Karma bites man

We have a customer in a very average little town in northern Illinois. I think it's actually Illinois' second or third largest city, but let's just say it ain't Chicago. It reminds me of Anytown, only without the life that a major university brings (which, in Anytown, is the only life you'll find.) I absolutely love the people with whom I work there; to a person, they're the smartest and most fun group with whom I've had the privilege to associate. I've made some friendships there that transcend the job, and that's very cool.

But, other than those folks, the place has nothing which distinguishes it from any other very average town in the Midwest. Except this: from city limit to city limit, restaurant service is horrible. Upscale joint, local dive, national chain, doesn't matter. I've taken to calling the place the Land of the Eight Percent Tip.

And so it was that I found myself at a Steak 'n' Shake very late one night last week, and the shake I ordered never arrived. For me, it was just steak, no shake. So I dutifully put the 8 percent on the credit card slip, sighed and shook my head, and walked out the door. I got my keys out of my pocket, pointed them around the parking lot in one of my typical attempts to identify which rental car is mine, and then felt a chill of a high-20s evening.

That chill shook me a little bit; just enough to make me drop my keys.

In a storm drain.

I knew it was going to happen the millisecond they left my hand. And all I could do was calmly think, "Yep, they're gonna land in the drain." I could see them down there; about five feet down, just far enough to where getting them out was going to be a project.

After determining that the cover of the drain was indeed cemented down, and that I was indeed cold, and that it was indeed 12:30 a.m. and it was doubtful that anybody at Alamo Rent-A-Car was going to care at that hour (or perhaps at any other), I went back into the restaurant ... and pleaded my case with the kid to whom I had just granted 10 percent. I told him my tale of woe. He went to the back of the store and came back with a broom handle, a long hook-like rod and one of his friends.

We poked around in the drain for about 10 minutes, when the friend came up with an idea. In the absence of a flashlight (nobody had a flashlight!), the guy went back into the restaurant and came back with several paper placemats and a Bic lighter. He lit the paper on fire and dropped it in the drain. "Hope there's no gas in there," he said as he dropped it.

The idea was genius; not only did it warm us up, but it gave us sufficient light to coax the keys onto the hook with the broom handle. The waiter nudged, I hooked, and we brought the keys back to their rightful above-ground place.

I was, of course, grateful; so grateful that I gave the kid all the cash in my pocket, which meant that his 8 percent wound up being closer to 100. Being a kid -- and probably on some level aware that I had basically stiffed him -- he took the cash.

Good for him, I say. And from now on, I ... well, I'll probably still meet bad service with a bad tip. But I will add a new procedure to the travel system -- the keys stay in the pocket until I get to the car.