Mo*Bee's Blog #2: Driving School

Mo*Bee's Blog #2:  Driving School

Well, as I left off last time, I said I couldn't wait to start taking some classes and reporting back to you what I've learned.  And as fate would have it, the class that I just took was the eight hour defensive driving course, Attitudinal Dynamics of Driving.

This class was brought to me by the National Safety Council.  If anyone out there is interested in taking this class, this is how I went about registering for it.

Kelly (my partner in this adventure) had been kind enough to invite me to go with her on a trip to Virginia to visit with her brother and his family.  On the way back I was driving Kelly's vehicle through a part of Virginia known as Charlotte County.  The road we were traveling on was straight and long but had continuous small rolling hills.  This road is like the little roller coasters you first ride as a toddler only instead of going in a circle you just keep going straight.

Kids' roller coaster designed to mimic the roads in Charlotte County, VA.
Hang on kids!  It is an expensive ride!

I had the cruise control set on the car.  (I like to use that feature because it keeps me from getting a ticket.)  Kelly noticed that I had the cruise control on and asked if I would turn it off.  She felt that having cruise control on while going over all the little hills might be bad for the car.  I told her why I had it on but agreed to turn it off, and she and I continued our discussion about how we could make Mo*Bee's the best website it could be.

That's really all I know about this road and Charlotte County.  Oh, I almost forgot one other thing.  There's a highway patrol officer who just so happened to be parked on the side of this road as I came by, and this would be how I found out I was in Charlotte County. This sheriff's deputy decided he would like to meet me.

Before leaving me he gave me a written invitation to come back to Charlotte County where I could meet the judge they had there and I could get to tell the judge for myself why I was traveling on his road in his county going 73 miles an hour when I was only supposed to be going 60.

My invitation to an eight hour class.

While I'm sure I would have liked to have gone back to Charlotte County and have met that judge and I'm sure some other fine people from Charlotte County and seen some of their architecture, perhaps of the courthouse.  I'm awfully busy these days getting Mo*Bee's ClassFinder up and running.  So, I decided I would just get on the Internet and find an attorney who I could pay to take care of this invitation I'd been given.

I found an attorney who for $300 went and met with that judge on my behalf and came back to me with this offer.  If I would agree to pay the court in Charlotte County $142.00 dollars and take an eight hour driving class ($75.00), in turn the court would not tell my insurance company on me. It would go down in The History Books as a guilty plea for defective equipment and not speeding as originally charged.  And no points would be assessed on my driving record and therefore no points on my insurance. (This people is just one reason why when you read our history books they sometimes favor whoever has paid the most to have them written.)

I decided I would take this deal and went to work signing up for my class. I found they had an eight hour driving class in a neighboring town at Isothermal Community College.

Because I had received my ticket in Virginia, I called the school to make sure this was going to be a school that was acceptable to the State of Virginia. There I spoke with a lady by the name of Butch Rollins.  I'm not going to bore you with a lot of these details but for one reason or another there ended up being a lot of hoops I was going to have to jump through to make sure Virginia was accepting this class.

The one & only, Butch Rollins!

Before this day I had never met Butch Rollins. I had never even spoken to her on the phone.  And while all the hoops to jump through were my own, she jumped through all of them for me.  Even the ones on fire and the ones with no safety net below. Seriously, she has given me a goal of how I want and expect my customer service for Mo*Bee's Class Finder to be.

There is now a sign in my office to remind me that reads: “Butch up your customer service”.  I'm glad to report that after all her hard work I was now registered for the class they were holding on the upcoming Saturday.

The sign in my office that reminds me that the bar has been set high.

I'm happy to say that I did learn some things in this class.  (I hate to think that anything I do is either a waste of time or a waste of money.)  I'm not sure that I needed all eight hours to learn what I was taught but I have to let that go.

I do love statistics, and this class was full of them.  However once I'm given one I tend to think about it long and hard.  So anything that is said after you have given me a statistic, I don't hear.  Depending on how fascinating the statistic is to me, I may not hear what you say for the next hour.  It's really weird how, for some reason, sometimes I can get stuck on a topic and can't let it go.  But 99% of the time (ha ha I just used a statistic) my attention span is comparable to that of a three-month-old Labrador puppy.

Oh yeah, they also had another thing that was very interesting to me. They had us answer all these questions in a little booklet. Then they calculated a score which gave you a self assessment profile of your driving. Here are a few of the things my test told me about me and my driving:

1. Displays independence

2. Willing to take risks

3. Willing to make unsafe driving choices (this should show up on every
    persons test in this room, otherwise none of us would be there.)

4. Views other drivers as opponents or obstacles

I must say I can't really argue with their findings.  It may very well be that that is because I view driving as a chore and not as a hobby.  I tend to just want to get to where I'm going when I am driving, but can be more laid back if someone else is driving.

Well, like I said I did learn some things in this class and it has made me try to work on being a better driver; but I hope from here on out that I will only be taking the classes that I want to take and not the classes that I have to take.

So, until next time my opponents of the road, my advice to you would be drive carefully.  As for Kelly, from now on if I drive your car, and I have it on cruise control so that I won't get a ticket, we can do one of two things.  One – if I tear your car up because I have it on cruise control, I will pay to fix it.  If it can't be fixed, I'll buy you a new car.  Two – instead of asking me to turn the cruise control off while I'm driving, just tell me you want to drive now, and we will switch.

And last, but not least...To Butch Rollins – you are my reminder that every cloud really does have a silver lining.  I don't know that I believe in fate or anything like that.  I do know that this whole experience and the money that it cost, was well worth what you taught me about good, no great, customer service!  Mo*Bee's Class Finder has been made better by you. Thank you again Butch Rollins!

Until next time.

Dee
a.k.a. Mo*Bee




Find the class you want to take at Mo*Bee's Class Finder.com!