Comments By Muleskinner 6

Well lets see….

Many years ago I was 18 and graduation was just around the corner and my aunt came to me and asked me what I was going to do for a "Real" job after graduation. I been working most of my life either bucking hay in the summer, fast food during school, and I never thought about having to work year around. What do you mean I don’t get summers off? No Christmas vacation? I thought to myself “This s**t just got real“.

So I thought about college but decided against that, I have a high IQ and never struggled in school but college didn’t appeal to me. I came from a blue collar family and we all worked hard for a living. Since I came from a family with a long line of veterans I decided to go into the Army to sereve my country that I love. I spent the next 11 years as a track vehicle mechanic and specialized in rebuilding the M1 Abrams turbine engine.

After 11 years I decided to get out because life was happening, my wife was pregnant and I decided it was a good time to move on. So I then became a firefighter with a small town in southern New Mexico. I really enjoyed the adrenaline rush of being inside a burning building. After four years of doing that I was offered a job in Law Enforcement where I loved the job and excelled at it and had a great time. After seven years of "chasing the bad guy" I decided to resign because of personal reasons.

I have always been into some type of construction, I was flipping houses on the side where I made tens of thousands of dollars and I also lost my ass on a few of them. But when the market fell out I lost everything. After law enforcememnt I moved to Colorado to help my aging father and I started doing custom high end granite work. For three years I worked rock and made excellent money but i am getting too old to pick up several hundred pounds and carry it into a house up a hill in two feet of snow. This old man needs something different.

Since most of my family either drives big trucks or works on them for a living I decided to get my CDL and go over the road for a few years to see if I like the life style. When i was in high school i would run with my uncle in his extended nose Pete and I loved being on the road and to see what was around the next corner or see where we would wake up the next day. Oh and I found out when i was 18 what a "Lot Lizard" was at a a truck stop called the Tin Lizzy. Yeah my uncle was a little upset but thank God he stopped me before anything happened. HAHA

I have always enjoyed being alone and making decisions on my own. So here we go…. Let the dice roll and see what happens.

I totally agree with the others in this thread that you should immediately stop as soon as you see the wig-wags behind you. As a former Law Enforcement Officer (Oh great here comes the jokes and hating) I also highly do not recommend you call 911 and inform the dispatcher of your intentions and keep driving until you find a “safe” place to pull over. In the western states that might be 30 - 50 miles.

First of all it depends on where you are at when you call 911 you might get a total different agency than the one that is currently attempting to conduct a traffic stop on you. The county that I worked in was 6000 square miles and depended where you were when you called 911 you might get one of about seven different agencies. So if you call and get the wrong one and get a lazy dispatcher you will be told they do not have any officers in that area. Next thing you are doing is thinking this is a fake cop with ill intentions and you continue to drive. BAD Idea. Do not be surprised if a few miles down the road you encounter another cop sitting on the side of the the road with his lights flashing. Just be aware as you pass them you will soon be hearing all of your tires going flat as you run over the "Stop - Sticks".

I know it will be very hard to see if it is a “real” cop that is pulling you over at night but be aware that the cop car will not just have the wig-wags (red and/or blue) lights. They will also have take down lights which are the very bright white lights between the red and blue flashing lights. Also it will have a spot light on the driver side of the windshield. If it is a real officer they will park in a way that their take down and spot lights are both shining into your driver side mirror. There is a reason for this but do not be surprised if the officer climbs up on your passenger door and scares the hell out of you while you are watching your driver side mirror trying to see him/her.

Second there is a Supreme Court Decision on a similar case where an underage girl was being pulled over and she called her mom and her mom told her to keep driving until she got to a business with a litghted parking lot. She continued to drive for another 20 miles at the posted speed limit and when she finally stopped the officer arrested her and impounded her vehicle. In the end the Supreme Court ruled the officer was doing what he was trained to do and there was no excuse for her not to stop.

So if you feel the need to keep driving to find a “safe” place to stop that is your personal decision but expect to be removed from your truck and taken to jail, your truck and load towed, you and your company will have to pay a hefty tow bill, and don’t expect the tow driver to make sure your refer has plenty of fuel so your load won’t spoil.

Just my 2 cents