Back in mid-October of 2002 Wholesale Josh Oliver Jersey , my husband Andy borrowed my Ford Taurus to drive to work. His truck was in the shop for the day, and since I stayed at home with our baby, I relinquished my car to him.
Andy's everyday route to work involves a short stint on the New York State Thruway, and the toll for this ride is twenty cents. Lucky for him, the benevolent Thruway Authority provides something they like to call E-Z Pass, wherein you place a sensor square on your windshield and are given permission to proceed through a special toll lane Wholesale Jawaan Taylor Jersey , sans human operator. A machine reads the sensor and charges your account, ostensibly saving the Capital Region's commuters time by allowing them to glide through the lane (at a leisurely 5 mph) without stopping. Andy has one of these sensor squares stuck to the windshield of his truck, and every morning he habitually drives through the E-Z Pass lane.
My car, however, is not equipped with a sensor square, since I rarely venture onto the Thruway for any reason. Unfortunately Wholesale Josh Allen Jersey , on the day Andy borrowed my car, his Morning Commute Autopilot led him through the forbidden E-Z Pass lane. So, instead of the usual ?have a nice day? green light, Andy was molested by a parentally angry red light. Here, the meat of my story begins:
Realizing his mistake, Andy pulls over to the side of the road and Wholesale Nick Foles Jersey , dodging oncoming cars in the morning chill, jogs to a manned tollbooth.
?I forgot I had my wife's car today,? he explains sheepishly. ?Sorry about that.?
The tollbooth operator replies that Andy will have to get a special ticket stub from the booth when he exits the Thruway, and then send it in with payment.
?But the payment is only twenty cents,? Andy protests. ?Can't I just give them the twenty cents at the tollbooth when I get off the Thruway??
No.
Turns out Andy's wild, illegal ride through the E-Z Pass lane set off its taxpayer-funded camera Cheap Will Richardson Jersey , which took a sharp, clear picture of the license plate. If Andy simply handed over the twenty cents, therefore, there'd be no way to tell the camera that he'd remitted the two valuable dimes, and my white 93 Taurus would be rendered a marked car.
Okay.
So, Andy procures the special ticket stub from the next tollbooth operator; that evening he writes out a check to the New York State Thruway Authority for exactly twenty cents. He and I joke about how it will cost us more than that just to mail the damn thing Cheap DJ Chark Jersey , but mail it we do, because we are among the honest and upright citizens of the great state of New York.
Perhaps a month or so goes by, and one day a letter comes from the Thruway Authority, addressed to me: You have committed a toll evasion violation and must remit $33.30 immediately. That's $8.30 (presumably the toll from the farthest exit) plus a $25 administrative fee.
Andy and I laugh. Surely they jest. On the bill there's a toll-free number to contact the sinister-sounding Violation Processing Center, and Andy dials this number to explain the mistake. The overpaid state employee who answers the phone pretends to listen to Andy's lengthy story and ultimately requests from him a copy of the canceled twenty cent check.
?My bank doesn't send me any canceled checks,? says Andy. ?I get a bank statement at the end of each month and it lists the checks that cleared.?
The state employee's tired voice tells Andy to fax a copy of the bank statement to her at whatever number Cheap Taven Bryan Jersey , with a cover letter explaining the situation.
Sigh.
We drag out my half-busted, dusty fax machine and we dig through our papers for the bank statement and we hand-write a cover letter to these people. We plug the fax machine into the hallway phone jack and shoo away baby Jonah, who has phone cord radar and is happily reaching for the whole mess. After faxing everything successfully, we shake our heads in mild disgust, return to our Seinfeld re-run, and consider the matter closed. Finally.
Imagine our joy when Cheap Logan Cooke Jersey , thirty days or so later, 2003 is ushered in with yet another letter. This letter has the words ?SECOND NOTICE? emblazoned across its stark white front: You have failed to remit payment for violation # T200211059815-0001 (yes, the number is really that long) and said payment is expected immediately.
Now Andy is mad. ?What the hell?? he asks the universe. Once more he calls the phone number and relates his ridiculous, ever-lengthening tale. This time the representative tells him to write a letter of explanation and return it with the notice itself.
Andy, tongue planted firmly in cheek, sits down and pens a brilliantly sarcastic diatribe in which he questions the intelligence of a system that hunts down its twenty cent offenders as if they were bank robbers. He also manages to squeeze in all about how we'd already paid the toll and sent in the special ticket stub and received a payment notice in error and faxed over our checking account statement with requested cover letter. To this letter he adds envelope and stamp Cheap Ronnie Harrison Jersey , and as it is mailed, both of us utter a prayer to the gods of the New York State Thruway Authority to please, please accept our sacrifice and rain upon us both favor and goodwill.
The gods, however, were apparently less than pleased with our measly offering and our weak-willed supplication, for yesterday Cheap Dante Fowler Jr Jersey , yet another envelope from this attentive government agency dropped through our mail slot and into my unwilling hands. This one was very stern and surprisingly verbose. Among other things, it said: