The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part Seventeen

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This series is dedicated to my friend ‘The Pieman’ who hosted ‘THE P.I.T.S’ BBS in New York City and sadly passed away in 2016. I know his son ‘Blake’ will be reading this sequence of stories with anticipation.


We will never forget you man, you were one of a kind.


Also I would like to say a big thank you to Fabulous Furlough, ex-leader of ‘The Humble Guys’ who helps me fill in the gaps of what happened almost 30 years ago, The Slavelord who has given me a plethora of memories from the early days and to Suicidal Tendencies (@trolleydave) who remembers more about the UK scene than me.


The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) is a continuation of my previous series, The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops.


I was once known as 'Bryn Rogers', a member of THG (The Humble Guys).


Other articles in this series:
The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part One
The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part Two
The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part Three
The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part Four
The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part Five
The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part Six
The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part Seven
The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part Eight
The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part Nine
The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part Ten
The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part Eleven
The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part Twelve
The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part Thirteen
The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part Fourteen
The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part Fifteen
The Software Piracy Chronicles of Slobberchops (The THG Years) – Part Sixteen


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August 1992

As we had left no contact information with ‘The Bitch’, we were confident that no further interaction would be possible at least for the duration of our trip.

The 15 miles or so road drive to downtown Los Angeles was not without incident. It was dark, I didn’t know the area and those raised freeways have a bad habit of ‘lane disappearance’.

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Let me explain. You are in the outside lane, and then it suddenly veers off right as it mutates into an exit. One such event had me swerving back on to the freeway and then what do you know, blue flashing lights are right behind you.

’FACT: Cops tend to materialise out of thin air, usually at the wrong times’

I was driving on this occasion and duly pulled over. Past overdosing on US movies and series educated me to ‘stay put’ and wait for the swaggering cop to knock on my window with his flashlight.

Everything went predictably and I duly pressed the window button in response to the incoming clang-clang on my driver’s window.

Evening’, he said, and without waiting for a response continued ‘you been drinking?..’

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Taken aback I stammered, ‘Just the one’, replying truthfully. I squinted, trying to see what he looked like but was dazzled by this enormous flashlight poking square in my face.

The light then flickered over to HootMon on the passenger seat who was holding a brown bag full of leftovers from KFC we had recently visited.

’What’s in the bag?’, was the next question. HootMon innocently went to open it but was stopped by the Cops’ sudden and startled response as he hurriedly reached for his weapon.

’One of the things that irritated me greatly about America was this non-trusting attitude. Guilty until proven innocent is the general motto. Especially in the workplace’

’HOLD IT’, screamed the cop in a voice that demanded immediate attention.

HootMon slowly turned the bag around to reveal the image of a grinning Colonel Sanders and the KFC logo, and slowly uttered the words, ‘Chicken leftovers’.

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We had both spoken by this point and yet he still appeared to be treating us like gun concealing, beer guzzling, freeway swerving fucked up locals. So the last point is quite valid.

Assuming his position with gun still in hand, the torch once again dazzled me.

Think you’ve had more than one beer’, he drawled.

Get out of the car’.

I was then ordered to do what they call a sobriety test. In the UK we get breathalysed by blowing into a handheld device.

They then check how much alcohol is sitting in your blood stream before deciding if you are over the limit.

’this ‘test’ appeared a little primitive to me and from the most advanced technological country in the world?...

Walk a straight line’. He demanded pointing to a painted line running down the edge of the freeway. The gun had disappeared by this time and I was confident the ‘test’ was not going to be an issue.

I walked the line easily without swaying, or so I thought. He gave me a strange quizzical look before shining that fucking torch into my eyes once again.

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You wearing contacts?’ he questioned in a most serious tone while scrutinising my eyeballs.

Yeah’ I responded, eyes streaming from the extreme glare.

’Are American cops all completely humourless? It’s like all happy thoughts have surgically been removed from their brains’

OK, you can leave but watch the road more carefully in future, be careful of other cars, and watch for pedestrians….’, he told me in a commanding voice.

I stopped listening after 20 seconds or so but the ‘cop talk’ went on for a couple of minutes before he ran out of fanciful blurb.

Welcome to America’, I thought, ‘Does this dick not realise we are tourists and have never driven on this section of road ever?

We continued the drive to our hotel in what we figured was the downtown area, thankfully without further incident.


To be continued...



All images have been cited and are under the category 'Labelled for Reuse' or are in the public domain.

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If you found this article so invigorating that you are now a positively googly-eyed, drooling lunatic with dripping saliva or even if you liked it just a bit, then please upvote, comment, resteem, engage me or all of these things.



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36 comments
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Cool story. It reminds me of the time I was pulled over in North Carolina on my way to go snowboarding in the smokey mountains.

Ha ha, personally I think most American cops are complete dickheads. Every story I've ever heard about them they've been on a power trip. I kinda get that they have to be more severe with guns all over the place. Some UK police can be as bad, but generally most police I've had to deal with here have at least been reasonable, and acted proportionally to the situation.

Lol, Classic move with the torch in your face too 😂

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I have been pulled over a few times while in the US. I seem to lose concentration on their roads and before you know it.. blue lights and sirens.

Some have been worse than others and if they do realise you are not a native, they tend to ease up.

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and if they do realise you are not a native, they tend to ease up.

Ha ha, yeah that's what I noticed about my encounter in NC. The cop seemed to be very much enjoying trying to shit me up and swinging his metaphorical dick about the place. I had long hair at the time and dressed like a hippie/grunge kid... in a very conservative part of hillbilly country.

I probably had it coming 😂

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Don't tell me.. he asked about the football club and if you had walked down Penny Lane?

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Ha ha, nah he was one of them real 'good ole boys' as they call them in the deep South.

He didn't even know that I was English. When I explained that I wasn't from the US he said 'you're not in Australia now.' Tbh, I don't think he was the brightest, but he was an aggressive asshole so I didn't even bother correcting him on the Ozzy thing. I just bit my tongue gave it 'yes sir, no sir' until he sent me on my way. When I returned from my snowboarding road trip my uncle told me that the highway patrol cops in NC are known for being like that, especially if you speak funny 😂

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The sad truth is more often than not the person they are dealing with is quite guilty of something. You should watch some past episodes of Cops sometime. It is because of the incidents that you see on there that they need to be as cautious as they are on pretty much every stop. There are some that go way overboard though. They have breathalyzers over here but there I think the laws vary by state about when they can administer it. They usually have to do a field sobriety test (fst) first which is what you got. I learn a lot by watching Cops and Live PD. :) It sucks that had to be your first impression though.

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I have seen many of those shows but the guys inside the cars always plead innocence when generally guilty. All this 'sir' stuff seems very false too, I see that on these cops shows.

Is that really respect or for show? Nobody here says 'sir' unless your at school or an army grunt.

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I think they see the camera and they try to make themselves look good even though they know they are in trouble. Like I said, there are some bad ones out there with bad attitudes. You just never know what you are going to get so it is best to be respectful, deliberate, and quiet as possible.

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so it is best to be respectful, deliberate, and quiet as possible.

This bit I knew.. and was! No joking around with these dudes is there?

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It really depends on where you are. Being near a big city like that, I am not surprised. I do computer work for a local police department here and they are pretty decent guys. My wife grew up down the road from the country sheriff. We have had our share of bad seeds that did some questionable things and got ousted though.

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I'm driving but will be back to read this!

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Multi-talented!

I confess to have taken off a jumper driving down the motorway at 90 hehe....

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I felt bad enough when taking of my prescription glasses to our on shades, lol!!

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Twas' a long time ago, I was a nipper then barely able to see above the steering wheel!

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Congratulations @slobberchops! You have completed the following achievement on the Steem blockchain and have been rewarded with new badge(s) :

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Vote for @Steemitboard as a witness to get one more award and increased upvotes!
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’FACT: Cops tend to materialise out of thin air, usually at the wrong times’… hahahah that is so true! Really enjoying your stories, nice work

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Really enjoying your stories, nice work

This is one of the more mainstream ones!.., usually I get little response on these.. they are too niche.

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Getting an audience, the hard part of writing...

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Do you speak from experience? Have you tried elsewhere.. do tell!

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I mean I tried to have a news site and martial arts magazine as well... But jeez it takes forever to build an audience, specially if you have no initial investment to promote yourself with. I think both did ok though but I was too impatient to reap the rewards and went back to salary working. Anyway I'm liking Steem a lot because there is really creative freedom here and I think with time it'll payoff.. how long have you been here?

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(Edited)

Anyway I'm liking Steem a lot because there is really creative freedom here and I think with time it'll payoff.. how long have you been here?

There is freedom, but be careful what you do.. people get very nitty about things and the daily reward pool needs to be shared out to the worthy.

There's a lot of politics too.., do the wrong things and it can end badly. I can see you have potential so am trying to steer you in the right direction as @steevc did with me when I started in March 2018.

This may all sound daunting and there's shit load to learn such as the tribes but it can be very rewarding here.

STEEM is as cheap as I have ever seen it and it's good that you have purchased some.

Use https://steemworld.org/@fenngen.. its an essential tool.

I can see you are doing the right things, engaging with people. It takes time and few keep it up. I was on of the ones that did.

You can make more cash flipping burgers.. even with what I get. Don't look at it as a form of income or you will be disappointed.

These are out of date but mostly relevant.

Paula's Redfish League has gone and @ocdb no longer operates a bot but actively curates.

https://steemit.com/steem/@slobberchops/some-newbie-tips-for-well-newbies

https://steemit.com/steem/@slobberchops/some-more-newbie-tips-for-well-newbies

However, you may find them useful. I ought to update them.

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Ok, thanks for the sound advice.. I'll stay alert to the dark side of Steemit. Also I know you can't get rich here but I suppose it can be enough for a humble living? What do you think?

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It's really up to you. I haven't taken anything out yet.., but I'm far from normal and treat it as an investment.

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Well let's just see what happens. Thanks for all the advice man, it's great to have someone throw a light in the dark, specially in unknown territory.

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Sup Dork?!? Enjoy the Upvote!!! Keep up with the dorky content for more love!!!

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Any encounter with foreign cops has to be scary, but at least he spoke some form of English. I am nervous enough driving abroad where there will be some differences apart from being on the wrong side of the road. Looks like you got off lightly, but having someone think about pulling a gun on you is too scary.

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Some of the cops I feel are a little dim. I have a northern accent and HootMon a Scottish accent. We are not going to have guns in the brown bag!

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Maybe they have had other close calls. When there are so many guns around people get nervous. You will know more than me about this having lived there. I was only ever visiting.

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Hi, @slobberchops!

You just got a 13.19% upvote from SteemPlus!
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Hi @slobberchops!

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Your UA account score is currently 4.588 which ranks you at #1934 across all Steem accounts.
Your rank has not changed in the last three days.

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