Over the last couple months I’ve been able to get out some sticky situations, just by saying something. Normally, I’d just accept these things or pay up, just to be done with it, but I’ve realized that sometimes, if you question things, the other party is just as willing to say, “It’s ok, nevermind.”

First, I got a notice for me to come to Jury Duty. My dad brought with him when he came for a visit because sometimes I still get mail at home. I was pretty bummed to go to jury duty, especially since it was scheduled for Ben’s birthday. I debated on whether or not I should call and reschedule when I realized that it was a request for me to come to Cook County court - I’m a resident of DuPage county. (yes, I know that technically I can’t call myself a Chicagoan especially since I don’t even live in the county but I don’t care if I become one of those annoying suburbanites that says they live in Chicago! I was born there!) So I called the hotline number and said that I got the jury duty request at an old address and I was currently a resident of another county. The lady told me to send them a copy of the jury notice and a copy of my driver’s license and I could request to be get out of it. I did it, but still hadn’t heard anything from them the day before I was scheduled to go, so I called again and I was told I didn’t have to go. Yay!

On Easter, we went downtown for lunch. Since I work at home, I don’t go out much other than quick shopping and errands. When we got back to my car, there was a ticket on it. Why? Because my license plate stickers were expired - by 5 months! There was a bit of arguing between me and Dave as to whether or not I had actually paid for new stickers, as well as the aggravation that even if I did, I didn’t put them on the car. I remember seeing stickers, but not sure if it was for Dave’s car or mine. I wasn’t thrilled at the thought of having to pay the $30 fine. When we went home we searched for new stickers and fortunately found them. But did I still need to pay the ticket? Or does the law say that you’ve got to drive around with updated stickers? Still high off my Jury Duty victory, I decided to try contesting my ticket, even if it meant going to court. So I made a photocopy of the updated stickers along with a letter saying that we hadn’t put them on the car yet and sent it along with the ticket. 2 weeks later I got a letter in the mail that said that since I provided proof of sticker, I was in the clear. Yeeeeah!

The last instance was with our I-Pass. In Illinois we have a toll system, and you can get a little box you attach to your windshield that is connected with an account so you don’t have to pay with cash. That account is pointing to a credit card and it pulls money from your card whenever it needs to be recharged. So I was surprised when I got a $450 bill in the mail because we’d been missing tolls (Dave takes the tollway every day to work). That bill included the cost of the tolls PLUS a penalty for each toll missed. Turns out that I never got notified that the card on the account had expired and I needed to enter a new expiration date. The last time that happened I got an email to tell me to renew - not this time! I called in to ask about it, and they said that the credit card always needs to be kept up to date. I realized that this was a fight I wasn’t going to win, so I sent a check in the mail (after updating my card information for our account). Ironically, I forgot to write in the amount for the check so it got returned with a letter that I could send in a money order or pay by phone. When I called to pay, the lady asked me, “Do you have an I-Pass account?” I said that I did, and let her in on my sob story. She told me she’d apply the fee to my account so we didn’t have to exchange credit card information. I thanked her and got off the phone. A couple days later I checked my account to see the damage, and guess what? She only took off the cost of the missed tolls - not the penalty fees! Instead of $450, it was only about $15.

So I’m feeling like I should be playing the lottery or something. I was thinking that I’d play 4-8-15-16-23-42 but then I remembered that the numbers are bad, so I’ll have to think of something else…

Tags: Stories //