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Tales from a small town

Short stories about life in a small town. Non-fiction. Great reading.

Wednesday, May 03, 2006

an e-mail to my wife

Before I do a copy and paste from my e-mail account, I feel I have to set this up so no one gets the wrong impression.

The salesmen in the showroom were just pranking me. They really didn't call the police, nor did they actually think anything was wrong, they just wanted to get me worried, although there actually were slim-jim tracks on the driver's window of the Lexus, which is where these clowns got the idea to fuck with me. After it was all said and done, it was funny, but I wasn't laughing at the time.

For the customer's name, I'm going to slip some non-alpha/numeric characters in there, so this guy doesn't Google his name and think that car salesmen blog about their customers using their real names, but this guy's real name plays into the story. Just so you know, Mark and Jerry are the top salesmen, Dave is the sales manager. In blue, here's the e-mail I sent my wife on Monday:

Hey Beautiful Babydoll!

Just sold a truck. This was a split-tender deal, cash and Visa. I thought the deal was going south when it took forever, but it was a problem on the dealership's end, not the customer's.

This was hilarious! It was a black guy who pulled up in a Lexus SUV. He wanted to know about the 1988 Silverado on the hill. I took a registration, and it turned out his name was Willie !H!o!o!d. I got him in the truck, and he said he had his wife in the Lexus. Since this was a single cab, there just wasn't enough room in the truck for all 3 of us, so I slapped my plate on it, drove him to the Lexus, and told him to have his wife hop in, and bring it back when he was done.

Well, Mark told me to get his driver's license. I told him it would be a bit awkward, since I told him to just take off. Mark shook his head.

Then, Mark goes out to the Lexus they left behind, and he says, "Look at the driver's door where the window meets the door. See those scratches? Those are marks from a slim-jim." They really were. Mark says, "You better hope this guy comes back from his test drive before Dave gets back from lunch, or you're screwed.

I said, "Why?" He says, "This guy obviously dropped off a stolen Lexus and now he's got our truck, you dumb-ass. How much more obvious does it need to be for you?"

Then, I go back into the show-room, and Jerry says, "Did you at least get his name?" I said, "Yeah: Willie !H!o!o!d."

Everybody starts laughing. "Willie !H!o!o!d?!!!!" "Willie !H!o!o!d?!!!! - how perfect is that for a black guy from Toledo? I guess Willie Horton woudv'e been too obvious of an alias, huh?"

I started getting worried.

Jerry takes the registration I just took and calls the Fostoria police department with the license plate number from the Lexus.

Then Dave walks in from lunch: "Would someone please explain to me why the Fostoria PD is calling me about a stolen vehicle? Whose is it?"

"My test drive."

"Why the fuck aren't you in it?"

I explained how the cab was just too small for 3 people.

"That's just fucking great. What do you think Jeff's going to think?"

But, the guy came back and actually bought the truck!!!!!

Whew!

Love,

Boris Yeltsin