Intelligence Quotient

Posted by: Blue

Me: "Man is he ever dumb, hey?"

JT: "I don't think he could pour piss out of a boot if the instructions were written on the heel."

Soup Can Cops

Posted by: Blue

Of the toil of policing, JT quipped the other day: "It's like trying to empty the ocean with a soup can."

Holy Vegetables

Posted by: Blue

Our domestic arrest from last night was asked at jail if he practiced any particular religion.

He paused, thought for a few seconds, then answered.

"I'm a vegetarian".

JT and I and the two prison guards within earshot paused for a few a seconds while looking back and forth at one another to confirm we had all heard the same thing.

I was the first one to break. We laughed for a good solid minute before the guard was able to compose herself and carry-on with the entrance interview.

Fisher-Price Police

Posted by: Blue

Last week, JT and I kicked loose a male we were spot-checking to respond to a baby abandoned and locked in a car.

When we pulled up and peered through the tinted window, we saw a child's plastic baby doll, sitting right where the child had dropped it, beside the car seat.

"What exactly did you see?" I asked.

"Some lady parked and got her stroller out of the trunk. Then she rummaged around in the backseat and left, pushing the stroller." Replied the concerned, furrowed-browed complainant.  "Are you going to have to break the window?"

"I don't think that will be necessary today, fortunately." I replied, leaning my head to speak into my shoulder mic. "Delta two-oh-three, this is a doll that's been trapped in the car. Unconscious, not breathing. No ambulance required."

We got back into the cruiser. There was a message from the dispatcher asking if she should send a Fisher-Price ambulance just to be sure.

I told her if she could get the Little People fire dispatch to answer their phone, it wouldn't hurt.

MHA

Posted by: Blue

The bi-polar patient we picked up two nights ago was in his manic stage.

He told my partner we had to kill Gretzky.

He also told the nurse he was going to climb down his v-neck, crawl up his crack and come out behind him to straighten-out his spine.

Then he threatened to rip my partner's head off with his bare hands and kick it around like a soccer ball.

It took 3 doses of Valium to put him out.

On the Wrong Track

Posted by: Blue

Yesterday, a lady drove the family van 100 yards down the train tracks, believing she was in a back lane.

Somehow I managed to refrain from laughing as I gathered the story upon our arrival.  

Her husband took the sight remarkably well, though he couldn't completely hide the look of disbelief when he walked over from the nearest railway crossing.

He was a bus driver, so I think he had seen a similar range of interesting things happen on the roads as we had.

Typically Abnormal

Posted by: Blue

A couple weeks ago, we showed-up at a Family Troubles call where the 18 year old son had smashed everything in the house, including breaking the tempered glass storm door with his face.

When we arrived, he was buck naked and swinging from the chandelier (not a figure of speech).

The odd thing about the call, I realized later on, wasn't cuffing him while he was stark naked, nor was it helping him zip-up his pants that I had to put on him.

The strange thing was that I never thought to ask why he was naked in the first place.  It just seemed so normal to me that he had no clothes on; perhaps due to his behaviour and intoxicated state.

I had to type into my report later on "It should be noted that it is unknown at time of reporting exactly why the male was naked upon arrival..."

It was a strange threshold to reach in my career when the nudity of a male that I proned-out at Taser-point was little more than a footnote in the report.

Code Brown

Posted by: Blue

Warning: Poop humour

Yesterday we had a shift breakfast together, pot-luck style.  I brought my favourite; hashbrown casserole.

There were sausages, fruit, apple pancakes, bacon, cinnamon buns, eggs, and the cliché; doughnuts.

I had two plates, then we cleaned up and headed out on the road  for the start of the shift.

It was a quiet morning.  No calls in the queue, so we rolled around and looked for some trouble.  It didn't take long to find it.  About 20 minutes in, I spotted an abandoned Chevy Cavalier with a torn-up wheel that had been pushed into the front driver's quarter-panel.  Looked like a drunk had hit the median and then abandoned ship before anyone could nail him for driving impaired.

As we sat waiting for a tow, I let JT know that the next stop would need to be the station for a bathroom break. Breakfast was catching up to me.

Ten minutes went by.

Twenty minutes.

I started fidgeting in my seat.  I tried some conversation to keep my mind off of my pending bowel movement.

Thirty minutes.

Forty minutes.

I called the towing company for an ETA.  10 or 15 minutes she said.

I had cramps now.  Had to relieve some pressure.  I leaned a little and let off some steam.

It was rancid.  The damn hashbrown casserole.  Too much garlic.  JT's eyes started watering.  We had to evacuate the car.

"I can't wait dude.  I gotta head for the coffee shop.  You mind waiting for the hook?"

"Sure.  I'd rather you not be around in case that happens again."

I started walking.  It was about 4 blocks.  I made it 2 blocks before the cramps started again.  "Why the hell did I put extra hot sauce on the eggs?"

A cabbie must have noticed the cop walking with something like a cross-over between a hunchback, a waddle and a gimped leg.  He stopped to offer me a ride.  1 1/2 blocks to go... I seriously considered it... then I considered that if my bowels failed me, my misery would forever be captured in that cab... both in the upholstery and on his passenger cameras.  I passed, waving him on with a grunt.  It was all I could muster.

My phone alerted me to a text.  I though JT might be on his way to give me a ride.  I checked my phone, still hobbling along.

JT: It still stinks.  I just threw up a bit.  Serious.  It got right in the seat.

I had to keep from laughing.  Couldn't lose muscle control...

I was crossing the parking lot now.  Made it to the door.  I started undoing my suspender clips and belt keepers for quick removal of the duty belt.

Through the dining area.  Back to the washrooms... "Please God, please don't be occupied!"...  The door opened.  I tried to slam it shut and lock it.  It had a slow-close piston and resisted slamming... I put my body weight into it... Shhhhhhh.......... cl-i-c-k.

Oh sweet merciful heavens.  That's better.

I almost didn't make it.  JT actually did puke a bit of his toast up.  It's the very first time anything job-related has made him nauseous enough to up-chuck.

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.

Tommy Solami Part V

Posted by: Blue

I've got court scheduled in May for ol' Tommy Solami.

I'm interested to catch-up on the drama between him and his girlfriend.

Downright Bang-able

Posted by: Blue

A few nights ago, while lodging a drunk male at the tank, he turned to my partner and said "You're pretty cute..."  Then he turned towards me and said "But he's downright bang-able".

Now I think JT's jealous of my sex appeal.

JT's Favourite Story

Posted by: Blue

There are two different tellings of this story.  The real story, and JT's version.  He has told his version of the tale to everyone on every shift... multiple times... often by special request.  I just let him.  It's way funnier than the truth, even if the truth alone was already quite hilarious.

DISCLAIMER: The facts as presented by JT were accurate to his standards at the time of posting.  It should be noted that the story becomes more and more elaborate and ridiculous with each re-telling.

It was the beginning of a day shift.  We were just signing on.  I was driving and headed for the coffee shop to pick up our regular morning java to kick-start the day.

It was the beginning of a day shift.  We were just signing on.  I was driving and jumping and telling JT to run plates the entire time he was trying to log onto the computer and he was becoming more and more agitated because he couldn't sign on but I kept bothering him with plate numbers.  He kept telling me to shut up and just focus on heading for the coffee shop to pick up our regular morning java to kick-start the day.

I saw a vehicle pass-by, going the opposite direction, without a front plate (mandatory in our province).  I waited until the traffic cleared, pulled a u-ball and then caught up with the car.  It stood-out to me because it looked like it had the dark tinted windows and shiny rims of a typical dial-a-dealer drug-mobile.

JT was still fighting with the computer and looking forward to getting a coffee to calm him down when suddenly he was thrown sideways as I careened through a u-turn which took me over the 8" high centre median and then all hell broke loose as I accelerated after some unknown target, all the while cutting-off a number of shocked citizens who were just trying to get to work safely.  JT kept asking me "What's wrong!? What did you see!?" but I refused to answer and I had the look of a determined mad man in my eyes.

We caught up with the vehicle and I turned my overhead lights on.  The car didn't slow down, so I chirped the siren a little.  The car still didn't slow or pull over, so I let the yelpers wail.

I almost rear-ended the vehicle, coming up on it hard.  Then I proceeded to roll down my window and hang halfway out the door, yelling at the person who was driving and wildly flailing my arms.  When that didn't work, I grabbed the PA system and started hollering at the driver that if they didn't stop their tires would be shot out.  A number of PITT manoeuvre attempts proved fruitless.  JT began voicing a slow pursuit over the radio.

At this point, I began to suspect one of two things; either this was a gang member attempting to make a very slow get-away, or it was a very elderly person who was oblivious to my presence.

I told JT to let dispatch know that the helicopter would be required for our pursuit.

The suspect finally pulled over and stopped, but on the left side of the street instead of the right.  I stopped the car behind them and got out to approach the driver's side door.

The vehicle in question remained in motion but the pursuit was so slow that I decided to get out on foot and give chase.

Just as I got to the driver's door, the vehicle began pulling into a left hand turn, across the intersection and headed for a side street.  I began running alongside, knocking on the window with my flash-light to alert the driver, who I could now see was indeed a frail old grandmotherly type, of my presence.

As I approached, the vehicle accelerated away from me.  Not to be left empty-handed, I jumped onto the trunk of the car, holding onto the antenna for support, and made my way over the roof of the car as it sped away to peer into the car through the windshield.  I held my Glock and pointed it at the feeble old lady in the driver's seat, threatening to send her straight to Jesus if she didn't stop the vehicle.

Just as we crossed through the intersection, our tactical team happened to be driving by.  They saw me running alongside the vehicle and decided to lend a hand if they could.  Meanwhile, JT still sat in the car in the middle of the road, with the driver's side door wide open and the lights still flashing, shaking his head and wishing he was drinking a coffee.  The driver finally noticed me and pulled to the side of the road.  The boys in the tactical car jumped out to help but I sheepishly waved them off.  They waved and drove away.

Just as we crossed through the intersection, our Tactical team happened to be driving by.  They saw me running alongside the vehicle and immediately assumed I was chasing down a murderer who was wanted on a Canada-wide warrant.  They finished the pursuit by ramming the suspect car into a tree.  The driver was unceremoniously pulled out of the vehicle through the smashed window and held at the point of two assault rifles while I begged them not to shoot and tried to quickly explain myself.

I explained my presence to the sweet old gal and asked why she hadn't stopped and if she hadn't seen the lights.  She replied "Oh sure I saw you there.  I just didn't think you were after me!"  I told her that she was missing her front plate. "Oh my goodness!  It must have fallen off!  Thank you officer!"  "You're welcome ma'am.  Just make sure to pull to the right and stop next time... even if you don't think I'm after you.  Have a nice day."

It was eventually discovered that I had scared the old lady so much that she had soiled herself.  In the end, she ended-up being the great-aunt of the mayor and I had to talk to the Chief and explain why I had been so rough on the woman.  I kept my badge but just barely because as it turned out, the mayor didn't really even like his great-aunt.

Cold

Posted by: Blue

In the coldest months of the winter, people often come up with strange ways to stay warm.

I frequently see all of the elements on the stove glowing red hot while the oven door is wide open, trying to heat the kitchen.

Lately, I have been going into houses where there are blankets and quilts nailed over the doors and windows to stop drafts.

Last night, on a disturbance call, we knocked on the front door of the house.

"GO AROUND TO THE BACK DOOR!"

We knocked on the back door.  Rustling and bustling was heard.  The door finally cracked open and the Steward of the Manor lifted a questionable blanket like a tent flap for us to enter into the home.  We had to duck under the material (quickly and with as much agility as possible to avoid chances of bed bugs living in the tapestry dropping on our heads) and then edge past the butler; a middle-aged gentleman with a uniform consisting of a beer shirt and dirty "athletic" pants (though I doubt they had ever been used for their intended design) and a mouth full of rotting teeth and spaces where teeth had already rotted away.  His breath smelled like Death and Hades riding out to drag souls back to Hell (and stale beer).

"I see you guys have the blanket fort all set up..."

He guffawed and a droplet of spittle landed on my cheek.

The Lady of the House proceeded to explain to us that the blankets were to keep the cold out, completely missing the jocularity in my jab, pointing to a small snow drift in the entryway, which had worked itself through a large 2" gap where the rest of the bottom of the door should have been.  She was also well into the beer, and kept telling me that it was okay because her daughter was babysitting her newborn and her house was clean, (which was a low-down-dirty-lie), so I didn't have to call CFS.

We quickly tidied up the call and excused ourselves.

I stood outside in the -45 C (-49 F) for a full 15 minutes, hoping to freeze any bed bugs out of my clothing should they have successfully stowed-away.

Ham

Blue is a very, how do I put this, particular person. He's slightly OCD and very detailed driven and I think that it is one of the reasons he's a good cop. He spent extra money to make sure all of the hangers in our house match and all of the ones in our closet sit in one direction making the clothing all facing the same way. If I have a hanger out of place, I'll hear about it! There are times where it's nice to have a husband like this and times where...well, I often thank God that he gave me a personality to be able to deal with it. You can only listen to the proper way to cut a pie or stack a burger so many times.

We had soup and sandwiches for dinner last night. I think that, for the most part, Blue is able to turn-off the obsessive personality or at least he's got enough smarts to know that he shouldn't always voice his opinion. But there are times where I can tell he wants to jump right in and show me how to do something better or more efficiently.

I made my ham sandwich and as I was picking it up a small piece of ham flopped around.

Blue: Your ham is gonna fall out.

Me: No, it's not.

Blue: Ya, it is. I saw it flop.

Me: I think it's fine. *wink*

He squared his shoulders and I laughed at him. He went about his business. I took a big bite and my ham proceeded to fall out of my sandwich and into my soup. My eyes went wide and I quickly scooped it up and shoved the whole thing into my mouth hoping he didn't see.

The worst thing when living with a particular person and is when they're proven correct in something they've tried to school you on. The best thing ever is when you end-up being correct and can put them in their 'you're not always right' place.

Well, he did see. I started laughing and he just couldn't understand why I would have made myself such a sloppy sandwich.

Roast Beef

Posted by: Blue

Sometimes the job requires a heavy hand.  Sometimes it requires delicacy and tact.  Sometimes it requires you to do something you never, ever, ever thought you'd be getting paid to do.

On Thursday, our call was a Sudden Death requiring a notification for the Next of Kin.  Pretty standard.  One of the harder parts of the job.  This one was significantly more complicated though.

The deceased was an octogenarian.  His girlfriend was also well into her eighties and suffering from the first stages of Alzheimer's.  He had died in her bed... ahem... after... uh... or during... well... there were two blister packs of Viagra found in his pockets... one was empty... um... sheesh.

So buddy was getting some in his golden years.  Her daughter didn't approve.  Then again, the old girl didn't approve of her daughter's lesbian relationship and wasn't shy to share that with the police and anyone else within earshot.  She also apparently didn't approve of the idea of a Black police officer (who happened to be the prime unit's reporting officer that night).

To further complicate things, the elderly missus had not eaten that day and was becoming more confused with all of the excitement.  She kept referring to her deceased boyfriend by her previously deceased husband's name.  Her daughter was trying to get her to eat, however the daughter happened to be the most patronizing person I have met recently and her mother was resistant to the idea of being parented by her child (naturally).

We were having difficulty ascertaining the identity and particulars of the deceased's son, so our supervisor came with us to the home of the gentleman visitor.  During our search for medications and NOK information, what should we stumble across, but a huge stockpile of improperly stored firearms.  Shit.

Most of the guns were able to fit into the gun locker which we managed to find a key for.  There was, however, a revolver which was unregistered (as restricted weapons, all handguns and a number of other varieties of firearms are required to be registered in Canada).  As there were no charges that would be laid against the dead guy, we brought the gun back to the station to be processed as a "found gun" and then turned in for testing and subsequent destruction to our firearms section.

We located the info for the son of the deceased.  He lived out of town.  The police in his jurisdiction were advised and requested to make the death notification.

We were an evening unit and the prime unit was days.  They had a little overtime already, typing up the report for the coroner.  We were dealing with the gun.  That left the elderly girlfriend and her family alone in the house to "grieve".  Unfortunately they were not grieving.  They were arguing and bickering.

Dispatch raised us on the radio.  There was now a Family Trouble call at the same address.

We headed back.

There was a neighbour over from down the street.  Per the daughter, the neighbour was known to steal from her mother.  Per the mother and the neighbour, the daughter was the one stealing.  There was apparently $100 missing from the 80 year old woman's wallet now.

No one had known about the $100 except for the woman with Alzheimer's.  Shit.

Side-note: my partner and I had already dealt with the neighbour prior to that night on a bogus theft call.  She and her boyfriend had been reporting a theft by her sister-in-law.  Upon arrival, the money had been recovered (apparently it had fallen under the couch).

There was a lot more reasoning and massaging and coaxing.  In the end, my Sergeant, partner and myself sat in the house and watched the lady eat a roast beef sandwich on rye and drink a cup of Ensure along with her pills.  Then the daughter and her lesbian partner finally satisfied, were escorted back to their car at the mother's request.  The neighbour was also removed, leaving the mother alone to go to sleep.

There were no further problems that night.

Sometimes the job requires a heavy hand.  Sometimes it requires delicacy and tact.  Sometimes it requires you to demand an eighty-something year old widow to muscle-down a dry, tasteless roast beef sandwich with too much mustard for the sake of public peace.

Semantics

Posted by: Blue

JT on the phone to a homeowner: "Hello.  It's the police calling... Not to alarm you but we've had a distress alarm at your house..."

He immediately turned to me and silently rolled his eyes over his ironic choice of words.

The (un)Usual

I often find myself laughing at how unusual our lives have become now that Blue is a police officer, but how normal the unusual now feels. I suppose it's more that Blue's life is on the crazy side of things as mine is still pretty uneventful with being a stay-at-home-mom (Although, I signed-up for a boxing class. That counts for something, right?). From time-to-time Blue's work experiences spill over into our home life through stories, texts, phone calls or random things that make it through our door. Sometimes the things are shocking and sad, sometimes they are hilarious, sometimes they are down-right frustrating but they almost always leave me thinking that Blue must have one of the most bizarre jobs out there. If only more civilians could see what police actually have to deal with.

Yesterday I was yet again reminded of the absurdity of Blue's line of work when I got a text from him later on in the day which read:

Probably some OT. Guns. Bullets. Crazy drunk Russian. The usual. 

I find it funny, and only slightly off-putting, that this is Blue's usual. 

No One Said You Had to be Smart

Posted by: Blue

Two days ago, one of the other crews had an intoxicated prisoner in one of the cells.  They filled out a property form and asked him to sign for the items that they had taken for safekeeping.  His name was Isaac.

The first attempt at a signature was painfully slow.... then he scribbled it out, presumably due to a spelling error.  His next attempt stuck.  This is how he spelled "Isaac":

That's right.  "I - Backwards 3 - Backwards 3 - 9 - C".

I've encountered a number of illiterates already, but none that couldn't spell their own name.  Wow.

Remarkably, his last name was correctly spelled on the first attempt.

A Package Deal

Posted by: Blue

On our second-last evening shift, JT found out that his uniform pants were ripped right down the fly.

He didn't have another back-up pair in his locker.

He spent the night working with his bright tighty whities poking out of his midnight blue duty cargoes.