Stupid Cops!
Posted
Friday, May 02, 2008 10:49 AM
Okay, if you are a cop or you're married to a cop, you might not want to read this blog entry.
Grrr! I got a parking ticket in front of my house! Here's the story:
I usually park in the driveway at our home. I almost always get home from work after my husband, who parks on the street. Dumb luck happened yesterday and I got home from work before my husband AND it was trash day. Those two things combined resulted in me getting a ticket.
You can't get the trash bin up the driveway if there is a car parked in it. Chris is usually home first so he drags the trash bin up the driveway before I get home. Since I beat him home, and yesterday was trash day, I couldn't pull my car into the driveway until I pulled the trash bin up.
It's a super pain in the butt to turn a car around on our street (to face the other direction for parking on the street) because it's narrow and cars park on both sides of the street. When I come home from work my house is on the left, so to park on the street I have to turn my car around so I can be facing the opposite direction. Make sense so far? It's never a problem because I usually park in the driveway.
Well I had my water aerobics class in about a half an hour and I had to leave facing the opposite direction in which you're supposed to park your car on the street, but it was the same direction in which I come home from work. So I just pulled in front of my house and parked with my car facing the wrong way, so I could easily just leave for the gym. For just 30 minutes.
I changed, grabbed my gym bag, and headed out to my car. I saw a cop car parked on the street, but I don't live in the greatest area of town so I didn't assume it was there for me. I got in my car and started it when some cop comes running up to my car.
"Hold on, I'm writing you a ticket," she said.
"What for?"
"Parking on the wrong side of the street."
"I'm in front of my own house. I just did it for a couple of minutes. It's very inconvenient to turn your car around on this street for just a couple of minutes."
"You should have parked in your driveway."
"It's trash day, I can't pull the trash bin up if my car is in the driveway."
"Well," she said, "I already started writing the ticket. I would have let it go if I hadn't already started writing it."
So I'm sitting there waiting for her to finish writing this ticket, super pissed because if the ticket isn't written and on my windshield by the time I return to my car, it should be her loss. So I said, "My front door is wide open. Could you really not have just knocked on my door and let me know my car isn't allowed to park like that? I would have immediately moved it. It's not like I'm in front of some building downtown or something."
"Nope, it's the law and you should know the law as a licensed driver. Doesn't matter if it's in front of just a residence."
Ugh, I just wanted to punch her. Seriously lady, you're in this neighborhood, there is probably a robbery happening a few blocks over, go deal with something more important than my freaking car which isn't inconveniencing or threatening anyone at all.
Even better, as I'm getting this ticket, all my neighbors are outside because it was gorgeous, and these are all the jackasses who park their cars the opposite way for DAYS AT A TIME and here I am getting a ticket for it even though I just did it for the first time since last year and for only 30 minutes! I was livid. Ooh, I'm getting all mad even now just writing about it.
I can't believe people are flying down main roads at 80 miles an hour, running red lights, and driving without insurance, never ever getting pulled over, and I'm getting a $35 ticket for parking my car in front of my own house the "wrong" way (which by the way, I lived in Pittsburgh for 4 years and it's totally legal to do that there).
So I'm super hating the Dayton Police Force right now. Seriously, I'm not out of line thinking that something this minor should require just a warning first. Had she given me a warning, I'd never park my car that way again. What, does she think she's teaching me some lesson by automatically giving me a ticket? Getting the ticket pisses me off to the point where now I actually want to break the law, considering real offenses never seem to be noticed anyway.