You know those roads that are marked with an unrealistically low speed limit, and everyone sort of ignores? Like the section of Hwy. 76 that passes through Clemson, which is marked 35mph but is basically a highway deserving of something like 55mph. Or Kennedy Expressway in PR, marked 45mph but is a long, straight road with no exits or on-ramps. I usually drive 65mph on Kennedy and it feels completely comfortable.

Tonight on the way home from dropping Liz off at her hotel in San Juan, I was making my way back on Kennedy at 2:30am. The only other car on the road was a cop car with lights blazing, as they always are here. Naturally, I matched his speed, but the lights were pretty much blinding me, so I nudged forward until I was just in front of him. He then got on the loudspeaker and said, "You're going faster than 40, you know."

My license expired a month and a half ago (yeah, I really need to renew that), so I have no room for leeway. So I sighed and slowed back down until I was just behind him again. What then followed was a tedious, eight-minute crawl down the deserted Kennedy Expressway at 40 mph, like a two car funeral procession, except the tears in my eyes were from blue burning eye death rather than sadness. Surely he realized that speed was ludicrous? He had to inch his way down the road just as slowly as I did. You'd think at that hour, with the road completely deserted, he wouldn't have bothered to say anything about a car going five miles over the speed limit.

It reminds me of the time in NJ a few years ago when I got a ticket for impeding traffic, for driving 10 miles under the speed limit on a dark, deserted road at 3:30am (Andrés and I were looking at a map, trying to find our way to Liz's house).

What is it with visiting Liz and stupid encounters with police? Maybe I should get my license renewed tomorrow morning.