We're the ones your mother warned your about...No, seriously. We are.








Yah. I can drive.

Have you ever been in those neighborhoods? Between the private drives, the gated communities, the ever-present road construction, and the fact that some of these people literally just have a small gold plaque with their house number on a stump outside a thirty foot long white wall as the only indication of where their house is WAY back in the brush, it's enough to make the Minotaur go all Movie-version HellBoy, break off his own horns and yell, "Fuck you! Someone go get Theseus. The sacrificial material ain't worth the trouble."

Seriously. My first thought when I started driving there was, "No wonder all these drunk famous people end up dead!" Not to mention that in reality, all of those schmancy houses are the first to bite the dust in any form of natural disaster. This is California, people. Fires, floods, earthquakes and riots - these people invented natural disaster coverage - just ask our resident insurance lawyer, Closet Buffyholic.

However, I can honestly say I now know a good amount of Beverly Hills, Bel Air, Brentwood and certain stretches of PCH really well. Not that I'm hanging out there for fun and amusement with my friends as we sip chardonnay and discuss the woes of the world while wearing Prada and Armani, but should the need for that ever arise, I'm the girl that can get you to the house.

Correction. I'm the girl that can get you to the sometimes palatial estates. You know, most of the people we work for are lovely, very nice people. They treat us quite well the majority of the time, and I have yet to have a customer be just outright rude to me. However, you need to go in there with the knowledge that these people just don't live on the same planet we do. It's not their fault, and lord knows I wouldn't be against being able to give their existence a try, but there are times that I can't do anything but ::boggle:: and mumble, "Dude, people like this really exist?"

Example - we're doing a party at a house that I'd worked before. Really nice people, gorgeous house. We show up, and are moving their cars from the entrance area to their alternate parking platform. (No, seriously - they have two parking lots for their cars) After I'd put the black Porsche in the garage next to the silver Porsche (because they have a matching set, like chess pieces from the Franklin Mint!), we realize that the keys aren't in the one Benz SUV that we have left. Turns out that we can't move that one. Not because it's broken, nothing like that. They simply have so many cars that they couldn't remember where they'd left the keys for that one.

I don't know about you, but I hate when that happens to me, don't you?

I was talking to one young woman as we waited for her car to pull around, and stopped to answer a question by someone with "Yeah, *name* went to get the black Porsche for him." The woman I'd been talking to replied, "I love Porsches! I wanted to get one, but I couldn't quite swing it, so I got an Audi TT instead. I figure if I keep it a few years, I can trade in and move up!"

Yah, that's totally my plan for when I trade in the Kia. Guys? How about you?

Of course, it's not all just schmancy parties and ::boggle::ment. I mean, we're a bunch of girl valets. That right there is awash with opportunities for amusement. Right away, you've got the guys that pull up and are hesitant to hand their car over to a girl. Although, I will say the best (in that it was the worst) line I have ever gotten was, "This is a big car for such a little girl."

It was a Miata.

I'm 5'10".

Have we been over the fact you're driving a Miata?

Methinks someone needs to work on their math.

There are benefits, too. Cops love us. Firemen think we're the shits. We were doing a bar mitzvah in Hancock Park one night, and a ladder truck stopped because they saw our sign. I'm walking back up the street from parking a car and to my surprise the supervisor for this gig rolls past me in the rear steering section! Turns out she said something in passing to them about always having wanted to steer a ladder truck, and the guys went, "Well, we're not doing anything, let's take it around the block!"

One of the catering guys came back from his truck and asked, "Um, did I just see your boss go by on a fire engine?"

C and I looked at one another, smiled, and I replied, "We can drive anything..."

Less issues, that's the important part...