There is indeed such a thing as internet addiction. I should know, I’ve been going through withdrawal. First my internet service provider was acting screwy and now I’m just flat out without internet at home. The computer at my mom’s office said “I Quit” and did not bother to give her two weeks written notice either. As a result, my mother has taken my desktop to her office since it still had some of the programs she uses on it. It was actually a shared computer until I inherited it. In the mean time Joana has no internet access at home. You see, where we live it’s dial-up, satellite, or nothing. She has AOL and since I have a screen name already I just use that. Well, I don’t really like AOL but it’s a step up from People PC. Either way, I refuse to put their software on my laptop though so I have to go without internet for a while. Sucks to be me.

So when I want to use the internet I’ve been forced to drive into town and use various free hotspots. Pain in the butt I tell you. I don’t know how much longer I’m going to be dealing with this sporadic internet usage, but in the mean time my posts will be lengthy and sort of random. There have been some interesting things happening in my life and rather than make a new entry for each one I’ve condensed them all into one post. So here we go:

May 11, 2009

I mentioned in the previous post that a relative of mine had passed away recently and that the Rosary was being held on Sunday evening. Turned out that was incorrect. We were given the wrong day and the Rosary was actually held Monday evening. My great aunt and uncle were, apparently, incredibly put out that they drove all the way to Anthony, TX for the service on the wrong day. Mind you, they got the information for the service from someone else and not from the immediate family of the deceased. So, upon finding out that the Rosary (Rosario, Wake, whatever) was actually on Monday evening they were miffed and refused to attend. Their excuse was that they were prepared to attend on Sunday and it was too much of an inconvenience to drive out again. Never mind the fact that the incorrect information was their fault since they didn’t bother to actually call someone in the immediate family or look it up in the paper. They just heard by word of mouth and ran with it.

But then hey, this is the same woman who is still trying to sell my great-grandmother’s house and the farmland surrounding it. I mean really, what can you expect from someone who has no regard for family history and only worries about remodeling their home to keep up with the Jones?

May 13, 2009

Texas has the most inefficient court system I have ever seen or heard of! If Texas officials are complaining about heavy case loads in the lower courts that primarily handle vehicular offenses, well they only have themselves to blame! In New Mexico, it has been my experience that, should you decide to contest a ticket, you appear in court on the date stated on the citation. If the officer doesn’t appear, it’s dismissed. If they appear, then you plead your case before the judge. It can get thrown out, changed to a warning, or you loose – whatever. But the fact remains, it’s all taken care of that same day.

Not in Texas.

In case you’re wondering, the ticket I’m contesting is the one that was issued to me back in February when I had that accident. Yeah, I’m still going through the process of contesting it. My first court date was set back on March 20th which was about a month after the incident. When I appeared in court I was given three options:

1. Plead guilty or nolo contendo and pay the ticket at the cashier.
2. Go before a judge, plead nolo contendo and take a driving class. Upon completion, the ticket will be removed from my record. Got to pay $110 for the class though.
3. Plead not guilty and be given a new court date.

You can guess which option I chose. Now, I had an idea that this wasn’t going to be a one-step process. When I was issued the citation the officer advised me to contest the ticket and informed me that when I went to court, I would need to say that I plead not guilty and they would give me a new court date. Considering the reason I had the accident was because I was trying to avoid a jerk that swerved into me, yeah I was going to contest it. The officer stated that the majority of the time citations for vehicular accidents get dismissed because the other party involved doesn’t have to appear and generally doesn’t since their vehicle is usually fixed by the time the court date comes around. In my case, she didn’t see anything, they moved our vehicles so the officer couldn’t “witness” anything either. In my situation it would be stupid not to contest this ticket, right?

I’m not so sure anymore. I went into court on the 13th of May thinking this was going to all be over now. It’s my second court date, we’ll get this done and I can get on with my life. Boy was I mistaken. It was a “pretrial” and so all the judge did was give us three options:

1. Plead guilty or nolo contendo and pay the ticket at the cashier.
2. Go before a judge, plead nolo contendo and take a driving class. Upon completion, the ticket will be removed from my record. Got to pay $110 for the class though.
3. Plead not guilty and be given a new court date.

Hmm, sound familiar? If you chose option three, as I did, you could choose to have a bench trial or a trial by jury. I went with bench trial and so they’ll contact me with a new court date.

As I said, Texas has the most inefficient system I have ever seen. What could be taken care in one go is instead just dragged out beyond belief. It’s a no wonder there’s a heavy backlog in the courts.

Also, do you recall me mentioning how mailing addresses of those who are issued citations are sold to local lawyers so that they can solicit you to death? It’s true! Your name goes into the system and then the lawyers all send you mailings advertising their services. After that, they just keep bombarding you with adverts for all of their services. To the point, I have never seen so many people opt to have a lawyer handle their citations before. Before that day, I think I might have seen one maybe two people take that route. There were about six or seven lawyers there that day representing folks and all of them had more than one client who was on the docket. Crazy!

Of course, considering how Texas operates, I’m not surprised folks go that route. Then again, maybe that’s why they drag the procedure out so much. More money for the lawyers who pay to receive the lists of those who have received a citation. Win, win, win.

May 14, 2009

Speaking of that car accident, I finally get to get Pyro fixed! One of my mom’s friends picked the car up and was going to start working on it. He has to look for parts and he wouldn’t actually be able to start until this week, but Pyro is finally going to get fixed and I’ll be able to drive it on the street without sweating a ticket for having a popped up hood and smashed front light. It took a while to save up enough money for this sadly. But hey, as soon as Pyro is fixed I’ll have my own mode of transportation back. More frequent internet usage that way, assuming the computer trouble isn’t solved by then. It’s just a good thing I’m not the type to splurge on things like travel insurance or even just frequent flier miles, or hotel points. There is no way I’d put any of it to use this summer.

There’s more that’s been going on that I could blog about, but right now, I think that’s the most important bits. That and this post is getting a wee-bit long. Back with more at a later date!