nolapdbs

friday morning i headed to work; magazine street becomes camp and with the park on the left and the international school of louisiana on the right i drove the left lane at the requested 20milesperhour with the rest of the commuters motoring to work. well beyond school grounds (100meters+) a sudden smash of brakes and warning red from the suv in front of me had me smashing mine and rather than jam them to a full stop inches from her tailpipe i quick check the right lane, make lane change and proceed to gather speed as to not slow that lane too. just as i was about to cross melpomene, a cop who was already busy writing up another motorist looks up from his ticket pad and jumps out from in front of his cruiser and nearly into the path of my vehicle, banging on the side+trunk; evidently not pleased with his morning or my ability to transport myself about town.
i thought briefly about continuing about my trip to work (and probably should have) but thought better of it knowing that driving off would certainly bring penalty once he checked the cruisers on-board-camera for my plate#, so i obliged the officer and spun my car around to sit on the corner of melpomene+camp. it was about 8:45a. the officer (i won't name him now, but perhaps after future installments to this story) was curt to say the least. "license, registration, proof of insurance." i obliged. "i'll be back," off to his cruiser to check me for warrants. i have none. he returned to my car window with my information and then very plainly informed me that i was driving 30mph in a 20mph school zone, that i was following too closely to the car in front of me and that i failed to signal. he handed me a citation for all three 'violations.'
"sir," i tried to be polite, "you were just writing a ticket. you didn't see all that. the car in front of me smashed their brakes, of course i was close. i did signal. and you certainly didn't clock me from outside your cruiser."
"sign here. you can protest it with the court if you like."
i do like. and i fully intend to. dude shit on my friday morning simply to fill an end of the month citation quota he hadn't yet reached. traffic cops, i've been told, have to meet #s like any other form of solicitation. as he began to walk away from me i said "excuse me sir, you give no favor or grace for the fact that i simply could have just kept driving? i wouldn't had stopped had you not got my attention by banging on my car."
"i didn't bang on your car," he said anxiously and then walked away.
i felt like telling him to get laid.
added 9.43p: initial research+calculations project approximately a $857 fine.