Lost.

I don't lose things. I'm not one of those people always searching for their keys, phone, shoes or glasses. With me, everything has it's place. My bus pass goes in my wallet as soon as it's swiped. My keys and work badge are stored in my purse when they're not in use. My coat is hung in the closet when I take it off. A co-worker sat at my desk while I was out of town and I came back to a sticky note that said, "You are so organized!".

You may call me OCD. I call me awesome. Awesome or organized. Either one.

But today I lost something.

I drove in this morning and, as is standard when parking in the parking garage, before I got out of the car I put the parking ticket in my wallet. I can see it happening in my mind. The problem is, when I went to move my car out of the garage this evening, there was no ticket to be found. Not in my wallet, not in my purse, not in my car. (Although I did find the string cheese that fell out of my pocket a few weeks ago.) I think it's safe to assume that it is hanging out on the floor of Sound Soups where I met Miss C for lunch.


Okay, that's a bummer, I thought, but people must lose their tickets all the time. Right? Which would mean there must be some sort of explanation somewhere of what to do when you find yourself without a ticket that I've just never noticed because I'm awesome. Or organized.

I first tried the lobby of the parking garage where I normally pay the annoying machine that talks to me. Not a thing about lost tickets. I decided it must be on the machine where I put my ticket as I'm driving out and made my way to my car. In the elevator I saw a notice that a lost ticket would result in paying the maximum fee. Acknowledgment of potential lost tickets. Promising. I got in my car and drove to the exit, pulled up to the ticket reader and...nothing about lost tickets.

I tried pushing random buttons that I thought would connect me to an attendant (even though there was a sign that said "No attendant on duty"). I tried putting my card in without a ticket. I tried talking out loud to the machine just in case someone, somewhere could hear me. No dice.

And now I was stuck.

I couldn't get out because the gate was shut, but I couldn't back up or go park again because the entrance is on the other side of the gate. Maybe this was the point where I started to panic a little. I saw a phone number on a sign so I called it. Answering machine. I used my magic phone to find another phone number. Another answering machine. Just when I was really about to flip out, a man who looked like he might work there was walking by.

As it turned out, he did work there. He gave me a fake ticket and I had to leave my car sitting in the middle of the exit (luckily there were two, otherwise I would have reached my flip out point a lot sooner knowing there was a line of cars behind me) run to the lobby, pay the talking machine, and come back to put the fake ticket in the reader and get my car out.

I was trapped in the parking garage, waiting at the exit watching car after car drive away, for 30 minutes. It felt like three hours.

And that is why I don't [usually] lose things.