Confessions of a Police Car Passenger.....

Thanks for all your comments on yesterday's post. It was fun to see what I'd get accused of IF you saw me in a police car.

Actually, I did get a free ride in a police car once. Here's the story, and I swear it's the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, as well as my memory serves me.

Jim and I had gone to New York to see a Broadway show. When we go to New York we usually drive to someplace in southern CT, park the car and take the train in to Grand Central Station, then walk from there to Broadway. This saves having to drive in New York City.

On one particular occasion we did as usual but on the way back we got off one stop too soon. (OK, here's another confession, Jim insisted it was the wrong stop and I insisted it was the right one. Gentleman that he is, he didn't say "I told you so". He was much better than I would have been about the whole thing.) It was well after midnight, very chilly evening indeed, and there was no one around. The train station was absolutely deserted. New York may be the city that never sleeps but it's just the opposite for Greenwich, CT. We had our cell phones but didn't know any numbers to call for a taxi and there wasn't a phone book at the pay phone.

As we were contemplating our dilemma, I saw a cruiser crossing over the bridge ahead. I started jumping up and down, shouting and waving frantically. He turned into the parking lot and I hurried down the steps toward him, Jim walking quickly behind. He got out of his cruiser quickly, hand on gun, and inquired urgently "What's the problem, ma'am?", all the while keeping an eye on Jim. As I later thought about it I suppose it looked like I was about to get attacked by this man who was following me.

I explained our problem and asked if he could call us a cab. He did better than that. He invited us to get into the back of his cruiser, offering us a ride to the next train station, apologizing for the lack of upholstery in the back seat.

Now this is the first (and only, I might add) time I've ever been up close and personal with a cruiser so I had to ask what happened to the seat covers and floor rugs. For those of you who've never been in a police car, it's just a hard plastic seat and floor which, as he explained, prevents detainees from hiding things in the upholstery or those who've had too much to drink from damaging it while expelling their stomach contents. It's a simple matter of hosing it out. (EWWW! I'd never thought before about cops having to deal with that in the back of their cars. That's worse than having to clean up after the kids. Wonder if they ever use my DIL's car wash idea?)

We had a very nice chat in the 20 minutes or so that it took to take us to our destination. And, I might add, he brought us right to our vehicle. After thank yous on our part and wishes for a safe trip on his, we were on our way home. The next day we tried to tell the kids that Jim was so rowdy that we were finally escorted to our vehicle in a cruiser and told "Hasta la vista, baby!" (picture Arnold in Terminator 2). As convincing as I tried to sound they just didn't buy it so I had to come clean as to why we had a police escort back to our vehicle.

So that's my story and I'm sticking to it.