Procrastination 101

I have always been a procrastinator, but ever since the children started school I have taken it to the next level. I got a ticket going to Austin a few weeks ago. Yes, I know I know. I tend to be a speed demon when I'm in the car by myself. Anyway, I was speeding down Hwy 71 and there behind some trees was our friendly local law enforcement agent. He was actually very polite and to the point.

I kept telling myself I needed to take care of that ticket but of course I never did. Then I went to Miami and I was really running out of time.

So here we were the last week of the month and I decide to look at the ticket. I find out that if I want to take defensive driving I need to have the form notarized! Have you ever heard of such a thing? Then I need to pay the fee online by the next day and it has to be postmarked on the 27th too.

It was 11 o’clock at night on the 26th and I called my cousin. I forgot she’s not a notary any more. Next morning I called my friend and she’s not a notary any more either, but her father-in-law is. So the next day I had a sales call in Cleveland, Texas and on my drive back in I stopped at her husband’s insurance office because her father-in-law works there.

I had the paper notarized, I continued to work for the day, picked up the kids from school and went to the gym. I figured I’d pay the fee for the ticket when I got home and then get to the post office before midnight, so that it could be postmarked by the 27th.

First off, my Internet decided not to work. I could not get to the official payment website to pay the fee. Of course it didn’t. That’s what happens to you when you procrastinate. I had to wait for my husband to get home and then of course he got home later than usual. He couldn’t get the Internet to work, but it did work on my laptop. He hooked my laptop up to the printer and I went ahead and paid it there. I needed to have a print out showing that I’d paid the ticket to include in the mailing with my notarized form. By now it’s 11 p.m.

I get to the post office at 11:15 and when I got to the drop box I see that it says that the last pick up time was 8 p.m. I panic. My mother always told me that if you mail something before 12 a.m. at the main post office it will be postmarked for that same day. I went to the post office with her at night many times, which is what I told the man who came to the window when I rang the doorbell.

I asked him if there was any way he could take my letter and postmark it for the 27th and he told me absolutely not. Apparently they stopped postmarking mail before midnight three years ago. My mom passed away six years ago so she wouldn’t have known that.

Then I told him my predicament. I begged and asked if there was any way at all that he could do it. Finally he said there was a way. He told me to use the machine that they have set up to send packages. You can also buy stamps there and it’s dated the date that you buy it. Since I already had stamps on my envelope he said he’d show me how to get a 1 cent stamp.

He looked like Morgan Freeman with a beard and he had that same impatient attitude with me, like he was half amused and half exasperated. He’d growl at me when I didn’t punch the button fast enough. “I said, ‘Enter’” he said impatiently. It was really funny. I thanked him profusely and told him I would always remember him. He said that at least now they wouldn’t have to send a warrant out for my arrest.

That reminded me. When I was reading the paperwork that they gave me with the ticket, earlier that night, it listed the different options. Option 1- Pay Ticket, Option 2- Take defensive driving, etc.. Option 5 was “Do Nothing.” Then it said that the consequences were that they would send a warrant out. When Rey saw me struggling that night to get the ticket fee paid and mailed off he said, “So you chose Option 5.” That’s our new saying now.