Page 333 - NIXBOOK

When I first started my career, the fire department guys (called “firemen” back then) would sometimes ride to fire or aid calls
by hanging off the back of the their larger fire trucks. One or two guys, on the back corner. There was a ledge there where they
could stand, and hang onto a grab bar. If you’re my age or older, you know what I’m talking about. Sounds crazy, huh? Around
the mid-90’s they stopped doing that forever, after their insurance companies got tired of paying out claims when guys fell off
and hurt themselves. Man I wish I had taken some pictures of that, but it was so normal back then, it wasn’t picture-worthy.

The Seattle Seahawks won another football game. About two minutes later, sure enough and as I had anticipated, CenCom
dispatched me to a report of an explosion, location exactly unknown. It was a ‘hawks fan, setting off a large celebratory firework.
We had a couple of those guys in town who felt like they were entitled to rattle their neighbor’s windows when their favorite
team won.

The suspected drunk driver was out of his car, standing in front of me. His driving had been poor, and his standing balance was
worse. He agreed to perform some field sobriety tests; one of them included a horizontal gaze nystagmus test, which involves
watching and tracking eye movements. Enough alcohol will cause a slight (or extreme) jerking of eyeballs when going back and
forth. I watched closely and saw his eyes were indeed jerking and bouncing a bit; he had no idea but I could see it clear enough
to establish probable cause with no doubt that he had consumed way too much alcohol. A breath test at the station later
confirmed it, and I issued him a criminal citation with a DUI charge.

On TV they call them APB’s but we called them BOLO’s – a Be On The Lookout dispatch for a wanted subject and/or car. I heard
them over the police airwaves on the average of about once per week during the times I was on duty, and every single time it
created the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon, which is what you call it when you suddenly start seeing that one certain thing. It
happened to me just about every single damn time, and it even kicked in when I was advised to BOLO for the purple chevy
pickup truck with the bank robber in it. Damnit there’s a purple pickup truck right across the street! WTF there’s another purple
pickup truck but that’s not the right one! Sonofabitch there’s ANOTHER GD purple pickup truck over there, but that’s not the
right one either!