COPS!

*cue the COPS theme music "bad boy bad boy, whatcha gonna dooo..."*

Soooo here I am in Dallas! Had a great flight, somehow I think I managed to score a premium economy seat as it was huuuge and I was lucky enough not to have anyone sit next to me so it was a great flight.  Watched Xmen 4, Pirates 4 and Transformers 3. The food was even half decent!  I hung out for a couple of days before picking up my car to get acclimatised and even managed to sleep for 12 hours the first two nights. I cant even remember the last time I did that.

Anyway I picked up my car on Saturday with no problems. I haven't had much problems getting used to driving on the wrong side of the road (well except once but lets not go there right now). BUT I have had a little run in with the cops already. It was about 3:30pm yesterday and I was on my way out of Dallas, somewhere on the highway. I'd stopped off in Walmart just outside of Dallas to pick up a GPS (PS Walmart is awesome!) but it was about 30 degrees so it was scorching sitting in the car setting up the GPS so I basically did the initial setup then got back on the highway with the GPS on the seat next to me instead of on the windscreen. I put in Shreveport as a place to go and occasionally I'd look at the screen to see what it was doing.

So I'm toodling down the highway at 70 mph and glance at the GPS and veered for no more than 2 seconds onto the shoulder of the highway (about as long as it takes you to say bah-dum) and then righted the car back into the lane. No big deal. Well apparently it is a big deal because next thing I know there is a cop in my rearview mirror with lights flashing wanting me to pull over. For a split second there I was thinking he needed to pass me but the highway was basically empty. So I pull over and like a scene in a movie he comes over the the passenger side and asks me for my licence and registration. I explained to him that I dont have any rego papers because it was a rental and that I have an Aussie licence, He said that I was driving on the shoulder and I told him that I'd just bought the GPS and hadn't attached it to the windscreen and had just glanced down at it when I veered. He asks me a whole bunch of questions like what am I doing, where am I going etc and just couldn't comprehend that I was traveling by myself for so long and didn't have any fixed plans. Is that really so weird? Anyway....

So he tells me me that I'd be getting a warning for it and went back to his car. I reckon he was also doing a check on me as he was really suspicious. When he came back he asked me to step out of the car and asked me if I'd ever been arrested for anything to which I replied no. Then he asked whether there was anything illegal in the car and again I replied no. I was thinking of joking about it but the way that this guy was I thought that would probably not be a good idea :)  Anyway he asked if he could search the car and my bags and for me to step away from the car. So he went back to his car to get his gloves and I went to stand in the shade because it was scorching out in the open. I'm standing there not quite believing that this is actually happening... that my car and bags are being searched by a highway cop because he thinks that I'm a drug runner!  He searched everything in the car, even the engine bay, pulled my bag out of the boot and went through everything and when he was done, went back to his car and brings out the paperwork which he makes me sign for. He kept saying that he was trying to make sense of it, that he couldn't understand that I was traveling by myself for so long and that there had to be more to it. Finally he gave me my warning and told me to be careful traveling and let me go. So here it is, my warning:

(image removed for privacy)

I felt pretty crappy last night, also because I got lost because I missed a turn somewhere along the way so I just found a hotel as I'd had enough for the night and it was almost 6:30pm. I found out this morning that I'm in New Boston which is near Texarcana which is near the Texas/Arkansas border. I noticed a problem with my car rental this morning which I'm trying to fix up with the company who are in England so instead of heading to Louisiana like I'd planned today I'm going to hang around in case I need to go back to Dallas and resign paperwork. It's a pain in the ass and I hope I don't need to go back so we'll see. I'm gonna head into Texarcana to see whats there in a bit and just hope that these people get back to me asap. Keep your fingers x-ed for me. :)