The following is some “field and stream of consciousness or what” from today:
My eye doctors and I often disagree over what constitutes a good-fitting contact lens. The blurs and shots of light are evidently good vision. Since arguing has gone nowhere in the past, I just go around in the bad fits so I can get yelled at by the next eye doctor for scarring my corneas.
Anyway, I blame the latest prescription for me parking in front of no parking signs twice in the past month. I didn’t see them until inspired by the tickets. And so today I went to pay my second ticket.
Asheville City Hall has the greatest of elevator operators. I joked with one about getting to pay my parking ticket, and as I left, I overheard the cop, who instead of patrolling high-crime areas is stationed to protect local government celebrities, pointing out how full of myself I was.
Asheville’s collections office is run by the water department. That’s because the Sullivan acts, passed the midnight hour before the termination of the regional water authority agreement, make Asheville use all water revenues for only water purposes. The city justified the move because water billing comprised a large portion of the city’s revenue-garnering interface with the public.
The first collection window was rather odd. It had a glass pane with a hole at the bottom for passing money, but it only went about as high as the attendant’s nose and was open all the rest of the way to the high ceiling. I put my hand through and made a “What in the world?†face. “Budget cuts,†said the attendant.
Meanwhile, the state House just approved a bill mitigating the impact of the Sullivan acts. If approved, the bill would allow the city to use up to 5% of the water department’s budget on resurfacing roads and repairing sidewalks torn up for waterline repairs.
