Parking Tickets

In Dallas, for an expired meter downtown, parking tickets cost $35.  I wonder if that's more or less than other big cities?

I learned that this morning, among other things.  Another thing I learned: if you have an August or September birthday, which are common months, and you think an hour on a meter will be long enough to renew your license at the DMV, you'd be wrong by more than 30 minutes. 

Also, if there is a business near your house that you go to once a year or so but don't look at frequently, don't assume they're still open.  After my DMV fiasco, I decided to go get my Chinese visa pictures taken, but surprise AAA has closed the location right by our house.  Ugh.  I hate mornings like this.  So I got to work about 2 hours late and only got one of my two missions accomplished.  And the visa picture has to happen today -- guess I'm going to have to also leave work early and hope that my yoga clothes don't show in the picture.  Visa applications are going in to the Chinese consulate on Thursday! 

Fun trivia:  when you apply for a Chinese visa, you have to list your profession:

Businessman
Government official
Company employee
Staff of media
Teacher
Religious worker
Student
Active duty military personnel
Housewife
Retired
Unemployed
Crew member
Member of national parliament
Other

Househusbands are out of luck!  If you work for a city parks department, I guess that makes you a government official? 

Well, it's less onerous than our Russian visas were -- for that, we had to list every country we'd been to in the last 10 years.  And I had tons, and then there were endless questions about whether we had to list all countries that had stamped our passports even if we were just there for layover or plane connection.  And you have to list all chemical, biological, nuclear and firearm weapons training, which was very easy for me (none), but as big a pain for my husband as the list of countries was for me.