“You can’t go around hitting shit” is a phrase that I’ve said for years as a collision investigator. The other day I was thinking about this Badge415-life-rule and the following came to mind.
Life is simple. You can’t go around hitting shit if it’s not your shit. If it was your shit, no one would care because it wasn’t their shit, but if it was, then they would lose their shit.
Why do people watch pursuits on TV? They’re basically waiting for the bad guy to crash and hit someone else’s shit. What if the the bad guy carjacks someone’s shit during the pursuit? Then people want to see if he is going to hit some shit with his feloniously acquired shit. As you can see, it’s a lot of shit to deal with.
How about the guy who drives his shit eighty miles per hour down your street? I bet you would want him to take that shit somewhere else because no one has time to deal his shit if he gets into some shit involving your shit.
This goes back to my original thought….. “You can’t go around hitting shit.”
It was dusk on Friday evening when an officer requested a follow up on a stop he’d made on a residential street not far from where I was writing parking tickets. When I got there, I saw an older car parked along the north curb and a male in the driver seat. Another male was already sitting on the curb with two other cops standing by.
The driver was patted down and instructed to sit on the curb next to his friend, who had been the passenger. The driver was in his early forties, thin and was wearing a Green Bay Packers hat. As soon as he sat down he started complaining as he said, “The cops are always pulling me over.” He followed that up with some more nonsense about being a victim and how the cops are always picking on him.
He said all of this despite having a meth pipe and being on parole for robbery.
Rather than stare at each other, I engaged him in small talk because you never know what’s going to come up, so I asked, “What else have you been arrested for?”
“Robbery, but that was a long time ago. I stole something from a store and they called it a robbery.”
“What else?”
“They once said I tried to cash a forged check.”
“What else?”
“Aggravated assault.”
“So, you’ve been arrested for robbery, assault with a deadly weapon, forgery and now you have a meth pipe?” The driver nodded, but still had the victim look on his face. “And you say the cops are always stopping you?” I added with a tone of skepticism in my voice.
He nodded again and said, “I can’t even sit in my car without the cops giving me a hard time. They’re always stopping me.”
This guy clearly has made poor life decisions and continues to do so. I wondered if there ever was a time he owned any of his tomfoolery or idiot missteps in life. This guy was the poster child for people who don’t accept responsibility for their actions.
I couldn’t resist and asked, “Did you know there’s a book called Maybe It’s You?”
He couldn’t help but smile at that one, but continued to talk about how the cops always stop him. That’s when I added, “Once again, maybe it’s you.” He shook his head and smiled because he knew I had zinged him again with Badge415 wit.
His attitude improved after some light humor and talk about his Packers hat and how they became the team. In the end he was cited for the pipe and sent on his way.
My comments were meant to be funny and to have a little fun at his lack of responsibility in life, but it was obvious this grown ass man has never looked in the mirror and figured out his biggest problem in life was him.
Where did the time go? I looked at the blog and saw my last post was in 2019. Now, at the dawn of 2021, I figured this would be as good as time as any to get these rusty fingers flying across the keyboard again with some sarcasm.
I’m not going to bore you with talk about how people thought 2020 sucked or how much better 2021 will be. If you ask me, it really wasn’t that bad at all. That, of course, depends on where you were sitting and what kind of view you had for the shit show.
What I really want to talk about is how I’m Woke AF now. Yes, that’s me, the awakened one. The one who was blind to all the un-wokeness of the past. I now view the past through the Woke prescription glasses of enlightenment.
In fact, I feel the Woke AF-ness flowing through me like The Force flows through Luke Skywalker.
You might wonder where this came from? What was my epiphany? Where was the U-turn sign in life that got me going in the Woke direction?
On Wednesday night, I responded to a crash involving a single vehicle and a light pole near a train crossing. When I arrived, the railroad arms were down and a train was passing by.
The crashed car was just south of the railroad arms with major front end damage. I looked at the scene and noticed how close the car came to ending up on the tracks. That definitely would’ve been a new twist if it was struck by a train after knocking down a pole.
After I interviewed the driver, he stood by and made small talk as the world’s slowest tow truck man attempted to clean up. I pointed out to the man he was lucky he didn’t get hit by the train after he crashed into the pole.
I then added, “You would’ve been a train wreck.”
Groan……
At least Matt, the other cop, got it and laughed……
On Thursday night a woman said she was drinking from a bottle of water when she ran a red light and crashed into another car, causing water to splash on the inside of the windshield.
Sounds believable.
After the crash, she wasn’t able to see because of the water, so she drove almost a half mile to get out of the road.
Let me get this right. She couldn’t see because of the water on her windshield, but she was able drive away with two witnesses chasing her as they called the police about a hit and run?
She also spontaneously said she had looked up and saw the red light. I asked her a follow up question about looking up while she was drinking from the bottle. She then said she was opening the bottle of water instead of drinking from it.
She obviously hadn’t thought this through, so I decided to have a little fun with some obscure humor.
I asked, “So water splashed all over the windshield?”
“Yes,”
“Why didn’t you use the windshield wipers to see?”
“I didn’t think about that!” she replied excitedly.
Did she really just say that?
“They only work on the outside,” I said.
Then the dim light bulb went off when she figured it out. And when I say dim light bulb, I mean really dim……
Later on, I asked her what kind of insurance she had. She said, “Cost you less.”
“Well, keep driving like that, it’s going to cost you more.”
This call was one-liner heaven because she made it so easy. You just gotta have fun out here.
Last week I called a woman to ask her a follow up question about a collision she was in. After she answered my question she asked, “Can you tell me who was at fault?”
That’s a question I like to avoid for many reasons because it sometimes ends up with hurt feelings when I tell them. The hurt feelings are usually followed by debate, arguing, and finally acceptance.
I guess it’s the car accident stages of grief.
With a bit of dread I replied, “You were.”
Her end was quiet as she digested what I said. After a moment she broke the silence and said with passion, “The witness told me I wasn’t at fault.”
I heard this and a Steve Harvey look of disbelief flashed across my face as all of these comebacks flew through my head. I pictured myself turning to The Family Feud answer board and saying, “The witness told me I wasn’t at fault.”
Instead of a “ding” for a correct answer, a long buzzzzzzzzzzzzzz could be heard as the X flashed across the screen.
After my Family Feud moment, I gently explained to her why she was at fault. I then tried to lighten the mood as I said, “I’ve been doing this longer than the witness.”
A few months ago the word “whale” came up during a call and it became a challenge to see if I could work it into the conversation with a suspect. Mission accomplished that night with a good laugh and an inside joke between me and another cop.
Another time the word “ball” came up on a call in a weird way by the driver of a crashed car. That night I was able to say ball in almost every other sentence while trying to keep a straight face. It’s a long story, but a good one for another time. It’s also another inside joke between me and the same cop.
On Thursday night, I was dispatched to a four-car injury traffic collision. A civilian report writer arrived on scene first and cancelled the fire department.
She next advised over the radio that the crash was a 902T (non-injury) instead of a 901T(injury). She added a little humor by saying, “It’s a crazy 902T.”
I never heard the phrase “crazy 902T” before, so I decided to have a little fun with it. I picked up the mic and said, “Confirming it’s a crazy 902T?”
“Affirm,” replied the dispatcher.
My computer beeped as a I got a message from MM, the cop with the inside “whale” and “ball” jokes. Her message gave me an idea.
I replied back, “Let’s see how many times I can say crazy 902T on the radio.”
I also typed to the dispatcher and said I was going to try and say “crazy 902T” on the radio when I went on scene.
When I arrived, I saw one car with front end damage disabled in the street. The other car struck two parked cars after the initial impact and was also disabled in the road.
“729, all eastbound lanes are closed and we’re going to have a sig-alert for the next hour for a crazy 902T.”
“10-4,” replied the dispatcher.
“729, I’ll need two 926s (tow trucks) for a crazy 902T.”
“10-4.”
Two times. Maybe I could say it one more time.
I started talking with one of the drivers and decided the paramedics needed to respond. I keyed the mic and asked for the fire department. I next wanted to change the status of the call from non-injury to injury. What better way to do that by saying “crazy 902T” again.
“729, this is no longer a crazy 902T. It’s a 901T light.”
I was stopped for a red arrow in the left turn lane when the dispatcher called me over the radio saying, “729.”
“729?” I responded as I gave my location.
The dispatcher came back on the radio and sent me to a crash involving a car that had struck a wall on the west end of the city.
“10-4,” I replied.
My light was still red, but the traffic signal for through traffic was green. I decided to move over and go straight rather than wait for the red arrow. I put the car in reverse as I quickly glanced into the rear view mirror. Apparently, I glanced up too quickly……
I started to back up and I felt a bump.
It was a bump, not a thump. It was a bump in the night.
A bump you say?
There was one problem with this bump. There was no Thing One or Thing Two. There was no Cat In The Hat or Dr Seuss to make this a funny story.
The bump in the night was my police car hitting the car behind me.
With an embarrassed feeling, I got on the radio and gave my location as I told dispatch that I was just involved in a traffic collision. I then waited for a sergeant to come out and take a look.
When it was all said and done, there there was no damage to the other car, but there were some minor scratches to my rear bumper. Another patrol unit was called to take my collision report. Ironically, I had taken his report when he was in training. This was the first time where a prior customer took my report.
After I cleared the call, I ran into one of my old traffic buddies. He heard what happened and just laughed at me. I laughed with him, but it didn’t make me feel any better.
Then someone pulled a copyright infringement on me and used one of my traffic sayings when they said, “You just can’t go around hitting shit.”
OMG. It was hilarious. I never thought that saying would be used on me.
The other night I went to a hit and run collision where a truck was rear ended at a red light. After the crash, the victim asked the bad guy for his information. The bad guy told him he didn’t have insurance, so the victim said he was going to call the cops.
The bad guy replied by saying, “I’ll go to jail.”
The bad guy went back to his car and returned with something in his hand. He walked over to the victim’s driver door and put something on the seat. He then went back to his car and took off.
The victim looked and saw a small red gift box with a yellow bow on top on his driver seat.
Was this some type of remorseful gift for the hit and run? Was there money or even jewelry to help the victim feel better about being left in the middle of the street with a damaged bumper and an injured wife?
What could it be? Was there something mysterious in the box? The feeling of anticipation was so thick you could cut it with a knife.
“What was in the box?” I asked.
“Nothing,” replied the victim. “It was empty.”
“Empty?” I replied as I heard the loser tune from The Price is Right playing in the background. WTF
The victim’s daughter held the box up in her palm and opened it up for me. I looked inside and saw that it was as empty as when Geraldo Rivera opened Al Capone’s vault (Google it if you didn’t get it).
After I left the call I thought of something funny. It’s too bad I couldn’t leave the the gift box at the suspect’s door with a note inside that said, “Badge415 found you.”
Maybe this year Santa can leave a lump of coal for Christmas in this guy’s stocking.
“I’m going to drop you off at school today with no shirt on.”
With a firm voice my 11 year old daughter said, “Please don’t.”
It was at this point, I thought I’d have some fun at her expense. I grabbed my keys and went to the garage without a shirt on. Once the garage door was up, I got in my car and waited with anticipation for her to come out.
About 30 seconds later my daughter stormed into the garage with a scowl on her face as he petite body carried a large backpack. With a serious and determined look she opened the passenger door and tossed a shirt at me as she said, “Put that on.”
The shirt landed on my lap and I tossed it back as she closed the door. I was going to put it on, but my little joke was just too good to pass up now. Of course, she tried to give me the shirt again, but I refused to take It. That’s when I put the car in reverse and started to back up.
“DAD! DADDY! DAD!”
I pulled onto the street and started heading toward school with my daughter in a panic because I was going to embarrass her. I got 50 yards down the road and couldn’t hold it in anymore as I started laughing. I finally had to pull over so I could put my shirt on.
With her arms crossed, my daughter sat there with eyes that could throw darts. I kept laughing, but she wasn’t amused. With my shirt finally on, we headed to school as I tried to get her to laugh.
She eventually cracked a smile, but she fought to keep it in.
I pulled into the school parking lot and I asked, “Why couldn’t I drop you off without my shirt on?”
“Because it’s embarrassing!”
She also hates it when I suddenly blast 80s music as she steps out of the car at school too! Maybe one day she’ll torture her kids like this because of all the fun I had with her.
My job is to keep them on their toes and to have a little fun at the same time.
Badge415 