It has been a while since we have had a really bad day, but today took the cake. It started off great because it was a Friday, which means a half day for me at work. Quintin and Abby were on their way to see me at around 10 this morning when Quintin called me and told me he got pulled over on base for speeding. No big deal really.... on base if you get a ticket they just give you citations on your base record, and if you get 12 in one year, then you lose your base driving privileges.
So, I wait a little while and then he calls me back to see if I can call our insurance and have them fax a current copy of our insurance card to me. I had forgotten to put the new card in the car at the end of last month. Still I am thinking that it wasn't going to be much of an issue- they would just give him a ticket and he would be on his way. So about 15 minutes go by and I haven't heard from him, so I call him and he said they had him out of the car and were acting like they were going to arrest him.
The crazy thing about all of this is that it is all taking place in the parking lot of the building where I work. So I run down there, new insurance card in hand, and I arrive just in time to find the base cop scraping the base sticker on our car. Turns out that he was trying to give Quintin a ticket for speeding, not having insurance, and driving without a seatbelt. The speeding and insurance part were his fault, but the seatbelt- that is where this story gets crazy. Quintin and I always wear our seatlbelts- no matter what. This cop says that as Quintin was pulling to a stop in the parking lot, (mind you this was as he was being pulled over) and the cop saw him "gesture" and remove his seatbelt before he came to a complete stop. Quintin did this so he could reach across into the glove compartment to get all the info. So, because he was technically operating a motor vehicle without wearing his seatbelt (his words, not mine), he was going to give Quintin a third ticket!
After a much heated discussion between me, Quintin, the cop, and his supervisor, the cop decides to drop all the tickets except the speeding. I'm not sure if me telling him that I knew the Executive Officer of the base and I was going to call him to complain had anything to do with it or not! :) Quintin can also be pretty convincing when he gets mad. I think the funniest part about the whole thing was the cop saying that the reason he made Quintin get out of the car was because when he told Quintin that he was giving him a ticket for not wearing a seatbelt, he said, "That's B.S." Now, I am not just abbreviating that to keep this PG, that is what Quintin really said. Believe it or not those words made the cop feel threatened! Give me a break!
When I got back to my office I was telling people what happened and it turns out that this guy has a record for being out of control. Someone else had a run in with him about a week ago and had all of his tickets dropped too. Then, come to find out this guy isn't even a Master at Arms (real military police), but he is a Boatswain's Mate. Apparently he just wanted to try to flex some muscle.....but Quintin out flexed him!
The good thing is that since this morning was such a bummer, the rest of the weekend has to be great. Especially since Abby turns 2 on Sunday and we are having a Scooby-Doo party! Yeah!
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