Something I Never Thought Would Happen

I'm sure it will shock most who read this, it certainly shocked me when I lived it, but I had a fairly interesting day at work today. As most interesting days, this one was rather unexcepted. Generally my Sundays are the slowest, it is the last day of my work-week, I'm tired, it's hot, and usually I am counting down the seconds until I get to go home. I drove into work this morning and parked my car, looking forward to the company truck I was going to be able to drive. This usually makes Sundays rather special because on every other day of the week I use my car, but on Sundays there is a truck available to use, so I use it with great excitement. I walked up to a blue locked box where the key for the truck is usually stored for me. I opened it up only to find no key. This was the first time this has happened, and I was rather annoyed, since I had been looking forward to not using my car. No matter though, I went back to my car and started my day as normal. A couple hours later I heard "Oh Crap!" coming from my mouth. I realized that I had ten tables and several chairs I had to move, chairs and tables that wouldn't fit into my car. I toyed with the idea of simply carrying them, but it was about two miles between where they were and where they needed to be so I abandoned that idea. After much thinking and debating I remembered another important fact: I had a key to a company van. It took me awhile to realize it because I hadn't used it all year, but it is the key to the van that I used last year, but is being used by someone else this year, but apparently they just gave me back the exact set of keys I had last year, complete with the van key. Now, you may be wondering why they didn't just take off the van key when they gave me the other keys. If you are asking that question than you obviously haven't worked for Metro Parks Tacoma. Anyway, so come evening I get the van and load it up with the tables and chairs. I am well pleased that they all fit in the first load. I drive it to the desired location, but before I get to the final unloading zone I must first open two gates, so I shut off the van, get out and proceed to open the two gates. I climb back into the van, turn the key, the engine makes a slight noise, and then is silent. I start to worry, but try it again, and again, and again. It's no good, the engine wouldn't start. Now, it wasn't all bad, I was pretty sure I knew what the problem was because it was acting just like my car has when a battery conector was corroded, so I popped the hood to check it out. The conectors were not corroded, infact they looked brand new. The only possible problem I say was this red stuff over one of the conectors. I of course thought this might be interferring with the conectivity of the battery to the starter, so I proceeded to clean it off as best I could. I later learn that this is supposed to be there, and ironically enough it is supposed to prevent corrosion. Since I can do nothing else, I start to unload the van, having to carry the tables and chairs 200 yds. or so. I had hopped that something would have happened, and the van would start working after this....no such luck. I end up having to walk close to 2 miles back to my car. I left a note for somebody, telling where the van is and why it is there, and I end up getting out of there more than an hour later than I had thought when I drove in that morning.

I don't know why I wanted to tell that story, probably because it is the first real story I've had at work, so it may not be all that interesting, but at least it was more interesting than my average day at work(that should tell you something about my average day at work).