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Today has been a bad day. I woke up to my landlord coming in to fix our microwave, which he had woken me up to install the other day, only to do it wrong, necessitating today’s visit. Then I had to drive Madalene to the airport to fly to Colorado. However, instead of getting tickets out of the St. Louis airport, she got tickets out of the Kansas City airport because they were cheaper. She was intending to drive her car there and park it while she was in Colorado, but since a friend wrecked her car the other day, we had to borrow his car. He was very gracious in letting us use it, but it meant that instead of being able to just park it in Kansas City, I had to drive there with Madalene, and then drive the car back that day. I’ll have to do the same thing in a few days to pick her up from the Kansas City airport, unless she buys a new car in Colorado, in which case she’ll be driving it back.

However, the car we were borrowing is pretty old, and while its in good general working order, its air conditioning isn’t functional. This, combined with the fact that it was over 105 degrees out, made the 4 hour drive to Kansas City downright miserable. The heat, combined with the fact that in order to survive, we had to have the windows all rolled down, which created a deafening roar on the highway, gave us both bad headaches.

Also, we hit horrible traffic jams coming out of St. Louis, meaning Madalene nearly missed her flight. We were delayed even further when a security team took it upon themselves to completely unpack Madalene’s possessions, lay them out on a table, and carefully examine each individual item. One guard pawed through her underwear on a table right next to the main terminal hallway where every slack jawed passerby could see, while three other security guards stood nearby whispering and chuckling to each other.

I don’t even see why its worth even packing your stuff, you should just bring your empty bags, then all your stuff in a big ass trash bag. Then just dump it all on the floor and let the guards paw through it and then stuff it into your luggage when they are done. That would save you from having your carefully packed baggage completely undone and hastily repacked, you could just let them hastily pack it when they are done, and forget the work of actual packing it beforehand.

Then, on the way home, in the heat of the afternoon, I was feeling very unpleasant. I pulled over and holed up in a Subway for a few hours, hoping the heat would begin to die down a bit. As soon as the heat got down to a paltry 100, I decided to be on my way again. I was in a hurry to get out of the horrific Kansas City highway system, and wanted to get home in time for a friend’s birthday celebration. However, I got pulled over by a cop on my way out of town. He claimed I had been speeding, which I probably was by a small amount, but certainly not the amount he was claiming. However, I wasn’t in the mood to argue about it too heavily. Then he got me out of my car, and sat me down in his. He told me that I and the car smelled like marijuana. He told me that he could smell it on me clearly. I told him that there was nothing of the sort on me, in me, or in the car. Then he administered a little sobriety test, and then took my pulse. He said my pulse was way to high for me to be sober, and that I was lying to him about being high. I told him that I had just been driving in 100+ degree weather in a horrifically loud car, and that I was pretty stressed out from the day’s circumstances, and rather nervous at having been accused of being a liar and a felon. He didn’t believe me, so called for backup. He asked if I would consent to a search, so I let him search me, but told him not to search the car, because it wasn’t mine and I didn’t feel it was my place to give consent for its search. Then he flat out told me that because of my responses and behavior, he knew I was lying to him, and that I had marijuana in the car. He told me to just confess, so the penalties would be less than if I lied about it and was caught. I told him I wasn’t lying, then nervously sat in his car and waited.

Finally backup came, and the second cop sat me down and questioned me. He was playing good cop, while the other one was playing bad cop. He asked me about my job, and about St. Louis and other pleasant topics (“Oh, you live in the U. City area, eh? Nice place, I grew up there myself, very pretty, blah blah blah.”), all the while eyeing me and trying to figure out if I was high or not. Then he told me that the marijuana smell that the first officer detected was considered probable cause, and that they could arrest me and search the car without my consent. I don’t know where this marijuana smell business was coming from. I couldn’t smell a thing, and the second cop never mentioned that he could smell it. Sure, the car wasn’t very clean, and smelled a bit like cigarette smoke. Also, I certainly wasn’t clean, having been sweating like a damn dog for the last 7 hours. Add to that the smells of Subway sandwich wrappers, stale Mt. Dew, and a partially spilled bag of Sun Chips and that amounts to quite a few odors to deal with. However, marijuana wasn’t part of that equation in the slightest.

Finally they both sat me down and told me that if I didn’t consent to a search that they would send for a K9 unit. I finally broke down and let them search the car. I didn’t want to. I wanted to stand up for my rights. I wanted to say, “Bring the dogs. I am certain of my innocence, and I won’t allow you to violate the privacy of my friend’s car. Let them smell it, and prove you wrong.” But my voice fell flat, and I caved. The ‘good cop’ chatted me up while the ‘bad cop’ searched the car. He didn’t find anything of course, so he just sat me down again, and decided to give me a fat speeding ticket. Thats exactly what I need now, being on only part time wages.

After several more excruciating hours of driving, I finally arrived back home. Its now after midnight. I’ve been out of the house since about 10:30am, I’ve only had one meal all day, and I feel like crap. I’ve also missed Tommy’s karaoke party. I might be able to catch the end of it, but I’m filthy and I have a headache, and I have to work tomorrow morning anyway. I’m also good and excited about getting to pick up people from the airport both Monday and Thursday, when, if Madalene doesn’t decide to buy a new car in Colorado, I’ll have to make this same to/from Kansas city drive all over again. Plus the car needs gas, which is another thing I can’t afford.

This was supposed to be my birthday week, but I barely did any celebrating at all, since only a few of my friends weren’t busy or out of town or something when I tried to get together with them. I didn’t even do any relaxing because I was either stressed out at work doing things for another department that I don’t know anything about, or driving people to and from the airport, or helping Madalene with insurance hassles, or something. And now I’ve got a 108$ ticket as my present to myself.

The moral of the story is: Never leave your house, because bad stuff happens out there. I’m going to wash the stink of sweat, road, and whatever that damn cop was sure was weed off of myself, drink a gallon of water, take some Ibuprofen and sleep a few hours before work. Oh, and I just found out that my PC isn’t workin properly. Goodie.

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