title

This tale hearkens back to the bachelor days when I was in my prime at Grand Forks AFB, North Dakota as Chief Clerk, Orderly Room for the 321st Civil Engineering Squadron (SAC) circa 1976 or so. It's also the only time I was almost a fugitive from justice all unknowingly.

Now just outside the base is an eye blink town called Emerado which has a very small strip mall mostly taken up with a grocery store and a clothing store and one of the very first comic book shops in North Dakota (if not the first--not sure) called Collector's Corner operated by two friends of mine R.C. and Clyde.

I had a small part in getting Collectors Corner off the ground but nothing official in writing. I turned down an opportunity to be a partner of what would morph into the first video store rental in the area. Oh those were the days of $1000 video recorders and the menace of Betamax on the horizon. Only occassionally do I regret this lack of foresight but neither here nor there.

The store was a quick five minute drive from base and there is an access road from the main highway with a stop sign just made for gliding through with barely a whisper of a brake pad being caressed. The visibility of the street was 100% and only blind people (or nowadays cell phoners talkers) could miss seeing a car challenging the right of way.

There is also a Dairy Queen (I believe--ice cream place for sure) right at the intersection and lo and behold North Dakota's finest was parked there and bored.

Maybe it was flaming red Ford escort that attracted him. One running a stop sign ticket later said transaction taking less then two minutes and I go back to work for Uncle Sam mumbling about full stops and no traffic.

Batman probably hadn't even come out that week either. Yes we are a glass half empty man who KNOWS what the full glass tastes like.

Now to understand this context properly I anticipated at least a $50 fine and payday was two weeks away but court met weekly on Tuesday--this being a Monday.

Better yet the judge was a friend of mine.

Sort of.

Mrs. Dorothy J. spents her days working for the 321st Civil Engineering Squadron Administration section. I always considered them competition for my glory in the eyes of the coimmander. They got all the gravy. My section got all the grief, i.e., military discipline activities which my little crew of rowdy dorm mates could keep me typing out in the wee hours. Often.

She worked directly under Belle J. who was very territorial and oh so precise but I quickly refined my Eddie Haskell techniques so I generally got what I wanted (if pride would allow me to ask) and there was little in the way of real warfare between us. There was a significant favor done back and forth that's not germane to this story but right now my interest in Dorothy was in her role as Judge for tiny little eye blink town of Emerado and traffic trap paradise.

As a prodigal son reporting his sins to his mother (that's pretty much the age differences at the time) I told Dorothy that I would finally get to see her in her official capacity. Prior to this I had never shown an interest but phoniness came so much easier back then when the games seemed less harmful to feelings. Mrs. J. reminds me that court is everyTuesday night. I mnetion that I'm short of cash til the following week. A mistake is about to be made.

She: That's fine.

Me: Okay thanks.

Now I was NOT expecting to be let off the hook for the ticket as I had been caught fair and square. I thought I had been given tacit permission to skip next Tuesday and bring me and more importantly the wallet the following week to render unto Caesar the things which are Caesars.

Well come now it would have worked that way on television.

Now looking back it was very maganimous on Mrs. J.'s part to even discuss the matter with me in such brief moments as had occured since she very very much kept the two jobs from the appearance of conflict of interest. But I was solid in my opinion of my ol' so charming self to daughter's mothers and elderly ladies if not my own age group. I should have thought this through more.

Tuesday night comes and goes. Wednesday and Thursday I get an occasional look from Judge D. but no comment. I tend to be linear in my thinking processes and project oriented. Traffic court to my mind was all but over and the next Tuesday was to be the day of reckoning. I'm about to have my world view changed.

Mrs. J. sighs to herself and sends Sgt David M. to see me as she knows we are friends (he deserves a blog entry of his own as an example of my inability to hang on to MALE friends for very long--in this case we fell out over the church he was attending; that and my sorry Christian testimony at the time that I was not practicing--these were the apostate years which I'm not proud of and still suffering some repercussions after all these years.

Dave wants to know why I missed traffic court Tuesday. I readily reply that I didn't have the fine payment and was going next week. Dave says that (off record) I'm listed as a no-show at court from last Tuesday and if I don't get my butt in place next Tuesday for sure there is an arrest warrant waiting to be signed off on.

I'm horrified and perplexed. Why hadn't Mrs. J. made that clearer? Dave points out she's on Air Force time here and consider this a friendly heads up.

A cringing dog shortly appears in her office to mumble apologies and stupid misunderstandings and I am forgiven.

Court goes well but the Collector's Corner is $50 short that week. No Batman either probably. But I'm sure The Avengers were there.