God lost in heaven, we lost on Earth

The sign said that to pick up my keys I should go to their other lot; call (some number). Good thing I had my phone. The company has about infinitely many parking lots in the vicinity of the Prudential Center, and while that's fine for them keeping people in all the kiosks would be a bit inconvenient. The voice on the phone asked me several times about what car I was calling about, and my receipt, and he said to come to the parking lot that was across the rail tracks but not the parking lot that was right across the rail tracks.

If this confuses you, imagine how it confuses someone who has only a vague idea of the layout of Newark (I know it has an airport and the Turnpike), sometime past 11 pm, with my pretty-near-deaf and awfully tired father in tow. Well, I kept walking describing just where I was and leaving out mention of the homeless people camped out under the train bridge, and got the key elements --- turning left, just after the train tracks, and walking a couple of blocks to just about where we'd parted ways from my brother were the main things --- straight. Before too much longer I was ... going on ahead because my father had had enough of all this walking and would see me when I came back.

For all that setup, there wasn't anything comical or confusing about getting my keys back; I just said I was the guy with the 2009 Scion and showed my receipt and he handed me keys that looked like mine, sure. Although since I don't really have a personal keychain --- just the dealer's keychain --- I had to take that it was the right set of keys partly on faith. Yeah, what are the odds they'd mistakenly swap my keys with someone else's Scion from the same dealer? On the other hand, is that really implausible?

Well, we got back to my car and the keys were the right set, or were at least a compatible set, and we drove back home with no incidents worse than my father insisting that Route 9 should be perfectly good to drive home at this hour. I took the Turnpike-to-Parkway because, you know, Route 9 is full of red lights, which my father views much more fondly than I do. We got in well past 12:30, maybe nearer 1 am, and my father went right to bed. I went right online to apologize to bunny_hugger for worrying her and to learn just how I had confused skylerbunny. This happens.

Trivia: The first mechanical pitching machine appears to have been invented in 1896 by a Princeton professor named Hinton. It was a smooth-bored breech-loading cannon on two wheels. Source: Great Baseball Feats, Facts, and Firsts, David Nemec.

Currently Reading: Ripe: The Search For The Perfect Tomato, Arthur Allen.