I’m not sure what to say about this besides what you see in the title – except that upon our return to Germany from Spring Break FrankfOrt, KY 2021, I had three speeding tickets in the mail! Yep, they just kept coming, one after the other, from three different towns in our area. It was a real delight to compare and contrast all of the different headers, town icons, and auditor names. But one thing that every ticket had in common was my mug shot:

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I mean, wow – seeing yourself in the act of speeding is pretty funny. What was I thinking about? Do I always look like that? At least my hands were at 10 and 2 and I wasn’t looking at my cell phone – I’m guessing that might merit a bigger fine. And how, after living here for almost two years without a single speeding ticket, did I manage to get three in three weeks? It’s not like I have anywhere to be. In fact, checking the dates and times, it seems I was just in a rush to get to the forest for a hike. Pretty sure the trees wouldn’t care if I was a few minutes late! Maybe I was just taking out my shutdown angst on the gas pedal.

I also love reflecting on what qualifies as ‘speeding’ in Germany. In the US, I pretty much nose it right up to 9mph over, no matter where I’m driving – anyone else do that? In Germany, though, the thresholds are much lower: Ticket 1 – 5mph over, Ticket 2 – 4mph over, and Ticket 3 – 7mph over. The numbers are bigger in km/hour, but still.

Luckily, the fines are also lower vs in the US (at least I think – happily haven’t had a ticket in the US in a while, either) – the grand total for all three tickets was a cool 50€. Not too bad! And the points don’t start racking up until you’re going 12mph or more over. Maybe it’s worth it to get a little adrenaline going during these very quiet times? (please don’t tell the Germans I said that)