I read the following police blotter item to Mr. Troutbend this morning, and he said it sounded like the decathalon of bad behavior.

"7:03 p.m. In the 700 block of East Fourth Street, a 36-year-old Loveland woman for investigation of vehicular eluding, failure to obey traffic control signal (red light), failure to display headlights, reckless driving, parking in handicapped zone, unlawful possession of Schedule 2 and Schedule 4 controlled substances and authorized possession of a controlled substance."

I enjoyed picturing what might have been going through her head:

'I'll just slip through the red light here, and then oh shoot, was that a cop sitting right there at the intersection? Darn! I think it was.

Now look! is that red and blue lights in my rear-view there? Yes, it certainly is. Well, I'll just shoot around this corner here and turn off my headlights so they won't know where I went.

Pulling into this handicapped spot and ducking my head down oughta work. Who's that knocking on my window? Cheese-it, it's the Cops!

Hope I remembered to take my supper-time dose of anti-depressants, I'll need all my resources to get through this. Here. Stick these pill bottles under the seat. I'll smile real big and they'll just give me a warning.'

I always check the Obituaries in my home-town papers in case someone I know died, keeping in mind the old joke about looking for my own in case I didn't realize I was dead myself. I look for interesting obits. I was reading about a rancher in Gillette, Wyoming, his obituary says:

"He always wanted to be a lawyer, but he laid that dream aside to take over the family ranch when his father asked him to do it.

He had a great intelligence and wide-ranging interests. He could fix anything with baling wire and spit. He educated himself on mineral law, then negotiated hard-nosed contracts with oil and gas developers. Larry traveled the world with his wife. He served on bank boards and school boards. He was a state senator assigned to the appropriations committee for six years.

Larry was a keen observer of life, and the irony of any situation was never lost on him. He could also be prickly, sometimes downright cantankerous.

Family life with Larry included healthy doses of yelling, cussing, snorting and stomping, sprinkled with plenty of laughter and fun. The end result was a whole family of opinionated, stubborn kids, who learned how to work hard, work smart, and suck it up when they felt like whining or quitting."

In the obituary is a little late to get to know someone interesting, but better late than never.

Hope you have a great day today. The sun is shining, there's wind clouds over the front range, and a little cold front is going to move in this afternoon.