Try this again.

Well, here I am almost 2 years later and it's hard to describe all the changes. A lot of things have happened to me in the time since my last post. It's actually going to be difficult to remember all of the changes to properly document them for you.

1) The Job: I ended up changing agencies in mid-December last year and going to work for the local Sheriff's Office in the county where I live. It was not an easy decision and I had already turned down 2 previous offers from them. Basically, things were not going well at the city police department and I felt like I needed to make a change. I heard of another opening with the Sheriff's Office and called the Patrol Commander about a job. Well, one thing led to another and I ended up getting the job. Since moving from a small city PD to a county Sheriff's Office, I'm amazed by the differences. First of all is the territory. I went from a small city of approximately 8 square miles with a small bit of interstate to a rural county of 370+ square miles. I can literally ride for 12 hours and never see the office unless I arrest someone or need gas. I'm still adjusting to the differences but having some good success and making good arrests. The big thing is that my partner is not as aggressive as I am at patrolling and trying to find criminals. That has hindered me from making as many cases as I probably could have.

The other big thing with work is the upcoming Sheriff's election. The Sheriff who hired me has announced that he will not be seeking re-election and that has caused the candidates to come out of the woodwork. So far we have a total of 5 candidates in the race and the deadline for qualifying is May 1st. We have a total of three people from the Sheriff's Office who are running, including the Patrol Commander. The other 2 are Deputies who work days on my shift. They're both good guys but I don't think that they really have the experience to be Sheriff. However, my main goal is to have a job after the election is done. So I'm not endorsing any candidates in public. My wife knows my thoughts on who I'm planning on voting for but that's it. They all have pros and cons for them as Sheriff. I'm just planning on riding it out and seeing how things fall out after the election.

2) Family: My marriage is doing well and I think it's a lot better with me being close to home all the time. I'm still working nights but working in the county I live in allows me to come home and tuck the family into bed at night before I go back out to patrol. My wife is doing well in her job as the Nurse Manager for the ER at our local hospital and my son is growing like crazy. He actually sang a solo piece at the Easter program at his school a couple of weeks ago and did really well.

My wife actually announced that she was pregnant shortly before I changed jobs. Unfortunately she lost the baby right around Christmas and it's been difficult for her to handle the emotional fallout from that. I was at work the night she passed the fetus but thankfully I was able to be at home with her and didn't have any calls. Since then she's said that she wants to continue trying for another baby and I'm fine with that. I think we'll continue just living our lives and not stressing about making a baby. She got incredibly stressed out TRYING to get pregnant that it was driving the both of us crazy. I got her to just relax and enjoy our time together, sure enough she got pregnant. We'll see if it happens again, but my stepson's wife just announced that she is pregnant and my wife did not take the news well. She said she was jealous but that she realized she was over 40 now and that things didn't go as easily as they did when she was younger. I would love to have another child with her but I understand that it may not happen. I love her more than life itself and I want to spend the rest of my life with her. I would love to have a little girl but my son is such a blessing that I'm at peace with the idea of not having another child. At this point I'm just trying to be the best husband and father that I can be.

3) Finances: We have been steadily on this pattern of reducing our expenses and living within our means for the past couple of years. This really hasn't changed much except that we refinanced the house again last year and further reduced our mortgage payment. All of our vehicles are paid for and all this work has resulted in our ability to enjoy what we have. We don't have to work all the time and we can still put money into savings. This resulted in our taking a week's vacation to Florida last October and spending a week at the beach. We rented a house not far from the beach and spent a week laying out on the beach and spending time with friends. Our lives are good right now and I'm not interested in doing anything to upset that.

That's about all I feel like discussing for right now. I'm trying to get back into the habit of regular posting so that there won't be these long absences. Of course I'm the only one reading this mess so I guess it really doesn't matter.

Happy June!

Well, here we are. It's now June, 2010 and I've been a cop for just over a year. I never could have imagined the wild ride this past year would be when I started the academy. Let's recap some of the things that have happened to me in the time I've been a cop shall we??

1) Departmental turmoil... This has been a big one. I had 20 years experience in EMS and Fire prior to going to the academy and I've never worked anywhere that was as crazy as my department was when I started. I got threatened when I interviewed that if I screwed up, then they would do everything they could to have my Peace Officer's certification revoked and that I would never work as a cop again. That threat was repeated when I was offered the job. I needed a job badly at the time and accepted anyways but I was planning on leaving as soon as I got an offer somewhere else. Then, the Chief of our department as well as the Lieutenant who threatened me were both fired for a variety of issues. Since then, we have a new Chief and one of our Sergeants was promoted to Lieutenant in charge of Uniform Patrol. I have to give my NEW Lt a lot of credit in that he has really changed my attitude about staying where I am. He doesn't micromanage and he expects us to do our jobs. He fights for us when we're in the right and he's the first one to chew us out when we're wrong. Also, once he gets done chewing us out and we walk out of his office, that's the end of it. He is getting us training which was a real issue prior to the change in administration and he's trying to improve the way we do things as a department. All in all, I'm very impressed with the things he's done. He can be very abrasive at times but he supports the guys in the trenches and I respect that a lot.

2) Time at home.... I used to work ALL the time when I was working full time in EMS. I still work a lot but I'm also home a lot more. My family doesn't see me as a stranger anymore and I get to spend more time with my wife and son which was a big deciding factor when I made up my mind to go to the academy.

3) My abilities as an Officer..... When I started working for the department, I didn't get much in the way of field training. I pretty much had to learn things on my own. Now, I'm not stupid by any stretch but it would have been nice to have someone I KNEW I could rely on to give me good information on how things needed to be done. I've done fairly well in learning how to deal with the myriad of issues that a Police Officer has to deal with on a daily basis and that seems to have been noticed by my Lieutenant. I consistently get a lot of praise on the quality of my reports and the Captain has stated several times in front of other officers that I write the best reports in the department. I'm making good cases pretty much on my own and rarely have any problems. I still screw up periodically but it's usually not a big issue and I learn from my mistakes.

Another factor in the situation is the fact that we've reduced our monthly expenses a lot and are living more within our means. The only vehicle we owe money on is the minivan and that should be paid off later this year. In addition, we recently refinanced our house which reduced our mortgage payment by about $400 per month. This has taken a lot of pressure off of me so that I don't have to worry so much about finding extra work to help cover bills AND give us some spending money. I still work overtime when I can get it plus I work a couple of shifts a month on an ambulance to maintain my paramedic skills. We are in a much better financial situation and that helps immensely.

These days, I'm keeping busy at work and at home. My garden is going well and we're starting to get some fresh veggies out of it so that's definitely satisfying. We're currently swimming in zucchini and trying to find ways to use it. My wife has been baking zucchini bread and made a chocolate chip zucchini cake tonight for dessert. I got the first cucumber out of the garden yesterday and got 3 more today. I'm probably going to take some to a buddy of mine at work since he likes it. I also got the first of the okra out of the garden today. My tomatoes are coming along well but we probably won't get any ripe ones for another few weeks. I'm contemplating taking some green tomatoes to my mother in law along with a request for some fried green tomatoes. If you haven't had these little southern delicacies, then you're missing out on a treat. Truly good fried green tomatoes are delicious and you quickly become addicted to them.

Well, I hope that this update finds you, my non-existent readers, healthy and happy. I'm busy locking bad guys up and enjoying my family time as much as possible. I'm looking forward to a well deserved vacation next month and some time away from work.

still alive!

I feel that I should apologize for the sporadic posting. Of course, since I'm pretty sure I'm the only person who pays any attention to this blog, maybe I'm really just apologizing to myself. Things have been going pretty well. I've been working a lot and trying to spend more time with my wife and son. In addition, things are getting a bit hectic here on the home front as well. My oldest stepson, we'll call him Bubba (yes, that's REALLY his nickname) will be getting married in just under 3 weeks so my wife has been busy attending wedding showers as well as planning the rehearsal dinner. We've decided that we're going to do Barbecue, stew and slaw for it, much like we did when the wife and I got married. There's a BBQ place in the next county over that is widely considered to be the best in the state so that's where we got the BBQ and my in-laws make very good Brunswick stew and coleslaw. Just in case any non-southerners come across my humble little ramblings, Barbecue in the south is something of a religion. You don't DARE invite people to come eat some 'cue and then expect them to be happy with hotdogs and hamburgers on the grill. Here in the south, BBQ=PORK with a vinegar based sauce. Anything else is just an invitation for a lynching.

Anyways, the wife informed me yesterday that even though I'm not Bubba's father, I will be expected to dress semi-fancy and be available for wedding photos. Now, let me inform you gentle reader that I DESPISE getting dressed up. Fancy uniform is okay but you try to get me in a suit and you'll have a fight on your hands. I would much rather kick around in a pair of blue jeans and a t-shirt (much like I'm wearing as I type this) so the idea of having to wear khakis and a nice shirt is rather distressing to me. Of course, you might ask "What's the issue? You're going to a wedding!" Well, my stepson and his lovely fiance have already announced that the dress code for this shindig is......wait for it....... blue jeans and t-shirts!!!! Well, there's really nothing to do but go ahead and make the wife happy. Trying to make a stand on the issue will inevitably result in an argument that I'm going to lose anyways so why waste the time?

Other than that, the garden is going well. My tomato plants are starting to bear fruit and my okra is FINALLY showing some growth. Most of my time is spent weeding with the tiller my father-in-law gave to me as well as my hoe. I'm really hoping that my garden does well this year and I'm already starting to think of things I might like to plant next year. It keeps me occupied and it pays off in fresh veggies hopefully.

Anyways, it's almost time to get started on cooking supper. I'm going to do chicken fajitas for supper so we'll see how those come out. Add in some laundry to do so I'll have clean clothes for the weekend and that make for an evening. Hope things are working out for you gentle readers. I'll talk to you soon!

Relaxing.........

Once again sitting here in the recliner. This is pretty much where I'm at when I'm cruising the interwebs and it is almost my favorite spot in the house except for the bed. The cat is in my lap and the dog is in her crate so things are pretty mellow at the moment.

Had a good day today. Got off work this morning and came home to find the wife up cooking breakfast when I hit the door. Now, I like eating healthy as much as the next guy but sometimes a little grease in the belly really hits the spot. We like a little bacon to go with our cheese grits and that's simply how it is. Living in the South and being married to a Southern Belle means that you rapidly become fond of southern cooking and my wife is a master of it. I get treated to a variety of southern delicacies such as greens, fried okra, cornbread and some banana pudding for dessert. Being on night shift has really helped me with my waistline since I only eat two meals per day typically so I really don't pay a LOT of attention to what I eat. I eat oatmeal and whole wheat toast a lot of times for breakfast but sometimes the bacon calls me.

Anyways, got home this morning and had a wonderful breakfast with my family. Took my stepson to school and ran a quick errand before coming home to spend a little time with my wife while my mother in law took my son to preschool. Then went to bed and slept until early afternoon while my wife went shopping. We are slowly working towards getting the house fixed up in anticipation of having the appraisal done before we refinance so that is causing a few inconveniences but nothing that we can't deal with. I'll definitely be happy when we have things back to normal and running smoothly but for now I'm just glad that we're making progress.

I'm also trying my hand at gardening. My eldest stepson has been keeping a garden behind our house for the past several years and his moving out has opened up the garden patch for me to play with. I have a bunch of seeds already and am working on getting things ready for planting. I started sprouting some okra plants the other day and will probably get some tomato plants started later tonight. My mom had a gift for gardening but I've never been into it. However, summertime is fast approaching and I've decided that I really want some home grown veggies to eat so it seems the logical thing to do. I've decided to plant okra, tomatoes, watermelons and beans. Between what we get from our garden plus what my father in law's garden produces, we should be swimming in vegetables for most of the summer.

That's pretty much what's going on in my life lately. I'm going to be going to bed early tonight because I have some errands to run tomorrow. For now I'm just going to relax and enjoy a quiet evening at home.

Back again

Sitting here in the recliner enjoying a little peace before the evening begins. Things have been very busy here at the casa lately. I worked 8 nights straight last week and tonight is my only one off this week. Last week my partner and I covered 2 nights for the opposite shift so that they could go to Field Sobriety training. Our Lieutenant basically told everyone that the city doesn't have the money to pay us overtime to cover for the guys going to class. So, in order to get everyone some training, we all agreed to cover each other's shifts while we all go to class. Last week was their turn and my shift goes to the same class in early April. It's not ideal but this department has a long history of giving their officers second rate training so getting a chance to take these classes at the state training center is a really good opportunity. On top of all this, we have quarterly firearms qualification and patrol rifle class coming up in April too. This means I get to go out and make things go "BANG" on the city's dime which is always fun.

Of course working all this time means less time to spend with my family. My wife is very supportive of my job and puts up with the demands on my time from work, court and side jobs to provide everything we want. We don't have a ton of disposable income but we have enough to cover the bills, keep food on the table and sock a little into savings for a rainy day. We are slowly renovating the house and recently managed to get a new roof courtesy of our insurance company for some hail damage we got from a storm last year. We are currently trying to get the house refinanced which will free up several hundred dollars per month that we can put towards paying off our minivan or the mortgage. As a result, we've decided to dip into savings and spruce up the house a bit by fixing some problems and putting in a new walkway from the front porch to the driveway. Eventually I want to renovate the kitchen to make it a bit more user friendly. I love to cook when I actually have the time so that would be a nice thing.

My wife and I are getting along pretty well. She had to go to work today but she's getting off early so that we can go check out a new school in the area for our son to attend next year. A local church is starting up a new Christian school and we're interested in sending the kid there. The local public schools seem to be a breeding ground for thugs and delinquents so we're looking into options. The question is whether or not this new school is overly Christian. My wife and I are somewhat religious but we try to keep a balanced view on everything and we don't want our son exposed to the bible-thumping TOTALLY right-wing wackos that are very prevalent here in the bible belt. We also want a school with better academics and better resources than what is currently available in the public school system. I want my son to grow up as a normal kid and not be criminalized because he drew a picture of a gun in school. We'll see how things go tonight and make a decision soon.

In summary, I'm working way too much and busting my hump to try and make progress at work. We also had city court last week and I got to see the guy who bashed his head in my patrol car. He plead guilty to all my charges and promptly got about $3k worth of fines and lost his license for a year. I'm just trying to relax and enjoy the time off while I have it. I'm back to work tomorrow night and have a million things to do before then. I hope you are having a pleasant day because I am.

Here we are......

Off tonight so once again I'm relaxing in the recliner and listening to my itunes. Currently I'm listening to "Stupid Girl" by Cold. The last few days have been interesting. The new partner and I are getting along well and starting to figure each other out. We've been keeping ourselves entertained lately by stopping cars and making arrests. We worked Wednesday/Thursday this past week and my partner got a DUI each night. I went in to work Saturday evening and played since my family was asleep. Stopped a few cars and wrote a few tickets but mainly just relaxed. One thing I've learned since becoming a cop is the fact that cops only truly relax around others in the business. We understand what each other goes through and the social isolation that we endure simply by the virtue of being in law enforcement. Had to go in yesterday afternoon to try and do a narcotics thing but it fell through.

Anyways, I WAS looking forward to having some time this morning to spend with my wife but unfortunately she has to go into work since the day shift nurse called out sick. I'm still worried about the way things are going with us. We're doing better but I'm still concerned. We're going away for a weekend at the beginning of next month so hopefully we'll have plenty of time to spend TOGETHER. The positive side is that she's supposedly going to be off on Thursday which is a day that I'll be off. I have to teach that evening but we should have some time that morning. We'll see, that's about all I can say.

Having fun

Feeling mellow tonight. It's been a very good day. I worked all weekend and did some good work. I arrested a lady for an outstanding warrant Friday evening, arrested a guy for DUI on Saturday night and then my partner got 2 felony arrests, some marijuana and a gun out of a car early Monday morning.

We came in for work Friday evening, had supper at a local restaurant and then went out to run some traffic. When I say we are running traffic, basically we're looking for whatever we can find. It isn't about the ticket but rather it's about looking deeper for something more serious. I could care less whether or not I actually issue a citation, I'd rather catch someone with drugs or a warrant than give someone a ticket for having a headlight out.

Anyways, we get a call about an argument between a man and a woman. We get to the house and find out that the guy has already taken off. The woman we talked kept insisting that they were just friends and not dating. She said they had an argument and she asked him to leave because he was drunk. So I'm thinking we might could catch a DUI so my partner calls him on the cell phone and asks him to meet us at the police department so we can talk. He agrees and we get set up to try and catch him coming back into town DUI. Well, he was smart and had a friend drive him to meet with us. He admits that he's engaged to the girl and just wants to get his stuff out of her house. We take him back to the girl's house and talk to her about it. She agrees to let him get his clothes and leave. During the course of the situation, I check the girl's license through dispatch. Uh-oh......... she's got 2 warrants for bad checks. We end up having to call her mom to come get the 2 little girls that were in the house and then we end up taking mom to jail for the warrants. That was pretty much it after that. We stopped a bunch of cars but couldn't find much of anything. It rained most of the night so it was hard to get motivated in the pouring down rain.

Saturday was better. I got to spend some time with my wife before leaving for work and was feeling pretty good by the time I started my shift. Stopped a bunch of cars but didn't find any serious crimes so they got warnings. We decided to go to the interstate about 2 or 3 in the morning. Usually, traffic in town dries up about 9 or 10pm and you can almost see tumbleweeds rolling down the sidewalks. Having the interstate in our jurisdiction makes for a nice change of pace. We roll down the on-ramp and park where we can watch traffic. A few minutes later, my partner rolls out to stop a car and I stay put. He'll call for me if he needs some help and I can find my own car to stop. While I'm sitting there, this white Honda comes past me like a bat out of hell. He was EASILY doing 100mph. As I watch him, I see him swerve across the white dotted line between the lines, which is a violation. I pull out after him and stop him about 2 miles down the road. I walk up to the car, introduce myself and the guy says "You got me Officer! I was speeding!" I ask him how fast he was going and he replies " I was doing at least a hundred when I passed you." Well, as I'm talking to him, I smell a familiar odor. Bingo!! I ask him to step out of the car to speak with me and he complies. Again, I smell an alcoholic beverage so I'm resisting the urge to giggle in front of him. I'm being very polite and asking him if he'd mind taking a few simple tests for me. He's more than happy to oblige and ends up in handcuffs for his trouble. I put him in my car while my partner starts the impound sheet and take off for the jail to give him the state required breath test.

Of course, with my luck, the guy starts flipping out in my car and ends up cursing me from the time we leave the scene until the time we get to the jail. He even bashes his head against my cage, earning himself a small bruise and cut. When we arrived, the sight of 6 deputies with Tasers drawn settled him down and he promptly blew 0.169 on the machine which is twice the legal limit. I'm actually looking forward to seeing him in court because everything was caught on tape and I'll be happy to let the judge hear just how many times he referred to me as a "cracker motherfucker."

So we come back in Sunday evening and I'm not expecting too much. Sunday isn't usually a party night and most folks are in the house asleep because they have to go to work on Monday morning. We tool around town for a couple of hours until my partner decides he wants to go write some speeding tickets. So we grab the laser and head out to the big road. Now I don't have any type of certification to run radar of laser but I can write speeding tickets for people that have been lasered by my partner so we get set up with him zapping cars and me playing bird dog. Sure enough, we get one running 93 in a 70 mph zone. I stop the car and hand the lady driving a nice yellow driving certificate. She said she's just going to pay it off but I forgot to mention the extra $200 fee the state is going to send her for doing more than 85mph on the interstate. Anyways, we hang around out on the interstate for a little while longer and then head back to town. We ride the city, patrolling businesses and neighborhoods looking for people up to no good. Thankfully we come up empty and go back to the interstate after a couple of hours. We set up again and traffic is slow compared to what it was earlier. We're standing outside of our cars despite the cold and talking about nonsense when my partner zaps one at 95 in a 70. We go after them and stop the car which is from one of our neighboring states. We start talking to the 3 occupants and I see that one of the passengers has lit a cigarette. Now this is a CLASSIC sign of extreme nervousness so I am extra alert.

My partner starts pulling people out of the car and having them stand at the front of his car. He gives me a thumbs up letting me know there's dope in the car. I go up to talk to the passenger in the back seat and I get a good whiff of it too. Very strong odor of raw marijuana in the car. We get permission to search the car and recover an ounce of weed as well as a pistol. Well, as it turns out, both of the male occupants are convicted felons which means they can't be in possession of a firearm. We end up arresting both of the men and the female subject who was 17 ends up having to sit at the PD until her father can come from the neighboring state to get her.

All in all, a very enjoyable and productive weekend at work. I ended up getting off work about 90 minutes late after all the evidence was logged and paperwork completed. The sun was rising as I drove home and the fields on both sides of the road were coated in frost. It was just a wonderful way to start a couple of days off. I even snapped some pics with my Iphone.

So I make it home and spend a little bit snuggling with my wife before heading to bed. We had a wonderful dinner this evening and my wife made a homemade banana pudding for dessert. Now I'm just relaxing in my recliner listening to Colt Ford on my Iphone and typing this post. This is what I'm all about. I work hard, love my family and try to be the best husband/father I can be.