I exited my freeway cloverleaf and found myself in a slow motion spin. I corrected and spun the other way, stopping sideways at the intersection limit line as an elderly lady pedestrian looked at me with a sad, knowing look of disapproval. Three latinos had exited the freeway at speed, overshot the turn and landed in deep iceplant. They were chopping iceplant with machetes and throwing it onto the asphalt. Our local CHP pulled up, saw the sun on the machetes and slapped leather. The 3 had no driver's license, registration,insurance, green cards or even national I.D.s My exaust was dragging like eviscerated intestines on the ground. OLD BALD GUY, one of your brother officers produced a quick fix-DUCT TAPE LOL. Oh, for survival, iceplant makes a good transpiration water source and machetes are very efficient at collecting it.

I love it, someone on the department (besides me) who carried tools and stuff to actually help disabled motorists. It kinda restores my faith in the "New CHP." Besides tape, I used to carry a couple dozen wire coat hangers (easy to come by when everyone wears uniforms that must be dry cleaned), basic tools, even some of that two part epoxy gas tank plugging stuff.<br><br>Ice plant also eats the spit shine off of your boots like crazy. Must be some kind of acid in it...I was never so happy to transfer out of the LA area to a local where they had tumbleweeds instead...