Oh the Cardinals.  So close.  They were SO CLOSE!  Only to have the Steelers steal away their lead at just over half a minute left in the game.  And then to see the Cardinals just fail miserably in the last 30 seconds with a stupid fumble to give it back to the Steelers for the last five seconds… Oye.

It was a good game, though.  And at least the Cardinals gave the Steelers something to work for instead of being an easy win.

We had watched the game at my husband’s brother’s house across town, so we had a bit of a drive to get home.  At about  the mid-way point downtown, driving down the freeway, we noticed the car we were closing in on in the next lane over wasn’t holding to their lane very well.  After a mile (and not passing them), we realized the person was probably drunk, so I had my husband turn down the radio and I dialled 911, who connected me to DPS’s 911. I told them we were behind a car that appeared to be weaving and swerving in their lanes and encroaching on other lanes, gave the plate # and description of the car.  The first guy I talked to said they had actually already received a few calls about that car and they were trying to get an officer out to pull them over.  I thought that was good, and hoped we’d see a cop soon.

We followed this guy (or girl) for several more miles, not seeing a single DPS officer anywhere.  We were approaching our own exit and my husband said we’d follow the guy until the next Loop and then we’d call it quits.  By this time there was at least one other car following this person like we were, also on their phone (presumably to 911).  We kept our distance but watched in fear that this guy would crash or take someone else out…

He/she got terribly close to the K rails in a construction zone – we don’t know how this person managed to keep missing the walls and other cars (yay on the other drivers for avoiding this guy though, they deserve more credit than this driver).

We came upon an exit only lane and this driver was in that lane (we were about four cars back), and my husband was watching carefully to see if this driver was going to yank back out onto the freeway when realizing he/she was on an exit-only lane… and he/she did (narrowly missing another car), and the SUV/pickup immediately behind this guy also jerked back onto the freeway (it was one of the vehicles we realized was also following this drunkard like we were).  However, we had a car immediately to our left so we could not move back onto the freeway, we had no choice but to give up our “pursuit”.

We were livid that the DPS officers had not shown up yet.  We had driven 15 MILES following that schmuck and had not seen one SINGLE cop.  Not ONE.  What the hell?  We could not fathom why DPS had not doubled or tripled their force on a night when it’s pretty clear with our home team in the Superbowl, that there would be a lot of partying and drinking going on, which would mean drunk drivers.  What. The. HELL!?!?

I just hope that whoever that dipstick was, they got to their destination safely and without incident; so far I have not seen any news aritcles about any accidents (fatal or otherwise) out west of where we had to exit.  I am thinking about writing a steaming letter to DPS complaining about the utter lack of officers on the freeway last night; we should not have gone five miles without seeing a cop on the road, and more importantly, not seeing one in pursuit of someone who it was clear to several other drivers, was driving drunk!

If this is what putting up all the new speed cameras has done to the number of DPS officers on our highways in town, this is just one more reason to have those damn things removed. It was supposed to free up officers for other matters, and to (mainly) bring in more revenue for the State.  But let’s face it – I’d rather see someone speeding down the road at 80 mph who is in control of their vehicle and get away with it, than a drunk doing anywhere from 45mph to 80mph and barely in control of their vehicle – and no cop in sight to pull that person over!

Ridiculous. Utterly ridiculous.