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There's a name for people like us
Monday, August 16, 2010 at 10:44AM 
Photo Jennifer Weber 2010It was the strangest thing!
After church yesterday, TG expressed a desire to take me out to lunch. We decided to haunt our favorite Columbia restaurant: Harper's in Five Points.
Although I do think they're slipping at Harper's and soon may not deserve or be granted the dubious coveted designation of our favorite Columbia restaurant.
The sweet potato fries were not up to snuff, is all. Not quite fresh enough, and I don't understand how sweet potato fries can taste old at one o'clock in the afternoon.
The service -- usually excellent -- was okay but not exactly warm and enthusiastic. More like hurried and obligatory.
I do so hate that.
Forgive, Forget, And Leave A Healthy Gratuity
Still, we gave our clearly beleaguered waiter a thirty-percent tip because he moved us from what I consider to be the worst table in any restaurant -- the one directly outside the kitchen -- when I pouted and kvetched.
Good man, and smart.
But anyway, when we went to leave and reached our car, TG noticed something odd about the automobile parked beside us.
It was a Buick Lucerne. That's not the odd part.
The odd part is that although the car was empty of actual people, the front passenger door was open wide (nearly touching the driver's side door of our car), and a lady's purse was in the floorboard.
There was also a Bible on the passenger seat, and a church bulletin.
Where Is Holmes When You Need Him
TG the boy wonder was instantly intrigued. He began looking around the parking lot and back toward the door to the restaurant, all alert and everything despite having consumed substandard sweet potato fries and a huge slab of key lime pie.
But nothing suspicious revealed itself.
Nobody walking toward the car or away from the car, no lady coming back to fetch her purse and close the car door, nobody nearby clutching a doggy-bag, talking to a long-lost friend, while their door stood ajar and their purse was in plain view.
Cue Twilight Zone music.
TG (a/k/a Last Of The Nice Guys) hastened to inform Harper's management of the situation. By the time he came back outside, a few ladies were standing nearby, chatting.
TG said excuse me ladies and asked if they knew anything about the mysterious door ajar.
Nope, they said. But one lady pointed out that no woman would go into a restaurant without taking her purse with her, much less leave it in plain view in the car with the door wide open.
All That's Missing Is The Deerstalker
At about that time it began pouring rain.
That's when TG whipped out his cell phone and called 911.
Want to know my exact thought at that juncture, as I fought draconian humidity in my stuffy car?
Okay, I'll tell you: What business is it of ours? Why must we concern ourselves with an absent-minded individual who can't keep track of her car door and her purse?
Whiny codicil: Hellowwww? I want to go home.
But then I must admit, dire scenarios began occurring to me: Had it been an abduction? Had there been foul play? Was a people-snatcher about, with no interest in purses?
I'll cut to the denouement.
The police arrived within ten minutes and listened to TG tell his story. Then the officer went inside the restaurant, no doubt prepared to utter the famous line: "Just the facts, ma'am."
But before he did, he told us we could leave.
Elementary, My Dear Watson
But we couldn't! We couldn't leave the scene of the maybe-crime!
So we circled the block and parked in the back of the Harper's parking lot, facing out so we could draw a bead on the mysterious open vehicle.
Shortly the policeman (who had parked his cruiser in the space we'd vacated) returned, wearing a Day-Glo yellow slicker against the frog-strangling rain.
He got back aboard his cruiser.
We waited.
And then it happened: A middle-aged man trotted out of Harper's and headed for the Buick Lucerne. He had keys in his hand and we saw him use his remote to make the lights go on.
I guess he got in. There was no lady with him.
It's a mystery.
As for us? Just call us crimestoppers nonpareil!
We did, after all, stop a car door from being ajar in a parking lot.
Reader Comments (12)
So, the purse was his? Eeew! No, I must think that his wife was still in the restaurant and the lights turned on when he locked the doors. That's it!
Mind you, speaking of absent-mindedness, when we were on Kangaroo Island, we stopped at a park and spent an hour or so walking around. When we got back to the car, the front door of the Getz was wide open. We panicked, but nothing was stolen. The parking lot was pretty busy too. We must've just spaced and not closed it. We scare ourselves sometimes.
Hmmmm. I've never been in such a situation, but I believe I would acted the same way Mr. Greg acted. An open door? A purse inside, clear as day? "Foul play took place," I would have thought.
Of course, THEN my brain would have said: "But Kevin, what sort of criminal would abduct a woman, but not take her purse?" And then the other half of my brain would have gone through all the scenarios where that might make sense.
Meanwhile, ten minutes would have passed, and the owner of the vehicle would probably return and ask me why I was taking photographs of her car and dusting for fingerprints. "Funny story," I would tell her, as she reached inside her purse (probably to grab mace or to dial 911).
Being a Good Samaritan is hard work.
I'm waiting for the "rest of the story". There must have been a lady? Where was she? Ah, the game is afoot Watson.
Hobbit, what on earth is a Getz?
Kev ... you ain't just whistling Dixie there, boy. Being a Good Samaritan is exhausting! But I like your theory. Do you know how to make sweet potato fries?
Debbie ... I wish I knew! It was a most unsatisfactory ending.
A Getz is a nasty little car that is the standard rental in Oz. You love it, 'cause it's good on gas (which is, you know, 5 or 6 dollars a gallon over there) but you hate it 'cause it's got no style or suspension to speak of.
Oh, and I forgot to say, I am usually only enamoured of a restaurant for two or three visits, then they inevitably fail my "worth the money" test. Wonder why that is? I think mostly because I like to eat what I cook.
Hobbit, now I have to know what Oz is. You speak in code, Kemosabe. And I am like you in that I do love to eat what I cook better than what you can get at a restaurant. And it is getting prohibitively expensive to eat out ... but TG and I like to go out to eat; it's how we live it up. We don't take vacations or anything. And Harper's has been SO reliable over the past eight years, it's unusual for them to slip up. I'll give them a few more chances.
UPDATE: OK OK a simple Google search reveals that Oz is colloquial for Australia and New Zealand, which makes sense and is what I actually thought you meant, but I've never heard it referred to as such. Where in the sam hill have I been? Out to eat, apparently.
Yikes! You think someone would be concerned about their purse! Your hubby did the right thing, even though you were tapping your heels.
It's far from elementar, my dear Watson; sounds like a mystery to moi...
And if I hadn't tippy-typed so fast, I would have spelled it ELEMENTARY...sorry!
Debbie ... yeah, it was heels I was in a hurry to get out of! LOL but I agree; he did the right thing. It could've been something serious.
Melissa ... no worries ... I do that all the time! Go YIKES upon proofreading that which I can no longer edit! And it sounds like a mystery to me too ... sadly we'll never know the truth. Thanks ever so for stopping by and do come again!
Oh how FUN!!! Maybe it was HIS!! Lol!! Well, it DOES happen! FUN story!!
We get similar circumstances at work periodically. I could tell you how we handle them...but I don't want to put Watson out of work ;-)