Oh dear.

[conuly]

Remember the woman who sends evidence about people who illegally park in handicapped spots?

Donovan McNabb and Jeremiah Trotter were found guilty of parking in handicapped spots. Their vehicles were photographed by Mary Ann Cottrell, who has made it her business to police the handicapped spots. I would suggest Ms. Cottrell look in the mirror before she takes another photo.

She has a handicapped license due to her caring for an adult child with autism. An individual with autism has complete mobility, and it is not necessary for them to use handicapped parking. Let those who are physically impaired use the spots, not Ms. Cottrell.

1. Stop it with the asinine phrase "adult child with autism". Just quit it.

2. You and I have no evidence that Ms. Cottrell's daughter does not, in fact, have any physical impairment.

3. Even if she did, she may still have a perfectly valid reason for using the handicapped spot - for example, if she gets lost very easily, as some people (me) do, due (I believe) to a spatial agnosia and bad sense of direction. That's for the courts to decide.

3.5 Which they already did, didn' they?

Shouldn't Ms. Cottrell be working or taking care of her handicapped kid instead of stalking the citizens of New Jersey?

I guess Ms. Cottrell didn't watch the Eagles play last season. Otherwise she would agree that McNabb definitely deserved a handicapped spot.

Humor as a defense mechanism. Never seen that one before.

Why would Donovan be so foolish as to contest a ticket for parking in a handicapped space?

He's a millionaire making more than enough to pay such a fine with the wages of an hour. Yet he brings a well-paid lawyer in to fight this fine. Why? Teammate Jeremiah Trotter isn't much better.

Exactly. He's just making himself look bad. *nodnodnod*

Three letters, two of which aren't worth the paper they're virtually printed on. *le sigh*

On a related note, about how many children under six do you have to have before a presumably non-disabling pregnancy justifies taking the handicapped spot? I'm not sure, but I think it *must* be more than just two.

Comments

[leora.livejournal.com]

I hate those attitudes. What, it might cost them an extra half hour, fifteen minute walk each way, maybe a potential temper tantrum... call it an extra hour of their lives. Well, great - suck it up. If I have to walk extra it'll cost me an extra few days, because that's what I need to recover from walking for twenty minutes. Plus, if I am already low on energy, it means I may end up having health problems wherever I am, and thus a) not be able to accomplish whatever I was there for b) have to do things that are socially awkward like lying down in public places (but it's less socially awkward than fainting).

My sister got a temp placard while she was pregnant. And if you feel the doctors in your area are unreasonably prejudiced against the potentially disabling aspects of being pregnant, by all means fight that. But stop taking spaces if you're not disabled. I don't have any sympathy for your "just five minutes" and not wanting to walk for ten minutes. And that's for one very simple reason: You can walk for 10 minutes.

You can, and you won't suffer any horrible consequences from it. In fact, for many of those people it will actively be good for them. It will improve their health. And it won't cause them agonizing pain.

Really, I'm too lawful for my own good. I'm stuck in limbo with so many of my benefits being based on vision, but needed for mobility issues. I'm not using my placard til I can sort it out, because technically I have it for blindness. But I'm uncertain on whether that's actually the right choice, since I'm damaging myself by not using it. But I really do like following the law. The tricky part is figuring out who to go to to get my placard for other reasons, since I don't really trust my GP to understand, and I'm about to probably lose my health insurance. Which means going out less often, because I truly can't handle the walking.

I just wish that every time someone parked in a handicapped spot without anyone handicapped being involved that they would then get the horrible leg pains that I get when I overwalk. Not anything too horrible... I wouldn't force on them all of my symptoms, but let them get the leg pains. Oh, and the inability to use my legs. So, they have to take itty, bitty steps and have trouble on staircases. They can also have the hip pain. Just a small fraction of what extra walking costs me. Every so often, if they get tired of that and want a change of pace, we can just trap them in their cars for awhile and pretend they need a wheelchair they can't exit the car with.

[conuly]

Did you tell her that?

[leora.livejournal.com]

No because a) I thought we were supposed to be avoiding drama and b) too many idiots, can't educate enough of them to really matter. c) it's not legal to break their shins so that they start to understand.

[conuly]

Fair enough. I just didn't want to drag drama into her journal. That seemed to be cheating.

As for educating the sillies - it's like that story about the boy and the starfish, and how he's throwing them back into the sea even after being told he can't save them all so it doesn't matter. "It matters to this one!" If we just keep throwing the sillies into the sea....

[leora.livejournal.com]

Then we again run into legality problems. I really think the solution to people parking in handicapped spaces is to give them temporary placards and temporary disabilities to go with them. Then they can legally use the spaces they covet.

As I tell people, the benefits I receive are open to pretty much all. Do you want a nifty placard like mine? Do you want audiobooks or Braille books mailed to your home? Well, you can have them too. You just need to poke your eyes out. They will count the disability, even if it is self-inflicted (as far as I know). And then you can have the same benefits that I do. Too attached to your eyes? Cut off your legs and I bet you can get benefits from that too. Really, these things are available to any willing to go for them. And if you're not willing, then shut up. Because if having the disabilities is such a hardship, then maybe you should let us have our friggin' spaces. Besides, the two disabilities I named are actually both fairly small ones. The really hard disabilities are hard to acquire by choice. The ones where you can't breathe and are prone to collapse and experience terrible pain whenever you need to move around. Those are the really nasty ones. Blind people at least don't tend to be in chronic pain from their blindness. Losing limbs varies, that can be painful even long afterward, but travel isn't likely to affect that as much. So, really, if you're not willing to put in the bare minimum effort...

[lizziey.livejournal.com]

You can, and you won't suffer any horrible consequences from it. In fact, for many of those people it will actively be good for them. It will improve their health. And it won't cause them agonizing pain.

Hm. I almost lost Topher, and ended up needing a cerclave (sp?) and bedrest for *months* after walking evryday with my older son. Not to mention the agonizing pains from the nerve Topher was lying on, causing my back and legs to get spasms. But, you know, its good for me, and won't cause horrible consequences.



Why is it some people who have disabilities think that other people may not have something as bad? Even, goodness forbid, pregnancy related? Pregnancy is *more than* difficult on my body. 2 out of 3 times, i cannot maintain the pregnancy, and the 1/3 of times I do, I am in the worst pain of my life. Labor is not nearly as bad as pregnancy, and in fact, i don't mind labor and delivery. Even unmedicated. But pregnancy in my body is simply debilitating.

[conuly]

Lizziey, we've only all said several times that people who have been disabled by pregnancy should go to their doctor and the DMV and register as temporarily disabled.

We all know that some pregnancies can be disabling.

If you won't acknowledge that we've already acknowledged this point, please stop wasting everybody's time.

[lizziey.livejournal.com]

really? reading the comment, it not *once* said ANYTHING about having already acknowledged the fact. not a single time.

And again, I said NOTHING about driving, i was refering to the comments about pregnancy in *general*. Period.

[conuly]

The comments, as you well know, are about people who aren't disabled. Those who are, for whatever reason, don't count.

[lizziey.livejournal.com]

it wasn't differentiated. at all. and so i made the comment.

[conuly]

Yes, it *was*, if you'd bothered to pay attention or at least read the link i posted

[lizziey.livejournal.com]

except...I was not commenting directly to *you*. I was commenting to the comment.

Wow. Calm. Down.

[conuly]

Which, Lizziey, was commenting directly about the link I posted, wherein I specifically said that people who are disabled via pregnancy should get disabled placards.

Lizziey, you start off, your very first comment on this post, calling me hostile to pregnant people because I say that those who are disabled have every right to go and get a temporary placard. And then you go on and on about how disabling pregnancy can be when nobody has disputed that. Nobody!

It's insulting, Lizziey. You make no effort to read what I've written, but you think you can reply to it. Which would be fine, except you're replying to things I haven't even said.

[lizziey.livejournal.com]

My comment about your tendancy to downplay pregnancy was not just about this post, and I said that. It is just how you have been talking about it lately, in more than one post.

And because the *person* I commented to had commented to you, does not mean MY comment was to you. I commented to things they said in their comment. Period.

If you are taking it as an insult, that is your problem. *I* for one, have been the brunt of your pissyness quite a bit lately, and I don't see the reason why. If you have a problem with me, just outright say it. I mean really, Con, you have that ability to a fault. Why not use it now?

[conuly]

Oddly enough, I'm *not* mad at you. I've noticed it too - but I'm not mad at you. Which is pissing me off. All this righteous indignation, I ought to be mad at you.

[leora.livejournal.com]

That is because there is absolutely no difference whatsoever between being disabled because you are pregnant and being disabled for other reasons. If you are disabled, you are disabled. If you are not, you are not.

That's like complaining because we didn't specifically mention that being disabled because you were hit by a car driven by a drunk driver, and that those people often need placards too. We also didn't specify that some people are born with disabilities and others acquire them. Disabled is disabled.

[lizziey.livejournal.com]

And thank you for stating that. But the way you worded it, made it as if the *pregnant* women were the ones needing to walk, and it would be good for them.

I've become a bit sensitive I guess. I deal with certain communities that have become very freetarded lately (that does not mean all CF'ers are freetarded, just some). And thinkingabout pregnancy a lot, as my husband and I will be trying again early summer (when he is home for a couple/few weeks from overseas). SO, yeah...

I myself do not have a vehicle, since I am legally blind, but many times friends of mine have to drive me places, and have to park quite a bit away, and are not able to drop me off close, and find a place. So, I am not able to get a placard, even though I need one.

[leora.livejournal.com]

My rant is against non-disabled people using the spots when no one they are with is disabled. I don't care if they are male or female, pregnant or not. I thought it was obvious though that it didn't apply to people who actually are disabled - of course they can use the spots, that's what they are designed for.

Why can't you get a placard? I found being legally blind was one of the easiest ways to get a handicapped placard (hang-tag) to use while riding wiht other people. Which is sad, because being legally blind didn't, in and of itself, disable me. I could walk just fine with just the blindness, it was the rest of the disabilities that made walking really hard. But as they were complicated and hard to explain, it was just simple and easy to get all sorts of things by saying, yes, I am legally blind.

I really strongly encourage anyone who needs a placard to get one. It's a pain initially to set things up, but it'll make your life much better in the long run. If you're disabled, use those spots. If you're perfectly healthy and lazy/in a rush, leave them for those who truly need them.

[lizziey.livejournal.com]

I didn;t know I *could* get one, as I didn;t drive. thank you!

[leora.livejournal.com]

Please read the thread. If you're disabled, get a placard.

You were disabled, ergo you should get a temporary placard. What's so hard to grasp about that? I have no problem believing that:
a) I am not the only person with disabilities
b) Some women will be temporarily disabled during pregnancy
c) Not all women will be disabled during pregnancy

If you are disabled, whether temporarily or permanently, get a placard and use it. Then you can also bitch and whine about the entitlement brats who take those spots from people like you, at risk of causing severe pain, and in your case the death of your unborn child. And they use it when they don't need it. Those spots are there for those who need it. And those who need it shouldn't be ashamed to speak up and say: I'm disabled, give me a placard.