So I'm on my way to work last Thursday, September 27th, at 5:30am (I work 6 to 3).  Heading down Balfour Road, it cuts down to two lanes and total darkness.  I go over a hill and there's the faithful Brentwood cop parked on the side of the road, no lights, waiting for someone to exceed the limit so he can fill his quota by month's end.  The speed limit is 55, so I slow to 50, pull into the left lane and carefully and SLOWLY pass his car.

Next thing I know, he's on the road, flipping on his lights and pulling me over!!!  Not knowing what's up, as he approaches Red (needed to stretch his tires, so I take him to work once every other week), I ask him what's up.  He responds, "Don't you know those headlights are illegal?!?"  I respond that I wasn't aware, that I rarely drive the car and have set it up as a show car.  I also mention that I've been driving the car day and night throughout town with the lights on, and no other officer has pulled me over until now.

He says, "It's usually the young kids with those lights", so in addition to stopping me, now he's insulted me!!  He indeed writes me a fixit ticket and I'm late for work.  I have one white bulb, but need another.  I go to Diablo Mazda and WITH the discount, a single white bulb is almost $10!!  The Parts Manager even gave a 15% discount since he couldn't believe a cop would do that.

On Saturday morning, the Discovery Bay Corvette Club is having a car show in downtown Brentwood, and I notice there's a couple of Brentwood PD cars in the lot.  I grab one of the cops, an older guy who's been serving Brentwood for over 20 years and ask if he can sign off on the ticket now that I've got the white bulbs.  He says, "I can't believe this young cop gave you this ticket--I didn't even know blue tints were illegal, let alone know the vehicle code for it!!"

The good news is the bulbs went in two hours on Miata.Net classifieds, so I at least recouped my purchase price.  And that's my tale of woe for this month.