You was doin' 55 in a 54
I got busted by the cops for running a red light yesterday. I run lights regularly, and on the Scale of Inevitableness, me getting ticketed is somewhere on the level of Sunrise, or Mortality.
I was hatted, scarfed and gloved, pedaling through the frozen suburbs. This being dinnertime Denmark, no one was on the streets, so I was blasting through reds like a joystick-wheelchair, paying exclusive attention to the cross streets. I didn't see the oncoming cop til I was already halfway through a red-lighted intersection, and I pulled over to the side before he even turned around to beckon me to the curb.
I had my speech all prepared: 'I ran that light, officer, and I deserve a ticket. I'm not going to argue this, so just write it out before my pinkies freeze, and I'll pay it tomorrow.'
I was in no position to argue, and my head was already doing the math.
Red-light-running ticket: 500 kroner.
Number of times I run red lights per day: At least 10
Days per week: 7
Weeks per year: 52
Number of years I've been in Denmark: 3
Per-Unit Cost of Running Red Lights: <.04 kroner (or 1/10th of a cent)
Fair.
When the cop pulled up beside me, I saw that someone else had run the same light after me, and the cop was pulling us both over. Before I could give my little speech, the cop started his: 'You guys know, right, that when a light is red, you're supposed to stop? You guys know that?'
I remembered the principal's office era, and decided to stay silent until I knew where he was going with this.
'We can all agree on that? Yeah? Good ... Have a good night, gentlemen.'
And he vroomed off. That was it. Warning, yes!
I looked at the other dude who'd been pulled over, and he had the same 'I defeated the universe' look on his face that I did. I wanted to high-five or something, but my hands were cold. We both got back on our scanda-Schwinns and set off, feeling lucky and repentant.
Until three abandoned intersections later, when we both resumed reducing our per-unit cost. As we enacted the 'see red, slow down, look both ways, speed up' routine halfway back to civilization, he looked at me, flexed a glove and said 'Fuck, it's cold!' There's no way to translate my favored response to that, so I just said it in English: 'I know, right?!'
