The other day, I reran a 2010 post about a time I lost my American Express card. Here from July 18 of that year is another such tale. I have since managed to not lose my American Express card again, though once since then someone got its number and charged a whole mess of lingerie on it at a store in Las Vegas. The AmEx folks removed the charge when I assured them that (a) I had not been in Las Vegas on the date in question, (b) I never wear lingerie and (c) when I do, it's not in that color…
Last Thursday, I went to lunch with a wonderful, witty lady named Laraine Newman who has done many things above and beyond being part of the original cast of Saturday Night Live. I mean, that alone would be enough but there's been so much more.
We talked about mutual friends and our mutual birthday and we marvelled at how though it was a hundred-and-something degrees in Beverly Hills, Sylvester Stallone was dining at a nearby table wearing an apricot-colored three-piece suit. I've just completed my end of the second season of The Garfield Show, which includes the voice-directing, and I was fortunate to get Laraine to appear several times as a guest voice. What's fortunate about this is, of course, that I don't have to do any actual directing when I get someone like that. I just hand Laraine a script, point her at a microphone and tell her to be funny. She always is.
After we'd finished our meals, the check arrived in one of those little leatherette folders. We fought over it, I triumphed and I tossed my American Express card into the folder and a waiter took it away. Laraine and I talked for another hour or so…long enough that when we got up to go, neither of us noticed that our server had not brought it back to me for tip, total and signature.
Friday morning, I took my car in for routine servicing…and this dealership always makes me nervous because they always give me a "loaner" with, like, twelve miles on it. I don't like driving someone else's utterly pristine car and not just because I fear I'll scratch it, thereby taking its automotive virginity. I'm also afraid I'll enjoy the new car so much I'll want to buy one…which I guess is why they only assign out new loaners. Anyway, when I went to give the cashier my AmEx card to imprint for the security deposit, I discovered it was in absentia. It took about a minute to figure out I'd left it in that restaurant.
I cell-phoned them and a nice lady went away for what seemed like about six hours. Eventually, she returned to report that they'd searched the restaurant, high, low and in-between and they definitely did not have my American Express card. Sorry.
I waited fifteen minutes, called again and got someone else. This person went off, did a little search and came back in about two minutes to inform me that, yes, they had my American Express card. "I'll come by and get it later," I told her.
Later that afternoon, I drove the loaner (cautiously) to the restaurant. You may be interested to know that Sylvester Stallone wasn't there but Fabio was and I had to wait while they seated him. I don't know why he's more important than I am. Of the two of us, I'm the one who has a job.
The manager searched the restaurant like the first lady I'd called but eventually, he found the card, checked my i.d. and returned it to me. He thought I would take it and go but I said, "You know, I don't think I ever added a tip to the bill and signed it." This did not win me any points for honesty. It was more like, "You really are a troublemaker, aren't you?" Off he went to plow through all of the previous day's credit card slips. I waited there so long, I was sorry I'd said anything.
Finally, he came back with a slip and announced, "It's okay. You added a tip and signed the slip."
I looked at it and told him, "That's not my signature."
He gasped, "That is not your signature?"
I said, "That's not even my name." Someone else had added a tip (not a very good one) to the bill and signed their name to it. Fortunately, the confusion was only in the bills, not in the cards, and they hadn't given him my American Express card. Anyway, I added my endorsement and left.
On the way back, I stopped at the car dealership, turned in the unblemished loaner and went to pay for the work done on my auto. I opened my wallet, reached for the American Express card…
…and it wasn't there. Gone. Missing. Again. Second time in twenty-four hours.
My distress must have been pretty visible because the cashier asked me, "Something wrong, sir?"
"My American Express card," I said. "It's supposed to be here in my wallet but it has this habit of running off on its own. Excuse me, I have to call a restaurant and —"
She asked, "Have you looked in all your pockets?" I looked in my shirt pocket and there it was, hiding behind my iPhone. And I just went downstairs and looked and it's there in my wallet right this second. I've been checking every hour or so…