Neighborhood Hazard or Why the Cops Won't Patrol Brice

I got this from another forum

Neighborhood Hazard or Why the Cops Won't Patrol Brice
Street Any More

Author: Daniel Meyer

I never dreamed slowly cruising on my motorcycle
through a residential neighborhood could be so
incredibly dangerous! Little did I suspect. I was on
Brice Street - a very nice neighborhood with perfect
lawns and slow traffic. As I passed an oncoming
car, a brown furry missile shot out from under it and
tumbled to a stop immediately in front of me.

It was a squirrel, and must have been trying to run
across the road when it encountered the car. I really
was not going very fast, but there was no time to
brake or avoid it --
it was that close.

I hate to run over animals, and I really hate it on a
motorcycle, but a squirrel should pose no danger to
me. I barely had time to brace for the impact.
Animal
lovers, never fear. Squirrels, I discovered, can take
care of themselves!

Inches before impact, the squirrel flipped to his
feet. He was standing on his hind legs and facing my
oncoming Valkyrie with steadfast resolve in his little

beady eyes. His mouth opened, and at the last
possible second, he screamed and leapt!

I am pretty sure the scream was squirrel or, "Bonzai!"
or maybe, "Die you gravy-sucking, heathen scum!" The
leap was nothing short of spectacular ... as he shot
straight up, flew over my windshield, and impacted me
squarely in the chest.

Instantly, he set upon me. If I did not know better,
I would have sworn he brought 20 of his little buddies
along for the attack.

Snarling, hissing, and tearing at my clothes, he was a
frenzy of activity. As I was dressed only in a light
T-shirt, summer riding gloves, and jeans this was a
bit of a cause for concern. This furry little tornado
was doing some damage!

Picture a large man on a huge black and chrome
cruiser, dressed in jeans, a T-shirt, and leather
gloves, puttering at maybe 25 mph down a quiet
residential street, and in the fight of his life with
a squirrel.

And losing...

I grabbed for him with my left hand. After a few
misses, I finally managed to snag his tail. With all
my strength, I flung the evil rodent off to the left
of the bike, almost running into the right curb as I
recoiled from the throw. That should have done it.

The matter should have ended right there.

It really should have. The squirrel could have sailed
into one of the pristinely kept yards and gone on
about his business, and I could have headed home. No
one would have been the wiser.

But this was no ordinary squirrel. This was not even
an ordinary angry squirrel. This was an EVIL MUTANT
ATTACK SQUIRREL OF DEATH! Somehow he caught my
gloved finger with one of his little hands and, with
the force of the throw, swung around and with a
resounding thump and an amazing impact, he landed
squarely on my back and resumed his rather antisocial
and extremely distracting activities. He also managed
to take my left glove with him!

The situation was not improved. Not improved at all.
His attacks were continuing, and now I could not reach
him. I was startled, to say the least. The
combination of the force of the throw, only having one
hand (the throttle hand) on the handlebars, and my
jerking back unfortunately put a healthy twist through
my right hand and into the throttle.

A healthy twist on the throttle of a Valkyrie can only
have one result. Torque. This is what the Valkyrie is
made for, and she is very, very good at it. The
engine roared and the front wheel left the pavement.

The squirrel screamed in anger. The Valkyrie screamed
in ecstasy. I screamed in .. well .. I just plain
screamed.

Now picture a large man on a huge black and chrome
cruiser, dressed in jeans, a slightly
squirrel-torn-t-shirt, wearing only one leather glove,
and roaring at
maybe 50 mph and rapidly accelerating down a quiet
residential street on one wheel, with a demonic
squirrel on his back. The man and the squirrel are
both screaming bloody murder. With the sudden
acceleration I was forced to put my other hand back on
the handlebars and try to get control of the bike.

This was leaving the mutant squirrel to his own
devices, but I really did not want to crash into
somebody's tree, house, or parked car. Also, I had
not yet figured out how to release the throttle... my
brain was just simply overloaded. I did manage to
mash the back brake, but it had little effect against
the massive power of the big cruiser.

About this time the squirrel decided that I was not
paying sufficient attention to this very serious
battle (maybe he was an evil mutant NAZI attack
squirrel of death), and he came around my neck and got
INSIDE my full-face helmet with me. As the faceplate
closed part way, he began hissing in my face. I am
quite sure my screaming changed intensity. It had
little effect on the squirrel, however. The RPMs on
the Dragon maxed out (since I was not bothering with
shifting at the moment), so her front end started to
drop.

Now picture a large man on a huge black and chrome
cruiser, dressed in jeans, a very raggedly torn
T-shirt, wearing only one leather glove, roaring at
probably 80 mph, still on one wheel, with a large
puffy squirrel's tail sticking out of the mostly
closed full-face helmet. By now the screams are
probably getting a little hoarse.

Finally I got the upper hand ... I managed to grab
his tail again, pulled him out of my helmet, and
slung him to the left as hard as I could. This time
it worked ... sort-of. Spectacularly sort-of ...so to
speak.

Picture a new scene. You are a cop. You and your
partner have pulled off on a quiet residential street
and parked with your windows down to do some
paperwork.
Suddenly a large man on a huge black and chrome
cruiser, dressed in jeans, a torn T-shirt flapping in
the breeze, and wearing only one leather glove, moving
at probably 80 mph on one wheel, and screaming bloody
murder roars by, and with all his strength throws a
live squirrel grenade directly into your police car.
I heard screams.

They weren't mine...

I managed to get the big motorcycle under control and
dropped the front wheel to the ground. I then used
maximum braking and skidded to a stop in a cloud
of tire smoke at the stop sign of a busy cross street.
I would have returned to 'fess up (and to
get my glove back). I really would have. Really...
Except for two things.

First, the cops did not seem interested or the
slightest bit concerned about me at the moment. When
I looked back, the doors on both sides of the patrol
car were flung wide open. The cop from the passenger
side was on his back, doing a crab walk into
somebody's
front yard, quickly moving away from the car. The cop
who had been in the driver's seat was standing in the
street, aiming a riot shotgun at his own police car.

So, the cops were not interested in me. They often
insist to "let the professionals handle it" anyway.
That was one thing. The other? Well, I could clearly
see shredded and flying pieces of foam and upholstery
from the back seat. But I could also swear I saw the
squirrel in the back window, shaking his little fist
at me. That is one dangerous squirrel. And now he
has a patrol car. A somewhat shredded patrol car
... but it was all his.

I took a deep breath, turned on my turn-signal, made a
gentle right turn off of Brice Street, and sedately
left the neighborhood. I decided it was best to
just buy myself a new pair of gloves. And a whole lot
of Band-Aids.