Somebody Call the Cops. The Neighbors are Fighting Again.

You are probably not from a small town.  According to my statistics (which, btw, I'm just making up) you are probably young, slightly more likely to be female, semi-driven, and a city dweller.  Don't be mad if I've buttoned holed you all wrong.  I know I've got my minorities out there, too.  I just figure I know who I'm talking to for the most part.

Now, I've told you this often, so you're probably aware that I grew up in a small town.  I'm sorry for driving this point home, but since you live in the city I feel a constant need to make my posts relevant to your life.  Actually, I am well aware that you have no idea what I'm on about small towns.  I could never truly make you understand, but I try.

I'm going to tell you about an accomplishment called the police blotters.  This is a section of the paper dedicated to every call-out in the small-town cop's life.  They have things like over width farm vehicles and wives moving their husband's golf clubs into the middle of the street.  The local paper is well aware of the fact that people read it for humour. What we try to do is get anonymously listed in these blotters.  Nothing like five minutes of fame.

One of the most effective ways to pull this off is to get listed as "shot's were fired in the fifth block of..."  Here are some of the ways people I've been, err, associated with have been listed.

Stealing garden ornaments is ever popular.  They are disappearing in most editions of the paper.  I have some friends who were briefly famous for successfully stealing the potted plants of a hilarious local character, Mrs.
Dalton.  She wipes her cat's bum, takes toys from small children until they learn their manners, and has a remarkable wardrobe of vintage outfits, gloves and ridiculous hats..

Ah yes, the time the cow got out.  Or, one of the times the cow got out.  This time she wandered, not off into the wilderness, but out onto the road and out into the neighborhood.  It was precious.  Mostly because I wasn't there.  It got considerably better when a female cop showed up.  My brother has a re-account where she yelled at him, "Stay where you are!" in all her female cop power trip.  Buttercup chewed her cud and meandering down the road well the poor lady in a uniform was quite at loss as to how ridiculous she appeared.

My littlest brother will quite forcefully state that they even stopped when cars went by.  Apparently that's not enough.  A collection of young hooligans tossing snowballs on main street is a truly valid reason to call 911.  Unfortunately, the youth had dispersed by time police arrived at the scene.

We've all done doughnuts in near empty parking lots, right?  That perfect little beater with the hand brake.  Those perfect frozen conditions with a light skiff of snow.  Now, who else has had their father reported for this activity at the local community centre?  I don't think you quite understand. My Dad had fled the scene after a serious case of reckless driving.


My own masked intruder almost deserves a full post to himself.  Except he wasn't masked, he was wasted out of his mind.  I was there and he dented the door a little bit well I fled out the front in my socks.  We'll keep it brief and note these two items.  1. my cousin, room mate, and best friend came in, saw the guy under my sink, and thought he was me before getting confronted and making her getaway.  2.  Our incompetent cops couldn't find my house.  Creepy intruder ended up being chased all over town and captured by my brother and Dad, even though I called 911.  They couldn't even find him when my Dad gave a play-by-play over the cell phone.  Turns out he was wanted in Alberta, anyway.  And, yes, for a while there I had restraining orders against two, possibly three people.  I'm hardcore like that.

No.  I don't know of anyone who's actually gone cow-tipping.