Minor Revolutions

Upon reflection into yesterday's 50th anniversary of the squelched Hungarian Uprising against the Soviet Regime, we here at superimportant were reminded of our own struggles against those forces that suppress our freedoms & mobility. To this day, the memories of these battles raise feelings of bitterness and anger in our spacious offices.

Back in University, we were the driving force behind the revolt against the iron fist of parking services. The student movement was boiling over at that point. There was even a riot, but official records draw no parallels between it and the events superimportant helped orchestrate. Further proof of these subtle, yet inarguable connections is beyond the scope of this article.

Events unfolded one freezing fucking cold spring morning in like May or something, when it shouldn't really be snowing, but in Syracuse, it was snowing, because that's just what it does. I was running a series of errands for a very busy week at the end of the semester. First off, I had to pay off the leeches at Parking Services so that I could register for classes. I really, really wanted to get into that watercolor class, because I heard it was an easy A. But these douches somehow have the ability to put a lein on your ability to register if you've got unpaid parking tickets. Of which I had accumulated several during my half-decade stint at institutions of higher learning.

So I dropped $100 cold hard cash or probably a check just so I could make sure I could get into Writing 102, which was another weird thing about syracuse. See, I transferred there from NYU, right? Apparently, only the first semester of freshman writing at NY-freakin-U counted towards Syracuse credit. The second semester was clearly sub-par by upstate, lake-effect, inbred, snowplow driving standards. Whatever. A hundred dollars towards unpaid parking tickets. I was less than cheerful about it.

Shortly thereafter, I drive to a campus building to pick up some slides that were being developed. While inside, I got a parking ticket because I wasn't supposed to be there. I threw that ticket in a puddle. Did I say it was snowing? Yeah, ok, maybe it was melting. I threw that ticket in a puddle and drove away to meet a set designer in the art building. I parked in the circular "fire lane" behind the building which all students park in while picking stuff up. The "fire lane" was seriously not big enough to fit a damn fire truck, I swear. While inside the art building waiting for...let's call him "Dylan", I had this sinking feeling, based on my luck, that I was being ticketed at that very moment. I walked outside to check on the Volvo I had been driving at the time - which I had nicknamed "Chewy" because it made this wookie-like groan whenever I'd turn the steering wheel - and sure enough, the parking services Hummer was driving away at that very moment, the driver snorting cocaine off of a hooker's tits in the front seat, burning half a gallon of gas per hundred yards, running over cyclists, sawing down natural growth forests, and killing endangered species for sport. Son of a bitch.

I shook my fist violently in the air, and tore the ticket from beneath Chewy's windshield wiper. Seventy Five dollars! Seventy five dollars for parking in an inadequate fire lane! I flew into a rage. I took my big, black, bold magic marker, and wrote on the front of the ticket "GO FUCK" and on the back of the ticket "YOURSELVES". Rather than mailing the ticket back sans-payment with a smirk of satisfaction as I let it settle to the bottom of the curbside mailbox, buried under whatever recent snowfall had hidden it from the postman who wasn't looking for curbside mailboxes anyway because we all had mailboxes outside our off-campus apartments, I decided that this, like those Hungarian students in 1956, was time to take action. I recruited "Dylan" to accompany me back to the offices of these savages as an official witness to the verbal excoriation I was about to unleash. He declined. To this day, I fucking hate that kid for that. He totally missed out. Chewy and I drove up alone and emboldened by our mutual rage. I stormed across the carpeted flooring and stood tapping my fingers on the edge of the desk as the receptionist completed her phone call.

"How can I help you," she sortof smiled.

I took the vandalized ticket, facing the "go fuck" side towards her, and with a grimace, showed her that side, then the "yourselves" side, before tearing it up in tiny little pieces while declaring with just how much passion I hated parking services. The rage built up, and my sense of purpose became clearer and clearer. Verbal thrashing! Verbal thrashing! At this point, I was committed to the tirade, and there was no going back.

The blood-red color of rage obscures my vision for the rest of this recollection... Also, the sky turned black and thunder clapped, and my voice sounded like, like a lion or a giraffe, or like, some really fucked up Grendel kind of beast.

I can't remember the specifics of the diatribe, but I know that the word "fuck" was implemented frequently, as was the string of words "vampiric, bloodthirsty vultures". This was no exaggeration, of course. They liked my blood, and circled above me, waiting for my moment of weakness. It was obvious. I completed my reaming by tossing the tiny pieces of stupid ticket across the desk and clomping back out of the carpeted office while the desk workers reassured me that my actions were not altogether mature. Right. Jerks. True revolutionary tactics are rarely understood, initially.

In a crippling turn of events for this revolution, the young superimportant was contacted the next day, a hero amongst his peers, only to be told that the ticket had been scotch-taped back together and judicial affairs was about to be contacted in regards to my conduct. A temporary concession was made in the form of a snarky letter of apology to conclude the matter, BUT THE RESISTANCE CONTINUES becuase still, my mom gets overdue notices from parking services and I'm like "jeez don't these people let up? Freakin' losers!"