So yesterday on my daily skate to work from St. Edwards Dr to Downtown via Congress. I got a ticket. How fucking ridiculous?Every weekday I skate to work. I leave at about 1025 and usually get there at 10:50. The ride to work is the best start to any day. It is all a downhill ride from Oltorf and Congress, even though its a main road. Once I cross the bridge into Downtown, I take the sidewalk and skate six streets north to work. On the sixth street (6th street), this time there were three cops socializing on the corner of the street. I saw them from further but honestly, I wanted to test my limits. One of the cops, immediately after seeing me, sticks his arms out and steps in front of me.
"Hey! Get of that thing! let me see your ID"
"Sir, I'm just going to work, right around the corner"
"Skateboarding on the sidewalk or the street is against city policy"
"So where can I skate then?"
"On private property"
"Well I didn't know that, Ive only been here for three weeks"
"Well now you know"
He didn't hesitate to write me a ticket. He walked up to his bicycle, opened the pouch in the back and took out one of his many little ticket booklets and wrote me a ticket, a ticket promising to appear in court on August the 5th for "skateboarding on the sidewalk".
This made me think about something. I wonder if its a competition between all the cops who can finish the most little booklets first. And I wonder what its like needing new booklets.
"Hey, Cindy, I need you to order more ticket booklets for next month, summer is the season for tickets!"
Tommy from ALC had told me about getting tickets, for going 70 on a 45. For "not having lights while riding at night" and even for "not having brakes" on their vehicle. Yes, it was that fucking stupid, but I had to see for myself
Omar, great to find you safe in Austin and that the scene is all that you expected. I had begun to worry that you had given up on your blog. Hang there awhile 'til it cools off before skating out across the desert.
ReplyDeleteBummer about the ticket. Least you've got a job now to pay it.
Thanks for the kind words about your visit with us old fogies in Linden.
Accept those occasional donations with gratitude and humility. Remember, it's a two way steet.
I'm reading "On the Road" by Jack Kerouac. You've probably already read it. Man, you're a better writter them him and he's famous. I'll see about the book you referenced by the fellow who walked across the US.
Keep on truckin'.