I left the office today on time to pick up the Monkey. On-time, in this case, means 4:25 p.m. -- plenty of time to make the ~45-50 minute drive, still allow for traffic and have time to spare. I'm responsible and stuff. Oh yes.
But apparently it rained.
Now, if you've ever driven out here you know that an ominous cloud is enough to turn traffic on its ear...much less, god forbid, precipitation. ZOMG!!1! Wet...stuff! Falling! From the sky! Ohhh noooooes!!! And whammo: instant traffic jam that can literally go on for miles with no discernible cause except for the crazy mystery liquid that appeared RIGHT OUT OF NOWHERE and got the road ALL WET!
So an hour into my 50 minute drive, I bailed out of the beltway madness and tried for a more circuitous approach. Sadly I wasn't alone in my crafty plan...and 96 minutes into my 50 minute drive, I finally arrived at daycare to pick up the Monkey.
For those of you playing along at home, that means that I arrived at 6:01 p.m. By 6:03 p.m. I'd hugged the Monkey, made frantic apologies to everyone in earshot, grabbed his coat and we were out the door...but not before the last remaining teacher (who, I should point out, still had ANOTHER child waiting for a parent) sweetly informed me that anything after 6 p.m. was $25 and it was now 6:03 p.m.
I looked at her, incredulous...tears forming from the stress of it all...and asked if I could bring it to her in the morning because I only had $5 in my purse unless she wanted a credit card. She said that would be fine.
I was sobbing by the time we got to the car and the Monkey was concerned. I tried to explain that it had just been a very stressful trip and I felt bad for him being there so late and now I had to pay $25 and I'd be ok, but I missed him and I was just glad that I'd picked him up.
He looked at me for a minute and said "Do you want to use that dollar that I found yesterday? You could pay the teachers with that, if you want to..."
God, I love this kid.
4 comments:
Aww. :( That's one heck of a long ride home, dude.
The other day when I was moving - a 15-minute drive, normally - it had rained, and the traffic was ridiculous. And I thought it was normal traffic ridiculousness (unusual for a Sunday, but not unheard of), but then discovered that multiple traffic lights were out (definitely confounding to drivers - it's a four-way stop, people, it's not that hard) and also, some power lines were down and they had two of three lanes closed.
So, then I didn't feel quite so annoyed at my fellow drivers, because squeezing from three lanes into one is a good reason to slow down.
Know what I found out today? The teacher on duty gets the fine-money personally. That chick cleaned up last night.
Pop quiz, math geniuses...
Let's assume that the other little girl's other made it there by 6:15. If the teacher has my $25 for the 3 whole minutes she stayed with the Monkey and the $25 from the other little girl (assuming it's a flat $25 and not a sliding scale fine)...what was this teacher's overtime rate last night?
...if you answered "a helluva lot more than I make in overtime" you're absolutely correct.
Wow. I mean, I get it...but wow.
Wow, I didn't know it went to the teacher! That is a great overtime rate. I appreciate that they have to enforce it exactly, though, because when you start getting into squishiness, there's that whole danger of slippery-slope action.
Exactly. I totally get it, but still. Just. Wow.
Post a Comment