This is Not Legal Advice. This is Pretty Much Crazy Speaking Crazy.

I like to think of myself as a rule follower. I do what I'm supposed to, what is asked of me and for the most part, really don't like to get in trouble.

But sometimes it seems trouble finds me.

Back in November, right about the time I had a crazy trip to Chicago and also found out E needed tubes in her ears, I got a ticket.

Thinking about it tonight I did get one ticket way back in 2002 for speeding in Wisconsin that I promptly paid off but besides that I've been ticket free.

So I got pulled over on 94, along with half a dozen other cars, for failing to move over to the left lane when an emergency vehicle was on the side of the road.

Did you follow?

In case you're wondering, that, my friends, is the Ted Foss Law. Consider this your lesson in criminal justice and traffic laws today.

The law states: When approaching and before passing an authorized emergency vehicle with its emergency lights activated that is parked or otherwise stopped on or next to a street or highway having two lanes in the same direction, the driver of a vehicle shall safely move the vehicle to the lane farthest away from the emergency vehicle, if it is possible to do so.

Did you know it was a law? Or were you, like me, thinking it was just the right thing to do?

Regardless of that (because ignorance may be bliss but is not the best defense), I was unable to move over to the left lane (along with the other half a dozen cars that were pulled over simultaneously) because of the heavy traffic on 94 that day.

Now, I definitely could have stopped, holding up traffic, but just after going under an underpass that happens to be under construction, I noticed the lights in front of me and then behind me and all around me as myself and, wait for it, the other half a dozen cars.

So after I was written a $300 ticket I was pretty fuming and knew that I would definitely attend my court date. Which I did, this morning.

I had no idea that there were that many interesting people in the county I live in, but oh dear, there are.

In the courtroom, I stood in line with the rest of those charged with petty misdemeanors right next to the line for misdemeanor and assault. Does that strike anyone else as funny? Because it was pretty darn hysterical to me.

When it was my turn to plea my case with the prosecutor, I felt hopeful, until he pretty much deflated my hopes for leaving with a fine of $0 and no record and instead offered me a deal of $150 and the possibility of having it on my record.

No, thank you. I said. And just like that a trial date was set. I am my mother's daughter, you know.

Two weeks from today, I will have to plea my case in front of the judge alongside the officer who wrote my ticket that cold November day.

The good news is while waiting for the judge to make a statute change on my violation and paperwork (since the officer that ticketed me wrote the wrong one. Again, hilarious, right?) I met someone else who was pulled over 20 minutes prior to me, in the same area, by the same officer. Our tickets are one digit apart. And get this, he was pulled over with a half dozen other cars too.

A trend?

While he got a better deal from his prosecutor than I did, he did offer to help me out with my trial since he was there same day, same place, same officer.

All this to say, I think I'm a magnet for crazy. I'm not sure if it's just the way I react to things or just my personality or what, but it seems that crazy things tend to happen to me more than the average person.

The less likely the odds, the more likely it will happen to me, or one of my kids.

What I would give for a week of no crazy. But then again, I might not have much to talk about.