Towing company that targeted Trump rally had license revoked (07-26-2024--Hour1)

[00:00:04] What's going on? Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. It is heard live every day from noon to 3 on WBT Radio in Charlotte. And if you want exclusive content like invitations to events, the weekly live stream, my daily show prep with all the links, become a patron, go to thepetekalendershow.com. Make sure you hit the subscribe button, get every episode for free, right to your smartphone or tablet. And again, thank you so much for your support.

[00:00:28] If you had your car towed out of the Dunkin' Donuts parking lot whilst attending the Donald Trump rally on Wednesday at the Bojangles Coliseum, well, you might be able to partake in some sort of litigation. I'm not saying you should. I have no idea. I'm just going off of the story that Ron Lee over at WBTV did.

[00:01:00] Apparently, the tow truck company that was called in to remove all of the Trumpster vehicles from the Dunkin' Donuts parking lot, apparently they had their license suspended.

[00:01:20] So, is that Grand Theft Auto? I'm not sure. Can you operate a tow truck company without a... I don't know. All I can do is go off of the information in the story that was updated today.

[00:01:33] So, let's backtrack a little bit. This was the story from, what, yesterday? Well, Wednesday, so like two days ago, about 48 hours ago.

[00:01:44] But it would have been after the rally was over when people left the Bojangles Coliseum and went over to get their cars.

[00:01:51] So, this would have been somewhere in the neighborhood of, what, about 8 o'clock, 8.30 at night?

[00:01:56] And, oh, cars are gone. All of the cars are gone from the parking lot.

[00:02:02] And people were not very happy about it, as one might imagine.

[00:02:07] Dozens of people found themselves stranded following Wednesday's Trump rally in Charlotte

[00:02:14] after their cars were towed from a nearby Dunkin' Donuts.

[00:02:17] Now, the first thing I know everybody is going to think is political motivation.

[00:02:23] And I don't know, I have no evidence, I've not seen any evidence that this was specifically done

[00:02:31] because the nature of the rally, because it was a Trump rally

[00:02:35] and the people who were attending the rally were obviously pro-Trump.

[00:02:39] I have no information that would confirm that.

[00:02:43] It is a possibility, but it has not been proven.

[00:02:48] There's no evidence to that effect.

[00:02:50] What it seems like it comes down to is a bit of a misunderstanding, I guess, is the charitable way to say that,

[00:03:02] that the manager of the Dunkin' Donuts reportedly told the people that they could, in fact, park there

[00:03:08] and then towed them.

[00:03:10] Now, the manager has told WBTV's Ron Lee that he did not tell them that they could park there.

[00:03:18] Now, there are some people who parked there who were told they could park there by some randoms.

[00:03:24] And that's never a good idea, okay?

[00:03:26] When you have signs all over a parking lot that say no parking except for, you know, patrons of this business,

[00:03:33] in this case, Dunkin' Donuts, never a good idea to park there and use the parking lot

[00:03:40] if you're not going to use their business, right?

[00:03:43] Which is why, like, you should go in, get yourself a cup of coffee or maybe some donuts or something,

[00:03:49] hang out in the parking lot for a little while, eat,

[00:03:52] and then leave all of the trash all around your car.

[00:03:56] Oh, but Pete, it might blow away.

[00:03:59] That is true.

[00:04:00] It could blow away.

[00:04:02] Which is why you want to fill the bags with, like, sand or concrete or something like that

[00:04:07] and just kind of leave it all around the vehicle to obviously send the signal

[00:04:12] that you have been patronizing their business.

[00:04:15] You are a Dunkin' Donuts customer.

[00:04:18] If you don't have sand or concrete, you could use just their donuts, I guess.

[00:04:23] That might work.

[00:04:25] I mean, the cream-filled ones.

[00:04:28] No, I'm kidding.

[00:04:29] I love the Dunkin' Donuts.

[00:04:35] I did hear somebody say, like, Krispy Kreme needs to be all over this.

[00:04:39] Like, seriously.

[00:04:41] Like, they need to do, like, a local marketing blitz of, you know,

[00:04:46] come to Krispy Kreme, we won't tow your car, you know, something like that.

[00:04:51] So parking was at a premium.

[00:04:53] Drivers claimed the manager of the Dunkin' Donuts allowed them to leave their cars in the lot during the rally.

[00:04:59] However, when asked for comment, they said several people were told they could not park there.

[00:05:05] While they were gone, tow trucks showed up and began hooking up the vehicles.

[00:05:13] I am kind of curious.

[00:05:14] Is it that big of a problem for the cars to have parked there for a couple hours?

[00:05:20] I don't know.

[00:05:21] I don't know for how long.

[00:05:22] I'm assuming, though, it was probably, like, four or five hours people had parked there.

[00:05:27] But for a lot of the time period, they could have been hanging out in the parking lot itself.

[00:05:32] Right?

[00:05:33] I don't know.

[00:05:33] So, um, the managers inside, this is according to Xander DeSoto, said the managers inside promised that they could park here.

[00:05:44] Some of the people here even gave money to the people inside.

[00:05:50] Ah!

[00:05:52] So that was, that's a nice little racket you got going on there.

[00:05:56] You charge people to park on a parking lot and you don't actually have the authority over the lot and then they get towed.

[00:06:03] And then you just kind of punch out and go home after collecting a bunch of money.

[00:06:08] What did you, how much do you think they pulled in from these people?

[00:06:11] 20 bucks?

[00:06:12] 30 bucks for parking?

[00:06:14] Like, what a missed opportunity.

[00:06:16] You could have just put a sign out there, stuck a staffer, right?

[00:06:20] And been like, hey, you want to park right here?

[00:06:22] Well, you know, charge you $25 for a spot.

[00:06:26] And then you could have made a bunch of money.

[00:06:29] And it would have looked like you got a lot of people at your restaurant, right?

[00:06:33] Like, oh my gosh, look at the Dunkin' Donuts.

[00:06:35] It is packed.

[00:06:37] Like one of their cream-filled donuts.

[00:06:39] That's...

[00:06:40] I'm kidding.

[00:06:41] They don't really pack them that much.

[00:06:42] Um, so the towing company that Dunkin' apparently contracts with is a company called Gotcha Towing.

[00:06:55] Gotcha.

[00:06:56] Now, I read it as that, just because of the nature of the story.

[00:06:59] But it could also be, I guess you could interpret the name to be like, oh, I got you.

[00:07:04] You know?

[00:07:04] But then I think you should probably have called it got you.

[00:07:06] Not gotcha.

[00:07:07] Because gotcha sounds like, aha!

[00:07:10] Gotcha!

[00:07:11] Nailed!

[00:07:12] Busted!

[00:07:12] Right?

[00:07:14] Got you would be more like, oh, I got you.

[00:07:17] It's okay.

[00:07:18] You had a car accident.

[00:07:20] I'm going to come get you.

[00:07:22] You don't say I'm going to come gotcha.

[00:07:25] All right.

[00:07:26] So I think, yeah, like the name of the towing company, it just automatically sets the tone.

[00:07:32] You know?

[00:07:34] It sets the tone for the relationship.

[00:07:36] It seems like it's going to be a bit adversarial.

[00:07:38] You know?

[00:07:40] Uh, they pulled the cars out of the lot.

[00:07:42] They said there was a sign warning that illegally parked cars would be removed.

[00:07:47] And this is private property.

[00:07:49] And so Dunkin' can call up, you know, usually you have a service that you contract with.

[00:07:55] And so you post up the signs.

[00:07:57] You put their phone numbers on the signs.

[00:07:58] And then when they come and take the people's cars away, then they have a number to call.

[00:08:04] One man said he went to confront the Dunkin' manager and the shop's employees locked the doors and refused to come out.

[00:08:14] I could see that too.

[00:08:16] I could totally see that happening.

[00:08:19] Yeah.

[00:08:20] Hey!

[00:08:22] Why'd you take our cars?

[00:08:24] Get on out here.

[00:08:25] Explain yourself.

[00:08:26] Like, nope, sorry, we're closed.

[00:08:27] Then close the blinds down.

[00:08:28] Lock it all up.

[00:08:30] So now you're closed for business.

[00:08:33] Again, it's 8 o'clock at night or so.

[00:08:35] So I'm not sure if they're selling a lot of coffee at that time of day.

[00:08:40] But now you've not only, you know, gotten yourself heaps of the bad press, but now you're also, you got people that are never going to, you know, drink Dunkin' coffee again.

[00:08:50] They're never going to eat a Dunkin' donut again.

[00:08:53] They're never going to go to your store again.

[00:08:54] You got bad press.

[00:08:57] And on top of it all now, it turns out that the tow truck company might not actually even be allowed to tow cars.

[00:09:04] It's just a mess.

[00:09:07] Let's head over to the phones.

[00:09:08] Here's Earl.

[00:09:08] Welcome to the program.

[00:09:09] Hello, Earl.

[00:09:11] Hey, how you doing?

[00:09:11] Hey, I'm good.

[00:09:12] What's going on?

[00:09:13] Hey, I heard about, you mentioned about the people getting towed.

[00:09:16] Yeah.

[00:09:17] It's very interesting.

[00:09:18] I moved here from Ohio, and I have a few friends of mine that own businesses, and they used to hate when there was a big concert, a big football game, or whatever, and people would just voluntarily park in their parking lot.

[00:09:32] And then when they had regular customers, there was no place for them to park.

[00:09:37] So what they did in Ohio is they would do a contract with the towing company, and the towing company would be in the parking lot and wait for somebody to park there and leave and go to another establishment, and they would tow the car.

[00:09:52] And the agreement was whatever car you tow, we charge the people $150.

[00:09:58] The owner of a Dunkin' Donuts would give the towed people $100, and they'll keep $50 the owner to keep their parking lot clear.

[00:10:07] So in this case, the people whose cars were towed had to pay $380 cash to the...

[00:10:16] Yeah, but they can't park in another establishment parking lot.

[00:10:20] And if you notice, in every parking lot, you can go to the Dollar General.

[00:10:24] They'll have signs posted, you are not allowed to park here if you're not shopping here.

[00:10:29] Yes, I have seen the signs.

[00:10:31] I am aware of how the practice works.

[00:10:32] I'm just saying for the $380 towing fee, you're saying that the business owner gets a cut of that $380?

[00:10:43] Not in this case.

[00:10:44] I'm just using an example of how it worked in Ohio.

[00:10:47] Right.

[00:10:47] Well, I would imagine...

[00:10:48] Yeah, I imagine that there's some sort of...

[00:10:51] It would not surprise me.

[00:10:53] I suspect there's always some sort of a revenue share out of the deal.

[00:10:56] Well, I don't know what the cut would be, whether it's, you know, $10 a car, $50 a car, whatever it might be.

[00:11:02] So that would not surprise me.

[00:11:04] And the business owner, their idea was, I pay for this parking lot.

[00:11:08] I'm not going to have you park in my parking lot and go to a concert across the street.

[00:11:13] And then when I have customers come here, there's nowhere for them to park.

[00:11:17] Right.

[00:11:17] So that is one way to...

[00:11:19] That is definitely one way to approach the situation.

[00:11:22] Another way that would probably make Dunkin' Donuts more money would be to actually charge people to park in some of the spaces.

[00:11:31] To charge like a $20 or $30 event parking fee, right?

[00:11:36] Yeah.

[00:11:37] And then you could have collected that money on the way in, filled up your parking lot,

[00:11:41] left a couple of spaces for your customers because you would be counting the spots and you would know how many cars are in there.

[00:11:48] And then you could make money without angering people and getting all the negative press.

[00:11:53] Well, I'm thinking if they did that for a Trump rally because of the division of this country,

[00:12:01] you would have an uproar from the non-Trump supporters.

[00:12:04] Really?

[00:12:05] Yeah.

[00:12:06] Just for event space parking?

[00:12:10] For a Trump rally, then when Kamala Harris come here, you've got to do the exact same thing for her.

[00:12:16] Yeah.

[00:12:16] If she's going to sell out Bojangles Coliseum, sure.

[00:12:19] Yeah.

[00:12:20] Like, absolutely.

[00:12:20] I bet she's right down.

[00:12:22] Well, no.

[00:12:23] Yeah.

[00:12:24] I'm just looking at it from a pure revenue-generating perspective.

[00:12:28] It doesn't matter to me what event is going on at the Coliseum.

[00:12:32] If people are coming in to park and you want to make some money, it seems like a win-win.

[00:12:38] Yeah, I agree.

[00:12:39] Yeah, I agree.

[00:12:40] But, yeah, the people that were told, that would be it, that their signs post that they're not allowed to park there.

[00:12:46] Right.

[00:12:46] Or event parking and go across the street.

[00:12:48] Right.

[00:12:49] I think the problem here is that you've got people that say they were told by the manager that they could park there,

[00:12:55] and then some of them even paid employees inside Dunkin' Donuts to allow them to park there.

[00:13:02] So some people did actually pay some money to park there and then had their cars towed.

[00:13:08] Well, those people, what they should have done was recorded the name of the person that told them that,

[00:13:13] and then they should go back to the headquarters of Dunkin' Donuts and dispute it with them.

[00:13:18] But they need to have the person's name that told them that.

[00:13:21] Right.

[00:13:21] No, I agree.

[00:13:22] But I think maybe part of it also is that, like, the general demographics of, you know,

[00:13:27] Trump's voters probably older and they're not really that adept at the videotaping and such.

[00:13:33] I'm kidding.

[00:13:34] I'm just kidding.

[00:13:35] I'm just kidding.

[00:13:36] All right.

[00:13:36] Earl, I appreciate the call.

[00:13:38] Okay.

[00:13:39] I appreciate it.

[00:13:39] You have a good weekend.

[00:13:40] You too.

[00:13:40] Take care.

[00:13:41] I'm just kidding.

[00:13:42] They know how to use the videos.

[00:13:43] Come on.

[00:13:44] But, no, that's a good thing to do.

[00:13:47] Right?

[00:13:48] I will take pictures when I go to, like, a parking deck and there's a car that's parked too close to, like, the line,

[00:13:58] so I have a feeling that when they open up their car door, they're going to hit mine.

[00:14:02] And if they're going to be jerks about it, they could, you know, open the car door really hard and, you know, try to dent my car.

[00:14:10] And so I take pictures of the cars that are next to mine.

[00:14:15] I take pictures of the car with the license plate.

[00:14:18] This way I know who was there.

[00:14:20] And if I come back and there's a, you know, if there's some, you know, chartreuse Nissan Altima right next to me and I come back and the Altima's gone

[00:14:30] and there's a big chartreuse dent on the side of my car, then I'm going to call the cops.

[00:14:38] I'm going to file a police report.

[00:14:39] Well, okay.

[00:14:40] I'm going to call the cops and I'll probably end up waiting, like, about four hours.

[00:14:43] And then I'll file a police report.

[00:14:45] And then I'll be able to provide them with a lead.

[00:14:51] And then probably nothing will happen after that.

[00:14:53] But it makes me feel better when I park as if I've done some something proactive, you know.

[00:15:00] So $380 towing fee for these people.

[00:15:04] One man said that when he went to confront the Duncan manager, the shop's employees locked up all the doors, refused to come out.

[00:15:11] One family drove more than two hours.

[00:15:13] The Crump family, that's according to the story.

[00:15:17] They said that the other parking spaces were shut up and there were other people saying the same thing that we could park here.

[00:15:27] See, so that is not persuasive to me.

[00:15:30] Other people in the parking lot telling you that you can park there, I don't take that.

[00:15:37] But I will not take that as truth.

[00:15:40] I will go and talk to the manager first.

[00:15:43] And like Earl said, be like, hey, would you mind if I just kind of record this so, like, I'm covered in case you try to enforce the towing ban or something?

[00:15:51] But now you've got another layer because the North Carolina Department of Revenue suspended Gotcha Towing's business license.

[00:15:59] But the company obviously continues to operate.

[00:16:05] WBTV's Ron Lee has the story.

[00:16:07] Here's Harold.

[00:16:08] Welcome to the show.

[00:16:09] Hey, Harold.

[00:16:10] Hi, good afternoon, Pete.

[00:16:11] How are you doing?

[00:16:12] I'm good.

[00:16:12] What's going on?

[00:16:14] Well, let's give a firsthand account of what actually happened at the towing incident there at Dunkin' Donuts.

[00:16:19] You were there at the Dunkin'.

[00:16:22] Well, I ended up there after working 12 hours because my wife and my mother were stranded there.

[00:16:28] Oh, no.

[00:16:30] Yes.

[00:16:31] And I was greeted by a pleasant crowd of Trump supporters and possibly six law enforcement vehicles in the parking lot.

[00:16:40] And everyone had the same story.

[00:16:42] Hang on.

[00:16:42] Did they tow the police cars that were in the parking lot?

[00:16:46] No, I'm kidding.

[00:16:48] I'm just kidding.

[00:16:48] They haven't got around to that yet, but they did try to tow one of the WBT vans that was there.

[00:16:58] That's not surprising.

[00:16:59] Although you need a special vehicle, I think, to tow those things because they got the – if they had the mask to broadcast out of.

[00:17:05] But, yeah, they –

[00:17:05] Right, yeah.

[00:17:06] Yeah, look, I've been there as a reporter and I would be driving the WBT radio news vehicles and private property owners, especially if you're doing a story about them.

[00:17:16] They don't want you on their property.

[00:17:18] So, like, I've been run off of properties myself.

[00:17:21] All right.

[00:17:21] So, you said your mom and your wife went to the rally.

[00:17:26] They parked at the Dunkin'.

[00:17:28] And then what, they call you after your 12-hour shift and then you have to go pick them up.

[00:17:34] Right.

[00:17:35] And so, while I'm on the way there, my wife is explaining what happened.

[00:17:39] You know, and she went into the restaurant.

[00:17:42] She loves Dunkin' Donuts coffee.

[00:17:44] It's the alternative to Starbucks for us.

[00:17:46] Mm-hmm.

[00:17:47] Uh, we'd much rather patronize Dunkin' Donuts.

[00:17:50] So, she went in.

[00:17:51] She bought a coffee for herself and a handful of donuts to take back to my mom, who she dropped off to wait in line.

[00:17:59] And she didn't want my 86-year-old mother to have to walk all the way back to the Coliseum.

[00:18:03] Mm-hmm.

[00:18:04] And she politely asked, hey, I'm going to the rally.

[00:18:07] Do you mind if I park here?

[00:18:09] And the person across the counter, she said it was the manager, but who knows who the manager is sometimes,

[00:18:13] she said, yes, that would be fine.

[00:18:16] Everyone else is going to anyway.

[00:18:19] So, you know, she felt secure in the fact that, hey, great, you know, they're being nice about it.

[00:18:24] And, you know, it's 3 in the afternoon.

[00:18:27] Who's going to, you know, not too many folks are going to Dunkin' Donuts in the afternoon.

[00:18:30] Right.

[00:18:31] Like, I frequent the Dunkin', and I can confirm that generally in the afternoons and early evenings,

[00:18:38] there's not a lot of traffic rolling through Dunkin' Donuts.

[00:18:41] It's more of a morning thing.

[00:18:42] Right, morning and maybe a quick lunch, light lunch.

[00:18:45] Yeah.

[00:18:46] Afternoon hero, who knows.

[00:18:48] But, so, the story was the same from everyone there.

[00:18:52] Gentlemen, a lot of well-to-do folks actually parked there, and successful folks.

[00:18:58] And they were, one person tipped $100 to the manager.

[00:19:03] One gave $60, several gave $50.

[00:19:05] So, they tallied it up, and there's actually a police report for this incident, tallied it up to be over $700 that employees, you know, gathered from people parking there.

[00:19:18] Via tips.

[00:19:20] Yeah, a tip.

[00:19:21] Yeah, they weren't requesting payment from us or from them.

[00:19:24] But they were graciously accepting them, which is great because, you know, it's nice for them to let us park there.

[00:19:32] Right.

[00:19:32] And then they turn around and have our vehicles towed.

[00:19:35] And for $380 for a towing facility that is less than a half mile away is highway robbery.

[00:19:43] In fact, these people are from Greensboro, and they come down just for these events.

[00:19:47] So, we really felt targeted.

[00:19:52] I don't know if it's political, but maybe to them they thought it was funny.

[00:19:56] But my 86-year-old mother is in the parking lot of a towing company until 11 p.m.

[00:20:02] Yeah.

[00:20:02] And had a flight the next day.

[00:20:04] So, anyway, I understand people, the previous gentleman called in saying, you know, they have a right to tow vehicles and so forth.

[00:20:13] And I agree.

[00:20:14] But even the Charlotte law enforcement officers that were there noted that there was only one sign, and it was towards the drive-thru.

[00:20:21] And they were relaying to us that the code actually requires that you mark every entrance to the parking lot.

[00:20:29] Uh-oh.

[00:20:30] So, who knows?

[00:20:32] But thanks to the Charlotte-Meckemburg Police Department, they were very professional, looking sharp with their bulletproof vests under their shirts.

[00:20:38] And, you know, they were very helpful, and they agreed that, you know, this was wrong.

[00:20:45] It was just a terrible experience overall.

[00:20:48] That's what I mean.

[00:20:49] Like, the negative press that now Duncan is receiving after this incident is not worth whatever the couple hundred dollars or $1,000 that they made at that store.

[00:21:00] And maybe the manager said, yeah, go ahead and do it, and maybe then, like, the owner came by and was like, the franchise owner came by and said, what are you allowing this for?

[00:21:08] Get him out of here.

[00:21:09] Like, we don't know.

[00:21:10] But right now, they're going with the story of that.

[00:21:13] The on-duty manager said, quote, I told several people they cannot park here.

[00:21:19] We have a towing and forced sign.

[00:21:21] That's my statement.

[00:21:23] Right.

[00:21:24] Well, there are, I think, we have a group text of all the people that were involved, and there were over 12 vehicles towed.

[00:21:33] And they are organized.

[00:21:36] And I believe someone was talking with Inside Edition today.

[00:21:39] I believe the gentleman's name that you quoted earlier at the beginning of your story.

[00:21:43] Yeah.

[00:21:44] And so...

[00:21:45] Xander DeSoto.

[00:21:47] Yes.

[00:21:48] Yes.

[00:21:49] And it's not, you know, it's not going away.

[00:21:50] What's really funny is I just bought another 30-ounce container of Dunkin' Donuts coffee for, you know, for the house that day.

[00:21:58] And so it's really insult to injury.

[00:22:00] Yeah, now, because you can't just let it go.

[00:22:02] Well, I mean, you could.

[00:22:04] Oh, you know what you could do?

[00:22:05] You could pour it maybe in the garden.

[00:22:07] I've heard caffeine is good for plants, but I don't know of that to be true.

[00:22:10] So don't do that.

[00:22:11] Well, I use that after I drink the coffee.

[00:22:13] But, you know...

[00:22:16] There you go.

[00:22:18] It's a little too expensive, you know, these days with the prices and everything.

[00:22:21] So...

[00:22:21] Yeah.

[00:22:22] Yeah, but I just wanted to relay that.

[00:22:23] And I really felt bad about my mother being stuck out there.

[00:22:25] Yeah.

[00:22:26] In 86.

[00:22:27] And she just happened to be visiting, and she wanted to go to the rally.

[00:22:30] So we made it possible for her.

[00:22:32] And she had a blast.

[00:22:34] So...

[00:22:34] Yeah, that stinks, though.

[00:22:36] Well, Harold, good luck to you.

[00:22:38] And if you guys do pursue litigation, keep us posted.

[00:22:41] You know, send me an email and keep us posted on how it progresses if you guys take that route.

[00:22:44] Yes, sir.

[00:22:45] Will do.

[00:22:45] I'll shoot you an email.

[00:22:46] We're supposed to wait for a call back from the owner.

[00:22:49] All right.

[00:22:49] Cool.

[00:22:50] Harold, thanks, man.

[00:22:50] I appreciate it.

[00:22:52] Have a good week.

[00:22:52] All right, man.

[00:22:52] You too.

[00:22:53] That's Harold.

[00:22:54] The email, by the way, is Pete at the Pete Calendar Show dot com.

[00:22:59] All right.

[00:22:59] Let's head over to the phones here.

[00:23:01] Mark, thanks for hanging on.

[00:23:02] What's going on, Mark?

[00:23:04] Hey, Pete.

[00:23:04] I know you're a master of sarcasm, so I don't think I need to preface any of this.

[00:23:08] But, you know, I've been listening to you.

[00:23:12] I've enjoyed listening to you ever since the first time you were on BT before you went off to Asheville.

[00:23:17] And I give you about 90% on accuracy and acumen.

[00:23:21] That's very kind of you.

[00:23:23] Yeah, well, put it in your resume.

[00:23:25] Forgive me.

[00:23:26] But anyhow, when you start talking about taking pictures in a parking lot, I mean, unless you've got a Mercy Lago or a Ferrari F50, I mean, ain't nothing going to happen.

[00:23:40] And I'll tell you from experience, and this is a lot worse than a door thing.

[00:23:45] I was parked in Charlotte.

[00:23:48] Charlotte, I was short-term parking when I was parked.

[00:23:51] They were resurfacing the, this is a long time ago, they were resurfacing the top floor like six floors up.

[00:23:57] I'm on the bottom.

[00:23:58] And somehow there's these little openings.

[00:24:02] The seams.

[00:24:04] The seams, yeah.

[00:24:05] And this crap, this concrete stuff they were jackhammering off, fell six floors, hit my car, cracked my windshield, ruined the paint on the front half of the car.

[00:24:17] And I'm like, oh.

[00:24:18] So I go in, I get the Charlotte Douglas cops to get their own cops, and I had them write a report.

[00:24:26] I got all my ducks in a row.

[00:24:28] I sent it off to Charlotte-McLenberg, where I pay inordinate amounts of taxes every year for God knows what.

[00:24:35] And I'm just looking for some recompense, right?

[00:24:37] Right, well, you're paying for the resurfacing of the park index.

[00:24:41] Yeah, I'm also paying for the insurance that they should hold on these people.

[00:24:46] Well, after, I don't know, a couple months, I get this letter back, Charlotte Charmeck, and it says,

[00:24:51] we have reviewed your case and have determined that this is not our fault or liability,

[00:24:57] and we suggest you go to Joe Blow Asphalt in Indian Trail.

[00:25:02] Wow.

[00:25:03] Are you kidding?

[00:25:04] So I was out.

[00:25:05] Yeah.

[00:25:06] I'm out on that.

[00:25:07] So you know what the moral of the story is?

[00:25:09] You should have taken a picture of your car and the work that was being done beforehand.

[00:25:16] You know, I think I probably got rid of the car shortly after that.

[00:25:19] Who knows?

[00:25:20] But I will.

[00:25:22] You know, I just now, I don't even carry a cell phone today.

[00:25:26] Well, then you can't take it.

[00:25:27] Do you have a camera?

[00:25:28] Do you carry a camera?

[00:25:30] There's a camera on the cell phone, I suppose, if I absolutely needed it or the phone.

[00:25:35] You know, I do like the old days.

[00:25:36] You know, I'm in Harris Teeter, and I need a phone.

[00:25:39] I go up to the service desk and ask, can I borrow your phone?

[00:25:42] Hmm.

[00:25:43] And what, do they just hand you their cell phone?

[00:25:45] Yeah.

[00:25:48] No, I can't use a cell phone.

[00:25:50] They don't like me.

[00:25:51] I don't like them.

[00:25:52] This technology stuff.

[00:25:53] Good God knows what AI is.

[00:25:55] But anyhow, yeah, I was thinking you were in some parallel universe there with Joe Biden

[00:26:00] circling some unknown planet there for a while talking about, oh yeah, I'm going to take

[00:26:06] pictures.

[00:26:07] Well, I said I'm going to take pictures.

[00:26:08] If the damage is bad enough, then I can give the police a lead.

[00:26:12] And then what did I say?

[00:26:13] Where nothing, and then nothing would happen.

[00:26:15] I mean, I recognize.

[00:26:18] You're right.

[00:26:18] You did say that.

[00:26:19] I'll give you.

[00:26:20] But it just makes me feel better on the front end.

[00:26:23] That's all.

[00:26:23] And that's really what it's about for me.

[00:26:26] Huh.

[00:26:26] Yeah.

[00:26:27] As long as I feel better, it's like I did everything that I could do.

[00:26:30] I'll never be, you know, left with regret.

[00:26:32] Like, oh, if only I had taken a picture of that license plate, I could have given the police

[00:26:36] some sort of, because I have, like, I had the whole front end of my car ripped off by

[00:26:40] a U-Haul.

[00:26:41] Like, just cleaned right off of the front of it, because I was parked in a parking lot

[00:26:46] in my old apartment complex, and somebody was moving in.

[00:26:50] Now, luckily, they stopped, and they filed a police report, because I didn't know.

[00:26:55] And then a cop shows up at my door, and it's like, hey, your car, like, just got, you know,

[00:27:02] thousands of dollars in damage done to it.

[00:27:04] So, yeah.

[00:27:05] Oh, my goodness.

[00:27:06] Mark, I appreciate the call, man.

[00:27:08] All right.

[00:27:08] Take care.

[00:27:09] All right.

[00:27:09] You too.

[00:27:09] Sorry to hear about that.

[00:27:11] My dad, one time driving home from, he worked in New York City, and he drove, and we

[00:27:16] lived on Long Island, he made a 50-mile commute each way every day.

[00:27:19] He was driving back.

[00:27:21] He had a 1986 Honda Accord, and I know virtually every inch of that vehicle, because he was

[00:27:26] coming across the bridge, and they were painting the bridge.

[00:27:30] And he got little, tiny dots of that green paint that the bridges, you know, like the rusted-looking

[00:27:39] iron color green, just all over the car.

[00:27:45] And so we were out there, yeah, in the dark after he gets home, into cleaning that car.

[00:27:52] All right.

[00:27:52] Let me go back to the phones.

[00:27:54] Here's Will.

[00:27:54] Welcome to the show.

[00:27:55] Hey, Will.

[00:27:57] Hey, man.

[00:27:57] Can you hear me, Pete?

[00:27:59] I think so.

[00:27:59] Is that you, Will?

[00:28:01] That's me.

[00:28:02] All righty.

[00:28:02] How are you doing today?

[00:28:03] Good.

[00:28:03] How are you?

[00:28:03] Good.

[00:28:04] Good.

[00:28:04] I'm great, man.

[00:28:05] I'm riding up the highway hearing about the towing thing, and it just turned my stomach

[00:28:10] out of experience a few years back that was horrible, and thought I'd share it with you.

[00:28:16] All right.

[00:28:17] Now, you've built it up as something horrible, so let's hear how horrible it is.

[00:28:20] It better be horrible.

[00:28:20] It was horrible.

[00:28:21] All right.

[00:28:21] Well, first of all, I'd say, you know, if your car breaks down on the side of the road

[00:28:25] or something like that, the towing company's your hero, right?

[00:28:28] Right, right.

[00:28:29] But I feel like there's just a different level of ethics in different kinds of companies,

[00:28:34] kind of like you were talking about the name of that company.

[00:28:36] But this happened, I was in medical school in Chapel Hill, and I think college towns

[00:28:43] are really where the predatory people are more than anywhere on earth.

[00:28:47] But I came home, and I was married, came into our apartment, and to our apartment, it's

[00:28:53] a walk-up.

[00:28:54] The parking spaces are two spaces right in front of our front door.

[00:28:57] The door has the address.

[00:28:59] The spaces have the address.

[00:29:00] Yes, my wife had a brand new car that didn't have the sticker yet, you know?

[00:29:04] So they had a sign and all, you got to have the sticker to be in a residence, the park there

[00:29:10] and everything.

[00:29:11] But she didn't have the sticker.

[00:29:12] So the tow trucks got her new car on the hook.

[00:29:17] And I'm like, hey, man, that's our car.

[00:29:20] That's our apartment.

[00:29:21] That's my wife.

[00:29:22] Trust me, really.

[00:29:23] You know, just kind of common sense.

[00:29:26] Good people would say, okay, sorry, no big deal.

[00:29:29] Nope.

[00:29:29] But it escalated.

[00:29:32] And I'm not a person that escalates stuff, you know?

[00:29:34] But you're kind of like, come on, man.

[00:29:36] You got to be kidding me.

[00:29:37] And the come-on man's turned into a little more and a little more.

[00:29:40] And the guy brandished a pistol.

[00:29:44] You know, pulled his shirt up, basically, and showed me a pistol.

[00:29:48] And, man, he said, you give me 200 bucks and I'll take it down, you know?

[00:29:53] And what do you think I did?

[00:29:55] Started scrambling for 200 bucks.

[00:29:57] Oh, I thought you were going to say you pulled your own pistol.

[00:29:59] Okay.

[00:29:59] Anyway.

[00:29:59] Yeah.

[00:30:00] No, well.

[00:30:01] Hey, I am from gas.

[00:30:02] You never know.

[00:30:03] All right.

[00:30:04] Well, I appreciate the call, man.

[00:30:05] Thank you very much.

[00:30:06] All right.

[00:30:07] That'll do it for this episode.

[00:30:08] Thank you so much for listening.

[00:30:09] I could not do the show without your support and the support of the businesses that advertise

[00:30:13] on the podcast.

[00:30:15] So if you'd like, please support them, too, and tell them you heard it here.

[00:30:18] You can also become a patron at my Patreon page or go to thepetecalendershow.com.

[00:30:23] Again, thank you so much for listening and don't break anything while I'm gone.