I realized I had been referencing a certain speeding ticket, but that I had neglected to post anything about it.  Sorry for that.

I was running late one morning in October and decided to take my motorcycle to work that day.  Bike = 20 minutes to work, car = 45.  So I was cruising along in the car pool lane and came up on this guy on a Harley.  I stared to pass him when he notice that, Surprise!, I was a girl.  So he stared to speed up just enough to not let me pass.  Well, being a girl, I wasn’t going to stand for that.  I sped up just enough to start to pass him again.  This goes on a bit until we are doing about 87-88 mph.  We come across a fork in the road and he takes the one on the right and I the one on the left.  I start to slow down when I hear a siren behind me.  It’s the CHP!  He pulls me over and tells me to turn off my bike, remove my helmet, and step away from my bike over the car loudspeaker.  The CHiPpy gets out of his car and asks for my license, registration, and proof of insurance.  I tell him I have my license, my registration is at home (I had only gotten it from the DMV the day before) and my proof of insurance was still in the mail somewhere.  So he takes my license back to his car, and comes back a few minutes later with a ticket for going 91 in a 65 zone, and no registration or insurance.  He has me sign, and then tells me to “ride slow and have a nice day.”

The address on my license was an old one, so I figured I wouldn’t be getting anything about the ticket in the mail.  I pull up the Orange County Courts website and do some reading.  I find out there is a court house right around the corner from my work and decide to head over there to pay my fine.

When I get there they look at my ticket and tell me it is a mandatory court appearance.  Well that’s just great.  So I arrange for a night court session the middle of December.  I show up, get signed in, and wait for my name to be called.  It’s a looooong 3 hours.  I am finally called before the judge and he asks for proof of registration and insurance.  I show him those and he signs off on them on the ticket.  Then he looks at the speeding portion of my ticket.  He tells me to sit back down while he has my driving record pulled up.  I wait another 20 minutes until he finally has it.  He calls me back up and asks if I would like to take traffic school.  (Because I was going over 25 mph over the speed limit, technically I was ineligible for traffic school.)  I asked if I could and he says that since my driving record is clean, I can take traffic school.  Just when I think he is being nice, he then tacks a $100 penalty on my ticket costs bringing the grand total to $400.  ($250 for speeding, $100 penalty, and $50 for traffic school.)

So that is what all the “damn ticket” references are referring to.

Damn Ticket!

Anyway, I just finished up two, 4 hour sessions of traffic school yesterday.  I think I may have learend my lesson.