Back Safe

I have returned from London. Victorious.

Not over London.

My victory came about twelve hours later when my reckless driving ticket was dismissed in court. While it might have appeared reckless to drive to Virginia minutes after a 10 hour flight (Gatwick to Cincinnati, Cincinnati to Charlotte—remarkably, all on time!) it needed to be done so I grabbed my mom and headed up. The snow was constant but not bad and traffic was low--thanks, I think, to everyone on the eastern seaboard camping out that night in DC. I'd never seen lorries drive—or have the ability to drive—that fast on I-85. I stayed out of the way. 65 is fast enough for me in the snow. Anyway, slept over in South Hill (twitch) and headed to court the following morning in the nearby town of Boydton through a dazzlingly white landscape. Everything was delayed a few hours on account of the snow but I only had to wait half an hour (after three trips through courthouse security. My mom, a nurse, always has scissors and at least one hemostat in her purse. These came up in the bag x-ray and I had an amusing time explaining to the security guard what a hemostat was while she bustled her tools back to the car.) The judge was straightforward and fair and looked surprisingly like the judge from Baltimore's traffic court. Most of the day's defendants didn't show, which is normal, so mine came up pretty quickly. Turned out the cop, the judge, and half the room had had trouble on that onramp and the cop even emphasized "that real tight curve with all the ruts in it" and "tried to correct but landed in deep mud." The judge asked me if I'd gotten caught in one of the ruts and I said I did. To paraphrase his final comment on the matter, "This court is very familiar with accidents caused by that onramp, and I personally am very familiar with it, and can't find you at fault. Case dismissed--you're free to go." I thanked them politely and booked it out of there. Hooray!

Oh yeah, England is good too.