Parking Illegally Is No Day At The Beach

I live a ten-minute walk from the beach. As you can imagine, on nice days, people park in our neighbourhood — free parking — and walk to the beach. There is a lot of paid parking space closer by. Parking is quite enough for the residents, but not for us and tourists who don’t want to pay or can’t get a parking space closer by.

My husband and I decide to remove some poles from our front yard so that I can park my car there. It’s small and fits just right, and there is enough room to get the bikes out of the shed and things out of my car. Our front yard is our property to be very, very clear.

Here is where the entitled people come into play. One weekend, the weather is quite nice: not too cold, lovely sunny weather, and overall pleasant for the time of the year. My husband and I take our son out to a petting zoo. We choose to go with my car so that my husband won’t have to drive circles around the neighbourhood afterward.

After a couple of hours, we come home to find someone parked in our front yard. Yeah, no. Not your house, not your yard, so certainly not your parking space. We decide to call the non-emergency line from our local police station to ask for advice.

Police: “You go ahead and call a tow truck, and we’ll send someone over to supervise.”

Okay, cool.

Then, the tow truck company is called and they say they will be over in around twenty minutes; they have some other towing to do.

I decide to stay outside to wait for them. The tow truck company comes, we show proof of residence, and they start to do their job after getting some drinks from me. (Mom always taught me to be kind and look after people, even if they do the jobs you hired them for.) They have their drinks, give a business card for the owners just in case, and leave with the car. I go to my car and put it back in our own front yard.

Two and a half hours later, our doorbell rings. The entitled people who owned the car have returned from their extended walk on the beach. I open the door.

Man: “Hello. Our car is supposed to be here.”

Me: “Yes, it used to be. We had it towed as it was on our property.”

Woman: “But there’s no sign, so we are allowed to park here.”

Me: “No, you’re not. This is private property, and we don’t need to put a placard or anything.”

We had checked that.

Man: “You little liar! You just stole our car and sold it.”

Me: “No, I didn’t. I have the phone number of the towing company.”

I try to hand them the card.

Screaming ensues from the both of them. I’m still standing in the doorway, and my husband is throwing anxious glances through our living room door. I’m nineteen weeks pregnant and he doesn’t like the sound of what is happening outside.

Then, the fun begins. The man tries to force entry to our home. My husband sees this, pushes the man out, and closes the door. Afterward, we dialed for some police assistance.

Meanwhile, we have a pair of banshees at the front door, ringing the doorbell and pounding on the door. A couple of minutes later, the police show up. My husband is not having me near them again. He goes outside where the entitlement comes wafting through the air towards us. He explains the whole situation to the cops while the couple keep screaming things like, “Liar!” and, “Thief!”

My husband even calls the tow company, and they affirm that they have towed a car with the given license plate number.

It comes to a point where the cops give the couple two options: either leave willingly or leave with a couple of shiny bracelets on.

They left… screaming. The tow truck company called us afterward, just to tell us how it went and ask if we were okay. They told us they had loads and loads of fun messing with them a bit.

And now, three times a guess what is screwed on our side of the shed? Yep, a note saying that our front yard is private property and cars will be towed.