One does not turn down gummi skeletons
Been interesting up here. I had the pleasure of sitting through a real life police line up last night. A little less dramatic than on TV, but basically the same. No. 1, step forward...face the door...face me...step back...No. 2, step forward...
Me and the female officer running the line up didn't start off on the right foot. I came in to teach and she barked at me about I was going to need to relocate or I would have to train with inmates in the room, blah blah woof woof. Not being a good barkee, I told her basically, none of the above, but we could work something out. She high tailed it to the superintendant, who also told her that she could probably work something out with me. Then we did. I called lunch and the hands on training that take us elsewhere for 2 hours to coincide with when she needed to use the room and, to channel Rodney King for a moment, we all just got along.
Once she started talking to me she got a big ol dose of southern charm and, by evenings end, she was smiling and chit chatting, patting me on the back, and promising to bring me a haloween basket on Monday because I would be travelling on the 31st. Like I was going to miss out on going door to door myself, I suppose. Anyway, one does not turn down gummi skeletons. Or at least this one does not.
Frost is annoying. Just so you know. And aren't yankee rental cars supposed to come with those snow scraping things? Clearing your windows with the rental car agreement jacket cannot, I repeat CANNOT be Plan A. It gets your fingers cold, the stiff paper becomes much less so, and it allows the natives to give you that "poor, dumb bastard" smile as they walk by. Luckily, my car has Nebraska plates, so I just give 'em a big ol' goofy prarie smile back.
GPS has a problem with this area. Last week, my NeverLost from Hertz was more of an EverLost. It was always about 2 blocks off here in the land of narrow one way streets and 60 story buildings. If I turned where it said, it had to recalculate. And if I tried to keep going, knowing that the road it was referencing was just ahead, it recalculated before I could get there. Plus, it had a propensity to erroneously make me turn onto roads that had other roads built on top of them, causing it to lose satellites long before it could un-lost me. 2 words: sucked badly.
My personal GPS has been no better this week. Besides attempting to make 3 to 5 turns anywhere none are required, it tends to talk down to me. Yep. When done right, there are 3 turns involved in getting me to work, and no interstate highways. So Missy (a nickname, her full name being Misinformed) has me on I-55 headed for Indiana, in the wrong lane to turn from (quote: "keep left then exit right), and, as luck would have it, during rush hour. Can't blame Missy for rush hour, but I'd like to. Anyway, she finally gets me to an exit. Her conversation:Exit right on Van Buren, then turn left, followed by a left...Turn left, followed by a left...turn left and take ramp left (puts me on I-55, heading the other direction, which makes me think that the exit I really need is only accessible from this direction)...RECALCULATING. And she was almost surly when she said "recalculating". Like I was some kind of dumbass or something. Look, Missy, I'm just turning the wheel. You supposed to be doing the navigating.
I always get there. But I do, and this is true, allow myself an hour to make a 5.3 mile drive.Anyway, starting yesterday I made a drastic change to the way I do business. I started by actually learning the route, all 3 turns of it, then politely turned Missy off (no need to piss her off, just in case), cranked what passes for a country station here way up loud, and cruised, all cool points and stylish, to work without drama or hijinks. Word.
An Iraqi song called Consanguinity carries a message of unity and is a call for brotherhood among Iraqis. The band itself is made up of 2 Sunni, 2 Shiite, and a Christian. That's right, this message of hope and coexistence comes to you from the band Dog Faced Corpse.
There's more, there always is. There's the tunnels under the jail complex, there's the old jail and it's forboding sterness,and there's the camaderie. But all of that involves typing and storytelling, and I am running out of time. I will leave you with this real conversation I had with an officer from Division 1 on Tuesday. I had told him the reason I tended to walk behind who I was with was because my wife is so short that if I don't see her turn in somewhere while we're out I lose her because she's not taller than clothes racks and displays.
Z: I know the feeling.
Me: Really?
Z: Yeah. I had a girlfriend from Guatemala and she was only four foot something.
Me: You mean when fully inflated, right?
Yes, jail officers are a lot like the guys on the ship, only the jail guys are more allowed to hit you. Hard.
Peace, Love, and Hey! Ya got paper on that phone?, out
Ramblin' Ed
Me and the female officer running the line up didn't start off on the right foot. I came in to teach and she barked at me about I was going to need to relocate or I would have to train with inmates in the room, blah blah woof woof. Not being a good barkee, I told her basically, none of the above, but we could work something out. She high tailed it to the superintendant, who also told her that she could probably work something out with me. Then we did. I called lunch and the hands on training that take us elsewhere for 2 hours to coincide with when she needed to use the room and, to channel Rodney King for a moment, we all just got along.
Once she started talking to me she got a big ol dose of southern charm and, by evenings end, she was smiling and chit chatting, patting me on the back, and promising to bring me a haloween basket on Monday because I would be travelling on the 31st. Like I was going to miss out on going door to door myself, I suppose. Anyway, one does not turn down gummi skeletons. Or at least this one does not.
Frost is annoying. Just so you know. And aren't yankee rental cars supposed to come with those snow scraping things? Clearing your windows with the rental car agreement jacket cannot, I repeat CANNOT be Plan A. It gets your fingers cold, the stiff paper becomes much less so, and it allows the natives to give you that "poor, dumb bastard" smile as they walk by. Luckily, my car has Nebraska plates, so I just give 'em a big ol' goofy prarie smile back.
GPS has a problem with this area. Last week, my NeverLost from Hertz was more of an EverLost. It was always about 2 blocks off here in the land of narrow one way streets and 60 story buildings. If I turned where it said, it had to recalculate. And if I tried to keep going, knowing that the road it was referencing was just ahead, it recalculated before I could get there. Plus, it had a propensity to erroneously make me turn onto roads that had other roads built on top of them, causing it to lose satellites long before it could un-lost me. 2 words: sucked badly.
My personal GPS has been no better this week. Besides attempting to make 3 to 5 turns anywhere none are required, it tends to talk down to me. Yep. When done right, there are 3 turns involved in getting me to work, and no interstate highways. So Missy (a nickname, her full name being Misinformed) has me on I-55 headed for Indiana, in the wrong lane to turn from (quote: "keep left then exit right), and, as luck would have it, during rush hour. Can't blame Missy for rush hour, but I'd like to. Anyway, she finally gets me to an exit. Her conversation:Exit right on Van Buren, then turn left, followed by a left...Turn left, followed by a left...turn left and take ramp left (puts me on I-55, heading the other direction, which makes me think that the exit I really need is only accessible from this direction)...RECALCULATING. And she was almost surly when she said "recalculating". Like I was some kind of dumbass or something. Look, Missy, I'm just turning the wheel. You supposed to be doing the navigating.
I always get there. But I do, and this is true, allow myself an hour to make a 5.3 mile drive.Anyway, starting yesterday I made a drastic change to the way I do business. I started by actually learning the route, all 3 turns of it, then politely turned Missy off (no need to piss her off, just in case), cranked what passes for a country station here way up loud, and cruised, all cool points and stylish, to work without drama or hijinks. Word.
An Iraqi song called Consanguinity carries a message of unity and is a call for brotherhood among Iraqis. The band itself is made up of 2 Sunni, 2 Shiite, and a Christian. That's right, this message of hope and coexistence comes to you from the band Dog Faced Corpse.
There's more, there always is. There's the tunnels under the jail complex, there's the old jail and it's forboding sterness,and there's the camaderie. But all of that involves typing and storytelling, and I am running out of time. I will leave you with this real conversation I had with an officer from Division 1 on Tuesday. I had told him the reason I tended to walk behind who I was with was because my wife is so short that if I don't see her turn in somewhere while we're out I lose her because she's not taller than clothes racks and displays.
Z: I know the feeling.
Me: Really?
Z: Yeah. I had a girlfriend from Guatemala and she was only four foot something.
Me: You mean when fully inflated, right?
Yes, jail officers are a lot like the guys on the ship, only the jail guys are more allowed to hit you. Hard.
Peace, Love, and Hey! Ya got paper on that phone?, out
Ramblin' Ed
That's what I'm about. Ramblin' Ed at 3:02 PM
2 comments:
Dude my gps too. I am wondering who the gov is trying to keep from bombing us but not bothering to tell us about until after the elections. Hmmmm. -Jn
An interesting enough question you pose, my young conspiricy theorist. And did you catch the moral of my story? Yep, I had to go "old skool" and actually learn my way around. Dang GPS. Dang government sleight of hand.
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