Thought of the Day

Inspiration

2011-12-29T11:42:00.000-08:00

Thought of the day: you generally don't get where you want to go unless you want to go somewhere. Really, have you ever gone out on a date with the super hot man / woman on Saturday night, having the greatest time and knowing in your heart you've met the person you will spend the rest of your life ( or statistically, the next ten years) with? Well, that's a stretch, some have, some have not. My point is you had to have wanted it. Else it would be categorized as kidnap (which seems oddly kidcentric, if you thought about it, who would want to steal a kid? If i were to grab someone, I'd grab an adult, typically there's a lot less complaining).

Wow. What a horrible start.

Anyways, you have to want something before you typically get it. Funny enough, we spend our youths "needing" things, but when we grow up can't figure out what the hell we want.

So what do you want? Money, fame, stuff? Seriously, you are not in a bikini competing for the Miss America ribbon, so world peace is not a valid answer right now. Especially if you have kids. After a day of dealing with them, you are lucky if you remember to take the garbage out, so get away from the world peace stuff.

So, what do you want? Have you ever written it down? Try it. A couple times. I've spent this year ( more so since May 22, Google it ) trying to figure out what exactly I want. I mean, considering how much I've lost, I've really gotten a lot this year. But what have I been looking for?

I've known many close friends and family members who have suffered PTSD from the tornado. I've convinced myself I have not. Until I started researching symptoms for someone else, and one direction PTSD can take you is in thrill seeking behavior. Well now. Here's my justification for why my thrill seeking behavior is NOT PTSD: I refuse to die and unlived life.

What does that mean though? An unlived life. Superficialists would probably say that if you don't live you're dead and since you're not dead you must be living. Thanks for the deepness of thought. Please stick to the shallow end of the pool, will you? So, does my desire to skydive come under thrill seeking from PTSD or does it come under refusing to die and unlived life? Here's how I know it's the latter: I want more than to fall from a plane. This year has brought me to a new level of want. The combination of a new kick-ass job as well as the tornado, and all the other things one can go through that rates high on the doctor's shitthatcausesyoustress list has really allowed me to get one step deeper in what I want.

So here's what really means something to me... inspiration. I love to be inspired. I think everyone does. We watch an inspirational movie, read an inspirational book, or listen to an inspirational speaker and have an incredible feeling after. The feeling we get isn't like "Snow Dogs" which is a good feeling movie. I mean the feeling which you get that actually makes you sit up, stand up, move, help, create, experience, LIVE. That's inspiration. I recall watching a show where a millionaire goes around acting like a regular Joe Shmoe and then gives out money to people who they feel are deserving. They bless people with their money. I would love to have the capacity to bless people. But let me differentiate between blessing someone and inspiring someone. It's the same as the adage of giving (blessing) a man a fish and teaching him (inspiring) him to fish. One causes him to possess a fish, which isn't bad and can really brighten someones's day, and the other causes that person to have the capacity to give others fish. One stops with the action and the other causes a wildfire of good.

So, what is it that I want? Not that you personally care about what I want, but you've read this far so suck it up. I want to inspire. I want to be the person by which others cannot help but to be moved to positive action.

But this really isn't about me. This is about us. Inspiration affects us. The question is do you want to affect others? Become the Donald Trump of life in that your actions have repercussions beyond what your own hands do? You must. Some people are content plugging day to day, but please know, I have been inspired by everyone in my life at one time or another. My dog has inspired me, my children have inspired me, my family and friends have inspired me. Anyone can inspire. Anyone. You must choose to do it daily though.

Really, that's the only way I'm going to get world peace. :-) Hope you like my bikini.

Someone is behind you

2011-12-28T09:22:00.000-08:00

Thought of the day: someone is behind you. No really. Someone is right behind you! Please, by all means, turn around and look. Ha! I'm assuming no one was behind you. But you didn't know until you turned around, did you? Well, that's the TOTD.

I have this syndrome. It's called, "ICantStandBeingBehindPeopleitis". Normally I don't admit that to people, but, well, there it is. It's not that I have to be ahead of everyone. I simply don't like being behind. Really, what this means is I have no need to define myself by other people's actions (I came to this conclusion when I was driving one day trying to figure out if I was Mr. Testerone or if it was something else. I concluded it was something else, because I don't need people behind me which would have pointed to Mr. T. I simply don't attend to other people who are plugging along in their own lives. I'm happy in my own warm blanket of "stay the hell out of the way").

However, many of us have been in the situation where a lady with a shopping cart is walking down the aisle in a store. Simple enough. Except when you do the math, she really is only taking up a quarter of the aisle. However, because of HOW she is taken up the aisle (walking in the middle with a gentle drift back and forth like she is bouncing between lines on the road after a late night of rum and coke), you simply can't get past her. (If you haven't been in this situation, look behind you).

Now, this isn't limited to women. But typically it's the women pushing the cart. With guys, they don't have to have a cart. They will do this with their elbows spread out and their ego filling the gaps between a doorway or an aisle. Now, I'm making some leaps here and a couple assumptions. But here goes. The woman does it because she is oblivious due to the other thoughts going through her head, such as comparisons, pricing, etc. The man does it cause his ego causes him to believe that the only matter in the world worth considering is his very next step and how the peanut butter is all the better now that he decided to travel that aisle instead down the aisle of the spaghetti (poor spaghetti).

Really, they both are doing the same damned thing. They are both in my way. When I come up against issues like this where the cause appears to be completely respective to genders (not to say that guys aren't taking up the aisle due to pricing and women aren't strutting their egoshiz, but I'm generalizing ), instead of, like some guys do, assuming that women are at fault cause men never do that (women, bet you never heard that one before), I try to figure out what it is that's bothering me. Again, it's cause they are in my way.

That's where my gender differentiation ends. Because the common denominator is this: You are in my way, because you did not consider that THERE IS SOMEONE BEHIND YOU!

I realize you may be led to believe this is a personal rant about having to slow down (I'll go slow when they are carrying me to my grave, but now that I think about it, I'm sure my Will can say that the pallbearers have to run), but this really is not so. This is about consideration. To me, it is the single largest issue facing our society. Every society. Utopia will NEVER happen (whether it can is for another conversation) without consideration. Crime would drop, car accidents would decline, marriages would be more fulfilling, and it's a high likelihood that the planets would align and interstellar travel would become possible if people were more considerate.

Consideration is the glue that bonds us together. It's what keeps us from an anarchistic society (the merits of which will not be discussed here). I may not care about the person behind me in the aisle, but I care about society, of which he is a member. So my simply stepping aside, so he does not have to slow down, allows him to continue what he is doing without my negatively affecting him. You will note that when you have been a part of this, you'll usually hear an "pardon me", and "certainly" (if you interacted with me, that's what you'd get). This is typically a pleasant exchange done with a smile. I quite enjoy it. And I'm out of the way. That was because I "considered" what my effect is on the person behind me. More so, because I don't know if someone is behind me and I don't have eyes in the back of my head, like my mother, I simply stay to the right of the aisle. That is me being considerate. Now, if you want to go faster then me, you have plenty of room to do so without any negativity between the two of us. See how pleasant consideration makes things? Ever been stuck behind someone completely oblivious to you? It sucks. Perhaps you are in a hurry to get the flour cause your kids want to make you cookies? You need that crap NOW! What happens in your mind and stomach when you are now stuck behind someone just sauntering and taking up the whole aisle, when, if they had considered someone was behind them, they would simply step aside? You not only get frustrated at the fact that you now have an issue to address, but you get doubly frustrated because it's such a simple issue and would not have been caused but for someone's INconsideration.

Same with the road.

But people are inconsiderate. They simply, for one reason or another, fail to consider the person behind them.

So, when you step out of your house (cause you can abuse your family as much as you want, as long as I'm not in it), please take EVERY step assuming that someone is behind you waiting to get past. This will make your, and what's infinitely more important, my days a lot better. :-)

Mental Illness

2011-12-27T08:44:00.000-08:00

Thought of the day: Mental illness is real. Not sure if some of you are aware. I recall a time where I was standing next to an officer who suggested that the more frequent spanking of a girl would correct her behavior after she was abandoned by both parents while she was 7 years old. The trauma from that event is real. The effects of the trauma are real. And the fact that the two people who are responsible for shaping this girl, by their actions, told her she was not worth the time of day really does play into the fact that she has turned into a hellion. You cannot hit self-esteem and self-worth into people. The officer is no longer employed as an officer, thank God. I've also heard someone say of another child that spanking would have corrected the behavior. Except the behavior was part of a frustrated reaction by a child in the autism spectrum. Really, you can't spank autism out of a child. Now this is not an anti-spanking TOTD, hooked on spanking worked for me! (Really, for the Greeks, aint one of us who didn't get the koutala). However, there is a time and place. The problem is if that is your only solution, you may be trying to spank a mental illness out of someone.

I make a lot of my decisions and foster beliefs mainly because of probability. I recall in 1993 coming up with a decision matrix for God (what else was I to do at 16?). I found out a year later, Pascal stole my idea and published it as his own about 370 years earlier (google Pascal's Wager). So too, before I became a part of NAMI (google NAMI :-) and started a lifelong education, it seemed to be very probable that something could be wrong with the human brain. From wikipedia (I don't have my old human biology book anymore or I'd give that citation) "The human brain has a huge number of synapses. Each of the 1011 (one hundred billion) neurons has on average 7,000 synaptic connections to other neurons. It has been estimated that the brain of a three-year-old child has about 1015 synapses (1 quadrillion). This number declines with age, stabilizing by adulthood. Estimates vary for an adult, ranging from 1014 to 5 x 1014 synapses (100 to 500 trillion).[11]" - Neuron page.

At this point, people that have an open mind will look at that and think, damn, there are a lot of places where things can go wrong. However, there will be others who still think that bad behavior is strictly a bad-upbringing issue. Now to disclaim: There are children who suck out there. There are parents who suck out there. There are sucky parents who produce sucky children. There are excellent parents who produce sucky children. AND there are sucky parents who produce excellent children. (I'll let you figure our the last combination). I'm not talking about them.

I don't know if you've heard, but there are children who are born with birth defects. Like three legs, an arm that's half as long as it should be, 1 eye, or http://goo.gl/dvRWR.

If this can happen with the external body. Is it not only possible, but very probably that a child can have 1 of a gagillion of their neurons not form correctly? If you say no, then please unfriend me. :-) Cause fanatics in any religion or opinion are stupid and should suffer dysentery.

Now, if I told you a child was born with two heads, you would generally know what to expect. Not that the site may not shock, but you can at least put together the picture in your head as to what the possibilities are before you EVER see the child.

So, what if I were to tell you that one of the child's neurons did not form correctly. Can you picture in your head what that would look like? Some of you could! Some of you would have absolutely no clue. And for the nocluers, I am glad to say, I'm here for you.

The brain controls every single function of the human body. So, when your nose runs, there is a cause and effect of data travelling to your brain which concludes stuff and decides an effect of action (crap running out your nose). When your lungs fill with air, your brain has concluded that it would suck if they didn't, so they do. It controls whether you have to hold your textbook in front of you when you walk down the hall when you saw, "OMG she's hot" bend over to pick up a dropped pencil. It controls when you are happy. How happy you get. How much control you have over yourself. How much control you have over others. When you get dumped, your brain determines whether you put one step in front of the other or whether "you will show him" and start taking scissors to your wrist. It also determines when you would do that. And what factors play into you doing that. And what the barometric pressure has to be when you do that. What color will set you off to do that. If you have the capacity to do that. And whether you do that before or after your morning shower. If somehow you are more likely to do that if you didn't eat a good breakfast. If interaction or the lack thereof with other people will make you more likely to do that. I can keep going on. It's called infinite. I think a lot of people ignore that in their lives and the lives of others. But life is not lived based on the numbers you can count on your hands. There are an infinite number of possibilities between your fingers.

So what happens if your neuron that is supposed to work doesn't? What if you were born with 10 neurons that just started work one day and said, "Screw it, the health insurance sucks, the pay sucks," and went on strike.... and never went back to work? Let's hope it's not in your happy place of the brain. Because people will call you lazy. Let's hope it's not in the smart part of your brain because people will call you stupid. Or in your motor control part of your brain cause people will call you clumsy. AND, someone will have the belief that if you had been hit harder or more as a child, that the neurons will simply realize that working is much more fun than striking, will put down there picket signs, and you'll just be perfect.

My point is, you don't know whether bad behavior, lack of control, or any other unacceptable social constructs are due to a child who had a "third leg" in their brain. And the day I'm shown that you can slap diabetes out of someone, I'll believe you can also slap self-esteem into, or mental-illness out of them.

Mental illness is real. And it does not make people evil. Like all adversities, it either makes people victims. or survivors.

The golden rule

2011-12-25T08:44:00.000-08:00

Thought for the day: be excellent to each other. Seriously, it's the golden rule and the main theme in most of the worlds religions. Sad that it was expressed best by Bill S Preston, Esquire. Anyways, do it. Or you suck. Party on dudes!

Balance

2011-12-23T08:43:00.000-08:00

Thought for the day: there is nothing wrong with professional foot care. Its a health issue, providing maintenance of an oft ignored appendage, stress relief, and cns (central nervous system) stimulation. Really, that has nothing to do with my thought though. I believe that balance is a natural principle. Just like gravity. It enacts a force upon you constantly. It does not, however stop you from going against it. You can use planes and jets to go against gravity. But you can only go up for so long (my analogy implies you stay within the atmosphere) until eventually, you lose thrust and gravity once again brings you back to neutral. The longer you go against gravity, the harder the equalizing is ( bigger crash)? So too with balance. We can go against balance and it takes effort. Eventually, our effort wanes and balance brings us crashing back to neutral. The farther from balanced you are, the harder the crash upon equalization. You can have what you want, but you must learn to get it in balance. Equalization could take from you those things you want most. Be it a marriage, ajob, your family, your friends. So, please, friends, find balance in your life. Find balance and then follow your dreams

Communication

2011-12-22T08:43:00.000-08:00

Thought for the day: Communication is the most important thing between two people. More important than love, family, or friendship. Everything else can fall apart without communication and everything can be made better with communication. Communication must include not only saying something, but making sure the listener understands it. If you are simply talking without ensuring understanding, then you are not communicating. It is your responsibility as the communicator to ensure your words are understood.

Dogs and Coffee

2011-12-10T08:41:00.000-08:00

Couple thoughts for today, firstly, dogs should not be aggressive in their pet seeking. If you want to be pet, stop hitting me. I realize that I am fostering your bad habits of hitting people by rewarding you with pets, but really. It's just bad form. And it's starting to hurt.

Today I have found the first pro in living in a 5th wheel over living in a house. And it's quite simple really. When I lived and worked in the 5th wheel, I could hear my coffee brew throughout my entire abode. Now, I set my coffee to brew and walk away, which is typical, however, I can't hear jack-poo from across the house. Now, I get my coffee when something brings me back to the kitchen and I see a full cup of coffee in the machine and realize that it belongs to me. This means that I never get hot cups of coffee anymore. However, if you've seen my (I'm trying to thinking of a good synonym for addiction, but nothing seems to work) of coffee, you already know that lukewarm coffee causes me no anxiety or disappointment. I am drinking it happily. :-)

Our tornado story

2011-07-25T09:16:00.000-07:00

I don't have the energy to tell it again right now. So here you go. This is a story written by Susan Carey of the Wall Street Journal.

http://blogs.wsj.com/dispatch/2011/05/27/family-faces-black-wall-in-their-car/

Have at it!

Word to the CEO

2011-06-06T09:23:00.000-07:00

The following is a letter I sent to CEO Alan Mulally of Ford / Mercury.

---------------------

Dear Mr. Mulally,

I wanted to write a letter to thank you for the care with which your company constructed our car, a 2007 Mercury Milan.

On May 22, 2011, my wife and I attended our daughter, Jeane's, graduation from high-school. This was an event that we had hoped for, but feared wouldn't happen. Jeane has Autism Spectrum Disorder, but is high functioning. She is also the first child ( to our knowledge ) in the Missouri school system to be able to bring an Autism Server Dog, Athena, to a public school. Needless to say, I was very proud when both Jeane and Athena crossed the stage wearing matching graduation hats.

On our way home, we decided to stop at McDonald's for a bite to eat, at which time we heard the tornado sirens start. The employee at McDonald's offered to let us go inside the building, but as most of it was made of glass we attempted to drive home. You see, we have tornado sirens which are set off several times a year with no tornado in sight. So hearing it again, unfortunately, was not an alarm which indicated you have mere seconds to react.

Sunday was not the case, however. We were 30 blocks from home and were heading West on 20th St. in Joplin, MO. As we drove past Connecticut St., we were met with a black wall of nothing and hail so large that I'm surprised our windshield did not break. I immediately did a u-turn and took refuge under a bank drive-through awning at a bank located at 20th and Connecticut St. This allowed us to get out from the hail, but we did not expect what happened next.

The wind, which had been blustery and multi-directional immediately blew horizontally, carrying with it everything it touched. It appeared to be a debris field that defied gravity, traveling sideways with no appearance of falling at all. That was when my wife, my daughter, and I realized we were in the middle of the tornado. The windows of our car broke out and debris entered our car. At that time, we put our heads down and started to pray very, very loudly. Athena, we thought, had been sucked out of the car, but we later found that she had thrown her body over my daughter to protect her.

We tried to keep our eyes closed, but were unable to keep from seeing horrendous sites, such as a lady's body hitting our car.

The event seemed to have lasted many minutes, but in all actuality, the tornado itself probably lasted about 30-60 seconds. We continued to stay in the car for a few minutes after to avoid direct hail injuries, but eventually an anonymous teenager helped pry my daughter's and wife's doors open, while I crawled through my window.

At that point, I sent my wife, who had a protruding bone in her arm, daughter, and dog, to the hospital in a stranger's pickup truck. We later found out the hospital had also been destroyed by the tornado.

I stayed and started digging screaming people out of their homes.

The rest of our personal story you can read in the online copy of the Wall Street Journal.

This is where your part comes into it. As we went back to the car the next day to retrieve what items we could, we had a chance to see the total destruction in that area. The bank, whose awning we took shelter under, had been completely blown down, the vault being the only section still upright. The awning had completely disappeared, and the ATM machines were completely missing. The building on the other side of us was partially standing, but most of it was in a crumbled pile of rubble. There was a truck that also took refuge under the awning, and was somewhat protected by the fallen bank. Our car was protected by nothing. We determined that the only reason we had not been picked up like the rest of the vehicles is because the short metal poles that protect the ATM machines from inattentive drivers stopped our car from being pushed sideways and subsequently lifted up. The steel I-beam that supported the awning had fallen on our car and was lying on the ground about 15 feet from the car. The Milan, which we had purchased this November previous, had been a dream car for us. We had enjoyed driving it simply to drive it and had been so thankful that we found a car like this. As a reserve deputy, safety is also a major factor in a car for me.

The car was torn up, badly beaten, and filled with debris. But it was still there. My family was badly beaten and still covered in debris and glass, but was still there as well. I know numerous angels were there to keep our car safe. But I also know that were it not for the care, attention, and consideration with which the employees of Ford/Mercury designed and built our car, I would most likely no longer have a family.

This was the thought in my head as I had walked home through the destruction and discovered I had lost most of my personal property in the tornado. None of that mattered in light of the situation we had been through.

I have my family and for that I thank you.

I would love to be able to thank each and every employee for helping my family on that day. I'm hoping you can help with that.

Sincerely,

John Tsangaris

5th wheel

2011-06-06T09:22:00.001-07:00

Blog post - 5th wheel

So most of this will be in reverse chronological order, except for the posts that will be documenting the progression from now on, which will be standard chronological and the posts that will be completely out of order because I remembered something from my completely spotty memory.

Last week we decided to buy a 5th wheel. We had considered it for quite a while since we wanted to eventually do a little traveling. Of course, this was a "maybe next year" time frame. Well, the tornado moved our time frame up a little. Since our house had been condemned by the city and the insurance company is not really johnny-on-the-spot, we needed to find a semi-permanent location to rest our heads. So we bought a 31' 1993 NuWay, Champagne Edition. Still trying to figure out how it works. The built in generator runs the air conditioner which is most important right now. The fridge runs on both electric and LP. I haven't filled up the LP tanks yet and I can't figure out how to get it to work on electric. Oh well. I'm hoping that the electric company will make use of the 14.5 foot a-frame tower I built in my yard so we could get temporary electricity. It would be nice to be able to plug the 5th wheel (hereinafter known as the trailer) into an electric source that doesn't suck up $30 of gas every day.

Anyways, I know my trailer is now a city code violation because it not only goes past the sidewalk, but also extends out onto the road as well. Considering the amount of garbage, debris, trees, etc, that was lined up on the roads, I didn't think they would mind too much at this point. I'll move it once I can properly tear down what's left of my fence so I can park it in the back yard.

Word verification

2011-06-06T09:22:00.000-07:00

I started this blog with the intention of describing my circumstance and feelings regarding the tornado. When I created the blog itself, blogspot always has a word verification to ensure that a computer program is not automatically creating blogs. So.... the word I have to verify is... "unkill". Seriously?

First tornado post, but not really

2011-06-06T09:21:00.000-07:00

It is now two weeks and a day after the Joplin tornado and I'm finally starting to write about it. Today is my first day back to work. I'll be back filling some details and information. I was hoping to start this sooner, but it's been hard to get back into a routine amidst all the turmoil.

As I drove in to work on my motorcycle (it's been a while since I've been able to ride) I saw a bird flopping on the road about a block from the office. I dropped off my bike and told my wife ( we share an office space) that I was going to steal her car to go pick up the bird in a box to see if I could help it. I really didn't have a choice. It seems from one minute to the next I go from numb to the verge of tears; that every minute hangs on one obsessive task being completed after another, no matter how small or low priority, it becomes the highest priority.

And my highest priority was saving that bird. I grabbed a file box and drove back. I didn't seen the bird at first so I parked and walked around. After finding nothing and assuming that it had flopped itself into the tall grass somewhere I started driving back.

That's when I saw it on the road where someone decided to end it's life with a tire.

I can't know whether it was malice or sympathy with which it's life was ended, but it tore at me more than it normally would have. As of last night the death count rose to 141. We lost three more people yesterday who succumbed to their wounds after two weeks. At this point, it feels like every death is a needless death, even a dying birds death. There could have been a more respectable death than under a tire.

I hope I can get back to life soon. It feels like it has been permanently paused for the last two weeks with no sign of "normal" ever returning.

An online life may mean no job

2009-12-05T09:15:00.000-08:00

Being from a software background, I pretty much live on the net. I'm connected in multiple ways all hours.

But law enforcement officers are expected to live according to a set of standards. Depending on where you live, this could mean lots and it could mean nothing. But if you are late on a car payment, you must not be trustworthy. If you are not trustworthy, then you can't be trusted to be a cop.

That seems extreme, but it happens. Policies are written to protect the department and not the officer, which is why there of unions. But for those departments that don't have unions, you have an employee making more than minimum wage, but not really enough that either you don't have to work a second job or your significant other doesn't have to work, who has no recourse against the departments politics.

So if you post something about your brother being gay (my brother is not, in case he reads this! ;-), or your ex-wife and her intimate misdeeds with other men, you may lose your job. We take for granted the ability to talk to people anonymously on the web, or to be able to connect with long lost buddies, but being online is almost like being in church. Our words are sometimes so closely monitored that even talking online isn't worth it.

I've written cautions to LE officers before to be careful what they post as it could be career enders.

Where do we set that line for expecting perfection from humans, simply because they carry a piece of copper on their shirt?

Sometimes you don't like what you see

2009-12-04T09:14:00.000-08:00

With all the fun that you can have with being a police officer and all the good you can affect in society, there are times when you see things you don't want to see.

I just had someone from HR where I work come up to me and tell me they saw me on tv. This wasn't as fun to hear as it was several years ago. In fact, someone recognized me on tv stuffing my face with samplers at a wine tasting event. It was great, because I remember that moment when I was putting the pastries down the hatch and turning only to be met with some guy with a large camera on his shoulder a lot closer to me than one would expect given, ya know, zoom lenses. So that's what came to mind when this person said they saw me on tv. They said they had to do a double take because they were surprise to see me there.

That was, until I asked why I was on tv and she said I was in uniform and it had to do with the boy that died.

I don't like remembering that event. It's one of those things that I try to block as part of me 'getting over it'.

It wasn't a horrible thing, in fact, I've seen a lot worse, usually having to do with suicide or with some type of death that hadn't been found in a while.

But I will never get that screenshot, for lack of better terms, out of my mind. Since the legal process is still moving on this one, I can't reveal much on this. I suppose to tv mention was about a next step in the charges / trial.

The story is basically this, an uncle and his wife have 11 year old nephew over. Nephew is found dead the next morning having just died (he was still warm when we got there). Uncle suggests maybe the boy got into some booze and drank too much. It came out that uncle and wife had been playing drinking games with the nephew the night before. Nephew ended up unresponsive the next morning (when we were called) and was taking by ambulance to the hospital where he was pronounced dead.

I recall showing up with my trainee. I wasn't the first responder, but I got there fast enough to be assigned to take charge of the crime scene perimeter. So I seized the opportunity to show the trainee how to do the crime scene, the crime scene log, etc. I had heard reports that the boy was most likely dead at this point. They were still working on him inside.

The snapshot happened when they got him on the stretcher and brought him outside. They really had no choice but to go through the entrance that I created, bringing the boy by me.

Funny thing, now that I try, I can't really remember his face, I can only remember the feeling in the pit of my stomach and how his face was tilted slightly to the side. But I remember him going by, knowing he did not make it, but they were still trying. It's a lot harder to give up when it's a child. It's a lot harder to get over it when it's a child.

There are times when we wish we could take back those snapshots that most people don't have to deal with. I believe that is the burden that officers take on when they put on the shield. Not that we have to put up with people's garbage sometimes, but that we have to see the worst and have to live with those pictures forever.

Perhaps time is the only way to make those pictures fade.

Take a breath

2009-12-03T09:14:00.000-08:00

The key to survival as an officer is always being prepared. There are many ways to do that, and some have been valuable to me in helping people outside of law enforcement. For instance, I was in my office one day and heard "help" from the hallway. It was odd and out of place and took me off guard, but being who I am, I jumped out of my chair and headed that way. Into the development room walks one of the developers, barely able to stand, asking us to call 911.

He was light headed and felt like he was going to faint. One of the developers called the front desk to call 911 (which was a mistake to be documented another time if I ever remember). I had this guy sit and then I went to the front to coordinate emergency services.

Needless to say, the ambulance was further away than Santa, so another programmer drove our victim to the hospital.

Now you may think this is about the gentleman who needed help, but it isn't. It's about the programmer who drove him to the hospital.

He came back a couple hours later and gave us an update. He was breathing hard stating he had never gone 90 in the area he did, and since I am not going to rat out a friend, we'll just say the speed limit was 30 mph.

I remember when I looked like him. The first time there was an emergency and I hit my lights and sirens and drove really fast only to be called at the last second. I remember the adrenaline rush and the hyperfocus on every little thing in my world at that time.

I also recalled having a rider that day (a citizen who rode with me for kicks). I couldn't get one sentence out without yawning after that. Some sentences suffered from two yawns. My body was drained, I had no energy, and no will to do anything. I was wiped.

This is one of the most dangerous things to deal with as a police officer, the adrenaline. Regardless of popular myths, not all cops are adrenaline junkies, and the ones who are have limits. I say this because if you think of any drug or mind / body altering substance (we are talking legal ones here), too much is a bad thing. Ever drink lots of pop without anything else? How about alcohol? Sure, in moderation it can be handled. But with I told you to drink a bottle of Vodka at least once an hour. 1 bottle would take several hours (or more) to get out of your system, so the effects just keep adding up, choking your liver into utter submission.

That's adrenaline for you. It's that fight or flight (or posture or submission, again, another post) feeling you get. I bet most people have experienced it, when someone has spoken to you in a challenging or angry manner, you feel your ears prick a little, or your throat fall into your chest, the pit of your stomach suck back, your face flush, teeth clench, or any other numerous symptoms.

This programmer was experiencing the adrenaline hangover. And it was humoring in the context that I felt like I was watching a teenager get drunk for the first time and suffer for his stupidity.

I have experienced many adrenaline hangovers. I'm a pro. I know what to do to avoid the "headache" after. It's called the hair of the dog...

Actually.. sorry, wrong analogy. It's really called autogenic breathing. I learned that in the academy way back when, and it was one of my most used techniques that I learned after. In fact, I used that technique more than I used my handcuffing skills.

It's a method of breathing to release stress and it has saved me on many occasions. Not from the stress of anger or the stress of the job, but for dealing with the adrenaline hangover.

The first applicable google result produced this (if you want to know more about it):

http://www.ways-to-manage-stress.net/autogenic-breathing.html

I highly recommend learning this, because we are all in those situations where we need to take a "breather". Really, it's one of the best tools on my belt.

The programmer that drove did well. He spent the next 30 minutes breathing and was able to recover (with practice, he probably could get it down to about 2 minutes). The programmer who initially needed help had low blood sugar and is also doing well. Just in case you were wondering.

A cop and a red light

2009-12-02T09:13:00.000-08:00

I bet you have witnessed an officer at an intersection waiting for a red light to change only to see the officer turn his emergency lights on, go through the intersection, and turn them off on the other side.

No doubt you became very incensed and felt that the officer was being immoral for using his lights simply so he did not have to wait until the light turned green.

I know this, because I have had many people come to me and tell me how much that bothers them. And it would bother me too, were I not to have known the entire story.

Let's get one thing out of the way really quick, and I will be repeating this frequently. No population exists without it's sample of dumbasses. As well, no population exists without it's upper echelon. The police force is no different. You will inevitably have encountered or know someone who has encountered a dumb cop.

So, for me to say that no cop in the history of coppinghood has ever turned on his lights simply because he didn't want to wait for a light, would be ludicrous and definitely speak at the detriment of my veracity.

But, keeping that in mind, I know more good cops than bad cops. Like most populations, the majority of cops are good and try hard, bearing through the bad publicity brought to them by the dumbass few who can't seem to keep their foot out of their mouths and their heads out of their sleeves. Generally speaking, cops are good people (I'll talk about the statistics of good cops in another post).

So here is the side of the story. Remember the one from many paragraphs ago when you saw the cop use emergency equipment because he didn't want to wait for a light? I know this because I have turned on my lights many times to go through an intersection only to turn them off on the next block. Several dozen in fact. And not one time was I being impatient, as I hope you will see.

Here is an annotated transcript of what happened in the police car (from Officer Tim's perspective):

-----

Officer Handy: 345, car stop. Officers initiation of a car stop

Dispatch: 345, go ahead.

Officer Handy: Lincoln Mary Adam 435 Lincoln Mary Adam 435 at 10th and Main on a Red Ford F150The officer reads the license plate, location of the stop, and a vehicle description.

Dispatch: 1453 Some departments read off the time instead of saying "over and out"

5 minutes later

Dispatch: 345 status check

Officer Handy:

Officer Tim: Tim probably doesn't even hear this radio traffic as they learn to filter out anything not beginning with there number

10 seconds later

Dispatch: 345 status check

Officer Handy:

Officer Tim: Has just heard two unanswered status checks and his brain then registers the traffic. Officer Handy probably forgot to turn on or turn up his portable radio when he exited the car.

10 seconds later

Dispatch: 345 status check A tone is a single pitch note blared through the radio system to get someone's attention.

Officer Handy:

Officer Tim: Just pulled up to a red light and is starting to get worried, because normally, if the officer's portable radio is turned down, they will still hear the tone, turn the radio up, and respond. Officer Tim's heart starts pounding a little, because he knows what the possible situation is. He knows he has to assume the worst because that's how he has stayed alive so long on this job.

10 seconds later

Dispatch: Code 3, 10th and Main, Traffic stop, 345 is not answering his radio.

Officer Tim: Lights and sirens go on and he hits the gas because he may have just lost a buddy, a friend, a comrade and he is going to do anything possible so he does not have to go to his buddy's house, and tell Mrs. Handy that her husband died. Officer Tim keeps his action straight and sure, verifying the intersection is clear and proceeding as fast as the vehicle will go, though his blood pressure just increased drastically and his heart is racing.

5 seconds later

Officer Handy: I'm code 4. My portable was turned off.

Dispatch: Copy 345, code 4. All units disregard.

This is where Officer Tim turns off his lights after only 1/2 block because he is not justified in running emergency when there is none. He slows back to the speed limit and starts taking deep breaths because he was preparing for the worst, and now he has to bring himself back from that expectation to be ready for the call he was going to where a lady's $5 lawn ornament was stolen. After he regains his regular pulse, he calls Officer Handy on the phone, has a few choice words, in jest, and hangs up, silently glad that he still had his friend to call.

-----

The person in the car next to Officer Tim had no clue what just happened, except that Officer Tim was at the intersection, turned on his lights to get through the intersection, and turned them off on the other side.

I have been in Tim's situation many times and hope that reading this may change your perception of the Impatient Cop.

If you have any questions, comments, or stories, please feel free to comment!

Social Proctologist

2009-12-01T09:13:00.000-08:00

And again, I say welcome to the records of my tenure as a social proctologist. For those lacking a literary funny bone, the means police officer.

I was a police officer for 2 years 4 months and 4 days before I went back to another love, which is software engineering.

This blog's purpose is to document my thoughts, feelings, and observations during my police tenure as well as my ongoing awareness of what is was to be a police officer.

I hope you enjoy the writings. As well, if you have any questions you would like to ask, please feel free to let me know. My experience is that for every question asked, there were many who wanted the answer but were too scared to ask the question.

The Alpha

2008-09-16T09:11:00.000-07:00

Greetings to everyone who lands on my part of the net. I hope to produce for you what would be the literary equivalent of having warm toast with homemade jam and perfectly roasted coffee in the morning. I'm not quite sure what that means, but my message is that of enjoyment. I have no focus at this time but I will probably start of with lots of sarcasm about items I have minimal care for but which agitate me highly. This will either turn into solitary rant or be the beginning of community humor.

I spent the first part of my life as a software engineer, mainly focusing on web programming. I have, for the last 2 years, been working in law enforcement. And now I am trying to fulfill a desire of mine to put my words to good, and hopefully one day profitable, use.

Let me know if you have any requests, require a tongue lashing, or want intellectual banter!