Quote Originally Posted by sandm View Post
there was no point in trying to explain anything to these 2 officers. their minds were made up. emailed the lawyer that got me out of my last last traffic ticket this morning. if there's an out or reduction he'll find it.

as he leaned over the boat to give me my extinguisher back, he noticed the coozie in the drivers cupholder down low. immediately asked me to give it to him. the look on his face when I pulled the diet dr pepper can out of the coozie and handed it to him was priceless. he thought there would be a second charge for beer within reach of the driver. one of the guys on the boat saw his face and said he had never seen such a letdown
told him I was not drinking as I was entertaining the guys that were drinking. I don't think he believed me but whatever.....
One of the few areas where our laws are actually more lax...

Under Oregon law, boat operators are allowed to drink alcohol and possess open containers on boats. However, boat operators cannot be under the influence — meaning their blood-alcohol level cannot be above the same .08 percent threshold for drunken driving. Also, those with a lower blood-alcohol level face arrest if they are impaired.
In fact, I found out recently that OR law actually allows surfing w/o a life vest. I don't condone this, but occasionally I have a stubborn friend that wants to be free. This weekend he was on my boat and tossed his life vest in the boat while surfing. It's on him to accept the consequences, and I'm not going to treat him like a child. He surfed right past the sheriff shortly thereafter with obvious white upper body skin hanging out and the sheriff didn't do a thing.

They don't publicize these gray areas in OR, but they do exist.

In fact, I just read up that sitting on the sundeck, etc is only prohibited above 5mph in OR.