cindy's world

I received the official decision letter regarding my parking ticket hearing the other day. The best part of the 2-page findings and quotes of relevant statutes:

While there appears to be a sign posted indicating a DASH bus stop, the sign is not in conformity with The California Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices (CAMUTCD), which are the uniform standards and specifications for all traffic control devices adopted by the state in compliance with California Vehicle Code Section 21400. The DASH sign that is posted is meant for pedestrians rather than motorists. At minimum a red border is required, and without curb paint, a bus stop sign needs to set for the area where it applies so that vehicles know where they can and cannot park. There apparently was no paint or stencil on the curb to indicate that the area was a bus stop, and there still is no stencil on the curb. I therefore find the Respondent Not Liable for the citation. A refund shall issue in the amount set forth above within 30 days of this decision letter.

I received my $278 refund check from the City of Los Angeles only days later and no, it’s not an I.O.U. I’m surprised by the negativity from some that I got after my win, belittling comments like “How did you get a refund, did you prove you weren’t the person that parked your car illegally?” and “Cool, next time I park in downtown and get a ticket I can use a camera to fight the parking ticket.” Please, like I had no grounds to create my “well-presented case,” which was how the hearing officer described my argument, exhibits and declaration! Even Mr. W had little faith in me, suggesting before the hearing that I change my defense to claiming I wasn’t there, period, that the ticket was erroneous in identifying my vehicle, and saying that “ignorance of the law is not an excuse.” I wasn’t ignorant of the LAW, the LAW was not posted! My defense wasn’t that I didn’t know I wasn’t supposed to park at a bus stop, it was that it was the most invisible bus stop, ever! And the City eventually agreed with me, so there.

It really seemed like a magical special-treatment day starting from my drive to Downtown Los Angeles, which I normally avoid like I dodge kiwi (which, if you know me, is an impressive amount of dodging). The weather was great, not too hot, bright but overcast, and the 50 mile drive which I gave myself almost 2 hours to do, knowing the infamy of LA traffic, only took an hour. The information letter told me the hearing office is located in the Los Angeles Mall underground, which was completely unfamiliar to me. I pulled into an underground parking lot labeled “Los Angeles Mall” despite the navigation system telling me I was a block too early for my destination address. I didn’t find parking and accidentally circled back out to the exit, which presented another problem as I read the sign saying that cash payment was required upon exit. I asked the guy manning the exit booth very nicely if this is the correct parking lot for where I was going, and he said it was and to go one floor up once I park. I then said I’d exited accidentally, how do I get back into the parking area? He said he’d help me out, walked out of the booth and across to the other side of my car, and unchained a roped off part of the parking lot. He waved me in. Wow! I felt so VIP as I waved, thanking him.

Since I was so early, I wandered in the grungy open-air mall and looked for an ATM so that I could withdraw cash to pay for parking upon my exit. I eventually wandered into a drugstore and bought a travel-sized contact lens solution kit, which I will need for my upcoming weekend in Florida, anyway. I then used my ATM card and got cashback. Then I checked in for my hearing at the ticket hearing office, tucked between a storefront and a restaurant, 20 minutes early.

The lady behind the counter in the lobby seemed accustomed to dealing with rude idiots. This was a ticket dispute office, after all. I walked up and started writing my name on the sign-in board. She walked to the window and I smiled at her. She didn’t smile back as she demanded, “You got an appointment?”
“Yes, for 11 o’clock,” I said pleasantly.
“Do you have your appointment letter?” I handed it to her from the manila folder I held in my hands, which contained a copy of all documents I sent and received involving this ticket, plus a new 13-page declaration with 19 photos showing the unpainted curb before and the painted curb now. Without looking at the page I handed her, she simply flipped it over and shoved it back at me, saying flatly, “Sign and date at the bottom.”
I looked down at my signature and date on the bottom, a little confused. Could she not see that? I handed it back to her and she made no motion to take it. I think she may have repeated herself. I said politely, “I already did.”
“Oh!” she looked down finally. “Oh, I’m sorry!” she said. She was a lot nicer after that. I guess unlike most people she deals with on the job, I can read and follow written instructions.

Alone in the lobby/waiting room, I flipped through a magazine until soon, the door opened and a very normal-looking, unintimidating man in his 40s in a dress shirt, slacks and a tie stepped out, calling my name. I smiled and stood, he waved me in, and I followed him to a uniformed officer who did a security check on me with a metal wand and a manual weapons check in my purse. He then pointed me into a small office where the first man sat behind a desk which took up half the closet-sized space.

The man introduced himself, pointed out that this hearing is being tape-recorded and gestured to the old-fashioned cassette tape player on his desk, and I was comforted by the smile I saw in his pleasant eyes. He recited the ticket number and pertinent ticket information, then told me that he’s read the documentation I’d sent in previously, reviewed the attached photos, and it seems like there isn’t much for me to say here, that the issue is simply whether the bus sign is sufficient enough to indicate that this is a no-parking bus zone. I wasn’t sure what he meant by that, but I took it as, he’s announcing I have an uphill battle.
I started by telling him that I have additional evidence to support my point. I’d returned to the scene of the ticket yesterday to take better photos, ones that depicted the exact intersection with street names shown, in case there was any doubt I was photographing a different area. He seemed unconcerned about that. I pulled out my 13-page declaration with new photos attached, and told him that I saw yesterday that the curb is now painted red. His eyes widened just for a second in surprise as he said, “Oh!” I took the opportunity to give my interpretation of the change, which is that this is the City’s acknowledgment of fault, that they knew the bus stop as it was at the time I received the ticket was insufficiently marked to tell people they can’t park there. I went through my new photos, organized into corresponding groups of befores-and-afters, pointed out the photo numbers as I explained what was depicted and what I think it all meant. He looked carefully at the photos I’d pointed to, murmured how thorough I was, and I thought I caught a hint of distaste in his voice as he noted that even with the new curb, no “stencils” were done on the curb. I said that as it is, I may still never know that it’s a bus stop, but at least I would know not to park there, and pointed out all the cars unwittingly parked along the curb in my “before” photos and how the entire street is now clear in the “after” photos.
As I finished my 3-minute presentation, he smiled at me and said, “I was leaning toward you, anyway — the sign ‘Dash’ doesn’t say anything about a bus and like you said, no marked curb, no stencils, no bus bench.”
I said I would’ve been fine if the acronym “Dash” were even spelled out so that I’d know it was referring to a bus. I didn’t think people who didn’t live in this city, and I live in deep south Orange County (he laughed), would know instinctively what “Dash” referred to.
“I don’t think it’s an acronym, is it? I don’t believe it stands for anything that has to do with public transportation.” I was surprised at this, but heck, it makes my point even better. “I’m not in the habit of proclaiming my decisions at the hearings, you’re to get your results in the mail, and this isn’t guaranteed because we’ll need to review your evidence afterwards, but basically, you had me at hello.”
I smiled gratefully and he smiled back.
He continued, “Very well-presented evidence, clean, clear, good presentation, it looks like you put in a lot of work, but it’s always better to be more prepared than not prepared enough. I’m sorry you had to come all the way down here, unless you work in this area and you’re going right back to work.”
“I don’t work in the area, but I took the entire day off because LA traffic is unpredictable.”
He nodded in agreement and approval, and took my new declaration and photos and placed them in my file. I thanked him for his time, shook his hand, and he told me to look for good news in the mail. 😀

When I drove out of the parking lot, I was so happy that I didn’t even care it cost me $10 to park there for an hour. I was getting my $300 back! The parking attendant very nicely greeted me, asked if I’d like a receipt, wished me a great day, gave me a big smile. I thanked him and smiled back.

I think makeup, dressing respectably and respectfully (to show that I take this seriously) helps, as does an unassuming attitude. I’m sure plenty of people walk in with a chip on their shoulders and already swinging their arsenal; I work in public service, too and most people aren’t happy to be in court, either. I was careful to not even disclose I work in the public sector, and I was happy I didn’t even need to throw names of judges and sheriffs around to get special treatment.

The time has come when offspring have moved from my peripheral awareness into directly touching my life. Yet unexisting children put their tiny fingers on me questioningly, unintrusively but unmistakeably. I suppose it’s inevitable; all those weddings we’d attended the past few years have to yield something, somewhere. The first baby in my close circle is due to arrive in November, borne to my cousin Diana and her husband Doug, who got married only months behind us. Her mother is giddy with anticipation of her first grandchild, and my mother is excited and envious. Mom treads carefully on the baby issue, so as not to annoy me, but she did ask a few weeks ago whether we’d given any more consideration to making some pretty Eurasian kidlets for her to play with. I don’t remember my response, but I’m sure it was something noncommital and uninformative, because no further conversation on the topic followed. Soon after that, Mr. W’s daughter (who’d moved in with us to start her first year in a local college) brought up at the dinner table, “So have you guys talked any more about having a baby?” She looked at the both of us, her eyes hopeful.
I laughed it off. “You really want to babysit.”
She said, not letting me off the hook, “Yeah, I really do! So have you?”
“Well, not really…” I looked to her dad for help.
He said, struggling a bit, “Well, we’ve sort of talked about it…”
“Nothing serious,” I added. She nodded and dropped it.

The first baby among my peer group of friends is due to arrive in about a month. I’m excited for them, and the mother is someone whom I’ve always admired. She’s smart, grounded, practical, kind, and has a strong sense of judgment without being closed-minded or inflexible. I think she’d be a great mom. Her pregnancy so far, described in her own words, has been “uneventful.” The classic symptoms of nausea, pain, and severe weight gain all seem to have evaded her. Aside from feeling big and more sluggish than usual, she’s handling her first pregnancy like a breeze. My cousin’s pregnancy has been uncomplicated, as well, and when I had dinner with her some months ago, she’d said she didn’t feel much different. No crazy mood swings, either. This makes me feel better about being pregnant. Of course, I have yet to hear the labor stories. The only immediate labor commentary I’d ever gotten was from my friend Erin, whom I’d met after she was already pretty far along her pregnancy. She’d called me the afternoon of her first baby’s birth — I was out in Huntington Beach with friends after I’d just gotten through a 5K race — and told me the good news, saying, “Labor’s no joke, Cindy.”

And now, a coworker approximately my age is pregnant. She had been trying with her husband without success for years. They visited a reputable local-ish reproductive clinic, fertilized a bunch of her eggs with his sperm, and selected one for implantation. Her uterus is too small for the usual 3-egg implantation, her doctor said about the very petite coworker. They didn’t want to risk complications if she were to have 3 successful fetuses. So they did the one…and the egg split on its own. She’s having identical twins anyway! How cute is that story? She’s being carefully monitored so she’ll be fine.

My reporter’s sister-in-law also went through the same clinic with her husband, my reporter’s brother. They’re both slightly older for having their first child — she being in her late 30s or early 40s, his being in his mid-to-late 40s. Standard impregnation methods (how clinical am *I*?) have not worked, but after only months of “treatment” with this clinic, she is now pregnant, too.

I’ll get to hear lots of stories of people’s experiences before I make up my mind. It’s the best way to make an educated decision, and to take the best courses of action given my personal rather difficult circumstances. It just seems like it’s not a “convenient” time to be pregnant, though. There’s still some traveling we want to do in the very near future, and I’d like to stay active. But let’s face it — none of us are getting any younger. I suppose a child isn’t a matter of convenience anyway, it’s an act of love. Or carelessness.

Instructions:
1) Come here in the morning, before the mood for the day has been set.
2) Turn on your computer speakers.
3) Click ‘play,’ below.

(“So Systematic” by David Choi ~ I’m a big fan.)

Yesterday evening, Mr. W and I visited my parents and Aunt Jessica (who was also visiting at their house) and took them out to a newish Japanese restaurant near their house for dinner. It’s noteworthy that my aunt ate raw fish for the first time in many years, because she still swears that the last time she had raw fish, she felt parasites crawling around inside her chest. (:/) I found out over dinner conversation that my mother regularly checks my blog’s image hosting site for photos. YIKES. I must’ve stupidly neglected to delete my history when using my mom’s laptop. This is quite a disturbing revelation, cuz you guys know the photos I post here. =P I wonder what my face looked like when my mother made the comment that the photo of the sashimi platter we ordered at Yama Sushi looked good. Thank goodness she doesn’t have this blog address. (I hope.) After dinner, we sat around my parents’ kitchen table having tea, and my dad and aunt mentioned that one of their Canadian brothers (the only member of the family to have a phD, I might mention), believes all scientific evidence suggests that the world will end in 2012. I did not enjoy that conversation. Seeing the discomfort in my face, my Aunt Jessica said, “Lemme tell you what kind of person your uncle is, Cindy. Remember when he came down from Canada for Grandma’s funeral in ’99? He believed THEN that the world was going to end in 2004, and sold his property in Florida because he didn’t see the point of owning land when it was all going to be gone in a few years, anyway. And here we are in 2009 and the world hasn’t ended. Also, when we were younger, he was so mean, he tied a string to a tree and he had the other end, to mess with your cousins –”
“No,” my dad interrupted, “That was ME.”
“That was YOU?!” my aunt asked my dad incredulously. What? What?
Then my dad told the story about how their eldest sister’s two boys (who are now in their 40s) were spoiled brats as children, so he’d decided to teach them a lesson. They were all sitting around the table chatting one day, much like we were that night, no one knowing that my dad had rigged a tree outside by tying a long fishing string to a branch by the front of the house, winding the string along the outside of the house and in through the screen window, and tied the other end to his foot. And then my dad asked, “Is there a ghost here? If you’re here, tap the house one time.” He moved his foot under the table, and the tree banged against the wooden door out front. The boys looked up in alarm. And then they said it was a coincidence. My dad ordered the powers that be, “If you ARE a ghost, pound on the door THREE TIMES!” And the door banged three distinct times. My aunt remembers the boys hysterically crying.
“I can’t believe that was YOU!” my aunt said.
“You knew about that?” my dad asked.
“Yeah, I saw broken string outside the next day so I knew it was trick, but all these years I thought it was our older brother. Did you ever tell the boys it was really you with a string that night?”
“Not to this day,” my dad gloated.
The conversation then went into all the horror and disturbing stories inflicted on us in our childhood by our older relatives, and the psychological scars they left. Stories with such characters as giant man-eating apes, hopping zomboid dead bodies out for revenge, tigers disguised as old grandmas eating little girls’ fingers. My aunt Jessica was afraid to look up into a tree at night for YEARS. I wouldn’t let her tell me why, because I really don’t have room on my plate right now to be scared of looking up into trees. As for the cruel joke my dad played on my cousins? It came back on me. I can’t write all the disturbing crap the younger of the two boys fed into my head when I was growing up. Over about a gallon’s worth of tea, we had some good laughs at the absurdity of my dad’s side of the family.

Somehow I found myself involved in a Lakers vs. Magic wager with some Orlando friends last week. At the time, although both the Lakers and Magic were doing well in their games, it was still up in the air who would be involved in the finals. As of this weekend, it became official. All I can say is, I’d better not have to walk around wearing a Magic bikini.

I wish I were more interesting. Sorry. Maybe I’ll start making up stuff to post.

Some people (me) have tanlines…

…and some people don’t.

I’m home, brown as a berry. But after examining the photos, I’m surprised at how even my tan is not. I guess this is why people lay out naked from day 1, and not from day 5 like I did. Maybe I’ll post a photo of me that caught a topless sunbather in the background, because I’m kind to my friends James and Dwaine like that.

Ich bin verloren.

Und ich frage mich, ob ich die nur ein bin, die irgendetwas vermisst.