Random Gripes: I'm the only moron in the world to get a JAYWALKING ticket!

A couple weeks ago, I received an email from 20SB announcing their eighth Blog Swap. I'd seen such emails in the past and had given a passing thought to participating but had never taken the necessary steps. You see, a Blog Swap involves featuring the post of a fellow blogger and being featured on their site in return. I have contributed to a friend's blog before but I haven't as yet featured anyone else on this blog. Sure, some of my friends have an open invitation to send me content or ideas they want to see me explore but having someone contribute an entire post is a new experience. And because I'm all about the experience, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to swap with guest blogger Africanlegend, who apparently had a recent run-in with law enforcement that he wants to share with us. Check him out:

I have long and distinguished resume of highly unlikely things that happen to me, I can regretfully report that I must add another.

January 2010….I AM ONE OF THE SELECT AND DISTINGUISHED CLASS OF ASSHOLES THAT HAS MANAGED TO GET A JAYWALKING TICKET.

THE STORY…..

It was a fairly mediocre Friday night, in fact in my memory, quite possibly as ordinary as Fridays can get. I was sitting in my living room. It was cozy, I felt safe and secure. Suddenly, I heard my phone vibrate and sprung up as if somebody poured a bucket of ice cold water on me. My friend Brian was downtown having fun and like a cancer the joy in his voice spread and I began to feel like a loser sitting on his couch on a Friday night: voluntarily. I jumped up to join him but quickly thought for a minute about the fact that I could hear my phone vibrating (doesn’t that defeat the purpose of having a “vibrate” setting?).

I arrived downtown. It was busy. There were drunken douchebags everywhere stumbling around. It looked like a moving Abercrombie catalogue with drunk models bumping their heads to bad hip-hop music. I finally found Brian and he was with two extremely crazy, unstable Englishmen, Matt and Ellis. Immediately I entered the bar the decided to relocated to another bar. Total alcohol consumption 0-1 beers.

The street was busy. We were at a four way stop and we decided to cut across the road to meet another walk signal (See: FIG A). My friends moved quickly across so I sped up to 1.75 times the speed of a casual walk. When I caught up with them, I proceeded to pat Brian on the back in some kind of boyish, “wow it’s good to be out” gesture.

Two seconds later we were apprehended by a couple of cops on bicycles. The Bicycle laden cops had got their perps and like a terrible cliché it happened to be four foreigners: a black dude, two Englishmen, and a Puerto Rican. In the back of my head I was thinking, “Oh no, somehow this will be filmed and I’ll end up being used in some anti-foreigner propaganda on FOX.”

A few minutes after we got caught…

Officer: Saw you crossing in the middle of road, I’m gonna have to right you up!

A.L: For what?

Officer: A traffic violation…

A.L: But I’m not in car?

Officer: You don’t have to be buddy. It’s Jaywalking!

A.L: HA HA HA…oh man like that segment on Jay Leno’s show...wait, seriously? Wait, I thought that’s not a real law. Is it?

Officer: You bet it is!

A.L: They arrest people for that? But it’s walking?

I started grinning and laughing under my breath, half-expecting that both officers would suddenly start stripping and our friend had played a distasteful practical joke on us.

Officer: SIR! Do you think this is funny? DO YOU THINKING THIS IS FUNNY!?

A.L: Well sorry sir but honestly, yes, a little funny. I just didn’t think anyone actually got tickets for stuff like this!

I realized I should just shut up. The cop finished writing me a ticket, looked at my Arizona ID and suddenly softened his aggressive tone.

Officer: You have an accent, where are you from?

A.L: Excuse me sir?

Officer: I mean you do not sound like you are from around here. Where are you originally from?

A.L: (puzzled) I am from exactly where my ID says, no place different.

Officer: OK? I was just trying to make conversation (in a tone suggesting that in this whole transaction that somehow I was the asshole).

A.L: Sir, forgive me if I don’t feel like a casual chit chat after getting a JAYWALKING ticket worth (I looked down)…holy Sh@T...!

MEANWHILE…

I looked across and the Matt/Ellis/Brian situation was panning out in a grossly less civil manner. Brian is telling a short, stalky officer that his mom is a lawyer and will throw the book at him. Matt was saying something non-aggressive but because of his English accent, which I admit even I don’t understand sometimes, he must have sounded like a Chelsea Football Club hooligan about to fight with an opposing fan. The officer that attended to me rushed over and grabbed Matt.

In any event, we all decided it’s better to just leave. As we were walking away, Matt began to vent to us, using a few choice words that wouldn’t fly in a class room. The officers, who had retreated by now to about 15 yards, heard him in the distance and in a bizarre change of mood, decided he needed to be arrested? Before long Matt was licking the wall while being handcuffed ~ FML

A few minutes later, we were sitting on the sidewalk watching Matt being tossed in the back of a paddy wagon. A black officer arrived at the scene of the crime. I thought I could at least reason with him, if for no other reason, because of our co-blackness but he didn’t listen at all. All he did was just repeat the same sentence over and over again as if a DJ was scratching a killer remix with a sample of his voice. I shook my head and walked away while he continued to mumble the same line over and over again. I began to suspect that at least this set of officers had smoked something tonight, and it was not for medicinal purposes.

CONCLUSIONS………..?

Yes you can get a Jaywalking ticket! They aren’t made up…

Yes it CAN cost $150…..which strangely is double the price of the ticket you get for running a red light, which may actually result in you running over someone that is jaywalking, but all that is semantics!

Don’t hang out with Englishmen….

If you are black, don’t expect the black cop to help you. He is one of them.

If you are comfortable and content just sitting there relaxing on a Friday night and you get a call from one of your buddies…SIT YOUR ASS DOWN AND READ A BOOK!

Keep Griping!

To learn more about Africanlegend and to see what nugget I had to share with his audience, check out his blog.