Your Don - A Nuclear Terrorist???

This past weekend, I had a run in with the coppers. Not for something like racketeering, extortion, gambling or anything like that. Nope. Apparently I was posing a threat to the Ginna Nuclear Power Facility here in Rochester New York.

The Saturday started out innocent enough. The remnants of Tropical Storm Ernesto were engulfing the Western NY area leaving us with a steady rain and gray, gloomy overcast sky's. Days like this are good for 2 things. Staying in bed or lounging on the couch all day or talking a drive. Yup. For some strange reason, when it sucks outside, the wife and I like to jump in the ole Cadillac errrrr Pontiac and cruise. This past Saturday's adventure set heading East out of Fairport and eventually North. For some strange reason we wanted to head towards Lake Ontario.

The drive was uneventful. I mean how many meth labs can one drive by being manned by some crack thin dude in a wife beater in 315 land before you just can't take it any more? As we neared the lake, I decided that maybe I would try and find the Nuclear Power Plant. Brenna had never seen it. And lets face it, growing up in Alaska and Missouri, seeing the feat that is modern Nuclear Technology is quite the treat.



Do to my astute navigational skills, when the road we were on came to a "T", dead ahead was Ginna . As traffic was nil at the time, we sat there for a second looking at it as I pointed some things out. Then we notice the gate right ahead of us manned by some jerk-off reservist in his mismatched Kevlar gear. I said "we should probably go before he gets my plate number and calls it in." How prophetic am I? We break left and drive a touch still checking out the facility and still looking for a road to get us near the lake. We happen upon a driveway that appears to be some type of construction entrance. Maybe for a construction company or whatever. We figure we might be able to get near the lake as well as a better view of the plant. After driving a few hundred feet its pretty evident it doesn't lead anywhere but to the plant and off to the side is a HMWVEE with another reservist in there dicking off. At that point we turn around and high tail it out of there, noticing all the security cameras on the light poles. Ah well I figured. No harm done. As we turn onto the main road here comes a State Trooper in his Blazer or Suburban flying down the other side of the road angrily pointing for me to pull over. Perfect. I should have been home…in bed.

Officer Friendly roles up on the car and asks if I know why he pulled me over. Fighting the overwhelming urge to retort with some smart ass remark, I simply say "no officer I don't". He proceeds to tell me that I was trespassing on Military Land. Since 9/11 all Nuclear Facilities have been taken over by the military. Hey, sounds good to me, but how in the blue fuck am I supposed to know Nuclear Power Plants now reside on "military land"? There are no "no trespassing" signs anywhere and being former military any military land I have even seen has been marked as such…so one would know. He asks for my ID. He asks for Brenna's and of course she doesn't have it on her. I was waiting for the cop to explode, but he just took my ID and went back to his vehicle.

After a few minutes, Friendly is on his way back to the car. Looking in my mirror it looks like he has his ticket book with him. Now I'm about to go into my own Thermal Nuclear Meltdown if I get a friggin' ticket, however its just a note bad. He confirms my name, telephone number, address whatever and Bren's as well. Again with the trespassing lecture however he was fairly cool about it saying they have been requesting the military, the government, the plant whatever to put up signs to people know. He let us know that our info would be turned over to some anti-terrorism task force. You gotta be kidding me. I'm a Veteran damnit. The copper coughs up my I.D. back and bids us farewell.

All in all it could have been worse I guess. Its good to know that security is diligent around something as sensitive as a Nuclear Power Plant, however while Brenna and your Don were being harassed, Akmed, Scandar, Muhammad and Akbar were all casing the joint while the two Americans (one a veteran ;) ) were getting gaffled by one-time.

I have now been harassed looking at Airplanes on a beach in NYC near JFK and now driving near a Nuclear Power Plant. Looks like I better not wear my Timothy McVay mask for Halloween this year. At least not until all this blows over.