Tuesday, August 30, 2011

You just can't make this stuff up



This morning I was driving my son to the bus stop 20 min. from our house (the school itself is over 30 min. away but the best in the county so we sacrifice convenience for quality). I dropped him off and it's still quite early as I head back. It was about 6:30 a.m. and inky dark outside.

I am driving along when a sheriff's car pulls out from a side street and falls in behind me. Up ahead I am planning to turn left and then right in order to get on the street parallel to where I am driving in order to be able to cross the river to get home.

As I'm preparing to turn left I look in my rear view to make certain the people behind me are slowing down too (it's just a habit of mine to check and see if I'm about to be rear-ended). I notice the cop had turned his headlights off and I thought this was pretty odd considering how dark it still was.

As I was completing my turn I caught sight of both headlights in my rearview at once. One was off and the other was on. The cop had a headlight out!

I completed my left and then right turn so I was then driving parallel to the deputy. I considered cutting back over and flagging him down to tell him about it, then decided it was a waste of time.

But I keep looking down each side street to my right to see if I can see his car. About 5 blocks later, there he is. He had turned left and was heading toward me, one headlight glowing, pulling into a parking lot and getting in a take-out line.

How could I resist? I, too, pulled in the lot and swung up on the right side of my now captive audience. I waved at him through his passenger window. He rolled it down, inquisitively.

"Hi! Did you know you have a headlight out?" I ask cheerfully.

"Oh...yeah...that..." he stammers "it happened on patrol last night and there's no place open to get it fixed yet."

I look at him sternly and say "You shouldn't drive it until daylight then, officer," adding "I'll let you off with a warning this time, but you'd better get that fixed!" and I actually wagged my finger at him.

How many times have you ever been given the chance as an average citizen to pull over a cop?

And don't you know I laughed until I cried when it finally dawned on me where this all took place.

We were in the drive-thru line at Dunkin Donuts.

5 comments:

  1. That's great! Would have loved to have seen his face, especially after the finger-wagging :D

    And the location is the icing on the ca......errrrr, donut XD

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  2. You were my hero before for keeping your cool in a forum situation that I would have totally got bat$h*t crazy over, you are now my SUPER-duper HERO for wagging your finger at a cop! I will be giggling about this all day. :D

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  3. Real life can be so much more entertaining than TV or movies, huh?

    That is hilarious. You absolutely created a mental image for me with your writing. Thanks!

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  4. Oy! Your cop encounter went far better than mine--One morning last spring, I was pulling OUT of Tim Horton's with my morning cup as a trooper was pulling IN. I made eye contact and smiled at him. What did HE do? Oh, just whip into a U-turn and line up behind me, tailing me closely as I drove up the street a couple hundred yards, turned left into the school drive and on into my parking lot. As I pulled into my space--feeling quite paranoid, considering--he pulled up beside me and eye-balled me long and steady. Really creeped me out! Then he pulled off. I didn't leave my car until I saw him pull back onto the highway! And guess what? For the next three days, there he was, staged at the bottom of the school's drive, when I arrived each morning. Sheesh! Who knew a smile was suspect behavior?!

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  5. Wow!! I'd have had to report him for stalking.

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