Friday, January 23, 2009

Based on a true story...

I'm enjoying a brief reprieve from midnights, at least for this week. And apparently while I've been sleeping I've been missing out on all the baby-raising fun. My first midnight week wasn't too bad. Just working and sleeping. Then the second week hit. My daughter decided to get the party started right by spending most of Monday afternoon puking. If you've never experienced my daughters puke, go rent The Exorcist. The vomiting prompted a trip to the ER at four in the morning for my wife and daughter while I was at work. This ER visit involved the equation: 500ml IV drip/60ml per hour = a long-ass ER visit. The ER visit was then followed by an event that shall hereafter be referred to as Armageddon. If you've never experienced Armageddon here's what you do: Get yourself a LARGE banana milkshake and a banana-nut muffin. Crumble the muffin into small pieces and mix it thoroughly into the milkshake. Take this mixture, heat it to 102.6 degrees and pour it into your pants. Repeat ad infinitum. People keep asking my wife and I when are we going to have another kid. Come closer so I can kick you in your face.

Wednesday, January 21, 2009

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Land of the Midnights Suck

I'm smack dab in the middle of a two week stretch(13 days) of midnights now so, as is my wont, I am shut down. I sleep from 9 am until about 4 pm, wake up and shower, give bubble bath time fun, eat, space out and then go to work. I would be sleeping now but the call of Assassin's Creed(for PC) was just too strong. All road personnel, including sergeants, must do eight weeks of midnights per year. With more seniority comes the ability to pick the exact weeks you want. I've got nine years in and for the last week have been the senior Dude on the road, excluding the sergeant. This means that for this period of time I should be starting close to home, right? No. My commute to work went from nine minutes to forty. My commute home went from nine minutes to an hour. To top it all off mother-frackin' NE Ohio has decided to snow during the morning rush hour. Super fun times, number one! Funny story; the on-duty sergeant does the midnight scheduling and at three this morning asked me, "What are you doing working out of your region?" About to strangle you, that's what.

Wednesday, January 7, 2009

I am N.D.

Go Irish!! And any team(including USC) that beats OSU!!

Blah, Blah, Blah

As a rule, I hate SuperMan. I mean, seriously, how can the strongest Man in the universe be challenged by anybody? Also, I'm not a fan of vampires. I don't know why, because Count Blah was hilarious. Maybe it's the whole, "I can live forever by just sucking some blood and having some lady write a book about me" thing but I don't find vampires interesting. But that may change if more foreign vampire flicks pop up. I just watched Lat den ratte komma in and let me just say, this movie kicks ass. I think that if Van Helsing had been foreign, and by foreign I mean in a language I don't understand, I probably would be a bigger fan of Dracula. There is just something about a foreign movie. Yes, I admit I did just want to see Amelie because Audrey Tautou is cute, and on a date it impressed my wife that I would "read" a movie, but on a larger scale, foreign movies rock. They make you feel small in a way that nothing else does. How often do you think about a foreign country? If you read Jason's blog it doesn't count. I mean how often do you think of a country in which you know no one? Most people don't realize it, unless they've been to that place and love it, but the sun rises and sets everyday on places where people don't know your name and don't care if you live or die. Maybe that's why I can groove to a foreign flick like Lat den ratte komma in. Not so much because of a vampire but because aren't those people cold? Watch the film and figure it out but Jesus, there's a whole bunch of people out there who aren't put off by the Storm of the Century hype that grips every American news channel every winter. Their cars are different, their neighborhoods are different, their food is different and their beer is better. For a guy that's only been out of the country once in his life and believes that nothing beats Nirvana, a foreign film is like a vacation where I can go native and not feel self-conscious about it. So I say 'Bring on the vampires!' As long as I can get a vacation out of it and not have to worry about finding a babysitter, it's all good.

Sunday, January 4, 2009

I Want to Believe...

On the midnight shift in NE Ohio law enforcement there are two constants: 1) A rookie from another municipality will find something in your jurisdiction at 3:30 am and 2) No matter if you roll up on a cop from a major city or a small village you will hear Coast 2 Coast AM. Just like a donut shop, C2C is usually the only thing happening late night so most guys and gals listen to it(except for the guy on our department who suffers from migraines, he rocks to classical music). If you're familiar with C2C, good on ya. If not, let me enlighten you: Conspiracy theory, ghosts, psychics, sasquatch, and ufo's. Most cops understand the meaning of "for entertainment purposes only" but not me. I'm a skeptical believer in everything but most recently in ufo's. Up until a few months ago I couldn't understand how I had never seen a ufo, seeing as how I'm usually up and out late. Then I saw something strange. Driving down the road one night I saw a bright light in the sky that proceeded to fade away into nothing. It wasn't a plane or a helicopter or anything, it was just unidentified. I did my duty and told people, including MUFON. Unfortunately, I didn't have a camera so my personal experience was just that, personal. But now I have video. That's right, I am officially applying for my Crackpot Card here on this blog. Please ignore my voice; I was talking to my wife briefly in the first video and then trying to call my sister who wouldn't answer her phone. Also, I sound really eager considering I carry a gun for a living and am 34. Creepily eager, in fact. Lastly, if you're a parent or an adult who is related to me, please excuse my language and just reassure yourself in the fact that I would NEVER speak like this in your presence. In the videos I took tonight the object is in the middle of the screens, pretty obviously the focus of my attention. It wasn't a star although it appears to flicker.

I watched this light for ten minutes and during that time it stayed in the same position in the sky. Also, it faded completely in and out several times as I watched but I didn't catch that on film; Though it does start to fade toward the end of both videos. These videos don't even begin to capture the brightness of this thing. At its most intense it lit up the surrounding clouds like the moon does on a cloudy night.

After the second vid I drove to a local golf course to try to get a better view of what this was but by the time I got there the light had disappeared and I didn't see it anymore tonight. Make of this what you will, I know what I saw and as you can hear me whining in the audio, I wish someone else had seen it, too.

Friday, January 2, 2009

I Got Giraffes, Take That Africa!

Working at the zoo in the winter is no fun. There are no people with lost kids, no stolen cars and no major injuries. The only thing to look forward to is spending time with the animal keepers. It's probably some breach of American zoo protocol but the keepers are pretty cool about letting you see the animals close up, as in not across twenty foot moats. It may not seem like much but believe me, when a tiger stares at you and starts growling because it can tell you're afraid, two inch solid steel bars are not enough to keep you from feeling like you just wet yourself. So, it was with great anticipation that I went to work at the zoo tonight. Armed with a brand new video camera, I had dreams of making Man vs Wild look like a trip to the grocery store. Then I got to the zoo. And remembered that it's a holiday. So there were no keepers. Still gayly optimistic, I started to check every single building within the zoo. With over a dozen the chance that one would be unlocked was pretty good. Well, after all was said and done, I only got into the rainforest. This isn't as cool as it sounds because the rainforest is basically a prison. If you don't actually work inside the building, you can only travel about ten feet in any direction if you are in an employee only area before you meet a locked door. These doors usually have signs posted, like: "Animal Containment Door, Keep Locked" or "Venemous Room, Keep Locked" or "If Orangutan Escapes, Lock Door".
I did find one door with a sign that should need no explanation:


Oddly enough, you wouldn't think a zoo employee would need to be reminded to wear eye protection around monkeys. Anyway, disgruntled because I only got into one building, I went to check up on the creatures who were out and or awake. Again, slim pickings. Five nosy harbor seals, one sea lion(that looked suspiciously high) and the giraffes. I don't know why but the giraffes are always awake. So I went visiting. And almost crapped my pants because there was one coked up giraffe that wouldn't stop running after it saw me. That wouldn't have been a big deal except for that the giraffes were inside. To be more specific, they were in two adjoining rooms that were only about 30' x 30' each and there was one giraffe that was lying on the floor directly in the path of the running giraffe. Yeah, it was a bad situation all around so I just took a video of a giraffe eating some dirt and left quickly.


All in all, a frustrating night but at least I got some excercise from checking all those buildings and I did see a high sea lion.