Out of the Mouths of Babes

When I was working for the Ohio State Highway Patrol, I stopped a Canadian car, which appeared to be a rental, for speeding. The driver of the car was a woman in her mid-thirties with a small boy sleeping in the back seat.

I asked her for a driver's license and registration, and informed her how much over the speed limit she had been driving. I told her that she would have to post a bond for the violation. She looked at me as if I was from another planet and in broken English said, "Nooo-English."

After some quick thinking, and this being a Canadian car, I suspected she might be French. So I tried, "Parlez-vous Francais?" Again I got the same puzzled look and reply, "Nooo- English." She did not appear to be of Latin persuasion so I tried both "Sprechen Sie Deutsch" hoping her to be German.

Again I got the identical look and reply "Nooo-English." By now I figured this was going to be one of those days, as I fumbled to try to communicate with some sort of sign language to get my point across. In desperation I tried one more language, "Habla Espanol."

This time I was ready for her and prepared to lip-sync with her in synchronized motion, "Nooo-English." Just then, the small boy in the back woke up, rubbed his eyes and asked, "Mommy, why did the policeman stop us?"

Communications now established, with no more French, German, Spanish, just plain old American English, I said, "You’re required to post bond, follow me."