Sunday Reading - Side by Sides

 

It seems every wannabe rural dweller who buys 2 acres around here somehow gets a new Side by Side, or mini-jeep as my wife calls em, attached to their home loan somehow. At like 20K for the low end ones they seem a bit pricey for me honestly but to each his own. They then spend the weekends driving them around with no plates zipping everywhere I guess thinking they are saving themselves money on gas or something.

Some evenings we have parades of a few dozen or more running around the area all night too.

Not that I really have an issue with them or what a person wants to drive or do on their time off. More power too em. Hell if I was 10 years (ok maybe 15 years) younger or had more acreage to take care of these days I might buy one myself. Especially if pretty girls wanted to ride in one. I will say I do have an issue when I go to some event that states "No Vehicles" yet allow these things to drive bumper to bumper like they are not vehicles themselves along the dirt paths. Some of these things are wider than my Dad's old Ranger.   

Yet what really pisses my old a$$ off every time I see these things buzzing down the roads and pulling into the towns ONLY gas station or even going all the way into the next slightly larger town further down the road for fast food. Always going a few miles under the speed limit (which is their max limit) and without a plate to see. What really burns me up? Is the fact that the cops (of whatever flavor) just wave and let em drive on by.

You know what would have happened 40 some odd years ago if I pulled my dirt bike into the town's only gas station and tried to fill my 2 gallon tank directly from the pump?

Now you might ask why this would piss me off? And you would be justified in asking since I am not a huge cop fan, and my libertarian bent and dislike of senseless rules should lean towards a "do as ya want" attitude and all.... AND it does, trust me.

BUT.... Every time I see some cop wave or ignore these things driving down the road with five teenagers hanging off them I think back to my younger days of running around the county on my old Yamaha 125 dirt bike. By GOD if my front tire so much as touched the easement along the side of a county or state road it was some kind of F$%*KING major law enforcement emergency. Those bored A$$hat deputies were calling in reinforcements from three counties over and screaming for some type of airborne operation just to bust my teenage butt. If I managed to give em the slip by cutting through a neighbor's field they would go lean on the neighbor to complain and be sitting in my driveway when I got home telling my parents what a juvenile delinquent I was for having the complete nerve to operate a vehicle without a damned license or plate on a public road. Why it wasn't even inspected they should put my 15 year old butt in jail right now.

Creeps.

Not that any of this bothers me to the point I want to become some Male Karen and call the cops or officially complain mind you. I have put up with rural teenage boys spinning out and racing in front of my property for decades now. Picked more than my share of drunks out of my fields and front yards then saved their coolers for them till the next day when they came back to get em. I didn't even pour their alcohol out like some creep deputy would have done so he could laugh about it later.

BUT damnit these kids (and adults) should also get to share the memory of running from the cops just cause they didn't have a plate on their vehicle same as I did. I am only thinking of them and how they should get the full rural experience and all.

Keep Prepping Everyone!!!!