After work one day I visited my tailor, Lorenzo, around the corner from my office to take in a jacket that I had recently purchased.
Lorenzo spoke with a thick Italian accent, and never marked any of the clothing that he was going to tailor. I would say: “Take this in 2 inches, put a cuff on it, taper this, add a button here and take off the belt loops.” And after all of those directions he would say, loudly, “OKAY!” And draw one line down the clothing.
Ninety percent of the time, Lorenzo would screw up the tailoring.
Back to our story…
Lorenzo was fitting the jacket when he noticed that my pants were too baggy and needed to be taken in, so he told me to bring them back the next day and he would fix them. I had no patience to bring them back and go through this all again. I told him to tailor them up right now, and I would get to my car somehow with no pants. He took the pants and all I had to do was get from the door of his shop to my car.
I ran through the parking lot, wearing black socks, shoes and a dress shirt tucked into my underwear with a red tie, and jumped into my car.
That went off without a hitch except for my ass was on fire from the hot leather seat.
I remember thinking, but only for a split second: “There are 2 things that could really derail this whole drive; getting pulled over for a traffic ticket or a car accident”.
Fast forward 135 seconds…I am stopped at a light 3 miles from my home and the sun is shining directly in my eyes while I am waiting for the light to change. The light changes, I step on the gas and rear end the car in front of me.
I am in little more than my underwear and just got into an accident. How is that for “Think…and you shall receive!”
So, we both pull over to the side of the road, and you have to realize that it is rush hour, so the streets are packed. She gets out of the car and is really, really upset. She is waiting for me to get out of car, but I am trying to figure out what to do because I am in my underwear. I am stalling and speaking to her through a cracked window for as long as I can.
And without any really good solution, I decided to get out of the car. Now, she is visually very nervous about this accident, which I would find out later was because her husband evidently was not a very understanding person.
So, I get out of the car and am standing on the side of the road, at rush hour, in my dress shoes and underwear.
Now, every car on the road slows down to gawk, her kids in the back seat are dumbfounded, but the lady I hit, in her state of panic does not realize what is going on. I had a full conversation with her, and she did not say one thing.
I returned to my car and waited for the police.
When the police finally showed up, I explained what had happened, through the window, and he just started laughing. I got out of the car, and the officer took a picture. It’s probably hanging up at the police station.