DON’T PARK
HEAR
STUPID

A few years ago, our company was one of several Sub-Contractors involved in the construction of the new Parkrose High School. One day, as I pulled my Service Van into the construction site to drop off a roll of blueprints, I parked in front of the General Contractor’s Modular Office space, alongside other commercial vehicles. Unknowingly, I was apparently parked in an empty, unmarked spot claimed by the General Contractor’s Superintendent as his own personal parking place.

My short visit with one of the General’s engineers ended up being 15 minutes longer than I had anticipated, as we were friends and fellow Scout leaders. As I left his office and approached the driver’s side of my van, I noticed this misspelled inscription drawn in the dirty film covering my door: “DON’T PARK HEAR STUPID”.

The very fact that we were all professional people, doing a professional job, building a facility of higher education with a well known General Contracting firm employing highly skilled, well educated, supervisors scrawling words in the dirt on my van with a scrawny finger, that told more of his educational achievements than any employment interview could have, caused me to laugh out loud! I couldn’t wait to run back inside the office to bring out my well educated engineering friend and show him the love letter I received from his boss! He laughed uncomfortably and went back inside.

Had the General simply scrawled down a few words telling me not to park in his space, this would not have been so funny. But the fact that he chose to call me "stupid", following a mis-spelled word, made this the most laughable event all year!

As I drove away, I couldn’t keep myself from laughing! I thought this was the funniest thing I had seen in a long time! It made my day! In fact, I decided to avoid washing my van for a few days to see if other people thought it was as funny; several people did!

I submitted this to Reader's Digest a few days ago. It will be interesting to see if this laugh is worth $200 or not.....