Driving and Hoping Not to Get Caught

Usually I drive a fairly new American made truck, XM Radio, Cruise Control, AC and so forth. Not lots different than many people drive, except for my son. Nate, my oldest son who has the almond business, owns a well worn minivan and now a little Honda. The Honda belonged to another student at UCSB but they didn't need it so loaned it then gave it to my son.

The Honda is a little blue/green civic with lots of dings, really dirty and just generally torn up by kids, loaning it to everyone, and hauling around hundreds of pounds of almonds. There is a radio that works only by pushing the magic button, which I've not discovered yet, no A.C., no cruise control and crank windows.

So this morning I had to take a load of almonds to my son, a 2-1/2 hour drive away, he mentioned that he might want to use my truck but was uncertain. I didn't think anything more about it and went on my way, driving to where my son was working a farmers market.

We'd had lunch and my son said that he was going to need my truck for a couple of days as he'd mentioned earlier. That was fine, not great, but fine. After we'd cleaned out his Honda and I was about to get into the Honda, my son said “the plates were stolen but I filed a police report and the new ones haven't arrived so if you get a ticket just give it to me”. Yikes! A 2-1/2 hour drive home in an illegal car!

I started for home and had the thought; I'm driving this ratty little car, am Hispanic, look Hispanic, with no plates. Now here is a combination for a disaster. I thought that I'd better drive the speed limit at least so that I wouldn't stand out from the pack drawing attention to myself as usually I set the cruise control for about 80.

I was driving along I-5 going in the lane next to the slow lane when I started thinking about some work issues and all of the sudden I found myself in the fast lane doing 80mph. I quickly slowed down and moved over to the slower lanes but then, as I was driving by the CHP office found myself in the fast lane and doing 80 once again.

As I continued down the hill I realized that my foot wouldn't let the car go less than 75, it just couldn't happen so I joined the traffic and drove home. I do think I'll leave the car parked until it the plates arrive.