So I'm pedaling along, thinking about Miami Vice, imagining myself as an academic Philip Michael Thom--

Suddenly I am blinded by a profusion of oncoming lights, accompanied by a siren, crossing against traffic into my lane on the two-lane road. Reacting quickly, I squeeze left and right brakes in addition to steering the bike sharply to the right. All together, it is perfect choreography for an overbar face-plant. I spill onto the blacktop.

I skid a little in front of my bike, scraping my elbows, wrists, and forearms on the road. Blood, but not too much. My childhood comes back to me in that odd mix of pain and nausea I felt from bike accidents in fifth grade.

No one is getting out of the police car to help. They're saying something through that electric bullhorn on the roof, unintelligible to me. I remember I'm in Florida, sprawled out in front of a police car, and consider the implications.

Painfully, I stand. My shirt is ripped. I try to get my bike but I'm told to stop moving. I can't see much because of the Klieg-like wattage pointing at my body. I keep my hands at my sides but away from my pockets, jazz-hand style. I wonder what I've done. I'm not wearing a helmet. My rental bike didn't have one to fit my cartoonishly large dredlocked head. I also didn't have a safety light or any reflective clothing. The man at the bike store said not to worry about it.

The first policeman steps out of the car. "Where are you headed?" I tell him I'm on a bike ride. "Why so late?" I say I like it late. "What are you doing here?" I tell him I'm a law professor attending a conference at The Breakers.

At this point, I'm still thinking about my lonely, abandoned doll of a bike on the ground. Then the second policeman approaches. "We've had some robberies here."

I'm incredulous at what's being suggested. Robberies? On a bike? On a rental bike? How am I supposed to fit a Sony flat screen on the back of a Huffy? Or plan my jewel heist at the mercy of a functioning kickstand? And do I really fit the profile? I've just spent the day with people who live (live!) for subject-matter jurisdiction. And what does it matter if it is after midnight? There are no martial-law curfews in Palm Beach.

The first policeman asks for my ID. He asks for my name and address--clearly printed on the card, next to my picture that looked exactly like me--and my university affiliation.

Both men retreat into the car with my ID to run it though an interminable, rotary-dial background check system. It takes no fewer than 15 minutes. I'm alone with my thoughts, which are mostly questions. I try not to move, and attempt rationalization. Perhaps the burglary announcement was coincidental. I had multiple bike violations, and night cyclists are rare. There must be a logical reason for getting stopped. Other people must have gotten stopped like this.