The Seven Freeway Fence Posts

So some people may remember that back in December I wrecked my car on the freeway while trying to drive to work during a snowstorm (black ice sucks). In addition to ruining all the metal on the left side of the vehicle (you can see the pictures on facebook), I also sort of took out the cable guardrail in the freeway median (basically I bent over/flattened some metal fence posts). I figured that, considering how many billions of dollars the state of Minnesota is in debt, I'd have to cover the cost of those metal posts (even though it was not my fault that I hit them). The cop told me that even though no other vehicles were involved and there were no injuries, he'd have to file a report because I caused "damage to state property." I figured it would cost probably a couple hundred dollars, and I waited for that bill to come for weeks. And then months. And then I figured that since they never sent a bill or police report or anything, I must have been wrong about having to pay for it. And being pretty tight up for money, it was a load off my mind!

So here we are, nearly six months after the accident, and today my aunt gets an envelope in the mail from the Minnesota Department of Transportation, and she thought that they sure did send the new tags for her car quickly. Then she opened it. And there were no tags. Instead, there was a bill for $696.78. And she was understandably shocked. Since the car I drove at the time actually was her old car, the bill came to her instead of me.

But the charges are ridiculous! Over double what I was originally expecting I'd have to pay! And the charges on the invoice are ridiculous:

1 ton dump truck 52 mi @ 1.64/mi=$85.22
1 1/2 to 3 ton special truck 7 mi @ 3.88/mi=$27.19
2 1/2 to 3 ton dump truck 0.50 hr=$32.15
changeable message board 0.50 hr=$0.46
locating pegs 36 @1.12 ea=$40.22
post cap 1=$3.13
line post socketed 7 @ $54.74 ea=$40.22
6 transp. maint wkrs 3 hrs @ 41.74/hr=$125.23

Okay, seriously! Isn't the state already paying its road maintenance workers to be at work? Why should I have to pay their salaries when they already work for and are paid by the state? My taxes are already paying their regular salaries! And what's up with driving out a couple of dump trucks? I've seen them fixing those freeway median posts before (people knock them over all the time, even when there's no ice on the road), and there is no dumping of anything whatsoever. They take a metal post and pound it into the ground. Okay, I guess they need some sort of truck to transport the posts and tools, but that certainly doesn't involve driving a special dump truck fifty-two miles.

And here's the other thing that annoys me. I wasn't kidding when I said people take out those fence posts every day. I drive on the freeway back and forth between Faribault and Owatonna every day I go to work, and I drive on the freeway back and forth between Faribault and Lakeville once a week when I go to church. And at LEAST once a week I drive past a newly-destroyed section of median fence. All the time. They build them right up next to the road, and there are constantly new skid marks pointing straight towards flattened fence posts magically appearing. But the state doesn't fix them right away. They wait and every few months they go through and patch up all the bare spots on the cable guardrail. (If I remember correctly my wreck spot was fixed sometime in February or possibly March.) Which means they don't drive a dump truck fifty-two miles to fix one spot. They drive a dump truck maybe one mile to fix one spot, and then another mile or two to fix the next spot, and then a mile or two to fix the next one, and so on. I happen to know that there were at least like six other wreck spots between Faribault and Owatonna that were fixed the same day as mine. Yet apparently every single person who takes out any posts has to pay for all the mileage of the truck. That irks me.

You know, every few weeks a wreck spot will appear that is really huge. Not like mine, where seven posts were bent over but still attached to both the cables and the ground. In these big ones there will be like twenty or thirty posts that are completely knocked out of the ground and torn away from the cables, and the grass in the whole area is all torn up. I really feel bad for those people. I'm not really sure how anyone manages to do that much damage--I figure maybe semi trucks barrel through them or something. But seriously. Those people must have to pay like thousands of dollars. The state probably even charges them for the grass.

So anyways, this bill that arrived today, for an accident that occurred on December 20, 2008, was sent on 06/02/09, and is due on 07/02/09. I do not have the money to pay it. My aunt is currently unemployed, so she does not have the money to pay it. I think she's going to send the bill to the insurance company, but we're sure they won't pay any because apparently since the car was so old and crappy to begin with it only had the bare minimum insurance--so it would have been covered if someone else had hit me. (And it had towing insurance, which for some strange reason did not cover the cost of towing the car back to town.) But I'm screwed for money now. It took me like a year to save up enough money to buy my laptop (which was only slightly more than $600). And I know I'm also waiting for the doctor bills I've accrued due to having strep throat for the past three weeks and having to go to the doctor not once but TWICE because the penicillin didn't kill it. And even though my new health insurance did start up three days before I first went to the doctor (Walmart gives health insurance to its part-time employees after they've worked there for a year), the only way I could afford the premiums that would be taken out of every paycheck, I had to choose a plan that had a higher deductible, so I know I will be paying all these medical bills out of my own pocket. So it'll be about a million more years before I have enough money to start taking classes of any kind (which is why I bought the laptop).

Hey, I know. I should send an invoice to the state for the damage that their median fence caused to my car (well technically, my aunt's car). After all, I would not have collided with it had they been more vigilant about de-icing the roadway, right? Heck, I was only going fifty at best when I went off. And by the time we finally left that day two other cars had gone off within half a mile of there, one going the opposite direction and the other at the exact same spot I went off, except that car slid to the right instead of to the left, so I guess all they had to pay for was a tow truck to pull them out of the ditch. Too bad they didn't go to the left, because maybe then they would have hit my car and we would have gotten some money from the insurance. Yeah, I think sending the state an invoice would be cool.

Somehow I don't think Minnesota would be very amused. Or willing to pay. Maybe I should write my senator. Oh, wait, Minnesota STILL hasn't seated theirs yet!