The 8/20 oil change
I woke up this morning and took my car to Jiffy Lube. I like Jiffy Lube, because at Jiffy Lube, they are less clueless than I am about cars, but not so clued-in that they are real mechanics; this means that they can’t charge you a lot of money for things. I feel this is a nice arrangement for all parties involved.
While waiting in the reception area for them to finish changing my oil, I began talking to the other person was waiting, an middle class black lady. I encouraged her to sign up for Jiffy Lube’s e-mail program, since it was going to shave $6 off my oil change. She seemed interested.
Then she asked me, “What’s your birthday?” Now that is a pretty odd question to get from a complete stranger. I was taken aback, but I answered her: August 20th. “Really?” she answered, “mine too!”
I didn’t believe her, and she could probably tell, so she began to fish around in her purse for her ID. She couldn’t find it and muttered about someone taking her ID. At this point, I was about 85% sure that this was an act she pulled on everyone: Ask them their birthday, claim she has the same birthday, claim she has the ID to prove it, and then fail to find the ID.
And then she found her driver’s license and handed it to me. 8/20/48
“How did you know to ask me my birthday?” I asked her as she was paying. “Oh, I’m from the Sixties, and that’s just something we used to do all the time,” she answered. Trippy, man.