Stormi the Folf - Car Emergency

Hi folks, this is protowave (Wave the Protogen). I'm creating this fundraiser on behalf of Stormi the Folf, a full-time YouTube content creator. You may have seen me in Stormi's "Interview With A Protogen" video. As I type this, Stormi and I are rooming together at Midwest Furfest 2021.

Stormi's car is missing. We don't know where it is. It's her only way home from the convention. Stormi can't fly on a plane by herself, and she doesn't have anybody to carpool with. (I would do it, but I'd very likely lose my job in the process.)

In 3 and a half days, Stormi will be stranded on the streets of Chicago with no source of income unless we're able to either find her car or pay for a rental car. If she uses a rental car, Stormi won't be able to go to the store to buy food and basic necessities.

Here's how we got in this situation:

While she was driving up from her home in Mississippi to Chicago for the convention (nearly 1,000 miles), Stormi's car blew a tire on the interstate in the middle of nowhere. Thankfully, I was already on my way to Chicago, so I was able to divert my route and go rescue her from where she was stranded.

Stormi has a membership with AAA, so she called them immediately to get her spare tire put on and get her car towed up to the convention. This was at around 10:00PM on Wednesday the 1st of December.

When I located Stormi 3 hours later, at 1:00AM, AAA had completely missed their listed arrival time twice already, with no notification and no call either time.

We stayed by Stormi's car for another 90 minutes, until 2:30AM. AAA called us twice and told us each time that they were unable to find a single person anywhere in the area that could tow the car. The AAA agent we spoke to let us know that we could have them perform an "unattended tow", where we could leave the keys with the vehicle and the tow truck driver would tow it without us having to stay there.

At this point I made the executive decision to head to the hotel anyway, since the AAA agent told us that the "unattended tow" procedure was possible, and since it would be 4:00AM or later by the time we arrived (and I was rapidly losing my ability to drive safely without falling asleep at the wheel).

Stormi and I arrived at the hotel around 4:30AM and both of us crashed pretty hard. While we were sleeping, AAA called Stormi's phone twice, asking if she "still needed service". At this point around 14 hours had passed since the initial claim with AAA had been made, and they were still passing the claim around internally, wondering if the car still needed to be towed (despite the claim clearly stating the vehicle was disabled on the shoulder of an interstate highway).

We called AAA three more times at this point, and were told twice that they were unable to tell us any more details - not even a time estimate for how long it would take to tow the car. On the third call, I had to repeatedly request to be transferred to a higher-up manager in order to talk to anyone even remotely helpful. Almost 24 hours had passed since the initial claim was made with AAA. Finally, during this 9th call, we talked with a manager who was able to actually find someone to drive out with a tow truck and investigate.

When the tow truck driver arrived, they called and told us the car was gone. Nowhere to be found.

Due to AAA's gross negligence of the issue, Stormi's car has either been stolen or impounded, and we have no idea where it is. She's stranded here in Chicago and she won't have a place to sleep in a couple of days.

More worryingly, had I not been able to rescue her, Stormi also could have been stranded on the shoulder of an interstate highway in freezing temperatures for over 24 hours.

At this point, even if the car is able to be found at an impound yard, Stormi won't be able to afford the cost of the impound fees and new tires for her car so that she can make it home.

Stormi really needs help. She needs to get back home. She needs to not be abandoned on the streets of Chicago. The streets are not the right place for anyone to live.

I'm reaching out to gather some funding for her to cover the best-case scenario, which is:

The important piece here is the time sensitivity. Our hotel reservation is only through Sunday night; we have to leave this upcoming Monday (6th December) by 11:00AM.

There is unfortunately also a chance that the car has been completely stolen. If that's the case, Stormi would need to rent a rental car in order to drive home - but then she will also need enough money to buy a different car once she gets there, since she'll need to be able to buy food and necessities for herself in order to survive.

Please feel free to send me a message with your questions or concerns, or if you have any potential leads on how we might go about finding Stormi's car. You can reach me like this:

Thank you very much for your time and generosity.