I'm finally good for something

I am in my hometown this weekend and this evening my parents and I were headed to a high school graduation party for Lindsey. We were on a small country road, dad was driving, we came over a hill and blue lights. Dad got pulled over by a state trooper. Whoops!

I think I have mentioned on here before that in my former job I met and trained every state trooper who patrols in the state of Alabama and trained them to use a program for writing tickets. The trooper walked up to the window and told my dad he was going 54 in a 40 (whoops) and asked for his license and insurance. I was sitting in the passenger seat and got the insurance card out of the glove box.

The trooper didn't notice me or recognize me and I didn't say anything... hummm... what to do. The trooper went back to his car. Well I happened to notice that I had two current insurance cards in my hand and figured I must have handed him an expired insurance card.

So taking my chances that I would not get shot by the trooper, I got out of the car and walked back to his car to hand him a current insurance card. When I walked back to his car he said "What's your name? Don't I know you?"

I sweetly answered that I was Kerri and that I had trained him to use that program he was using to write the ticket and that that was my dad I was with. He kind of fumbled around and said "Oh well I'll cancel this out. Just give the license back to your dad." I told him I sure appreciated it and told him that that was not why I came back to his car but that I would be sure to give my dad a hard time about it.

It really wasn't why I went back to his car but it happened to work out in this case. :-) As the trooper pulled away he told my dad that his daughter had saved him tonight. I just smiled, waved and thanked him again.

When I called my brother to tell him what had happened he said "Well you are finally good for something." I guess I am... and I would have to say my dad owes me. :-)

Old Friends

One of the hard parts of being a "younger" member of the crowd at work is that when you start getting attached to people, they retire. This happens with friends (even non-work related ones) that move and things like that but today I was reminded of how good it is to see old friends... even "work" friends. :-)

Over the past few years, I have had the opportunity to work with every state trooper in the state of Alabama and two of the head guys retired this year. This made me very sad as I enjoyed them on both a professional and personal level.

Well today I am at a conference for work in another part of the state and I heard one of them talking as he walked in the room. I turned around and literally squealed I was so excited. He gave me the biggest hug... so big that he literally picked me up off the ground. I had not seen him since the summer and I have missed working with him and talking to him so much. He was my partner in crime for the best time I have ever had at a NASCAR race... and I feel quite certain that I will never again have that much fun at a race again. He looked out for me at conferences and made sure I was having a good time and is still someone I will always look forward to seeing.

Then not 5 minutes later the other trooper walked in. I was once again thrilled! Even though they have retired to other jobs and new adventures in their life, they had decided to come over to our conference to visit everyone. In the back of my mind I had hoped that they would but I didn't really expect that they would.

Oh how good it is to see old friends. It makes me want to look up friends from college and go visit them too. It's so easy to forget how much you miss some people until you see them again.