Arithmetic For Playas Pt. II: The Rolls Royce Incident

PROLOGUE:

Okay, so you know how it goes playas.

My sista calls 'em Sara Jessica Parker moments. You know that Sex n the City where Carrie thinks she's lookin so fine during the fashion show....and then damn near breaks her ankle, falls out in her $10,000 dress on the runway.

Yeah, you know pride goes before the fall...LITERALLY.

Well...we at the W.A.S. had one of them......

ONCE UPON A TIME,

We were in Miami and our good friend loaned us his Rolls Royce Corniche to roll out in.

We're talking a white 1980 convertible with a maroon interior. A classic with only 43,000 miles on it. You already know. We couldn't even contain ourselves. It was too much.

But before we knew it, without warning or a flicker of lightning in the sky, everything that could go wrong...did go wrong. One second we were the kings and queens of Ocean Drive, and the next, well, as you know.... pride goes before a fall...LITERALLY.

Here's a small list of things that happened when we were riding on the top of the world:

1) A man who was rollerblading almost broke his back trying to spin and look at the car, and his rollerblading girlfriend almost rolled into the street breaking her neck and trying to see what was going on;

2) guys driving black Lamborghinis and yellow Ferraris nodded their heads as if to say DAMN, where do I get one of those...

3) an Indian guy handed a friend his camera, jumped in the street, and did a quick shuffle as he tried to take a picture with us cruising slowly past;

4) a girl named Luisa (that one of our illustrious party called "the most perfect girl in Miami") said she's on the way...even though she was tired from working all day, and it was already 1:00 in the morning, she was jumping in the shower and would see us in a second...she just "loves Rolls Royces, and can't wait to own one someday...";

5) men everywhere--and i'm talking ballas, shot callas, and billionaires with Rolexes and supermodels on each arm, all stopped in their tracks to deliver amazing new levels of HATERATION...I guess they had to grit their teeth and hate because their girls were breaking their necks with that "who's that?" grin...but damn....;

6) We got free ice cream, gigantic free slices of pepperoni pizza, free parking spaces at the trendiest spots in Miami, and for the first time in my life, everything in the world seemed free...



Now, for the fall...LITERALLY. Here's a small list of things that happened when we sank to new levels of low, and began frantically asking ourselves how low can this go?

1) I hug Luisa in the lobby of the Hotel Delano. Outside in a prime location in the circle drive sits the white Corniche. We look over to see some giggling gorgeous girls taking photos next to the car, rubbing it like it's Apollo, or some lost sacred stone. We laugh. We all walk over to the car. We jump in. And Nate Wonder turns the key. And nothing happens. No soft sweet purr. Nothing.

2) No, seriously, the car won't start.

3) We begin tapping the leather with our fingers, nervously licking our lips. This is a convertible. There's really nowhere to hide. And folks are walking by in their $2,000 dresses and pulling up next to us in their classic Ferraris. I don't think this is a good time for this.

4) NO, SERIOUSLY THE CAR WONT START. WTF?! IS HAPPENING...

5) Nate Wonder frantically asks the valet if they've done something to the car. Suddenly, none of them know how to speak English. But Nate's fluent in Spanish. So they suddenly switch from Spanish to another language that sounds like a cross between Russian and Korean. WTF?!

6) No one knows who parked the car. Of course, of course, it parked itself....

7) Nate decides to pop the car in neutral and start it that way. He pops the car in neutral and it promptly begins rolling backwards, headed toward the busy sidewalk and the dozens of Bentleys, Porsches, and limos cruising by slowly in the street.

8) Nate pumps the brakes. Nothing happens. If anything we roll faster.

9) We hit the wall. No, I'm serious. We hit the wall of the circle drive. And we sit there. Saying things like Oh shit, Oh shit over and over.

7) Luisa laughs. We all laugh. We begin ducking, embarrassed, scared, not sure what to do. We feel like criminals. We just wrecked a classic automobile. There are circles in hell for that. Bums on the sidewalk join in: they point at us and laugh. We're beyond nervous now. We're going to hell. And the car won't start.

8) The valets run over like paramedics. They check the back of the car: no damage, they claim. Yeah right, we feel like dying cancer patients: doctor, just tell me the truth. The valets (who suddenly now speak perfect English!) decide to jump the car: we just need to wait 15 minutes for the cables....15 MINUTES! For some reason, I wonder if Andy Warhol is here somewhere, giggling with his Punked camera crew....



9) Cables arrive! They pop the hood. And a Scion pulls up next to us. A Paris Hilton-type walking by says, "Are you serious? You're gonna jump a Rolls with a Scion?" I answer "Yep."

10) While a valet guy is fiddling with the hood, the HORN STARTS TO BLOW. NOT BLOW-- BLARE!!-- AND IT WONT STOP.

11) Folks start to run out of the hotel. The hotel manager, guests, club people. People flick us off, glare at us, begin throwing things at us from their hotel windows. And there we are like little frantic roaches on a china plate. Ducking and hiding in a fancy car. WITH A HORN THAT'S BLARING NONSTOP AT FULL BLAST AT FOUR IN THE MORNING.

12) People on the street rolling by in their coupes and convertibles begin laughing and blowing their horns in unison. I notice odd harmonies in the horn blasts. Maybe we could put together an auto doo wop group of some sort...

13) We close the hood to make the noise a little quieter. Then frantically realize we can just pull the wires to the horn and stop the racket. Of course, this is the moment when Nate realizes that "the silver thing, the silver thing!" is now conveniently missing. I guess the silver thing is the lever we need to pop the hood back up. Great. I look at Luisa and smile. And the horn seems to get even louder.

14) I ask Luisa if she's having fun yet. She smiles and says yes. I try to believe her.