Today I went online to pay 2 (I repeat, two) parking tickets. When I got to the page at the City of LA, I realized that I had an account. There were not two, but five parking tickets that I had to pay. Is there someone running around LA stealing parking tickets off of the windows of cars?

Long story short, I just paid $534 and got nothing in return. I decided to come home and ask Quicken Microsoft Money how much money I had spent on parking in the last year. Mind you, this is just violations not meters, garages at the mall, and $20 parking lots in Hollywood. I have spent over $1000 in parking violations in less than 365 days. Microsoft Money tells me that is just less than “Bank Fees” and just more than “Personal Trips to South America”.

Aww, city life.