Claim Jumper

On Friday, December 18, my girlfriend and I went out for dinner to Nick's at the Beach on the corner of Mission Boulevard and Thomas Avenue. When we arrived, there weren’t any parking spaces available in Nick's small lot, but we noticed people preparing to vacate a spot in front of the restaurant. My g.f. got out and went over to the space to "claim" it while I waited to pull in.

It was a distance of only 20 feet or so, but before I got there, a pickup truck came from out of nowhere and zipped into the empty spot. The couple in the truck hopped out and headed for the door. I thought that was a rude thing to do but went on to search for another space without saying anything. After a couple of passes up and down the street, I found a spot on the ocean side on Mission Boulevard and headed back to the restaurant.

We entered and were seated. We ordered our meals, and ten minutes or so later, the person who grabbed the parking spot came to our table and said, "I want to apologize for jumping into your parking spot." He was nice about it and sincere. I said, "Thank you. It is nice of you to say something about it, but don't worry about it.” He asked if he could buy us a couple of drinks, but we said, "No, thanks, but it was polite of you to apologize." My girlfriend told me, "Not many people would bother saying anything at all."

We finished our dinner, and when the waitress asked if that would be all, I said "yes" and waited for the check. When the waitress came back, she said, "The gentleman in the corner booth insisted on picking up your dinner tab."

On our way out, we stopped and thanked the couple for the nice gesture. I thought of the saying "character counts," and these people had it. P.B is a nice place after all.