There are a few of you, I would even say “several”, who will read my next sentence, look up to the heavens and exclaim with frevrent joy “It’s about time!”.
I got a speeding ticket yesterday.
If you know me then you know I drive pretty fast. I like to be in control (which is why I have a stick shift) and I get very impatient when stuck behind slow drivers or sloppy drivers or drivers overly cautious of rain or snow or, oh hell, anyone not going 55+. I like to get where I’m going and I love getting there on a nice windy road at high speeds.
Which makes yesterdays ticket that much more insulting. I was heading through NC State’s campus late in the evening. I’d been at work all day, followed by a three-hour history class and I just wanted to be home. Classicly, I was stuck behind some good ‘ole boy driving through campus at (what I would call) exceptionally slow speeds so I got impatient and made a right to get away from him and exit campus a different way.
My alternate path was a road that’s under-utilized most days and downright dead at 9pm on a Wednesday night. There are no dorms down there, only administrative buildings and as I drove I did not see a single car- not even headlights in the distance. Until I saw the cop. The NC State cop. He was hiding on the side of the road. I passed him and he pulled out and followed me. Strangely he didn’t pull me right away. He actually waited until I was on a “real” road, off-campus (actually, I wonder now if that had anything to do with my ticket…), a road that is quite heavily-traveled.
Probably because he was an NC State cop I didn’t think it would be a “real” ticket. I was wrong. Under the circumstances, I really didn’t think I was going that fast, but 42 mph sounds a lot worse when you find out the speed limit on that road 25 mph (I honestly thought it was 35 mph!). So if I do the math… carry the one… that’s me going 17 mph over the speed limit. I don’t know how that translates in points on my license, but it can’t be pretty.
Ironically, I haven’t had a ticket in four or five years. My driving record is decptively clean considering my little speeding habbit. And this is where those family members and friends start cackling and rubbing their hands together: I think my brother has had three tickets in the last few years and I doubt he drives as fast as I do. I think I was due, and despite the crummy circumstances, my whining will stop here. I’ll try to be a good girl, drive the speed limit (ok, plus 7mph or so…) and avoid all windy roads for the next few months.
Dammit.
