Auto Club? Thing of the Past

It's quarter after 3 Friday morning, and I am sitting here livid. That stupid motorcycle of mine, same one that was stolen twice in the same summer and has cost nearly as much to repair as it cost new off the showroom floor broke down on me again. But that's not what I'm so pissed about.

 It's the AAA.

First off, I spent $168 buying their premium service so that I wouldn't end up stranded somewhere because of unreliable transportation.

So I call them and tell them I need a jump. They tell me they no longer jump start motorcycles even if you'd paid extra for motorcycle service (like I did). Okay, fine. Instead, I tell them I need it towed from the Universal Studios parking structure to my house a couple of miles down the road. This was at 12:30 a.m. when I got off work. They tell me they're sending out a driver, but it could take two hours. I'm not happy. But what can you do? So I wait.

Finally at around 2:03 a.m. the driver calls me.

He's Hispanic and can barely speak English.

He keeps asking if I have a flashlight. I say I do and ask him why he needs to know that. He doesn't answer. Finally he asks if I can see him. I say no and ask where he is. He says he's in the structure two sections down from me. I tell him to just follow the arrows. I hear a lot of radio chatter in Spanish, probably from a dispatcher. I ask him where he is, because I should be able to see him. He doesn't answer. I repeat my location. I hear nothing but radio chatter.

Finally, a pair of headlights catch my eye and I turn. There he is...in the other structure. I tell him I think I can see him and ask which section he's in. Sure enough, he left the structure I'm in and somehow went to other structure. I tell him he's in the wrong place and tell him once again where i am.

I see him on the down ramp leaving the structure.

He hangs up.

I try to call him back.

He doesn't answer.

I flag down some Universal security patrolling the parking structure. I tell them what happened. One of them tries to call the driver from the number retrieved from my IPhone.

They get voice mail.

So they dispatch cars trying to find him.

I call AAA and tell some woman what happened. She says she has to look up information.

Meanwhile the security officers come back while she's on the line. She hears what they tell me, that they can't find hide nor hair of him. She's apologetic and totally useless. I lose my temper and say, "look lady, I'm in a parking structure so big that it can be seen with the naked eye from the space station, and you sent me the world's biggest dumb fuck driver who can't find it. Since I bought your most expensive product, instead of apologies it would be swell if you'd find out WHERE THE FUCK HE IS cause I don't want to stay here all night."

I hang up.

The security officers, who had, of course, been listening, apologize. It isn't their fault. I ask them if I can leave my broken bike in the structure overnight. They tell me I can, adding that they are going to try and track the AAA driver down. "But even if we can't find them, we'll be back." They leave.

They don't come back.

Now it's 2:50 a.m. The yacht (I'm a boat captain, in case you didn't know) closing crew is going home. I wave them down. I had been convinced I'd have to walk home. One of my fellow captains, Aly, offers to take me home.

God bless him.

AAA left me stranded despite what I'd paid them. This is the worst service I've gotten anywhere from anyone. it's not just bad. It's stunningly bad. It's unbelievably bad.

This is intolerable.