On This Night In October – LOTS Happened…

… we just can’t figure it all out.

Perhaps it’s our unsettled atmospherics, variations of barometric pressure and a swinging compass as a storm bears down on us that has everyone so jumpy. We don’t know.

It’s our only word for it, neighbors arguing with neighbors, seeing things that aren’t there, chasing each other around your front yards, doing – well – some pretty dumb things.

No one ever said the species that put a man on the moon and invented Netflix was immune from bouts of temporary insanity, but Jeez Louise, in manageable intervals, please.

We were out and about last night, looking for a restorative coffee and signs of anything amiss, and we found the latter before any decent cup of Joe. Craig, our lensman, ‘headlamped” a would-be car burglar outside a local Safeway, keeping his car lights on the thief until he had enough of Craig’s spotlight, gave up his thievery and walked quickly away.

Score one for the Newsies in the War Against Crime.

That set the tone for things, though, as our radar lit up with reports of scattered random nastiness until our Flash Manager – aka “Jonesy” – started tracking calls and texts about multiple car burglaries in San Ramon, then a stolen car, then a crash involving a stolen car, and then the Heavens opened and incidents were pouring in like seawater through a holed hull.

At about 9:55 p.m. a Pleasant Hill PD cruiser was rammed by a suspect in a stolen car near Target, the suspect 2005 Silver Honda “rabbiting” north on Contra Costa Boulevard to Highway 4 where our Jonesy reported he’d resorted to the “Crazy Ivan” – driving west in the eastbound lanes in an effort to throw off pursuers.

That may have turned into something as our Crazy Ivan may have been wanted for something more than car theft, running off our radar screens and crashing in another jurisdiction while we turned our attention back home as the bar scene heated up and Demon Rum took hold.

Turned out folks were feeling scrappy and some required a police escort out of their chosen watering hole as we made it through the Witching Hour and the Lonely Hearts Club (explained in last week’s screed) came out to slash the tires of former paramours or confront their replacements.

All in all it was a busy, and draining, night as we ran back and forth trying to figure out what was going on. It appears the car burglars had a good night, scoring a gun or two and money and computers and all the other stuff people seem willing to donate to them.

The police were busy, and we can appreciate the sense of futility they might feel after seeing people they’ve risked much to put in jail walk free. The police need some work, we would argue, but at the same time we feel they don’t get much credit for the good individual members do on a daily basis – beyond the occasional school visit and photo op.

Now that we’ve made it to the weekend it’s harder to get details on Friday night’s events due to weekend staffing and all, plus we have that storm coming and it could overwhelm the news cycle for a bit, but we’ll keep trying.

We have our galoshes and battery-powered coffee maker ready for the downpour and, hard as it is sometimes, we’ll try to keep on top of developments.