Yesterday was an exceptional day. After a long sleep on a Sunday morning, CM and me prepared to go ‘downtown’ LA to eat Chinese food. In California, to reach that ‘downtown’ means having to drive 90-minutes on the highway, at least. At least if the Gods are generous, if the traffic jams are merciful of if some “Chase Protective Services” company doesn’t tow your car away from your apartment complex while you are sleeping as it turns out it happened.

I think, the  20^th and 21^th twin-centuries will be remembered as the ones that created and exploited (financially) new genuine sensations as any century before. They delivered us the love for technology, the passion for gadgetry. Take this, do you think the Romans had the facial expression that remains when we accidentally flush our nano-iPod down the toilet? Or, like in our case this Sunday morning, the face of ‘Where my car has gone?’ after you leave it parked in front of your house?

There is something thrilling about the experience. First, the disorientation:  Is this the right spot? Then the denial: it can’t be!! Then the paranoia: Did someone stole my car? And finally the rottweiler: Arrgggg!! I’m going to kill those mother f** of the towing company!!!!

Finally, after 15 minutes of an arduous calling process, overcoming multiple operators and a battalion of answering machines, we manage to find where the car-deposit is. But wait a moment; we are in California, and without a car, that damn deposit turns out to be “A deposit too far”. It’s about six miles away into the desert, so how to get there? Do we need a Jeep? Call a cab? Hitchhiking? No! Hopefully, a casual American offers to give us a ride. In the process of accepting the help, due to our desperation constraints, questions don’t abound. Will be this a fatal mistake? Presentations, of course, are not either. This old European habit of asking what’s-your-name is un-hip in America.

In a matter of seconds CM and I are riding in a pick-up truck with a chatty driver of unknown origin. The man, around his fifties, keeps gabbing like a fountain:

-They shouldn’t do this, this towing guys are all crooks….no, no, the shouldn’t –bloooarrp-. Suddenly he blurps:

-Excuse me. He proceeds: Once I had to go there…they towed my car. And I was giving them a lo’ of sheet, you know, and they threatened me: If you don’t stop talking, you won’t get your car back!!!

The driver is clearly drunk, and his car status doesn’t help to ease us: there is a massive crack in the front windshield along with a half reconstructed left rear mirror. CM seats in the backseat, while I am in the copilot. The scenario looks increasingly like that of a serial-killer trap. A stranger picks up two poor souls and they vanish in the desert, resounded in my head like a journal headline. As we approach the “supposed” car-deposits, the buildings are exchanged by loose trees and desert wasteland. We head towards “Pine street” and we reach a dead end, at what point, our drivers pulls inside a semi-abandoned house filled with open cars and other pieces of junk scattered around. Now the setting shifted from “The Silent of the Lambs” to that of “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre”. Our driver walks off the car and I start staring at CM with big eyes: Is this really a trap???

Then, the driver returns:

-Oh, I think we passed by…We make a U-turn and we keep searching the deposit. Finally, we reach 23802 Pine Street. Yes! This is the place, but, now what? There is a huge black fence with no ring bells. No- nothing. A fence and a desert, period. We have to call again the sheriff office and a guy comes down and opens us: saved!!! Amazing!!! We say bye to our good Samaritan driver and we proceed to pay $216 as towing fee. While on the office, taken out from the Brokeback mountain movie, I become curious and I ask the clerk:

-So, everyday the car is in the deposit, the fine increases $100??

-No, just $22. And then the man adds:

-Today its $48 extra because the office is closed.

-Sorry? I ask.

-The office is closed, office hours are 9am to 5pm, Monday thru Friday.

Fact: when this happens, present time runs as Sunday 3:16pm.

Then, a strange set of thoughts start crawling my brain: Could it be that there is something illogic or plain impossible between those last statements? Option A, we are in a time warp. Option B, I have suddenly developed a hearing disorder…

I ask the clerk to clarify one more time:

-Sorry, you said the office is closed?

-Yes. Then, I can’t resist:

-But then, how is it possible we are here, I mean, paying the fine?

The guy then freaks out in a rude tone:

-Well, if you want, I can make YOU COME BACK tomorrow…

Ok, no further clarifications are needed. Options A and B are ruled out immediately.

At that point, we pay, and we leave having learned a new term: “office closed” in American jargon is not the equivalent to its European one, in the US, it’s more financially rigged. In Yankeeland, “office closed” means “it is open if you pay me $50 extra”. Important learning, right?