As you're reading this column, chances are you're probably enjoying a much-deserved long weekend with your family and friends. Perhaps you have plans to go on a picnic later today, take a boat ride or attend a neighbor's barbecue.

(This writer's plans include trying to ignore the fact that it's her birthday and she's another year older. Sigh.)

If you're a cop, though, Labor Day weekend is anything but a picnic.

Holiday weekends seem to have this notorious stereotype as being a time for people to have more than their share of fun, then get behind the wheel drunker than a skunk (we apologize to all skunks and skunk enthusiasts who might have found that offensive).

Jokes aside, drunk driving in Maine during Labor Day weekend is a serious topic to law enforcement and traffic officials.

"It is going up, and it's going up fairly steadily despite all the OUI-enforcement activities we've put in place," Lauren Stewart, director of the Maine Bureau of Highway Safety, said.

During the last four Labor Day weekends, two people have been killed each year, Stewart said. All eight died in alcohol-related crashes. Of the 183 lives lost in traffic accidents in Maine last year, 69 died because they were driving drunk or someone driving drunk killed them.

To many of us, that's just a statistic. But try telling that to the 69 families who will never see their loved ones again.

We know a little bit about the pain drunk driving can create: It was only two-and-a-half years ago we came home from spring break to hear two dear friends were killed on their drive back to campus by a man driving 97 mph in a 45 mph zone and was at more than twice the legal limit for blood-alcohol content in that state.

It's only a statistic until it's someone you know.

And as the statistics in Maine continue to rise, cops all over the state will be laying the smack down today on booze cruisers.

In our fair capital city, Augusta police will put extra patrol squads on the streets, Augusta Police Sgt. Mike Small said. An OUI checkpoint will also be set up, he added.

State troopers will also have an increased presence on Maine highways, Department of Public Safety spokesman Steve McCausland said.

"I would want to make it clear to people that if you drive drunk, you are going to get arrested for it," McCausland said.

State and federal grants pay for the increased patrols, McCausland and Small said.

The penalty is severe for those who choose to drive drunk. The first offense can entail a hefty fine -- $500, and that's only the fine, never mind the court fees, towing charge and alcohol-education course -- and a one-way ticket to the place we like to call "Hotel Kennebec County."

Unfortunately, some people don't get the message the first time.

"A high number of the drunks that (state troopers) pick up aren't committing their first offense," McCausland said.

Follow Meghan Malloy's commuter blog and track the cheapest gasoline prices in town daily at www.kjonline.com.