blue & red lights + green machine = another night in Indiana

Hello again friends,

Today I'm writing you from the lovely town of Lafayette, IN, home of Purdue University, Jeremy Camp (really? really.), and my dads. Lafayette has become the perfect stopping point from all my trek from Chicago. But not anymore. nope. Tonight is the last because...

THE TRIP STARTS IN 4 DAYS!!!!

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!

shoo, now that that's out of the way, let's continue...

On Friday night, after saying goodbye the best hot dog in the world, I continued down toward K-Town. Let's take a quick moment to remember how tired I was. The night before I had stayed up all night (almost 2) to clean & pack everything so my boss could rearrange the furniture. I had then wake up by 7am to take the van to the shop. I got off work at 6:30pm, packed my car and headed on the 4 hour ride home, stopping at Portillo's for hot dogs and Meijer for something to drink (naked's green machine) in Lafayette to try to stay awake. All this is to remind you of my extreme tiredness, so when I tell you I got pulled over for drunk driving 30 miles outside of my home town you'll understand why.

So, 30 miles outside of K-Town, I see blue and red lights in my rearview mirror. I had been talking to my mom and had just realized I was speeding a bit in the small town (60 in a 30?) so I had just hit my brakes a little. This is when the lights came on. I quickly rush out, "Mom, there's a cop. gotta go. bye" and then like a good, self-respecting Chicagoan, throw my phone.

The officer who comes to my car is seriously the nicest cop who has ever pulled me over for drunk driving (yes, there have been others...I wasn't drunk then either! see why I don't drink!?!). He explains that he watched me cross the center line a few times (Keep in mind, I'm in the middle of Nowhere, Indiana) and was just to making sure I was okay. I tell him I thought he had pulled me over for speeding and talking to my mom on the phone. (I'm an idiot.) Thankfully, he was apparently a little deaf because he didn't say anything as he took my license and registration.

While I sat there, feeling the lights pound into my headache, I reached for my newly acquired Green Machine drink. I opened it, took a sip, and immediately began making facing and looking for a place to spit it out. Quickly I realized I had to swallow it because opening the door to spit liquid out my mouth was not going to help convince the cop running my license that I was in fact sober. Oh that disgusting liquid. After swallowing but while still making the faces, I turned it over and reread the back. Just like I had remembered there were still all those lovely fruit pictures but what I had apparently not registered before was the list of other natural ingredigents that been included, such as wheat grass (ugh! that's what I had tasted.) and green tea. green tea! green tea! I had bought and started to drink something that contained green tea! I must have been drunk! I'm allergic to caffiene, for Pete's sake!

At any rate, by the time the officer returned bringing me my WARNING (yay!), I was definitely wide awake and ready to be home! So in my lane I stayed as I sped home chatting with my mom. After all, I didn't even get a warning for those. Ah, Indiana... it's been good to be home.

the nomad