I have on several occasions paid homage to Sgt. D and spoken well of his character. Superlatives tend to fail me at that point. I tend to fall short in truly describing him. And some may insist that such a tendency leans towards painting myself as a sycophant. I believe the coarser vernacular terms in popular usage these days are either ‘ass-kissing’ or ‘slobbing the knob’. And while I would gladly and enthusiastically slob Big D’s knob I can safely disarm those accusations by simply pointing out that 1) The blog is anonymous and there is little to no chance of Big D seeing my schoolgirl-esque infatuation and 2) He rammed his patrol car into a scumbag tonight in order to end a chase...thereby rescinding anyone’s right to doubt his status as life-long bad-ass. My shameless bootlicking is well and truly justified. I’ve never seen the man’s balls...but they’ve got to be elephantine in proportion...the sort of genitalia that make grown men weep and grown women smile coyly and toss panties.

Here’s how it went down. Another officer in a neighboring county stopped a car. He smelled alcohol on the driver and then asked the driver to exit the vehicle to perform field sobriety tests. The driver then stated, "I love you man, but I’ve got to go." And then he left. The chase was on. Thankfully, this idiot was a member of a particularly inept breed...a jewel of stupidity wafting on the sea of mediocrity. In a world of morons...this man was king. He hopped on the freeway and decided to doggedly STAY on the freeway. It made setting up spikes and Wiley Coyote traps exceptionally easy as he barreled his way into our county. Big D was set up first and tossed his spikes. He got one of the tires. Three other guys were set up a little ahead and decided to forego the element of chance and just strung three spike strips across the whole road. It completely destroyed all four tires. Big D had since abandoned his spikes on the side of the road and gone to join the chase (now slowing down, obviously). In a voice as calm, cool and collected as if he were simply reviewing reports he said on the radio, "You wanna try and box him in?" The initiating officer replied that yes, that was a most splendid idea. Three units attempted to close in on our deflated quarry. He was smiling, waving and giving the thumbs up to the pursuing officers. Big D initially took the front position. The idea was to create an impenetrable wall of patrol cars and forcibly slow the vehicle and pin the suspect. Unfortunately, the officer who was responsible for the side of the box didn’t get there in time and the target ducked through an opening.

They were setting up again to box him in but the officers (since we’ve never been formally trained on the technique) were having difficulty coordinating it. It failed again. At that point, Big D got tired of it. He came up alongside the suspect vehicle and then rammed it. He pinned it against the barrier wall and they rode like that for about 1/4 mile. Eventually...the fuck-nut stopped. Sarge’s car was completely messed up, but the idiot was stopped. Sarge let him go and he shot back out and lost control as if someone had given him the old PIT treatment. The fifty or so officers trailing behind then pulled the struggling suspect out of the vehicle and eventually gave him five seconds on the taser when he failed to understand the phrases ‘stop resisting’ and ‘show us your hands’. A hardened veteran of the fugitive unit and gang squads told us he almost wrecked his own car watching Big D pull that move. He said it was absolutely one of the coolest things he’d ever seen.

The best part about the whole thing was sarge’s reaction to why he’d done what he’d done. He’s told us...the boys under his command...to end pursuits as quickly as possible in order to avoid hurting any innocent bystanders. After exiting his vehicle through the driver’s window since the door was now ruined, he said, very plainly, in that same calm, reviewing reports kind of way that the chase had been going for almost 30 miles. It had to end. He said he was tired of people running from us and every minute it went on was another minute someone could get hurt. He ended it. I think the highest praise I could ever give sarge is saying that he leads by example. Instead of being the kind of supervisor who stays in the back and gives the orders, Big D was the first one to step right the hell up and practice what he preaches. Boxing in (the safer alternative) had failed twice. Spikes hadn’t worked. Sarge ended it the only way he knew how.

So...in the end...you can talk smack about my sergeant any time you want. If you aren’t driving, I promise you won’t see my fist until it’s WAY too late. You WILL, however, have no difficulty seeing the other fist or the many sharp and repeated after-strikes sure to follow in what can only be described as a heinous and barbaric ass-kicking. If you ARE driving...I won’t have to do anything at all. Sarge will just knock your Hyundai into a bridge abutment and completely ruin your shit.

Besides the indirect proof for the enormous size of sarge’s balls, it was a REALLY busy week. We assisted another neighboring agency with another chase. We were on containment while a local bloodhound sniffed out the shit-bag. The bloodhounds, by the way, are absolutely unbelievable. They can track almost anything. Even in a crowded, scent-filled urban environment, this dog was only deterred once. He reacquired the guy’s stench and promptly hunted him down. Incidentally, this bloodhound is no vicious attack dog. True to the breed, they are really quite gentle. This particular pooch, according to Mike, does not want treats and does not want belly rubs. All he wants is the opportunity to lick the bad guys once he’s found them. As I understand it, the handler is usually quick to oblige him once the worthless excuse for a human is securely in cuffs and can’t escape the merciless tongue. The dog found this particular sack of monkey spunk hiding in a garbage can. It ended well.

It was definitely a week of chases. There was the one where sarge just completely dominated, and then there was another one where the officer lost him. Then there was a third chase involving Shoe where they ended up getting their guys.--Both the 13 year olds (one of whom was driving) and the 18 year old too stupid to realize he’s cruising the hood with the evil Latino version of the Hardy Boys. Seriously...you’d think the white guy would at SOME point notice that he’s hanging out with his kid brother’s junior high classmates. And THEN one would hope that he would realize that somehow...the 13 year old was driving. Not him. But no...he’s got weed to smoke. Shoe was the second unit on that one. When they finally crashed, deep in the ghetto, the 18 year old stepped out of the car and put his hands up. But, as the wise and venerable Chris Rock once said, "If the cops have to come and get you, they’re bringin’ an ass-kickin’ with ‘em!" Also, Shoe is not a small guy and Newton’s law of inertia makes it hard for the poor guy to stop once he’s got that mass moving. Needless to say, the 18 year old was ignominiously dropped-and not gently-to the sidewalk and ‘taken into custody’. I cannot even imagine the look of terror on someone’s face seeing someone Shoe’s size running at them full bore. For chrissake, his bicep and tricep look like two Volkswagens fighting over a parking spot. In any case, the adult was captured immediately. And since 13 year olds who go joy-riding in their grandma’s stolen Explorer are not known for having genius-level intellects, the other two were quickly tracked down and taken to detention as well. Not the, "Oh, man! I’m gonna miss Hannah Montana! Mr. Miller is SO mean!" type of detention. I mean the, "This is practice for when you grow up and get ass-raped in the shower," type of detention. The kind where they lock you in for the night and the big orderlies smell not-so-vaguely funky.

And this week also serves as a prime example of 436's karma when it comes to chases. See if you can detect a pattern here: for the first chase where the bloodhound eventually found them, I was at a local hospital half a county away having break. For the second one where the officer lost him, I was half a county away. For the third one where Shoe played "Nacho Libre" with the spindly pot-head, I was half a state away in the helicopter on a search and rescue mission. For the last one where sarge turned our highway into a bad Michael Bay film, I was half-naked putting on the body armor, having just returned from the search and rescue mission. On the last chase before ALL of those, I had just arrested someone and couldn’t go play. Do you see it yet? 436 has absolutely horrendous luck when it comes to chases. I’m NEVER anywhere near them! NEVER! Oh well...

The search and rescue mission was a great chance to get back in the chopper. It had been a while. It was a pretty easy mission. We were looking for three lost snowmobilers. The ground guys found them first. Since we were fifteen miles from both incident command and the victims’ vehicle, the pilot and I ferried them back in the chopper. The problem was, one of the guys was 320 pounds. A second guy was 300 pounds. The last one was a relatively reasonable 180. Anyone want to place bets on who would’ve gotten eaten first if they’d turned to cannibalism? Wow. I’m sorry...that was in bad taste... At any rate, there was absolutely no way we could take all three at once. We had to make two trips. And then we headed home and I managed to miss two chases.

SIDENOTE:  The coolest thing about that mission was it was just as the lunar eclipse was ending.  We had fog in the valleys, too.  So imagine this:  You're in a helicopter slowly headed over the mountains.  The dark moon is slowly getting brighter as it emerges from Earth's shadow.  You look behind you and see the glow of the city lights filtering through the haze of the fog.  It was utterly surreal.  Beautiful.

And just for the record...if any of you out there are wondering if maybe it’s time to lose a little weight...there’s a couple of hints for you. When a Eurocopter that has been documented as the only helicopter to be able to fly to the top of Everest can’t manage to ferry your mass fifteen miles nor even get off the ground while your epic ass is wedged in the back seat...time to evaluate your caloric intake. When a 1000 lb snowmobile (or ‘sled’ if you speak redneck) can traverse the hardened snow with no problem but the addition of your corpulent buttocks is what causes the crust of snow to crack like an elderly woman’s hip...maybe order the salad next time instead of the tub of fucking lard. I didn’t really ask how their snowmobiles got stuck. I just know that my nimble 160 lbs was striding across the hardened snow like Jesus on that lake...and that the snowmobiles were stuck. I also couldn’t help but notice that none of the snowmobiles the SAR guys were riding had been stuck in the snow either. Hmmm...

I also got a dui that resulted in the discovery of an ounce of shrooms and led to a 35 year old woman and mother of a 16, 10 and 8 year old to go to jail in addition to the drunk. But that’s a long story and this one’s already long.

All hail Big D! Here’s your horoscope:

You’ll be attacked for your unflattering and blasphemous depiction of the prophet Mohammed following a rather disastrous makeover this week.  (www.theonion.com)