Monday, August 18, 2008

Revenge of the Money Pit

Remember that old movie "The Money Pit" about the house that ended up becoming a deep canyon of money sucking misery?
I am currently living the sequel to that movie, where the house is reincarnated (after being burned to death) into a car. Sounds like the Chucky series, actually.
I have previously mentioned my disgusting story of ticket issues.
Well, my appeal was finally denied, and my bond was forfeit to the court. I did feel some relief, however, that it was over.
Dun dun DUN!
Not over.
Got a notice from Municipal Services Bureau on Saturday for two more tickets.
You can imagine my stages of grief.
First, denial: "Yeah right. This must be a repeat of what I've already paid."
Then, doubt: Today I broke down and called the Kaneohe district court.
Then, annoyance: 15 minutes of "discussion" finally led to me demanding to know exactly which tickets had been paid, and which had not, and did my actions of filling out several items of paperwork, three trips to Kaneohe District Court, and several hundreds of dollars flung in their general direction do NOTHING to merit at least a list of infractions?
Then, anger: Not only do I have two more tickets outstanding (currently in residence with the collections agency), I have THREE. The woman refused to go over tickets that were closed with me because it would "take too much time." I finally wrestled a number of total tickets issued to the vehicle, something I've asked for before from at least 5 different people at the court, and only now am I finally hearing the number NINE. I only have to explain 4 times to this woman that I cannot look up this information on-line because I am not in possession of any case numbers because I am not in possession of any tickets.
And I say this again, not because I am unable to remember saying it already, but because I am unable to process how this can be possible, but why is it that every time I asked these people exactly how many tickets I had and how much I had to pay that I did not get the correct answer until now? Now that I have yet two more tickets against my record and credit report and one on its way? I suppose I should have taken the worker I spoke to in March at his word when I asked him if this was all. He said, "Ummmmm, I think so."
Nine tickets to a vehicle not posing any sort of threat to the general population. Only to Pam, because it is still sitting in her driveway (so of course she will not see a cent of this money). And a threat to my general well being, because I am just sick, sick, sick of looking at it. Did I mention that a bill for insurance came in the mail last week?
This story just seems like some crazy fantasy to me. Really. It sounds like something that should be happening in one of those Big Brother post-apocalypse government takeover kind of movies. Like, "This totalitarian government issues tickets without proper notice and makes you pay them! And there's nothing you can do about it!"
The last stage of grief is not acceptance. It is a gut wrenching stress of hatred for Kaneohe District Court and their law-abiding officers.

5 comments:

Testing said...

This is CRAZY! Where are all these mysterious tickets coming from if the car is always in the driveway?

Jesse said...

Except when some haole is almost beaten to death, or a car window broken, by punks they know somehow and nothing whatsoever happens. Not to stoke the flames, but the Honolulu police department is a piece of crap. I am very indignant for you. I can't believe that you have to pay for nine tickets that you never even knew you got, for the same thing. I think you should write a letter to someone in charge, or to a newspaper, or something. Surprisingly, these sometimes work. There are plenty of real problems in Hawaii that are not being dealt with, that it's hard to see this treatment as anything but grossly unfair.

Mariko said...

Sorry I didn't clarify, Lindsey. I wrote a ridiculously long post before about this incidence. This is only the latest report. The car was sitting on the side of the road (before we moved it to Pam's garage after we received 1 of the 9 tickets the department says we have) and has expired tags because we can't get current tags until the car is fixed. And the car. is. not. fixed. BLEGH.
And Jesse, I did seriously consider writing to the Advertiser about this, especially in light of the current story where the police officer stood by in the case of assault on a woman, but I'm pretty sure they'd laugh at me. I mean, I'm not denying that I have an expired tags vehicle. I'm just flabbergasted that no one had the decency to check if we had realized that we were being given tickets. Or the decency to tell me they were on my record once I started calling the court.

Unknown said...

I can't believe they didn't tell you and THEN they decide to tell you when you haven't paid. HELLO! You never got the tickets in the first place! This whole thing is so silly and I would be so mad and you know what, I'm really mad for you! Maybe that will help take some of the "madness" off your shoulders! Good luck with everything!!

cailin said...

Okay, you and me, baby. We're gonna go into the ranting business cause I swear there has to be a way to get paid for all this grief.