2022, Automotive, Travel, Uncategorized, Weather

Speed

39 Comments

I drove home yesterday from Howard Lake, MN in seven hours. Google tells me it is 496 miles. The speed limit varied between 55-60 MPH on Highway 12 between Howard Lake and I-94 at Sauk Center, to 75 MPH once I got out of Fargo.

I tend to drive 5 MPH higher than the speed limit if I can. It isn’t so high that a Highway Patrol would care about me, but fast enough that I can make good time. I admit my MPH got up to 90 as I passed some slow coaches here and there, I haven’t had a speeding ticket in 30 years.

I was probably too tired to drive safely once I made it to Bismarck, but my, was I ready to get home. The temperature dropped to 62° as I entered western ND in early afternoon. I understand it is a little warmer in MN!

How many speeding tickets have you had? What is the fastest you have driven? How do you keep cool in heat waves?

39 thoughts on “Speed”


  1. One ticket from a West Fargo officer. As West Acres was just getting developed, 13th Avenue was a speed trap. 40 to 25. “You got me!”
    110 through Wisconsin at night.

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  2. 30 years ago. Warning ticket through Gooseberry Falls State Park for doing 55 in a 45 mph speed zone right behind an 18-wheeler doing 45. Neat Trick, huh? When I pointed that out, he made it a warning ticket.
    30 Years ago in Arnold area near Duluth. For doing 42 in a 30 mph zone. He was parked in a school parking lot on a Sunday. He turned on his lights as I approached, so I just drove over next to him. He thought that was funny and made it a warning ticket.
    20 years ago for doing 48 mph in a 40 mph zone on a rural four lane divided highway. Guess what state that was in? A state known for its speed traps. (Not Lousianna.)

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  4. Son got heat exhaustion yesterday and ended up in ER. He is ok. The temperature dropped as I drove west, and by the time I got home at 2:00 pm, it was 63°.

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  5. Heat is acomin’. 100° Sunday Monday. I would hide inside but baseball games for next straight 10 days.
    Living alone changes things. My electricity bills are way down. Only used oven once in 6 months. Have lights on only when I am in that room to do something, not just passing through. Just learned I can set AC 5° higher than how Sandy wanted it. Just calculated my monthly expenses are up close to $400 a month in last 4 months. And I do little driving. I can afford it but if I move to one bedroom apartment I will get some of that money back for donations. Moving at my age is daunting.

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  6. Warning at speed trap on I-35 outside of Clear Lake, Iowa decades ago. Ticket for running a stop sign in Plymouth MN – didn’t see it because of a school bus blocking vision, had to be 25 years ago now.

    I’m sure I’ve driven 90 or so on flat stretches of interstates through the prairies or Nevada, Utah…

    I close up the house early in the day, lower the blinds etc. Will turn on the A/C if there are two sweltering days in a row and the inside temp reaches 83. Go to basement and do stuff that’s set up down there – sewing projects, and we plan to do some purging, sorting, tossing lots of stuff – make it nice to be down there. We’ll see if that happens…

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  7. Every speeding ticket I ever received, I deserved, and I paid without protest as a reminder of my stupidity. I think I haven’t had one in about 50 years, though.

    I have likely driven at a speed exceeding 90 MPH, but not often, and not for long. Even 75, which is permitted in some parts of Michigan (where I reside), seems a bit too fast for me.

    Weather in Holland, MI (my current abode) was really warm yesterday afternoon. I retreated to the unfinished basement for about an hour in the afternoon, and felt much better for it.

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  8. Rise and Shine Baboons,

    I get a warning about every 5 years when I start to daydream and forget about watching my speed. Last winter (2020) in AZ I got an actually speeding ticket for the first time in about 20 years on an AZ reservation. They don’t report those to the larger system if you pay it immediately, so it does not get reported to insurance. Apparently the reservation is just collecting the money for the tribe. Hmmm.

    I do not enjoy this heat and humidity.

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  9. Back from NYC. We didn’t win an award but I’m told that it’s impressive to be a finalist, so there’s that. We spent a long weekend in NYC. Did a lot of the usual ‘tourist’ stuff but it was still a great time. And we got to see some friends that took us to a genuine NY pizza place and showed us around the West Village. Speaking of driving and heat, last night, about halfway home I noticed that my temp gauge was maxed out. Got it to my mechanic’s just as the ‘check engine’ light came on. Hoping I didn’t cook the engine. Of all the days for something in the cooling system to break…sigh…

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  10. I’ve never had a speeding ticket, and I always drive cautiously. I’ve never had a car that was new enough to carry collision on – my cars have always been liability-only insured – so I never go fast or follow close. Also, I drive for fuel economy.

    With gas prices going higher and higher, I sometimes wonder why everyone is still driving at the speeds they do. When we had gas shortages and sky high gas prices in the 70’s, there was a big push to get people to slow down, in order to save gas. No one is talking about that this time around. I usually try to go between 55 and 60 on freeways. All those SUV’s that are hurtling along at 75 mph are using more gas than necessary to get where they’re going.

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      1. Since you have a hybrid, it’s less important for you, but I imagine there would still be some advantage to the slower speeds.

        I bet you’re patting your Prius on its steering wheel and saying “Thank you!” every time you drive by a gas station and look at the price.

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  11. One warning ticket in Schaumberg IL about 25 years ago. 42 in a 30 I think.

    Rented a Corvette in Palm Springs for 24 hours 10+ years ago and cranked it up to about 90 on “the 10.” Wanted to get it to 100 but the Corvette is so low to the ground that 90 mph felt a LOT faster.

    But if you want to drive fast with no worries, go to Europe and hop on the Autobahn in Germany. NO speed limit when we were there about 35 years ago. Might be different now. I think I only got it up to 85-90 or so. Maybe about the same driving on the French equivalent (Autoroutes) about 5 years later.

    To stay cool I stay inside. If it’s really hot, I’ll go to the basement, which is always 5-10 degrees cooler than main floor, and 10+ degrees cooler than my office on 2nd floor. I used to go swimming, but then you get out of the pool or lake and you’re immediately hot again. What’s the point? However, we had lots of fun as kids running through the lawn sprinkler water. Or having water balloon fights.

    Chris in O-town

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  12. i am the outlier here
    i have had three speeding tickets in my record for as long as i can remember . the 4th one causes big problems so i am careful not to get the fourth. i’ve mellowed recently and find myself being pushed by drivers who are the former me and want to get there faster
    so i suppose if i put a number in it from age 16 til now i had about 50 or 60 tickets
    some are for running stop signs or expired plates but most for speeding and when i think of the ones i’ve talked my way out of it gets up there even further
    i’m getting good as an old codger talking may way out , i had 5 or 6 pull overs i talked my way out of this past couple of months
    no tickets in the last couple years
    like i said i’m mellowing
    fastest ever driven was 135 that’s all the faster it would go i was disappointed i thought i was heading for 175 but it just didn’t have the snooce. my buddy justin and i had so much fun back in my hell raising days but we thought it would be a good idea to set persmeters for drivingvafrer drinking questionable amounts we had one the said no driving over 100? when you been drinking. then we thought another good one would be no switching drivers without stopping when you been drinking but finally decided no switching drivers without stopping while grieving over 100 would cover the really important infractions gosh we had fun and we lived to tell about it
    i keep cool by thinking cool thoughts in the shade in a breeze if it’s there .iced tea and a straw hat optional
    ac is usually available but if it’s not there’s the trick if ice cubes in the back of your neck and or inside your wrists. it fools your body into thinking your cool
    wet towels will do it on a 100 degree day in the sun
    but i’m always amazed how good shade and a breeze feels in an oppressive heat day. if i can stick my feet in the lake with a lawn chair shade iced tea and a guitar i’m good for the day

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  13. I’ve had one warning, and five actual speeding tickets. All but one deserved, and that one I contested and got the fine cut in half. The judge encouraged me to meet with the City Attorney about this, but I felt as if I had already wasted too much time waiting in the courtroom, so I didn’t. Not too long afterward it became public that the Mendota police department had all kinds of issues at that time.

    I received my first speeding ticket in Wisconsin back in the early 1980s. We were on our way home from Chicago, and I had been speeding pretty much the entire way. Got nailed between Hudson and the MN state border, and I’m convinced it was because I had MN license plates as other cars with Wisconsin plates were zipping right past me.

    I received the warning on my way home from Chicago just south of Lake City. It was a gorgeous sunny afternoon, and I was in high spirits, returning home after a three week vacation in Denmark. My CD player cranked up pretty high, playing Beethoven’s 4th Piano Concerto at full blast when I got pulled over by a Minnesota State Trooper. I admitted that I had no idea how fast I was going, and he simply cautioned me to slow down a bit, and sent me on my way wishing me a safe rest of the journey.

    I got another speeding ticket on a rainy night on the way home from a concert at the General Store in Oak Center. Pete Morton was snoozing away in the passenger seat when I saw the flashing lights behind me and pulled over. Pete wondered why I was stopping, and I had to tell him that I was going too fast. He felt pretty guilty, though it clearly wasn’t his fault.

    I once received a speeding ticket in Montana. I was going 90 mph trying to get to Glacier National Park before dark. As anyone who has ever driven in Montana can tell you, you can drive for hours there and not see another car. As luck would have it, the one car approaching on the horizon was a Montana State Trooper. He was very courteous and explained that my ticket was a daylight speeding ticket, payable on the spot, and doesn’t go on your driving record. I thought the only way they could improve that service was by selling speeding permits at the state border, but I had enough sense to not tell him that.

    I received the ticket I contested on Highway 13 in Mendota. It was a weekday morning around 7 A.M., and I had just dropped husband off at the airport. It was sleeting, roads were icy and driving conditions were pretty treacherous. Visibility was pretty bad, and my windshield wipers were making a mess of it all. As you descend the steep hill into Mendota the speed limit changes to 30 mph, and it is necessary to brake as you enter town. In the parking lot to what years ago was the Jazz Emporium a police car was parked, just waiting to nab unsuspecting drivers like me. What really got my goat though, was the comment the officer made. She questioned why I had taken that much less traveled route, and hinted that I had no business being in Mendota. Less than a quarter of a mile away, rush hour traffic was slip sliding away all over the freeway, and here in sleepy Mendota was a public servant who thought this was the best way to protect and serve her community.

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  14. Afternoon-
    I’ve had 2; one was 30 years ago here in Rochester as I was headed for tractor parts to finish picking corn. The officer lowed my speed a bit.
    And the second was outside of Plainview; a small town about 20 miles from here. Didn’t have an excuse for that, I was probably within 10 but they just like to write tickets.

    As a kid I remember being in a car with my brother and his friends and they got the car to 110 going down a hill. On a motorcycle with my brother in law and he hit 100. I’ve probably done 80 or 90…not sure I’ve ever made 100 myself.

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  15. My current car doesn’t lend itself to speeding. Besides, I’m retired, so what’s the hurry. But back in the day when I drove a SAAB Turbo, I would routinely push the limits a bit if it was safe and traffic allowed. The fastest I have driven was in Montana, 95 mph for long stretches of deserted highway.

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  16. My speediness yesterday has made me pretty sluggish today. I guess it isn’t a good idea to drive 500 miles in 7 hours and only stop once. I am exhausted!

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  17. Twice in my youth I was pulled over, once for turning right where I wasn’t supposed to turn right and once for speeding. Back in those days the theory was that if you got out of your car it would make the cop feel more relaxed subconsciously because they could see both of your hands easily. This worked both times although I have since read you’re not supposed to do that anymore.

    The only other ticket I got was going north on York where it turns into Xerxes. On the York side it’s 35 on the Xerxes side it’s 30 so I was whipping through and there was a cop sitting in the church parking lot. When he pulled me over he said “do you know how fast you’re going?” And I smarted off and said “well obviously faster than I should be since you’ve pulled me over.” Maybe if I hadn’t smarted off I could’ve talked my way out of the ticket but it was too late by then.

    I don’t generally speed much mostly because of the sinking feeling I get when I’m driving too fast down the road and then see a cop. I don’t like that feeling so if I know I’m going the speed limit or just a smidge over then I don’t have to get that sinking feeling.

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  18. My dad and uncle once challenged a highway patrol speed reading gizmo, and somehow proved the device was wrong and unfairly targeted my uncle for speeding as they came home from officiating a high-school basketball game.

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  19. My strategy for beating heat is to go out in the morning, when it’s maybe 75 or so. You stay out for a few hours and your body acclimates while the temperature rises. Then when it starts to get really uncomfortable in the afternoon, go inside into air conditioning and have a cold drink.

    The worst thing you can do is stay indoors in air conditioning where it’s 68 or 70 degrees all day and then try to walk outside at around 5 o’clock when the temp is at its maximum. That’s pretty unnatural and your body will not deal with it well.

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