The hits keep on comin'

Last night on the way home from work I got a ticket for "obstructing traffic." I was following a HUMMER with black out windows on to the freeway on-ramp. Out of nowhere Arnold, I mean, the HUMMER owner, came to a screeching halt, leaving me right behind him with the tail end of my car in the intersection. Had I been able to see above, around or through his black out windows I might have stopped before following him through the intersection, but I didn't.

My car was sticking out in the intersection for all of 10 seconds and I was pulled over by a motorcycle cop. It was 6pm on Thursday night, arguably the height of rush hour traffic and the streets were gridlocked. But still this cop insisted on pulling me over, which took a good ten minutes to weave through the piled up cars and over to the right. By pulling me over we ended up blocking an entire lane of southbound traffic because there's "no stopping" between 4pm-7pm.

I rolled down my window and gave him my license & registration. He went back to his bike and I thought he was just going to run my license to make sure I wasn't an escaped convict or drug runner. But NOOOOOOOO! I look in my rear-view mirror and he's writing me a ticket! It took him a good 15 minutes to write the ticket. ( I dunno, maybe that's why he became a traffic cop? Because the only literature he can handle is Highlights magazine.) Those 15 minutes blocking the southbound lane made bad traffic even WORSE. But he was hell bent on giving me that ticket! Not the blacked out TANK in front of me.

He handed me the ticket, told me my court date and then said "be safe getting back on the freeway, ok?" Eat me.

I smiled and looked down at the ticket before driving away. The violation said "Obstructing Traffic/ Anti-gridlock Law." Hmmm, that's funny. Why you ask? Oh, well, there was a little protest yesterday that did a little obstructing of it's own. Maybe you heard about it?

Immigration & Labor March and Rally

To save you the time of reading the whole press release I'll just post some pertinent snippets.

"The Labor and Immigration March and Rally will take place on Thursday, May 1, 2008. Traffic impacts in Downtown Los Angeles may be felt on any street within the area bounded by Cesar Chavez Avenue to the north, Alameda Street to the east, Pico Boulevard to the south and Hoover Street to the west beginning at 11:00 am in the morning and lasting throughout the day"

"Due to all four marches occurring almost simultaneously, Downtown Los Angeles traffic will be severely impacted during the pm peak hours within the quadrants of Broadway from Pico Boulevard to Temple Street and 5th Street between Alameda Street and Figueroa Street."

"Many roadways in Downtown Los Angeles will be impacted for most of the afternoon."

"Traffic impacts will be severe in Downtown Los Angeles during the afternoon rush hour."

You get the gist. To give you an idea of how this little march affected us Angelenos I'll tell you a story. I work with a guy named Tim. It was Tim's birthday yesterday and all his buddies threw a dinner for him at a swanky restaurant in West Hollywood. Please note West Hollywood is NOWHERE NEAR DOWNTOWN. Tim left Santa Monica at 7:30 to be at his birthday dinner at 8:30. Long story short, (too late,) Tim ended up eating a meatloaf dinner for one from Boston Market, ALONE, ON HIS BIRTHDAY, because the traffic was so snarled he couldn't get near the restaurant. He finally got home at 10:15 pm. Sounds like some people had obstructed traffic well past where they were supposed to be marching.

But, I'm the one who got a ticket and am forced to take time off work to appear in court AND pay a fine. On any other day this would have been a simple annoyance. But I find it deeply unfair, not to mention ironic that all I was trying to do was get home from WORK, and I am penalized for "obstructing traffic," while a rally full of people can obstruct traffic for hours with no consequence.

It's not that I have a problem with our rights to gather and protest peacefully, but again, I get a ticket for OBSTRUCTING TRAFFIC?????????? So absurd.