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-Telephone quote: "TUE 2:10P Handset #1"-

Well, I had a dream last night that involved my relatives singing about my family's Social Security Numbers. For those who live outside the States, trust me when I say: that's disquieting. Our SSN's are pretty much our legal identities over here, the kind of information you're supposed to keep so secret that many official forms allow you to opt out of supplying it. Imagine my consternation when I found out (in the dream) that the song had actually been published into a book! But yet, that's just the sort of silly, spontaneous things that my relatives would do...

I've discovered another Vast Conspiracy of the Parking Lot. This one is perhaps more benign, as it involves little risk of harm to one's physical person; however, its very sneakiness makes it all the more pernicious. I'm speaking, of course, of the herd mentality of cars.

It will go something like this. You will be toodling along in your car in a near-empty parking lot, reveling in the wealth of excellent parking spaces available and trying to decide which is the very best. You will make your choice, then park. Note that this will usually happen for trips that require only a swift in-out, such as grabbing that last grocery item you forgot yesterday, or dropping something off for your child at school.

[short interval while task is done]

Approximately five seconds later, you have finished what you came here to do. Whistling, perhaps, you stride across the desolate parking lot to reach your car. Yet despite having only left the automobile mere seconds earlier on a virtually empty parking lot, it will be nowhere in sight.

[longer interval of searching for the car]

The key in finding your car is to seek out the most concentrated clump of vehicles, and head there. Invariably, you see, by some strange gravitational-pheremonal force unknown to modern science, your car, which you parked as far as you possibly could from the five other cars in the parking lot, will have attracted every single one of those five cars into an impenetrable cluster around its person. You will thus be forced to wedge yourself between the autos, sideways, and delicately jiggle the door open the smallest fraction that it takes to fit you into the opening.

This phenomenon has no doubt led some to wonder why people would choose to park right next to another car when so many freer spaces are open. This is the wrong line of inquiry. The drivers of these cars have no more control over the parking preferences of their car than if they were instead perched on female wildebeests, in heat. Regrettably, your particular car will inevitably exhibit all the characteristics of the lone male.

Reality check. However, if your steering wheel suddenly begins moving on its own, don't panic. Blame the wildebeests.