One very hot summer day we were going to our annual Family Reunion in Hastings, Nebraska. We landed and rented a car from a big national car company in Omaha. Carrie was driving and also in the car were our Florida sister, Yvonne and niece, Natalie. Driving down a long stretch of cornfield lined state road and it was really in the middle of nowhere. The temperatures all week had been in the 107-112 degrees and this day was no different. It was blistering hot! But we were on a mission to go to Lebanon, Kansas over the state line to visit the geographical center of the United States.
Suddenly we noticed a police car with lights flashing traveling at a high speed in the review mirror. Carrie pulled over on this narrow 2 lane road to let him pass. Surprisingly he stopped right behind our car. We all were shocked and bewildered! We hadn’t noticed even another car for over 20 miles on this road. The officer walked up to the car with his hand on his gun.
He shouted, “Get out of the car with your hands visible!” The next thing we knew Carrie was handcuffed. The officer looked at all of us with a squinted eye.Then the officer told us that this car had been reported stolen by the rental company. We laughed and showed him the rental papers. This mean cornhusker cop was not amused and made Carrie sit in the back of his police cruiser for over 2 hours in the very hot 110 degree plus Nebraska sun. We just sat in the car. We thought it might be a Nebraska “Book em Dano” experience. My darling sister wanted a bottled water that was in a cooler in the trunk. My niece thought and advised her mother otherwise!
He had to have the rental company verify the car was not indeed stolen. Not only was the car reported stolen from St Louis, MO but had the wrong license tags on the rented vehicle we were driving. OMG!!!!
He was nice enough to let us keep the supposedly stolen vehicle until we went back to the Omaha Airport in 2 days. And sure enough they had a tow truck waiting to take the car away on our arrival.
When back in Tampa we called the car rental company and told them what had happened. They just laughed and said, “This happens all the time.”
We have never used this big name car company again. NOT FUNNY! NOT FUNNY!!!