It seems weird: I get tired of wearing the same old drab work uniforms nine months out of the year. Then, when the weather warms up consistently and my firm allows me to wear shorts and a t-shirt, I find myself complaining again, with an accompanying blood pressure spike. "Only with Kevin," you might say. Allow me to explain.
A t-shirt at work has helped during this recent heat binge; unfortunately, the shirts we are told to wear lack pockets, which the long-sleeved uniform shirts have plenty of. Storage space on my person is very limited during the summertime, which increases my tendency to misplace important things... the most important of which is my parking pass, which I lost last night.
I had to park in the customers' parking deck today due to my running late. As it is with the free lot I go to, I get assigned a ticket which I have to keep with me & present when I exit the lot or deck. Many times I've seen the posting at the free lot: those who lose tickets could be subject to fines of $75.00 or more.
You can only wonder what was going through my mind when I reached into my wallet - which offered the only space to store a ticket - and it wasn't there. By wearing the winter uniform, the ticket just slides into the shirt pocket. As disorganized as my wallet can sometimes get, I've learned it's not a good alternative storage space in summer. I was racing back to the airport in a panic, thinking that the parking authority could now take permanent possession of my car, and I would not be allowed to take it out; while incurring $10 per day for each day it was left there.
Long story short, I was able to get the car out of there, but at the cost of nine people behind me in line, flashing their lights, gunning their engines, and thinking horrible thoughts. I had to show them my license and registration, which I thought I had lost as well. Heaving a huge sigh of relief, I was able to exit, immediately tempted to call a cab for work later today.
This means I will have to turn into a rulebreaker for my own comfort & peace of mind. Both lots tell you to keep your ticket with you. Not anymore with me; it will be left in the car in a safe place where I keep all my pens & such. As active as the job requires me to be, things can fall out of my pockets without any notice. The car can sit, inactive, for eight hours in the parking lot with the ticket safely in place.
How I only wish we had a normal employee parking arrangement like 99% of the other jobs in this country. But as I so well know, with airport jobs, "normal" goes out the window fast.
It makes me want to look at those who push bicycling as an alternative transportation & say they've probably got something there.
