When Violence is the Only Answer

Our company owns a fleet of cars. Well - about four cars to be exact – maybe more of a “fleetito”. A mini fleet. Three of those cars are owned by one enormous ad team for their exclusive use and the fourth is generic, to be signed out by any employee who needs to use it for company business.

One of my teams use it a lot. We have a very big client out on Long Island so the car is useful and saves on things like car services that cost the same as a weekend in Cabo. All we have to do to reserve the car is call a guy down in the finance department who is in charge of such matters, pick up the keys and he logs it in a spreadsheet. You then go to the parking garage downstairs, which, given this is Manhattan, we pay as much to park the damn car per month as it costs for my entire rent and bills, and you drive the car away.

Or not as the case may be.

Today, one of my team needed the car to go to a client presentation. It was her first time using the car so she went down to the garage with the keys, checked in with the management down there and was told, “No you can not have the car. Not without a signed permission note from Lisa!”

“I need a signed permission slip from Lisa…” yelled Amy, my team member, into the phone, when she called me in a panic.

“Just who the fuck is Lisa?” I replied, bemused, “And how come we’ve never needed a permission slip the other 500 times we’ve used the car?”

“The guy won’t let me have it!” she yelled back frantically. “He says, no permission, no car.”

I put her on hold and called one of our heads of finance, Carlos, whose department deals with the use of the car.

“Who the fuck is Lisa?” he said, when I explained the situation. “You don’t need permission to take the car, just the fucking keys!”

Carlos swears a lot. It’s why we get along so well. “Tell her to tell them to give her the fucking car or have the fucker call me and I’ll fucking give them permission!” he snarled. I had the distinct feeling the permission Carlos would give might involve a baseball bat and a lot of anger.

I switched back to Amy and conveyed this delicate message. Some mumbling. Lots of arguing. “He still won’t let me have the car” she said feebly. “I’m already so late I’m going to be in real trouble. He still wants a note from Lisa.”

At this point my other line rings and I see Carlos' name on the caller ID. I put Amy on hold and pick up. “I found out who the fuck Lisa is!” he says. “She’s an admin on the other account! (the account who own the other three cars) She doesn’t have anything to do with our car so that fucker doesn’t need any fucking permission whatsofuckingever and certainly not from fucking Lisa.”

I tell Amy this and the douche still refuses to let her take the car. So I call this “Lisa” who is horrified and offers to go straight down there and beat someone’s ass. Or talk to them rationally, I don’t know which. I just know which I’d do.

Eventually, 45 minutes later, after a lot of cajoling and threats, Amy gets her car and Carlos is promising to go down there and “talk to people” probably in the same way the mob like to "talk" to people.

Me, I am ordering some popcorn, sitting back and watching the entertainment.