When I was sixteen years old I did a lot of stupid things. The kind of things that you read about on the Darwin Awards site. A friend of mine reminded me of one of those stories today, so I thought I'd share it here.
I grew up in a small town in rural Utah. Needless to say, there wasn't a whole lot to do for entertainment. Many nights consisted of dragging Main Street, and that was it. Sure, driving up and down a single street in the hopes of running into friends so you could talk to them in a parking lot is a pointless exercise, but it beat sitting around the house, so that's what we did.
One of the other problems with living in a small town (and part of why dragging Main was the thing to do) is that everything closes by six o'clock p.m. If we got in the mood for snacks, we'd have to drive to purchase them at the "busy" gas stations along the freeway exits. One evening, we got in such a mood, so a carload of us went to the north end of town to buy some sodas and candy bars. It just so happened that I was the last one to pay, so my friends did what any normal sixteen year olds would do in an attempt to be funny: They ran out to the car, got in, and tried to leave me there.
I finished paying, then ran out just in time to be able to jump up on their back bumper and grab onto the car, thus insuring that I would not be left behind. Of course, I was under the mistaken impression that they would stop the car and let me in once they realized I had caught them. Instead, they decided it would be funny to go the other way, and they took the dirt road that led to the city dump. By this time, the car was moving too fast for me to be able to jump off without receiving any bodily harm. Everyone knows how afraid I am of receiving bodily harm, so there I was, stuck standing on the rear bumper of a car traveling ~50 mph down a dirt road, unable to do anything about it.
About this time I looked ahead and saw that one of the Sherriff's deputies was parked ahead, so I did what I thought best given the circumstances. I squatted down on the bumper, foolishly hoping that somehow he wouldn't notice me there as we went speeding by.
He noticed.
Fortunately, I was able to get down off the bumper safely once the officer pulled us over. Unfortunately, we had some explaining to do.
Officer: Alright boys, where's the party at?
Us: What party?
Officer: I'm not stupid you know. You guys are about the fifth car I've seen heading out this way, now where's the party?
Us: Honestly, we don't know anything about a party. We were just fooling around and came out this way.
Officer: So you guys aren't on your way to get drunk?
Us: No. None of us even drink.
[He then checked our IDs and eyed us all suspiciously for a spell]
Officer: Ok, I believe you. I'll tell you what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna treat this like a UFO. I saw somethin', and I don't know what it was, but if I see it again I'll know.
Then he let us go. No tickets. No calls to our parents. He just sent us on our way (making sure we were all inside the vehicle this time) then got back to trying to catch underage drinkers.
I just love that line he gave about the UFO. I'm willing to bet that he practiced it at home, and probably even bragged about it later back at the Sherriff's Office. Either that, or it's the line he gives everyone when he lets them off the hook for something. At any rate, it's a classic.
Showing posts with label cops. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cops. Show all posts
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
Thursday, November 16, 2006
But he's driving and striving and hugging the turns, and thinking of someone for whom he still burns
Here's the story about how my friend had a birthday and made me get a speeding ticket (what a bitch that friend is for doing that, I know).
She sent me an email a few days ago asking me if I wanted to join her at an Irish Pub last night. I have to admit that I wasn't too keen on going (since I've been working my butt off this week - literally, it fell off), but then I found out it was for her birthday celebration so thought I'd stop by for a little while. What could go wrong with that?
Well, I'll tell you what can go wrong with that. Plenty!
First, I drove out there with another friend of mine. We'll call him BJ (even though it has very little to do with his real name and he hates it when I call him that). BJ and I left campus in my car and drove out to meet the birthday girl & Co. When we walked into the place, they came to seat us and we told them we were looking for a group of people. Just then the birthday girl let out a big laugh, and the hostess said, "Can you hear them?" We obviously could so didn't need her to show us to our table. We sat for a while, beverages were consumed, jokes were told, and many laughs were had. It had all the makings of an enjoyable evening. They even had an Irish band playing, and let me tell you, you haven't truly lived until you've heard the up-tempo Irish version of Radiohead's Creep. I would normally hate that Irish band for ruining one of my favorite songs, but I actually know the fiddle player, and she's so nice that I can't hate her (no matter how much she might deserve it).
Unfortunately, I really was tired, plus it was a weeknight, so BJ and I left after being there a little more than an hour. I drove BJ back to campus so that he could get his car. After dropping him off I pulled off of campus and onto one of the major streets around campus. Little did I know that I was accelerating quickly. Quickly enough that Officer D. Devitte was horrified by my speed. Or maybe he was just looking out for the safety of that one other driver that was about a mile ahead of me on the road because you never know what a crazy guy like me is going to do when he's driving out of control. I ramped through my gears so fast that I was doing 48 mph within about two feet of the place that I turned onto the road. You had no idea that my car could go that fast that quickly did you? Neither did I. I always thought that it was powered by about seven hamsters running on a wheel, but there's no way that seven hamsters could crank out that kind of speed. Maybe the last time I took it to Jiffy Lube they upgraded me to seven squirrels or something. Everyone knows that squirrels run faster than hamsters.
Anyway, I also didn't have a current proof of insurance card in the vehicle with me so Officer D. Devitte wrote me a ticket for that and the speeding. In the time that it took him to write that ticket seven Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift type cars zipped by us, but those guys couldn't have been going as fast as I was. I'm also pretty sure that within a five block radius of where we were about 700 drug deals went down, 87 stereos were stolen from cars, 3 children were kidnapped, someone was raped and murdered and a drive by shooting was planned, but check the news to make sure.
So the way I see it, the birthday girl now owes me about $190 after I prove to the court that I do in fact have insurance on my car (that in no way shape or form is capable of accelerating as fast as Officer D. Devitte says it is) because if she didn't have to go and have her stupid little birthday party, then I would have gone home my normal way, at my normal time, and wouldn't have gotten pulled over because they can't pull you over when you're just one of 500 vehicles that are moving that fast on the same street. Sure, you might be saying that it's all my fault because the speed limit there is 30 mph so I should only drive 30 mph, but, I'm here to tell you that nobody can drive 30 mph on that street. Do you hear me? Nobody. I know because I've tried it about a million times, and I can never do it. Ok, maybe not never, but every time I do I get rear-ended because I'm going too slow (ok, so that only happened once, but then again, I've only driven 30 mph on that road once, so it really is every time).
I hate cops. But you know what? I say, "Screw you Officer D. Devitte. I'll drive the way I want." The people who come up with speed limits are all stupid anyway. They should really just be suggestions. That way all the stupid morons that don't know how to drive will kill themselves in fiery auto crashes and clear up the road for the rest of us.
Does anybody know if Ticketbuster people really can get your ticket reduced every time? I may have to look into that.
She sent me an email a few days ago asking me if I wanted to join her at an Irish Pub last night. I have to admit that I wasn't too keen on going (since I've been working my butt off this week - literally, it fell off), but then I found out it was for her birthday celebration so thought I'd stop by for a little while. What could go wrong with that?
Well, I'll tell you what can go wrong with that. Plenty!
First, I drove out there with another friend of mine. We'll call him BJ (even though it has very little to do with his real name and he hates it when I call him that). BJ and I left campus in my car and drove out to meet the birthday girl & Co. When we walked into the place, they came to seat us and we told them we were looking for a group of people. Just then the birthday girl let out a big laugh, and the hostess said, "Can you hear them?" We obviously could so didn't need her to show us to our table. We sat for a while, beverages were consumed, jokes were told, and many laughs were had. It had all the makings of an enjoyable evening. They even had an Irish band playing, and let me tell you, you haven't truly lived until you've heard the up-tempo Irish version of Radiohead's Creep. I would normally hate that Irish band for ruining one of my favorite songs, but I actually know the fiddle player, and she's so nice that I can't hate her (no matter how much she might deserve it).
Unfortunately, I really was tired, plus it was a weeknight, so BJ and I left after being there a little more than an hour. I drove BJ back to campus so that he could get his car. After dropping him off I pulled off of campus and onto one of the major streets around campus. Little did I know that I was accelerating quickly. Quickly enough that Officer D. Devitte was horrified by my speed. Or maybe he was just looking out for the safety of that one other driver that was about a mile ahead of me on the road because you never know what a crazy guy like me is going to do when he's driving out of control. I ramped through my gears so fast that I was doing 48 mph within about two feet of the place that I turned onto the road. You had no idea that my car could go that fast that quickly did you? Neither did I. I always thought that it was powered by about seven hamsters running on a wheel, but there's no way that seven hamsters could crank out that kind of speed. Maybe the last time I took it to Jiffy Lube they upgraded me to seven squirrels or something. Everyone knows that squirrels run faster than hamsters.
Anyway, I also didn't have a current proof of insurance card in the vehicle with me so Officer D. Devitte wrote me a ticket for that and the speeding. In the time that it took him to write that ticket seven Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift type cars zipped by us, but those guys couldn't have been going as fast as I was. I'm also pretty sure that within a five block radius of where we were about 700 drug deals went down, 87 stereos were stolen from cars, 3 children were kidnapped, someone was raped and murdered and a drive by shooting was planned, but check the news to make sure.
So the way I see it, the birthday girl now owes me about $190 after I prove to the court that I do in fact have insurance on my car (that in no way shape or form is capable of accelerating as fast as Officer D. Devitte says it is) because if she didn't have to go and have her stupid little birthday party, then I would have gone home my normal way, at my normal time, and wouldn't have gotten pulled over because they can't pull you over when you're just one of 500 vehicles that are moving that fast on the same street. Sure, you might be saying that it's all my fault because the speed limit there is 30 mph so I should only drive 30 mph, but, I'm here to tell you that nobody can drive 30 mph on that street. Do you hear me? Nobody. I know because I've tried it about a million times, and I can never do it. Ok, maybe not never, but every time I do I get rear-ended because I'm going too slow (ok, so that only happened once, but then again, I've only driven 30 mph on that road once, so it really is every time).
I hate cops. But you know what? I say, "Screw you Officer D. Devitte. I'll drive the way I want." The people who come up with speed limits are all stupid anyway. They should really just be suggestions. That way all the stupid morons that don't know how to drive will kill themselves in fiery auto crashes and clear up the road for the rest of us.
Does anybody know if Ticketbuster people really can get your ticket reduced every time? I may have to look into that.
Friday, June 02, 2006
Freedom's just a stupid superstition
When you're sleeping in the back of an SUV in the parking lot of a church in Portland Oregon there are few things that get your heart racing quite like being woken up at 3 a.m. with a flashlight on your face and someone yelling "Open up, it's the police!" Oh, and it's probably not the best move to reach for your keys that are underneath your pillow to electronically unlock the doors before opening them. |
Wednesday, April 19, 2006
Slow down, not so fast
Today I was going to the store with a friend to buy some maps (easy, it wasn't as exciting as it sounds). As we were walking to his vehicle, we came up behind a guy who was pushing a stroller and walking with a little girl. As we gained on him he turned around and asked "Do you guys work here?"
We said yes.
"You should put in a yield sign or something here. There are a lot of little kids that go to the elementary school over there, but cars come zipping through here all the time without paying attention."
(you know, because we look like we would have a say as to where yield signs should and should not be on campus)
He went on for a while about how nobody in this town ever pays attention to pedestrians (true, but I think it's probably true for just about any town in the west). Ironically, just as he was saying this we approached a crosswalk while a university police car came by. It didn't stop to let us cross.
He said, "See, even the police don't stop. But they're usually pretty good when it comes to writing parking tickets. Of course, that's where their paycheck comes from. There's probably a sale on donuts and coffee over there at Vons though, so he can't be bothered with slowing down."
We laughed.
He continued, "It's pretty sad that people don't pay any mind to pedestrians. Hell, I've been hit so many times. And I have a big van too. I could drive around town and run over people all day if I wanted to, I just prefer to walk."
I, for one, am thankful for that.
We said yes.
"You should put in a yield sign or something here. There are a lot of little kids that go to the elementary school over there, but cars come zipping through here all the time without paying attention."
(you know, because we look like we would have a say as to where yield signs should and should not be on campus)
He went on for a while about how nobody in this town ever pays attention to pedestrians (true, but I think it's probably true for just about any town in the west). Ironically, just as he was saying this we approached a crosswalk while a university police car came by. It didn't stop to let us cross.
He said, "See, even the police don't stop. But they're usually pretty good when it comes to writing parking tickets. Of course, that's where their paycheck comes from. There's probably a sale on donuts and coffee over there at Vons though, so he can't be bothered with slowing down."
We laughed.
He continued, "It's pretty sad that people don't pay any mind to pedestrians. Hell, I've been hit so many times. And I have a big van too. I could drive around town and run over people all day if I wanted to, I just prefer to walk."
I, for one, am thankful for that.
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