Monday, November 13, 2006

Do you know why I stopped you?

Who's asking: A police officer at the end of the Lowell Connector, around 9:00 yesterday morning.

"Was I speeding?" I asked, and the policeman said, "Yes." The speed limit on the Lowell Connector is 55 miles per hour; the Connector ends abruptly, dumping people onto a street with a speed limit of 35. He was waiting right at the intersection, watching for unwary motorists.

"You don't even speed," Anna said when I told her this story, and it's true; his radar gun clocked me at 56 MPH. Since that was more than 20 miles above the speed limit for the new road, I was lucky he didn't give me a reckless driving citation. He also cited me for a dead headlight I didn't know had burned out, bringing the total price of the ticket to $260 -- plus, of course, whatever it costs to get the headlight fixed.

File this one under "no good deed goes unpunished." I was in Lowell this weekend as a volunteer bookseller for Kate's Mystery Books; she paid for my hotel room on Friday night, but gas and all other expenses were on my own dime. I don't do any active business development at these things, but it's useful to me to meet people and be able to put faces with names.

I feel as if the universe just whacked me with a hammer. It doesn't help that it's cold and rainy this morning, Dizzy has a new and angry-looking hot spot, and I'm so tired I can't put two words together.

In happier news, The Mousetrap closed to full and appreciative audiences, and I did get to have dinner with Reed Farrel Coleman and Karen Olson on Friday night, which was worth any other aggravations the weekend may have held.

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