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Posted by: Blue

I testified in Traffic Court for the first time today.

It was a cell phone tag.  He said he was adjusting his seat belt.  He wasn't.  He was holding his cell phone to his left ear with his right hand.

The Judge believed the accused and commented that he didn't believe that I could have seen whether or not he was holding a cell phone to his ear from 60' away.

The Return of the Sun

Posted by: Blue

It was a beautiful day today.  It went up to 16 degrees Celsius and sunny (61 Fahrenheit).

Time to put away the mock-neck monogram shirts and break out the Under Armour Heat Gear short sleeves.

By mid-summer, the thermometer can top out at around 38 degrees Celsius (100 Fahrenheit), making this climate I live in the second widest ranging temperature scale on Earth, surpassed only by Siberia in Northern Asia.

According to Wikipedia, the highest and lowest recorded temperatures for my city encompass a 90 degree Celsius (162 Fahrenheit) difference.

Spring Transfers

Posted by: Blue

This year, our Spring Transfer season incorporated our district amalgamating with the one to the South of us.

We now use approximately 25% of the police officers in the city to cover a land mass that is almost 50% of the city's sprawl.

In addition, we have lost our beloved Patrol Sergeant and Desk Sergeant to the shift that rotates before us, along with 4 of the Constables (1/2 the shift).

With JT gone on holidays to Hong Kong for two blocks, 5 new faces, 2 new Sergeants and two stations to work between, I think I might be feeling out of place until June or so.

A few saving graces:

1. Our new Sergeants seem to be great guys
2. We received one more constable than we lost, bringing our compliment up to minimum... at least for now...
3. My holiday time bank is about to refill in 7 days
4. Many of the newbies on the shift are coming out of speciality units with plenty of experience in various areas to share with the rest of us General Patrol humps
5. The new district covers a number of my favourite eateries in the city, including my all time #1 breakfast spot - a falafel joint owned by a dude from Iran which has the best hash-browns ever
6. JT and I are officially still partnered and ready to rock the city all year again before he is a mandatory transfer next year - AND... I believe we will be maintaining our epic 203 callsign

Recycling

Posted by: Blue

Last night at around 1:10 AM, we spotted a guy milling around the hooker district.

He was carrying a toilet over his left shoulder and the tank lid in his right hand.

When asked what he was doing with a toilet on his shoulder at 1:10 in the morning, he replied "I'm salvaging it.  I work for a landlord."

"Oh."

I don't know what I was expecting.

I really never know what to expect.

Morale Patches

Posted by: Blue

I was at the local tactical shop today.  I picked up some Mil-Spec Monkey morale patches for my duty bag.

I liked the first one so much that I bought one for JT too.

Grow-Op

Posted by: Blue

Today we assisted our grow-op unit with a warrant execution.

The bust netted over 500 plants in various stages.  It had a street value of over half a million dollars.

Different Days

It's quite the challenge, I find, to make well put-together delicious meals with a child in Kindergarten and a baby in the house. For half the day I have one ear and one eye constantly on Waffle until she's shipped off to school and the for the whole day I have the other ear and other eye on Little Blue. If I can manage to stuff something in my face for breakfast and lunch other than coffee and more coffee then we've had a successful day.

So you can imagine how disappointed I get when I go to the effort to make a nice roast or chicken only to have Blue working OT.

Last Monday I was busy preparing dinner when I got a text from Blue saying he wouldn't be home for awhile. Sigh. While I was chopping potatoes and carrots and listening to some relaxing music, Blue was across the city waiting for the Medical Examiner. An elderly gentleman had passed away in the shower while cleaning-up after bowel movement.

I was struck by how polar opposite our days have become.

Although, to be fair, I do deal with my fair share of baby poop.

K9

Posted by: Blue

Last night we had an animal call.

He was a big, grumpy German Shepherd.  We were prowling the back lane looking for his owner who has 2 warrants.

The dog had broken free from the chain he has been kept on all winter.  We called animal services.  He didn't seem to like police and would growl and raise his neck hair every time we got close.  I didn't want to impose the jeopardy of having to shoot or Taser him by getting too close and finding out that he liked to bite.

After the City Pound folks managed to snag him, we got a look at his living arrangements.  He had no dog house, no water, very little food and was living right next to a large pile of his own excrement.  He had only a sheet of ice to sleep on.

His owner will be getting a number of tags including one for failing to adequately care for an animal.

We told the pound to call us if our guy showed-up to collect his dog.  We've been trying to hook him for months now.

A Sheepdog

Posted by: Blue

This is one of the best metaphors I have ever heard.

One Vietnam veteran, an old retired colonel, once said this to me: “Most of the people in our society are sheep. They are kind, gentle, productive creatures who can only hurt one another by accident.”...

...I mean nothing negative by calling them sheep. To me it is like the pretty, blue robin’s egg. Inside it is soft and gooey but someday it will grow into something wonderful. But the egg cannot survive without its hard blue shell. Police officers, soldiers and other warriors are like that shell, and someday the civilization they protect will grow into something wonderful. For now, though, they need warriors to protect them from the predators.
“Then there are the wolves,” the old war veteran said, “and the wolves feed on the sheep without mercy.” Do you believe there are wolves out there who will feed on the flock without mercy? You better believe it. There are evil men in this world and they are capable of evil deeds. The moment you forget that or pretend it is not so, you become a sheep. There is no safety in denial...

...We know that the sheep live in denial; that is what makes them sheep. They do not want to believe that there is evil in the world. They can accept the fact that fires can happen, which is why they want fire extinguishers, fire sprinklers, fire alarms and fire exits throughout their kids’ schools. But many of them are outraged at the idea of putting an armed police officer in their kid’s school. Our children are dozens of times more likely to be killed, and thousands of times more likely to be seriously injured, by school violence than by school fires, but the sheep’s only response to the possibility of violence is denial. The idea of someone coming to kill or harm their children is just too hard, so they choose the path of denial.

The sheep generally do not like the sheepdog. He looks a lot like the wolf. He has fangs and the capacity for violence. The difference, though, is that the sheepdog must not, cannot and will not ever harm the sheep. Any sheepdog who intentionally harms the lowliest little lamb will be punished and removed. The world cannot work any other way, at least not in a representative democracy or a republic such as ours.

Still, the sheepdog disturbs the sheep. He is a constant reminder that there are wolves in the land. They would prefer that he didn’t tell them where to go, or give them traffic tickets, or stand at the ready in our airports in camouflage fatigues holding an M-16. The sheep would much rather have the sheepdog cash in his fangs, spray paint himself white, and go, “Baa.”

Until the wolf shows up. Then the entire flock tries desperately to hide behind one lonely sheepdog.

- From the book, On Combat, by Lt. Col. Dave Grossman