. Even though the parking garage was several hundred feet away, I could hear everytime they honked the horn on someone else’s vehicle before bringing it out. And then everyone else could hear when they honked my horn.
Turns out, the valet manager had sent this woman, fresh out of high school, to get my vehicle, and didn’t warn her about the horn. After she had brought my car to the driveway, I looked at her face, then gave her some money and said “That was worth a couple bucks”.