Excuse me Ma'am

Do you know why I pulled you over?

Is there a right answer to this question. Seriously.

In all my 28 years, I have never been pulled over or gotten a ticket. I would like to say this is due to my amazing driving skills, but in reality, I usually don't get caught doing the stupid things I do daily (i.e. hit curbs, bump mailboxes, cut people off, accelerate through yellow lights, roll through stop signs, speeding, etc, etc, etc.).

Yesterday, JM begged me to meet him for lunch. At Subway. About 10 minutes from both of our offices. I agreed.

I know Oprah is all about the no phones in the car and after yesterday, I have to agree. After hanging up with my mom, I called JM to see if he had beat me to Subway. He had. Next thing I know, cop lights are on, the car is behind me and I tell JM I am getting pulled over. His incrediulous really? didn't help matters. I hang up.

Excuse me, Ma'am. (Ok, really!? I am only 28, is this really Ma'am territory...ok, I digress).

Excuse me, Ma'am. Do you know why I pulled you over? Ah ha! Trick question. I really did not know. Speeding? Did I hit a small animal? I have no clue.

You ran a stop sign back there. REALLY!? How is that possible? Are you sure? Yikes. My bad, officer. I was just talking to my babysitter about my son and (insert tapered off rambling here).

Ma'am, I need your license and registration. Ok, no problem. WAIT. STOP. THE. WORLD.

To really understand the next part, I have to inform you of my favorite sales guy, Big Jimmy. Jimmy is a 300 lb, foul mouthed co-worker, who has an intense fear of flying. His cure? Drinking. Yep, Jimmy gets drunk before every flight. I took him to the airport on Friday, after our sales meetings were over and prior to that, I took him to Liquor barn for a pint of vodka. To drink with his orange juice. At 2 pm. To make a long story short, Jimmy left the remaining 1 Tbsp of vodka and the plastic pint in my glove box. Which I now had to open for my registration.

Sweating and crying, I opened the glove box, pushing papers over said incriminating bottle. Whew. Luckily, the officer didn't see it. Sigh of relief.

Insert argument about seatbelt wearing here. Officer says I don't have it on. I say I took it off to reach in the glove box. He says no. I say yes. I have an annoying dinger in my car that mandates seatbelt wearing. He drops it. Again, I am thankful said Vodka bottle was not found. This officer is not seduced by my feminine wiles- ha.

Give him the papers. No insurance card. Dammit. Its in the glove box. If I dig for it, vodka is exposed. I tell him its a new car and I don't have the card yet. He leaves.

Comes back and a ticket for not stopping at a stop sign and no proof of insurance later, I am released. Sigh. I mean, of all the times I could get pulled over, it has to be when I have a bootlegged bottle of opened booze in the car!? I barely drink any more, let alone keep pints on hand.

I go to court in January. Apparently, running a stop sign calls for such things. The insurance thing I can drop by taking my card (which I have) to the court's office. Ok. I can handle that. The fine is what I am scared of anyway.

Case in point: Do not drive on backroads in Lexington with a half drank bottle of vodka in your glove box, without your insurance card, while running stop signs. Not a good idea, apparently.

Hope your day is better than mine!