Enthusiastic Phone Answerer Guy.

I'm so going to have to type up that story about the unlisted phone number, but today I actually have a story that's probably only funny to me, but it was just how totally EXCITED the guy I called to talk to about my ticket was.

So, I got a ticket for having my registration out of date on my car (for those of you who don't live in Texas, you have to register your car every year, just so the state can get 50$ a year for every car driving around, which they ostensibly should be using to fix potholes, but apparently they're spending it on coffee, because the conversation I had with the police department phone operator seems to indicate that that is the case.) This was the conversation I had. Note that every time I type in ALL CAPS it's because the guy I was talking to sounded very happy and excited and enthusiastic.

The Guy: Thanks for calling, what can I do for you?
Me: Well, I got a ticket for my registration being out of date...
The Guy: Did you get the car registered?
Me: Yeah, I did that on Monday.
The Guy: OH THAT IS FANTASTIC! That is just GREAT!
Me: Yeah, uh...so what should I do now?
The Guy: Do you live in Austin?
Me: No, Round Rock.
The Guy: OH THAT IS JUST A BEAUTIFUL NEIGHBORHOOD! SO NICE!
Me: Yeah, uh...so...
The Guy: Just take the ticket and the receipt to the station on Lamplight, you know where that is?
Me: Yeah.
The Guy: It'll be a 20 dollar fee. Anything else?
Me: Um. No.
The Guy: HAVE A GREAT DAY!

It was just so bizarre. The dude was way too happy. I'm very glad though that he was polite an informative, and told me everything I needed to know. So, Dude, if you ever read this and realize it was you, thank you. You were awesome. Every government agency should hire this guy to answer their phones. And he should get a raise.

When I tell the story of the unlisted phone number you'll know why I wish this guy had been working for the phone company at the time.

Incidentally, the ticket getting incident in the first place occurred on a dark street at night, and curious as to how the guy even saw that my registration was out I asked. Turns out cops have computers in their car and they just type in the license numbers of every driver that goes past them. It tells them if the driver of said car has any warrants for their arrest, or outstanding tickets, but apparently also tells them whether your registration is out. So if you're trying to be clever and cover up your registration sticker somehow or just have no sticker in your car so they don't see the wrong color or an out of date one, then well, that's not going to work for you. The computer knows.

Why the computer didn't just send me a reminder that I hadn't done mine is beyond me, but during my trip to the courthouse to get my updated tag I did discover that the courthouse has my old address in Pflugerville listed, so that would probably explain that one. The poor lady who bought my old house is probably sick to death of getting reminders to get my registration renewed.

Ok, I can't just leave it at that, I have to give you some links of some kind.

Andrew the Droid is a bit of a jerk, but he needs your help. Go help him.

The Original Star Wars Trilogy Explained...by someone who hasn't seen it.

This may be my favorite new blog. Superuseless Superpowers. I like 13th Bullet Bulletproof guy.

Well, I still like this blog too. Because I like to write, so a whole blog dedicated to which ink pens write the best is intriguing to me.

Fascinating. Everything you ever wanted to know about DNA in an effective, pretty understandable video with nice images.

So, yeah. That's what's going on around here.