Thoughts On Driving, Tickets, and Traffic School...

I've been driving 40 years. "Back in MY day" driving was not like it is today.  I got a driving permit at 15 and a license the day I turned 16.  There are very few things more exciting than being 16 and driving...alone (i.e., no adults)!  Like many of my peers, I had managed to get 3 moving violations by age 17.  Today they'd revoke a license. But 40 years ago it was a visit to Juvenile Court with mom to get a stern "talking to" from the judge and mandatory .  Of course, today is much different:  You can't even get a license until you can prove you've completed puberty.  Harsh!  But, as a grandfather of 8, this seems like a good idea to me!  ;-) 

Yeah, I've had a few "moving violations" over the years.  My worst driving year was 1996:  Two speeding tickets within 6 months both for driving over 100 MPH...and on the EXACT stretch of the southbound 215 Freeway!  It's probably just a coincidence that both times I was driving my 1995 Camaro Z28 (right!). By the end of 1997 I was driving a Buick La Sabre that my girls nicknamed "The Pickle".

Got a ticket recently from one of those "camera intersections" in Los Alamitos.  Got the picture right in the mail along with a $500 fine!!  That's more than I paid for my first 100 MPH ticket!  But I got the last laugh.  The picture showed me talking on my cell phone when I was blowing through the red light, but they didn't cite me for that (HA!!).  Anyway, I opted for traffic school and took it online.  Wow, what a breeze!  I highly recommend this. Use to be mandatory to go to an actual class...all day...boring lectures...gross videos (a la "Red Asphalt").  Not today.  In just two hours and $21 later, I'm done!  I never read the 7 chapters, I just took the quiz at the end of each section and then advanced to the final exam. What a scam.   

Well, that's all.  No big spiritual lessons.

Happy driving...The Gospelot