Chances are, I got a Ticket

From the collection (Letters to Jo Ann)

Hey from Bangor,

The weather man said it was going to be ten below zero. What the hell good is a ZERO, if we godda get ten below that! It’s so bloody cold I stopped to take a leak and had to use a cork screw to find my ahhh… then I peed a stalagmite. The state is so hard up for money, on my way back I noticed a sign said, “See natural amber formation, $1.00

Ya know when I bought this truck, they said it had 13 speeds, well I can  find ‘R’, ‘N’ and ‘L’ but I be damned if I can find one that says ‘D’. But one good thing, as an old man, they can’t tell if I’m shiftin’ gears or passin’ gas….???? And….Uhhhhhhhh….. Well???... I ain’t sayin’.

          I passed a trooper pointin’ a hair dryer at me (you know all them troopers got a hair dryer these days) and then he pulled me over. “Can’t you read?? That sign back there says trucks and trailers 55 mph!” I said, “sure I saw it, I got one of each, that’s 110 mph, and I was only doin’ 85.” He said, “Boy! Where did you get your license?” I said, “The Jack Daniels’ School of Truck Drivin’, Coke was my sponsor.” He wrote me a ticket.

          You know I weigh eighty thousand pounds, Eighty thousand pounds goes down hill real good, those little econo cars go pretty fast too when they all pile up on your front bumper going down a steep grade. A trooper pulled me over and said. “You know you’re shoven all them cars down this mountain.” “Just doing my part to conserve energy, sir.” He wrote me a ticket.

          The trouble with those little econo cars, they’re hard to wash off your grill.

I just love to teach them how to spell ‘Peterbilt’ backwards (as it appears in their rear view mirror) right before they’re sucked up into my fan.

          I got lost in a residential neighborhood and picked up a thump, thump, thump. A cop pulled me over and said, “You just ran over a little kid on a tricycle and he’s stuck in your duals!!” I said, “That’s all right. I saw him, he had on a safety helmet, and when I pick up some speed, it’ill throw him out.” He wrote me a ticket.

          A lot of trucks have a sign on them that say, ‘No lot lizards’.

I got one on my truck says, ‘Lot lizards welcome, I need a new pair of boots’.

          I bought a 500 watt CB for my truck, it’s got this button on the mike, when you push it a purdy little lite comes on says “on the air” and everybody can hear ya. But when you let lose of it, a bunch of crappy truck drivers start yakin’. So I got me some duck tape and I just tape that button down, now that purdy little lite stays on all the time, and I just sings my heart out going down the hyway. I know they all like it ‘cause they wave when they pass me by. Some of them use a finger, some no finger at all, but they all wave.

You know this thing got 18 tires. I can blow out 15 before I godda stop. I can scatter rubber and alligators over seven counties, (seven states if I’m up north). A trooper pulled me over and said, “You know you’ve blow’d out all your trailer tires and you’ve been plowin’ up pavement and leavin’ ruts for ten miles!! The road behind you is a mess!!” I said. “That’s okay, the road in front of me is fine.” He wrote me a ticket.

          I pulled onto a scale in West Virginny, and was told to pull to the side and come in. So I did, he said, “you’re 1200 pounds over gross, do you know how much you weigh?” I said, “Now look here! I may not be no prize, but I damn shore don’t weigh no 1200 pounds!” He wrote me a ticket. So trying to lighten things up a little I said, “Show is a purdy state you got here. Satellite Dish yor state flower?” He wrote me another ticket.

          I got stopped by a trooper down south, he got out and said, “Boy, don’t you know you’re in Atlanta!” I said rubbin’ my chin, “Atlanta? Atlanta? I’ve heard of Atlanta, now, now don’t tell me?? It’s a little town, let me think, in, oh yea, in east Texas, in a??? No, wait, give me a minute. In a county?? I know, I know. In a county we call, mmm Georgia.” He wrote me a ticket

          I was sittin’ at a counter in a diner havin’ a bowl of chili, when a trooper came in and sat down next to me. Just about then I ripped a stinker, ‘thubleeeeeiup’ I looked at him and smile while fanning the air a bit and said, “Missed a gear, I guess”. The trooper was looking rather pale and fannin’ the air quite a bit, mumbling something about methane pollution in the 3^rd degree, and wrote me a ticket.

          So darlin’, if there is anywhere you want to go, or some’m you want to see, give me a call, chances are I got a ticket.     ©

                                                          George Henry Nichols