Not My Day

What started out to as a possibly adventurous day quickly turned into the worst day I’ve had in quite a long time.

I was offered a job assignment working with a new company with a rather large client.   I had to visit 20 different locations, do a survey, and snap some pictures.  The catch was that none of the jobs were in any areas near where I live.  The closest location was about a half hour away, but the majority of the locations were at least an hour away.  Certain locations had to be visited in the morning, and of course, those locations were spread out.  The area I was visiting didn’t have an abundance of signs, so I got lost several times.  I wasted so much time wandering around, trying to figure out where the heck I was.  And trying to make a U-turn was impossible.  I don’t know what the people who live there have against U-turns, but every light I came to seemed to have a “No U-turn” sign, which made it even harder to figure out where I needed to go.  Then, when I did find one of the locations I needed to visit, of course I wasn’t in the correct lane.  Since I was at a stoplight, I decided to pull into the left turning lane, which had an arrow at the signal.  I wrongly assumed the arrow would turn green and I wouldn’t be blocking the lane I had been in.  The officer who pulled me over didn’t sympathize and gave me a ticket for impeding traffic, which meant that now I was basically working for free, because the money I was making from the job would now be going to pay my ticket.  I was polite to her and kindly asked her to please give me a warning, but she didn’t care.  I started crying, and when she came back for me to sign the ticket, she seemed like she felt bad doing so.  Good.  She should feel bad.  She should feel very, very, very bad.  Because she basically ruined my day.  She ended up asking me if I needed a few minutes, and when I said I did, she advised me to do so because she didn’t want me go get into an accident.  I called Del to tell him the bad news, and he could tell something was wrong.  He thought I’d had an accident.  He wasn’t too happy about the ticket, though.

But it doesn’t just end there.  Oh no, it gets better.  About an hour later, when I was leaving a location, guess what happened?  I was basically backing out of the parking space in an almost empty parking lot, when I hear a loud CRUNCHING sound and feel impact.  Oh, yes, the only other car in the parking lot apparently decided to back out at the same time I did, in the exact same spot.  Honestly, I don’t know what the person was doing.  He was just arriving at the location and trying to pull into a spot, but his car was at a 45 degree angle from where it should have been.  The good news is that there was barely any damage.  I got a couple of small scratches on my car below the bumper, and a few scrapes on top of the bumper.  He had a busted light cover, but the light bulb was still in tact.  I think it was his fault because I was trying to drive as carefully as I could, especially since I was still shaken by getting that ticket. 

I’m planning to file a Trial By Written Declaration, which I found is my right after doing some research on the internet.  It basically means I can do a trial through the mail, instead of having to make an appearance in court.  From what I’ve read, officers schedule court dates on their days off, and they get paid overtime (somewhere in the area of $200 – $300 in my state) to show up to court.  The officer who issued my ticket told me I had the option to appear in court, but smugly added, “But I’ll definitely show up.”  Well, of course she would.  I would, too, if I was getting $300.  So now, unless my case gets dismissed, I’ll be out about $200-$250.  I know.  Merry Christmas, huh?