>

..or “Fuck, I just tore up the parking ticket”

MMTP, renowned for his razor-sharp intellect (honest, he’s really clued up) and for roasting his sister’s cat and incediarising fondues, has just outdone himself.

We toddled off to the market in Offenbach yesterday and – after a long discussion with Mrs MMTP about where to park (Option 1: drive around for hours looking for street-parking, Option 2: go straight to the parking lot and pay a pittance) – we go for Option 2.

Mostly because I’m driving, MMTP is navigating and the wimmen are in the back.

I give the parking ticket to MMTP who promptly pops in his shirt pocket.

And later takes it discovers it, has no idea what it is, tears it into small pieces and puts it in his trouser pocket, then to utter the classic words at the top of the post.

Gets the usual bollocking from Mrs MMTP, but he says ” Not a problems, I’ll just show it to the cashier and we’ll be away”

There IS no cashier, it’s all automated, no-one responds to the emergency buttons and you can’t just go down to the barrier and press the button to get a new one.

I know this.

I tried it.

I either don’t weigh enough or the Bionic Leg didn’t fool the magnetic loop into thinking I was a BMW.

So we had to call THE NUMBER.

Conversation goes something like this:

“I’m afraid our parking ticket’s damaged and the machine can’t read it”
“Well, it’s in fact quite severely damaged”
“Well, actually, I tore it into small pieces. By mistake”

We send the wimmen off to look at shops to save ourselves from embarrassment when the chappy turns up to release us.

Which he does in no time at all, looks at the remnants of the ticket and works out that we owe him €3.60.

“Just give me €3”, he says. (We should do this more often…)

And then the obvious question

“How on earth can you rip up a parking ticket” he asks.

“Oh” I say ” dead easy. I’ll show you. You tear it once this way, fold it up, tear it again and then once more for good luck”

I think MMTP and I must be related….