I got a call around 5pm last night from a friend who needed some emergency computer help. I was on my way home from Clarendon, but Old Town’s not too far away, is it? So I trekked on over to Old Town to help him out. We finished for the night at 2am, I got in my car and headed back to my Fairlington digs. I cut through Old Town in the rain, it’s a place I’ve always loved when the streets have a bright sheen from fresh rain, and the christmas lights in the trees are up. The Masonic Memorial at the end of King Street was still lit up, and looked amazing.
I was headed westbound on King when the light at Payne street turned yellow and I put the brakes on to stop.
Sadly, the drunk woman behind me did no such thing and slammed into me at somewhere between 10 and 20 miles an hour. I put the car in park, set the GPS back on the dash, and opened my door to see how bad she clocked me. I got out, and there was the woman, window down, screaming at me, wanting to know why I’d stopped at the yellow light. Bad enough I’d gotten a parking ticket today for not feeding my meter, I didn’t want a red light ticket on my bill, too! Don’t you hate it when the car in front of you decides not to run the same red light you wanted to?
I called the Police as she was being belligerent and screaming at me. When I read her plate number to the cops, she rolled up her window, swerved around my car and tore up King, nearly mowing down a pair of pedestrians crossing the street at West street. I confirmed the plate with the 911 Operator and saw as an Alexandria Police Squad Car nailed her right at the corner of West and King. She apparently also sideswiped a car on West Street after she made the turn to pull over.
An officer came over to get my information and take my statement, which I gladly gave, my brain still a bit shocked by all the hubbub. He asked me to come over to the assailant’s car, and we moved my still quite healthy Jetta to the scene of her arrest. When I got there, she was in the back seat of a squad car, cuffed, and screaming like a banshee. She demanded a trip to the bathroom, swore she’d sue the whole police department, and when they took her out of the car to change her handcuffs, she screamed like she was getting the Rodney King treatment, even though she was being handled quite calmly by the very professional Alexandria PD.
Not exactly how I intended to spend a Friday night after closing time, but there you have it. The ultimate irony? Her name was Angelique. Not so much.
This post appeared in its original form at DC Metblogs
I live and work in the District of Columbia. I write at We Love DC, a blog I helped start, I work at Technolutionary, a company I helped start, and I’m happy doing both. I enjoy watching baseball, cooking, and gardening. I grow a mean pepper, keep a clean scorebook, and wash the dishes when I’m done. Read Why I Love DC.
