Or.. something like that! So yes, in a manner of speaking I donated $100 of my hard earned money to the Alachua County & Waldo County police department for the most ridiculous circumstance ever but hey... I gotta figure out how to turn this frown upside-down!
So hmm.... you may be thinking to yourself (or mid google) 'where the heck is Alachua county?? Well my dear friends, in the heart of the place hated by every Seminole around... Gainesville, FL. I ask you... what is there to like in Gainesville Florida? The Gay-tors? No. The thriving metropolis? No. The #1 city for issued speeding tickets in the country? No. Tim Tebow? Maybe... but technically he is from outside of Jacksonville, so we'll call that a wash. Either way.. nothing good comes out of Gainesville, Florida or the University of Florida for that matter.. haha. ;)
So yes, a few months ago I got pulled over for speeding, and the cop issued me a ticket (while asking me for my phone number) at the lesser offense of 'driving with the expiration date on my tag covered'. So I'm thinking to myself I got off good on this one right? Wrong. Turns out ol' boy missed the 5 or so meetings the Alachua Co. Tax Collectors office has had with the Waldo P.D. informing them of the increase in citation fees issued by the state. A little known fact Judy of the Alachua Co. Tax Dept. clued me in on... Who are these cops in Waldo anyway?
Back to the story, homeboy wrote $104 on my ticket, which I promptly sent in the money, and figured that was the end of it... but oh was I wrong. Turns out, I get a nasty gram towards the end of May saying that 'While the Cops and the Tax Comm do not have the authority to lower your ticket, the Officer made a mistake, and you actually owe a difference of $50.00'. WTF mate? When does this happen? Wait... your covering for a Cop making a mistake? I thought they were 'THE LAW'. Whatever... so I send in ANOTHER $50.00 check to the luscious Alachua Co. and call it a day. About a week later I get a notice, mind you we are in the 1st week of June by now, that if I did not pay the ticket by the end of May, my license would be suspended on June 15th. Well thanks for the prompt timing guys, but I mailed that check off a week ago... so I threw the letter away and went on about my day.
This past Sunday I was racing to do an Ocean swim with the Hammerheads when I got pulled over, for admittedly speeding. (Hey, I can admit when I do speed now..) told the cop I was sorry, knew I was speeding, blah blah.. he told me he'd let me go with a warning bc I was heading to the beach to swim (Love Duval cops btw!!) And took my license and registration as protocol.
WAH-MO! This is where it gets interesting. He comes back to my car 'Mam, did you know you were driving on an expired license?' Como what? Come again??!! 'Yeah, it seems your license was suspended on the 25th of June. Oh hell no... So yes, I got to get in my workout and being Sunday, fume about the fact that BOTH checks has cleared my bank account to the Lush-Alach (who will from here on out be referred to as the Snatchawah (cause they snatch your money).
So I was eyeball deep in work on Monday, and had to drive to a market work-with with the song 'Wanted, Dead or Alive' in my head for the rest of the day... but was finally able to deal with Snatch on Tuesday.
Judy and I became great phone friends throughout the day as I called about every hour on the hour because see, the computers had been down since Monday morning.. and there was absolutely nothing they could do to even investigate/clear me of whatever seemed to be the problem. I would later learn, that the reason my license was suspended was because EVEN THOUGH I paid what I was instructed to pay well within the 30 day window, the BALANCE, that I didn't even know existed, wasn't paid within the 30 day window. (Well no duh, I didn't know about it) So my license was suspended, further more... no notice was given, and it was suspended 16 days after they received payment... GREAT. Judy was no dice on trying to help me out with the clearly 'I got screwed' situation... so $100 later ($23 late fee, $47 suspension lift fee, $15 dollars in processing fees, and $15 to get a new license- cause the cop took my old one) I am now back in business, legal to drive, and provided at least 1 Cop a few extra hours on payroll.
As I learn in the back draft of this situation, County offices are having meetings with Police Dept's and pulling Detectives that are normally on you know, important cases like Homicide, Drug Control, etc.. and having them go write tickets because revenue is down. Since revenue is down they have two options.. write more tickets, or people are going to get laid off... thus, you see where this is going. I think, if times were not as they are, it would have been very easy for Judy to lift the 'error' and wipe it clean, since all money was paid... but unfortunately, we don't live in those times right now.
I have to chalk this up as my Good Deed #2 for 2009... Good Deed #1 being helping a dude from the Dominican Republic who didnt speak A WORD of English, fill out his declarations forms for himself and 6 of his family members on the plane flight back from 4 days of ridiculousness, where all I wanted to do at 10am was sleep on the plane. Hey, we all help out where we can right? High five for Spanish retention!! hahaa..
Hopefully it'll come in handy in Spain... I leave in the morning to fly to Philly to pick up Jilly before we do the 'Atlantic Time Warp again' (cue Rocky Horror Picture Show!) and meet 3 other travelers for a 10 day adventure through SW France & Northern Spain. Holla! Wait, we're going to Spain.. so I guess we gotta elongate that 'o'... Hoooola ;)
Prost,
Jen
