I have never received a speeding ticket, and only one (questionable but not worth the effort) parking ticket in the 20 years that I have been driving (crikey! 20 years!). Now, since September, I think I have set some sort of record for the number of traffic infractions attributed to one person without actually being behind the wheel. The extenuating circumstances bear noting.
Late September: I dropped off my old car, Petey, at a dealership for the beginning of a stare-down which resulted in the selling of Petey and the purchase of Sienna. After the drop-off I rode my mountain bike to the office. The combination of unfamiliar routes, the hurry of tardiness, the unfamiliar riding position (all my weight on my hands – which meant no hand signal), and a small dose of serendipity caused my path to divert down Battery right past an SPD motorcycle, officer, and mustache. I was nabbed and grudgingly accepted a fine for operating a vehicle in the wrong direction on a one-way street.
Late December: I received a call at work from my better half -
What does it mean if I just saw the lights flash on that new speed enforcement area outside the school? [both rhetorical and hopeful at the same time]
It means you were exceeding the speed limit and probably got a ticket. What were you driving?
The van.
The one that is only in my name?
Yep.
So I got the ticket. (it wasn’t a question)
Yep.
Ack!
It never came in the mail and it must have been one of those configuration errors everyone was talking about. Then…
Late January another call -
This time I know I got it.
Got what.
The lights flashed at me again and I am pretty sure I was going about 28.(spot on by the way, proves that the speedometer works.)
Stop that!…What were you driving?
The Camry.
Well at least it isn’t just me then. [smile]
Famous last words. As it turns out, when there are more than one registered owner only the first one on the list gets credit in computerized-traffic-court. Or maybe they have a newfangled device that assesses gender on the names of the registration and just assumes? Either way I am the winner of a new piece of mail with a nice little picture of OUR car frozen in time in front of the school. Doesn’t look very menacing in a still photograph.
Then, late tonight, another piece of mail (I am now able to recognize the stationary). This time it is from Tacoma? When the heck was she in Tacoma? Sensing a mystery I open the mail to see that good ‘ol Petey was likewise frozen in time, speeding in front of a school and somehow, after nearly 5 months, I still managed to get the credit.* Must be some kinda record.
One postscript to this whole affair; none of these infractions are considered “traffic” or moving violations. The one on the bike probably should have been but I think the outsized motorcycle mustache whispered sweet nothings into his ear and he took pity on my wittow gween bike. The other two, since they are photographs taken by machine and probably through some strange deal cut with the ACLU, do not count as moving violations. So none of them appear on my “driving” record. Good thing too, since none of them actually involved any driving (on my part).
* Never fear dear reader, this last one will NOT be paid by me. Computerized-traffic-court has a wittow mustache too that lets me send in proof of transfer of sale. I am sure the “buck” will get passed down the line to stop at the appropriate “here” – probably some guy on a bike. Now I wonder if the second buck, the one for the van, is being passed down the…oooh now that would really suck.
Incidentally, it would break my record…currently at three.
