HOV madness (fixed!)

I know I said I was going to work, but now I'm "supervising" :)

Okay, I will update this later on today, but the argument is ridiculous and I hope the judge throws the book at her:

Unborn HOV lane? Mother to fight ticket
Sarah Muench
The Arizona Republic
Jan. 10, 2006 12:00 AM
A pregnant Ahwatukee Foothills resident ticketed for driving in a carpool lane is scheduled to appear in court today to argue that her unborn child counted as a passenger.

Candace Dickinson, 23, hopes to overturn her penalty and prove her point that even though her child was still in the womb while she was driving on Interstate 10 on Nov. 8 in Ahwatukee Foothills, it still counted as a second person.

Since then, Dickinson gave birth to her baby - a boy.

Frank Valenzuela, spokesman for the Arizona Department of Public Safety, said a vehicle can't occupy the high-occupancy vehicle lane unless two or more people are in it.

The statute doesn't define what a "person" is.

"If a (pregnant) mother goes to a movie theater, she's not going to pay for her child," Valenzuela said.

Dickinson could not be reached for comment.

She faces $390 in fines and is to appear in Phoenix Municipal Court at 1:30 p.m.

BTW: HOV = High Occupancy Vehicle. In AZ, that's two people, or motorcycle operators (go figure).

Okay, so the law should be changed. I think it should be changed to be more with what the intention of HOV is - two people of legal driving age. Soccer moms carting around children should not be counted because those kids have no other way to get to their destination without her. I don't see soccer moms putting their kids on public buses or other public transportation (if we had any). While it's true she's more in the spirit of HOV if she's carting around other peoples kids, it's impossible to tell for any officer if the kids are hers or not, so kids shouldn't count.

Yes, it's obvious I don't have children. I've read comments about this case from mothers that say the HOV lanes are helpful to mothers dealing with children that are tired of being stuck in traffic. Guess what - I hate being stuck in traffic too. If your children are being uncontrollable at this point, perhaps you should learn to be a better parent. Call me a single bitch if you want to, that's just what I think.

My nephew is 16 months old now. I've carted him around a few times, and he's been fussy. But I haven't driven like a maniac or ridden the carpool lanes because he's been so upset that I had to get to my destination. Okay, so he doesn't speak words like except for "mama", but it'll happen someday.

UPDATE:
In ruling against her, the Phoenix Municipal Court judge defined a person, or passenger, as someone who distinctly occupies a distinct seat in a vehicle.

So that still counts children according to that wording. But at least there's an ounce of sanity there.

Tucson gem and mineral show

Yes, I know - HaloScan screwed up the template. I will try and work on it tonight.

In the meanwhile, I'm seriously debating going to the Tucson Gem, Mineral, and Fossil show. I've never gone before, and since this could quite possibly be my last year in Tucson, I'd like to see it once.

I hear great things about the prices, so I'm optimistic that I could get opal at a reasonable price. My maternal grandmother had some beautiful opal jewlery that she got from her mother on her wedding day. Of course, the robbers took the opal jewlery as well as the big screen TV. If I can get opals at a decent price, I'd like to try and help her replace some of what was stolen from her.

I'm feeling a bit overwhlemed though. Here is a list of the various events. I know I can't go to the commercial ones because I don't have a business of any kind. Anyone have experience navigating these events? What should I go to?

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

GM musings

Okay, seriously, I will go into the tissue culture room when I'm done with this post and get some work done. I am just not feeling very motivated this morning.

I grew up as a peripheral part of the General Motors family. My mom's sister worked for United Auto Workers (UAW), and then re-married someone that worked for GM. So my mom was able to participate in the employee discount program. Through her, I bought my first car, a Pontiac Sunfire.

It was a great little car where I didn't have any problems with it. I had it for about a year before I got into an accident where it was written off. I had heard about the problems with GM cars in the long term, but I didn't think that would have been a problem with the Sunfire.

That was over three years ago. My mom again, enrolled in the employee pricing program to help me get the Pontiac Vibe. I really wanted another Sunfire, but was told that the Sunfires were being discountinued. The Vibe was a new model, and I was hesitant to get a new model, but went with it.

The reason I went with it was because of the fact that the Vibe was more like the Toyota Matrix. I figured that it being more Toyota than Pontiac, it would not give me trouble in the long term. The first six months I owned it, I had to take it back to the service station for various little things that drove me nuts. Some of them they wouldn't even fix.

I read today that GM has been able to improve the long term durability of their cars, but they still retain the image of flimsy cars. I'd like to believe it, but since my car is more like Toyata than Pontiac, I can't say for sure. I just find it funny that the Sunfire was phased out, even though it seemed to be a more durable car.

A decent start to the New Year

It seems that almost everyone makes a New Year resolution to lose weight. Me personally, I don't make a resolution. However, since my jeans are a bit tight now (I'm blaming the drier), I STRIVE to lose about 10 pounds.

Part of the torture that was my annual ob-gyn appointment yesterday was a weight check. I wasn't looking forward to it since I was sure that I was now over 170 pounds.

NOT! It was close, but I tipped the scale at 167.5. Slightly encourging since at first the nurse thought I was under 150 pounds.

According to the slightly unfair body mass index scale, that puts me at 23.4 - which is a bit high, but still on the "normal" side. The reason I say it's unfair is that I inherited my italian maternal grandfather's "above average" body frame, combined with my maternal grandmother's tall height. So when most people look at me, they say I look great and don't need to lose any weight.

Still there's something I don't like about my body (I know, who doesn't). So I'm hoping to bring my weight down just a bit to see if it'll look better.

One heck of a happy hour

According to a study, 15% of the US workforce is under the influence of alcohol.

One heck of a happy hour.

He took it well

God this is really embarassing.

On top of the other issues that came up at my annual ob-gyn appointment yesterday was that I'm suffering an outbreak of human papilloma virus (HPV). The news was broken to me by the NP I've been seeing for about five years. So she had to ask the difficult question - "do I think I know how I became infected".

Well considering I've only had one partner within the last year, and a couple years of no partners before that, yes I think it's obvious where I got it from.

So I had to tell lovely boyfriend the wonderful news last night. He took it well. I told him that some women never show signs of infection, and guys rarely do (which is why HPV is such a common STD). He seemed to be preoccupied a bit with trying to figure out how he got it, but wouldn't elaborate. He had said a few months ago that he didn't want to hear about my sexual past, and he didn't want to talk about his.

I think we're going to have to do a bit of that this weekend though. Not that it'll be easy going into our sexual histories. But it is true - when you sleep with someone, you sleep with the last 10 people your partner did.

Doesn't change how I feel about him at all. I still love him. But I guess this means that if there's anyone else after him, I'll have to worry more about protection besides birth control pills.