Not in Kansas Anymore

I was going to post about old houses and other historic stuff, but I told this story to a friend yesterday on the phone and she said I should post it.  So here goes.

The place I'm renting has ample parking behind the house, but parking here does have one problem.  I feel as though just about every bird in Charleston has left its mark on my car.  I managed to clean most of the mess off the windshield.  Although there were still remains, I wouldn't get arrested for impaired vision.  But the top, the hood, the trunk, everything on my little red car was a spotted mess.  BTW, this is not just me.  Another renter solved the problem by spreading what appeared to be a sheet over the windshield and hood of his car and anchoring it in place.

Finally, I had to do something.  This was clearly not going to wash off in the next rain.  (Not that there's been much rain since the pseudo snowstorm.  Charleston is all about sunshine.)  So I checked good old Google for a car wash.  It never occurred to me that car washes would have reviews but once again I underestimated Google.  One of the closest ones included a review from a woman who had lost a ring with both sentimental and monetary value.  She thought she had lost it in the car but had searched thoroughly and had not been able to find it.  She took the car to this car wash and when she got into the clean car, there was the ring on the center console waiting for her.  Thrilled, she found the attendant who had cleaned the interior to thank him and tell him how much it meant to her.  The response was along the lines of Well, I found it and figured you had lost it and would like to have it back.

Clearly this was the place for me.  Especially with my history of losing and finding and losing and finding a ring.

So I was only slightly surprised to see the sign for this place as I headed out for my next exploration and realized that I would be passing it on my way home.  Looked like I needed to go there.  It seemed a nice enough place, with the usual array of services (I even got to pick the scent of the air freshener to be used.)  Then I paid and waited for my car.  After a bit, it appeared but it wasn't placed with the other clean cars for detailing or whatever you call the hand drying and interior clean up.  Instead it went on through the area and headed away to another area.  A bit startled, I followed and found someone to ask what was going on.  He explained that they hadn't been able to get all the gunk off my car so they were sending it through the wash again.

I walked away slowly thinking about this.  I wasn't surprised that the wash hadn't taken care of everything.  If I expected anything out of the ordinary, it would have been a quick comment that they had not been able to get everything off.  I hadn't expected that they would do the job twice at no extra charge.

Not only am I not in Kansas, I'm sure not in Long Island anymore.  Let's hear it for Southern courtesy and thoroughness.