Do You Know What We Do to Thieves in This Country?

I should've posted this earlier, but I've basically been one of the walking dead for about a week now. Moving is pretty much the pits and having finals stacked right on top of that really isn't helping, either.

But anyway! To my (suspected) thieving.

On Monday, Bill and I rented a cargo van from U-Haul in an attempt to clear the last of our belongings out of our former apartment. That didn't happen until Tuesday, but that's another story for another post - complete with a picture!  We rented the van around noon and went over to the apartment to pack, which - in hindsight - was not the best of plans. What we should've done was pack and then rent the van, but I occasionally have moments of absolutely epic stupid, especially when left with exactly enough energy to operate either my brain or the aching muscles in my arms and legs, but clearly not both at the same time.

We got a fair amount of work done but had to stop far earlier than was ideal because we're both attending school part-time and needed to go to our respective Monday night classes. Being as I didn't want to pay for the mileage to drive the van to campus and back, I thought it would be a brilliant idea to go back to the U-Haul lot, swap the van out for my car, go to campus in the car, come back to the U-Haul lot after class, and swap the car out for the van again. So that's what we did -even though we earned ourselves a really weird look from the guy working the counter when we parked the van but didn't return the keys. On the reverse switcheroo, we apparently earned a weird look from someone else entirely... namely, the po-po.

It was about 9PM when we got out of class and back over to the lot to trade vehicles, at which point they'd been closed for about two hours. Exhausted and without stopping to think that the cargo van wouldn't have its headlights set to come on automatically in the darkness the way my car does, we just hopped in and I proceeded to make my way down the street, totally clueless. Stupid of me, I know, but it's a busy road with traffic in both directions and lots of streetlights, so neither of us really noticed until we got to a slightly darker stretch of road. Cue me going, "Crap, sweetie! Are my lights on?!?" followed by fumbling in the dark of the cab of an unfamiliar vehicle, trying to find the controls for the headlights. Which, of course, were nowhere near where they are in either of the cars I've owned. I did eventually manage to get them on, but only about a minute before I noticed flashing lights in my rearview.

So, I pulled across two lanes of highway to the side of the road and proceeded to sit there with the cop's headlights angled perfectly to blind me via the side view mirror of the van, tapping my thumbs on the wheel and knowing exactly why I had been pulled over and already having corrected it - or so I thought. And there I waited and waited while not only that car pulled up behind me and prepped to approach the vehicle but one more car, an unmarked one, pulled up behind that. Plus a third across the street! (Although I didn't notice that one until much later, when we were pulling away.) That's a lot of police officers for one brain-dead girl that forgot to turn her headlights on for a few minutes. Needless to say, by the time the officer approached, I was... let's go with somewhat confused. So was he, judging by the look he gave me through the window when he saw me. The conversation went something like this:

"Uhhh, can I help you, officer?"

"Can I see your license and registration please?"

"Here's my license. But I don't have the registration."

"Is this your van?"

"Uhhh, well, you see... I rented this U-haul. So, y'know, it's obviously not registered to me."

"You don't have the registration."

"Well, no. It might be in the glove box or something. I dunno. I can check. Sweetie, can you che---"

"Do you have proof that you're allowed to drive this van? Your contract or something?"

"Yes. I have my rental agreement right here."

I handed it over to him, pointing out exactly where my name was on the rental agreement. I was too tired to really be aware of exactly how rude I was being, but given the fact that he had asked if a very large cargo van with the words "U-Haul" painted on it in multiple places was mine, I was a bit concerned about where this conversation was going and the accuracy of his powers of observation. Protip: You probably shouldn't make "WTF? Are you stupid or something?"-face at the police in most scenarios, even though I'm about 99% sure that was exactly the expression that I was wearing by that point. But I only have so much polite to go around before some of the snark leaks out, regardless of how hard I try to stop it, and the stress of this house has had me in short supply.

"Alright, well, I just needed to make sure that you were authorized to drive this vehicle. Your headlights were off and it gave me an excuse to pull you over."

"Ohh, I figured. I realized it a few blocks back and turned them on. Sorry. My car turns them on automatically, so I didn't think about it when I was pulling out of the lot."

"Yeah, we've been following you since then."

"Umm, okay.... why?"

"It was a strange time of night for someone to be picking up a van."

"Well, yes, but we're also students and needed to go to campus. I didn't want to pay for the mileage and didn't have my parking permit in the van, anyway, which is why we went to get my car and then switched coming back."

"Yeah, yeah, okay. But it's a strange time of night and there have been a couple of vans stolen from that lot."

"Wait, what?"

"We've had several calls to the Upper Darby police about U-Haul vans stolen from that lot in the middle of the night."

"Oh, no! My car is there! Should we go get it instead of leaving it there overnight?"

"No, no, they're not interested in stealing the cars. Just the vans. They find them abandoned all over town and no one knows who has been taking them or why."

"Err, okay."

"I'm going to check your license and be right back."

So, the police officer walks off. Cue a look exchanged between the boyfriend and I before we crack up. I wasn't pulled over for having my headlights off. Having my headlights off was an excuse to pull me over as a suspected U-Haul van thief. A suspected U-Haul van thief who is on the loose in Philadelphia's suburbs and may be dangerous! My license was clear, as expected, but by the time the guy came over to give it back to me and tell me he was letting me off with a warning - and that he would've done that had I just been in my car, anyway - neither of us could possibly keep a straight face. I tried to explain what was so funny between snicker fits, but he seemed far, far less amused by this fact than we were. All he could say was that if he had just sat there while two shady characters made off with yet another cargo van, he'd look pretty stupid at work, which is entirely true. While I sympathized, that didn't make it any less hilarious.

Even now, I can only think of Lewis Black's bit about his rental car being stolen in Miami and how he knew the guy must've been on drugs because, with a Lexus and a BMW on the same block, only someone tweaking could be like "I... I... I gotta have the Plymouth Horizon!". It fills my imagination with daydreams of what sort of person steals moving trucks for joyrides down Route 1, flooring the massive beasties to, what, maybe 45 MPH? Disenchanted teenagers from the local high school? Thrill of a lifetime, right there. That's my best guess. The other options I came up with were: a drug cartel moving far too much product to fit into a reasonably sized trunk, Mafiosos on a killing spree so large they had to haul half a dozen bodies at once, or maybe a renegade band of underground musicians too broke to make it to their next gig any other way. The longer I think about it, the crazier the possibilities become, although I've ruled out a troop of amateur clowns practicing their car-cramming gag by starting big and working their way down in size. And as if dreaming up all those possibilities wasn't enough to keep me giggling to myself for days? Every time I tell the story, I cackle at the thought that for the rest of our lives, Bill and I will be telling everyone we know the tale of how, in the process of moving into our very first house, we were pulled over on suspicion of Grand Theft Auto: U-Haul Van.

PS - I sincerely hope that becomes the next title in the video game franchise.