![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
(as Celes would say...) Flagrant Suckage
I haven't been posting lately. Honestly, I haven't felt like it. Real life stress has been getting to me, and I just wanted to escape into friends-list and forget about that stuff here. Then I realized that I could use some advice/sympathy/vent-ilation. So here's a bit of that ucky RL stuff I was talking about.
Last month, I went to Merced. Before heading home, I checked the headlights. From inside the car, it seemed to me that they were too dim. My husband pointed out to me that we were in a well-lit parking lot, and I was used to driving in Yosemite in total darkness. So they were only relatively dim. Okay, great. Both headlights are in perfect working order.
I drive through intense fog (which I like about as much as a face full of sweaty ass) and then through a small but well-lit town. It seems as if I can't see a thing, but I figure I must just be tired. My back is cramping from being so tense for so long. I ask my husband if he would mind driving. My asking woke him up. So much for that idea.
Just outside of town, as we were commenting on how dark the night was, we got pulled over. Turns out our headlights got water in them from the fog (sweaty ass!) and one went out. After waiting for half an hour while the police checked our IDs for outstanding warrants, we were gifted with a fix-it ticket. The officer told me she would like to let me go, but I had passengers in the car and she had to put their safety first. [WTF!!??!]
When I asked why I had to sign a "promise to appear", she told me to ignore that part. She said that only applied if I wanted to contest the ticket. In which case we would both have to appear, first thing in the morning, after she had worked graveyard. She made it clear that she would appreciate it if I did not decide to appear. She said to just get the headlamp replaced as soon as possible, and get any law enforcement agent to sign off on it. She told me that the easiest way to handle it was to wait until I got more information from the court, and send a check to the court along with the cleared ticket.
[I won't bother telling you what a pain it was getting someone to sign off on the correction. Suffice it to say, I spent hours.]
There was no contact information on the ticket. It did not tell me how much the fine was or who to make a check out to. Nor did the officer know. I tried looking up the court's number in the phone book and calling for information, but I always got the same message. We are currently unavailable or you are calling outside our business hours of [when I'm at work]. Fuck off. I even tried calling on my lunch break, on a weekday, and got the same message. Finally, on February 9th, I got a notice in the mail with the information I needed. I wrote a check immediately and it went out in the next day's mail.
A few days later, I got a notice informing me that my $10 check was DUE Feb. 9th, and as it was a day late as determined by the postmark, I now owe them $348. THREE HUNDRED and forty eight dollars. I got this notice on my first weekday off from work this month. So I called and spoke to my first Real Live Person! I calmly asked her, WTF? She smoothly replied, "Suck my dick. The one I will purchase with your ridiculously inflated fine payment."
I now have a court date which will require me to get up before 6am on my day off [the court is over 50 miles away over snow-covered roads, which is why I didn't just go there and handle this shit weeks ago]. Watch me get thrown in jail for contempt of court. Or for blowing up the place.
Hmm... that could work...
Last month, I went to Merced. Before heading home, I checked the headlights. From inside the car, it seemed to me that they were too dim. My husband pointed out to me that we were in a well-lit parking lot, and I was used to driving in Yosemite in total darkness. So they were only relatively dim. Okay, great. Both headlights are in perfect working order.
I drive through intense fog (which I like about as much as a face full of sweaty ass) and then through a small but well-lit town. It seems as if I can't see a thing, but I figure I must just be tired. My back is cramping from being so tense for so long. I ask my husband if he would mind driving. My asking woke him up. So much for that idea.
Just outside of town, as we were commenting on how dark the night was, we got pulled over. Turns out our headlights got water in them from the fog (sweaty ass!) and one went out. After waiting for half an hour while the police checked our IDs for outstanding warrants, we were gifted with a fix-it ticket. The officer told me she would like to let me go, but I had passengers in the car and she had to put their safety first. [WTF!!??!]
When I asked why I had to sign a "promise to appear", she told me to ignore that part. She said that only applied if I wanted to contest the ticket. In which case we would both have to appear, first thing in the morning, after she had worked graveyard. She made it clear that she would appreciate it if I did not decide to appear. She said to just get the headlamp replaced as soon as possible, and get any law enforcement agent to sign off on it. She told me that the easiest way to handle it was to wait until I got more information from the court, and send a check to the court along with the cleared ticket.
[I won't bother telling you what a pain it was getting someone to sign off on the correction. Suffice it to say, I spent hours.]
There was no contact information on the ticket. It did not tell me how much the fine was or who to make a check out to. Nor did the officer know. I tried looking up the court's number in the phone book and calling for information, but I always got the same message. We are currently unavailable or you are calling outside our business hours of [when I'm at work]. Fuck off. I even tried calling on my lunch break, on a weekday, and got the same message. Finally, on February 9th, I got a notice in the mail with the information I needed. I wrote a check immediately and it went out in the next day's mail.
A few days later, I got a notice informing me that my $10 check was DUE Feb. 9th, and as it was a day late as determined by the postmark, I now owe them $348. THREE HUNDRED and forty eight dollars. I got this notice on my first weekday off from work this month. So I called and spoke to my first Real Live Person! I calmly asked her, WTF? She smoothly replied, "Suck my dick. The one I will purchase with your ridiculously inflated fine payment."
I now have a court date which will require me to get up before 6am on my day off [the court is over 50 miles away over snow-covered roads, which is why I didn't just go there and handle this shit weeks ago]. Watch me get thrown in jail for contempt of court. Or for blowing up the place.
Hmm... that could work...
no subject
Re:
I appreciate you listening, anyway. It really does help. :)
Re:
no subject
Tho I did crack up quite a bit (after getting over my shock; I'm so gullible sometimes) at the agent telling you to suck her dick.....
I can't imagine it's legal even for goverment agencies to charge 300+% in fees ... I would definitely take this to court. Judge Judy would surely be on your side .... guess this means no Grand Slam tho huh.
*snif* Fight them all the way to City Hall! I'm right behind you! *lifts pitchfork and torch*
no subject