Things not to have in open view in your car when stopped by the police in Bumblef*ck, TX

I got a ticket Sunday on my way back from visiting my sister in DFW.

I confess: It was all my fault. I was doing 82 mph. The limit was 65 miles per hour. (It should�ve been 70 mph � NOTE: Johnson County is one big speed trap.) I wasn�t being as careful as I usually am. I was out front coming up over a hill. Easy pickins for radar. And as soon as I saw him (too late) hiding in a thicket off to the side of the road, I knew he had me. I pulled over to the side of the road almost before he�d turned on his lights.

See, speed is my weakness. I expect to pay the piper now and then.

God, there�s nothing better than a sunny 80-something-degree day with a hilly, mostly empty highway to fly down. When you were 12, did you ever ride your bike to the top of a hill, just so you could race down, feet over the handle bars, hands out slicing the wind? Occasionally, I�d set up ramps so I could get airborne. Even then, I was addicted to speed. So, no. The ticket doesn�t bother me so much. It�s my first in three years. I can take defensive driving to get my record squeaky clean again. The insurancecompanyfromhell never has to know about it. But of all the times to get pulled over!

See I had three problems:

One was that I�d forgotten to put my updated insurance card in the glove compartment.

Two was the half-finished six pack on the passenger floorboards. (I did not have gastrointestinal relations with that booze while driving. I did not.)

Three was the vicious-looking hacksaw in the back seat that everybody has been saying I need to put away. (Yeah, yeah. You all told me so.)

And that�s why this entry is coming to you from the Alvarado city jail.

Just kidding.

Officer Friendly gave me a ticket for speeding, a warning about the insurance card (He believed me! I wouldn�t even have believed me.), a strange look about the four-once-six bottles of beer (Texas just adopted a no-open-container law after all), and a stranger look about the hacksaw, which was in the car for a very good reason.

I just can�t remember what that reason was.

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