Road Runner Going Faster Miles An Hour Home To Mommy – January 4, 2011
• Sunday, November 21 7:16 a.m. A 92-year-old woman was found deceased in her home, and the coroner was called.
8:22 a.m. The forest-urban interface features a relative abundance of two great tastes that taste great together: garbage and bears.
1 p.m. A man called from a Valley West store requesting “real police officers with real badges,” because what he believed were some faux officers were harassing him at his home. Police found the man not quite crazy, and managed to assuage his fears.
2:01 p.m. After a hearty meal from a trash can, a bearded man whizzed upon the Plaza and snuggled up on the sidewalk for a nap. Police found him drained, drunk and destined for the tank.
4:58 p.m. Three mendicants, one thoroughly cocktailed, aggressively panhandled in the covered entrance to a Plaza shop. The drunken one was arrested.
• Monday, November 22 6:54 a.m. A South G Street business was burgled, with a TV/DVD player and guitar stolen.
8:01 a.m. Possible evidence of arson was discovered in back of a business; at least the owner thought so.
9:17 a.m. A lad left his $700 yellow Torker BMX bike unlocked overnight near some bushes at Ninth and I streets. When he returned in the morning, he was shocked to find it gone.
• Tuesday, November 23 3:11 a.m. A man appeared at Valley West motel’s night window in boots, green shorts and a hoodie asking for a key to room 229. He had an ID for the registered guest, but the photo didn’t look anything like him. As officers were summoned, Mr. Dressed-in-the-Dark disappeared back into same.
9:39 a.m. A man headed toward the Marsh on lower H Street found his appreciation of nature encumbered by the lack of proper equipment. Well outfitted with elegant garbage bag and sleeping bag, he wailed a lament that “he couldn’t find anyone with a pipe or drugs.”
10:34 a.m. A Valley West coffee hut has taken to wiring down its tip jar. In a canny game of one-upmanship, a criminal brainiac in a red hoodie showed up with wire cutters so as to liberate the prized chump change. Though he wasn’t exactly dangling upside down amid a maze of laser beams trying to hack into a museum’s security system, but trying to operate his opposable thumb and digits wth minimal alacrity, he scuttled away toward a burger stand, demonstrating the one thing he’s good at – running away from problems.
11:01 a.m. Two men and a woman had a big argument inside a maroon van parked on J Street. At one point a toilet plunger was brandished for purposes of intimidation and unintended comedy.
12:43 p.m. A regular customer went into a store and examine the coat section. After a while he came to the front counter with one of the store’s coats on underneath two of his own coats. The store employee saw the merchandise “peeking out” from ’neath the customers coats, and touched it, asking “Are you going to pay for that?” At this, the customer peeled off the two outer coats and handed the employee the store’s coat. The employee wondered, “Were you going to pay for that?” The man became upset and said what a good customer he is, then left the store. The whole thing was caught on videotape, and the store asked that the formerly good customer be warned about trespassing if he returned.
3:14 p.m. Someone mistook a lawful protest on the Plaza for someone trying to start a non-philosophical argument.
6:57 p.m. Someone started using checks stolen from a Golf Course Road mailbox.
• Wednesday, November 24 12:14 a.m. People were reported “shooting up” narcotics inside the Post Office. Police found two drugless schlubs and cited them for possessing any can, bottle, or other receptacle containing any alcoholic beverage that has been opened, or a seal broken, or the contents of which have been partially removed,
in any city, county, or city and county owned park or other city, county, or city and county owned public place, or any recreation and park district, or any regional park or open-space district.
2:04 a.m. A person possibly tampering with a vehicle at 11th and I streets was found using the right keys on the wrong car. The correct vehicle was then located, but too late to avoid an arrest on a public drunkenness charge.
9:33 a.m. Two recycling pirates who had it together enough to have access to a truck rather than the usual shopping cart used the lorry to load up recyclables from a home on L.K. Wood Boulevard. The truck was so full, said a witness, that when it pulled away, glass bottles fell off the back and shattered in the street. The witness speculated that the bottle brigands were already at the recycling center collecting cash for the load, but police were unable to substantiate any theft.
9:55 a.m. A man rode up to an Alliance Road apartment complex’s laundry room on a blue bicycle, went in, opened a dryer, took out a t-shirt, stuffed it in a backpack, then went out, hopped on the bike and rode away. Police did locate and question a suspect, but no arrest was made.
11:41 a.m. The previous day’s wire cutter technician without portfolio was spotted lingering in front of a car wash. He was warned to steer clear of the coffee hut.
2:46 p.m. Four men argued on the corner of Ninth and I streets about marijuana. Was it over who owed who what, whether sativa or indica was buzzier, whether full-on legalization or a more limited form of decriminalization was appropriate or simply why’d you break my new pipe, man? We’ll never know, since even the antagonists likely don’t remember that or much else.
4:37 p.m. A man waited in line at a Fourth Street market when the cashier asked the person in front of him what he was doing for Thanksgiving. I’m going to burglarize a house and make some money, the man quipped. Everyone went silent, that is until the guy left. In short order, the dispatcher’s phone rang, or blinked or beeped or something.
9:06 p.m. A Buttermilk Lane resident saw a car blaze past her house on the narrow ribbon of asphalt at an estimated 60 mph and took impulsive action, throwing a rock at the car. The well-aimed rock glanced off the windshield, leaving a chip, and the car screeched to a halt. Emerging from the vehicle in menacing knit cap and plaid jacket, the driver bitched out the speeder-weary resident. She apologized for the rock throwage and explained that she was tired of cars speeding past her home. But the plaid-clad rocketeer was unyielding in his righteous victimization, pledging to call the cops. Fine, she said, you do that – I’ll tell them how fast you were going. The driver then said that he was going to come back with his mom and an attorney, and left.
• Thursday, November 25 3:33 a.m. A nitwit-beleaguered Plaza cab driver reported a relentless, bleached-blonde woman trying to hail his cab all night on the Plaza with the intention of getting a ride to Arcadia. This was never going to happen, so police came and ascertained that the woman wasn’t commitably nutso. She was to catch a southbound bus in the morning.
4:38 p.m. A man entered an unoccupied building on lower H Street and crawled into makeshift bed. Police sent him on his way.
9:03 p.m. A low-effort camper bedded down under a blanket in Bret Harte Alley, oriented so that his head was on the downhill side. Police sent him on his way.
• Friday, November 26 9:08 a.m. A Valley West motel manager called police about a guest was was demanding a refund or the room he’d rented the day before because of a “stain” that resembled mold. The motel’s view was that the stain hadn’t been there when the room was rented (and by the way, that arduous procedure had represented a whole ’nother nimrod imbroglio, with the guy’s credit card being declined and him having to fork over cash, which he now wanted back, but anyway…) Told police were on the way, the stainophobe swiftly took his leave.
9:49 a.m. A man having a heated argument with himself at 12th and I streets was asked if both he and him could keep it down to a dullard roar.
1:20 p.m. Anguished peals set the glistening cheese steak ectoplasm all a-quiver at a Northtown shop. A sweatshirt-clad male-type slumped away at good speed after some unfriendly frisson with a woman. A report was taken.
9:25 p.m. A man was gradually robbed on Alliance Road by a guy in a zip-up sweatshirt who first took a beer away from the man, then asked him to “buy some weed,” then asked for money and finally, a cell phone. The total estimated loss in the incremental shakedown: $3.
11:13 p.m. A man and woman horizontally cavorting with the blinds open in an Alliance Road apartment created distress among the surrounding populace.
•Saturday, November 27 3:59 a.m. A man at the police station front door demanded to be taken to gaol. Found drunked up on F Street, he got his wish.
10:40 a.m. A green-backpacked woman who had stenched up the restroom of a Valley West burger joint with dope smoke the previous day showed up again. She was turned away and made straight for a nearby golden arches, presumably to work the same stinky magic.
12:36 p.m. A six-month-old infant was left unattended by a car on the Plaza, which a witness reported encircled by travelers. Police arrived and lectured the (ir)responsible adult about child endangerment.
2:56 p.m. A citizen was walking on Shirley Boulevard when two young adults in a red pickup truck stopped and made some unspecified but presumably not-so-cordial contact. The citizen wanted the incident documented beause the youngadultsters’ home had just been raided by police.
3:31 p.m. A baggy-clothed male seen writing on a building with a marking pen was arrested on a malicious mischief charge.
5:26 p.m. An unknown benefactor (John Beresford Tipton, Jr?) has made repeated deposits to a person’s account at a downtown bank.
5:18 p.m. A scruffy-bearded man in an orange jacket extensively questioned workers at a downtown business as to what time they closed and if the two employees on hand would be there at closing time.
7:34 p.m. A Spanish-speaking man called 911 and said “Arcata” a couple of times, then hung up. On callback he indicated he’d get his English-speaking brother to call, but didn’t.
• Sunday, November 28 8:37 a.m. A woozy skunk sat at the corner of a Benjamin Court chicken yard, demonstrating behavior erratic enough to earn it a trip to Heaven.
12:05 p.m. A man parked his motorcycle and Second and F streets the previous night, but by morning it had been relocated a block away. Someone reported seeing a mysterious blond-haired man rolling it away for reasons unknown.
12:25 p.m. Another Buttermilk Lane road runner streaked westward in a vehicle with yellow-taped blinkers, a spotlight and a green stripe. The garish veloci-jalopy was pulled over and the owner found to have a suspended license.
