Tailgating.

There is no picture for this blog entry. If you will, please picture me with swollen face and blubbering. And, then, maybe a little steam coming out of my ears and writing a large check.

I've already shared how Troy and I have felt out of the loop or in the dark regarding the details for Nate starting school. Well, somehow we came to know that Nate's school would be hosting it's Open House on the night of September 2nd. This is exciting, right? The all day kindergarten program was posted for 5 until 6pm. Troy and I are working parents and anything happening at 5p makes us cringe, but we were reassured by the fact that this is an Open House. Where I come from, this means you can drop in any time between the designated start and stop times. So, our plan of attack is that Troy will pick up the kids from daycare as usual and I will bust *ss to get out on time and meet them at the school.

You know the business of babies is quite unpredictable and despite all the times I've been caught online shopping or reading a People magazine there is one of those laws by Newton or Murphy or someone evil that ensures that something major must be going on when you need to be somewhere other than the hospital. Needless to say I got out late. I give Troy my frustrated call and tell him I'm on my way and before I hang up Troy decides to curse me by saying something like, "Well, don't speed and get picked up." Approximately 1 minute later I'm trying to merge onto a 4 lane highway at sometime between 5 and 6pm. What rushing mother trying to get to her firstborn's kindergarten open house isn't going to go at least the speed limit or a little over and squeeze into all the sea of cars and quickly make her way over to the left lane so that she can speed with all the other rushing folks on the road? Not me. And it just so happens, because of one of those evil Murphy's or Newton's or Troy Baughman's , a donut-eating police man in his black charger was not so busy eating donuts but sitting watching merging rush hour traffic. I see the lights and immediately start to cry. All I am thinking is I need to be at my kid's thing and my whole life of being that mom and missing special events is flashing before my tear-filled eyes.

The cop strolls up to my car not in a rush at all and spots me wiping tears from my eyes with one hand and holding all of the appropriate license and insurance information in the other. Just give me the ticket already so I can get to my kid's open house. But, no we need to have a conversation about why I'm getting pulled over and did I see him and my road awareness and blah blah blah. Well, I burned 9 minutes with that police officer and it resulted in a big fat ticket not for speeding but for TAILGATING. Seriously. Merging traffic at rush hour who the hell isn't tailgating? And, no I didn't see you (the cop) because I was busy focusing on the cars in front of me and trying not to hit them!

Anyways, the good news is that I did make it to the Open House with 4 minutes to spare. I got myself together in the 20 minute speed race from the point of the pullover to the school. Nate whisked me around his room and I met his teacher. And, we also got the WORST sign up time for parent teacher conferences. Because, apparently, there are some benefits to coming to an Open House at 5p sharp. And, I'm sure to be tailgating on that afternoon too unless I can cut a deal with one of the Murphys or Newtons.