2 x 4 to the Haid or #4 in the Trooper Bob Chronicles

I am on my way out the door to board the vessel of germs to fly 5000 miles to get somewhere only 1700 miles away. Yes I am flying to California through New Guinea. I have a couple of disclaimers about this post. First I swore I was going to do Trooper Bob on Thursdays but yesterday was a holiday so I’m doing it on Friday. Second, the events of this story occurred years ago before there were “warning labels” so don’t get your panties in a wad. Third, I did not proof read this story very closely so if there are typos or grammatical errors, well just put your big girl panties on and deal with it. Now I have to go pack my 43 pairs of big girl panties and my 83 books to read and go and get strip searched to get on the vessel of germs. With out further blabber from me, here is #4 in the Trooper Bob Chronicles.

My Daddy and his partner Ray were often called out on dangerous assignments. No really they were it wasn’t all teasing poor Yankees. They often had to go after hardened criminals. One of their duties was to serve warrants and to pick up probation or parole violators.

They had received a warrant to pick up a young man who had violated his probation. Let’s just call him Joe the Criminal. Joe was no small fry either. He was a big old boy known to be just a little bit of a fighter and more violent than not. They had been trying to get him for about a month but every time they would go to his house he would hear or see them coming up the road and bail. The two troopers decided that a new tactic was needed. They decided to wait until they changed from day shift to the night shift and would try their luck at rounding up the hoodlum after dark.

They waited until about two in the morning then they parked the patrol car up the road from the house and went in on foot. Now you can imagine this is Texas in the summer with crickets and mosquitoes not to mention the fact that the guy probably had a dozen old hound dogs. It also didn’t help that the two troopers weren’t the quietest trackers going in. Somehow they managed not to trip, swat or even wake up the gazillion hound dogs and they snuck up to the house. The plan was that Ray would go up to the front door and knock and daddy would go around to the back door and wait for the nefarious Joe to make his predictable exit.

Ray knocked on the door and immediately the 47,000 hound dogs start barking and howling and yipping at the door. Then from the front of the house the sound of boots on the wooden floor boards started echoing running towards the back door. Daddy was standing next to the back door wondering short of shooting the guy how was he going to take him out. Then he spied a 2 X 4 on the ground next to the stairs. He reached down and picked up the board and then he had an epiphany. He knew how to stop the guy in his tracks, no bullets involved. He decided he will hold the 2X4 just high enough that when the criminal exited the back door he would trip over the board fall to the ground at which time daddy could hold him down and cuff him. That would be that and they could take him in and still have time for breakfast before shift change.

We all know how life never works out exactly the way we plan. We also know that sometimes things work out for the better and sometimes for the worse. This time it was some where in between. Sure enough just as the troopers predicted Joe Criminal headed for the back door unaware that a 2x4 was waiting to trip him up. He swung the back door open and plodded down the stairs only the 2x4 wasn’t at ankle height or even knee height. My daddy was actually positioned a little bit higher up on the yard than he thought and the 2x4 hit Joe Criminal right between the eyes. Then like David slaying Goliath the big man fell to the ground. Out cold.

Daddy yelled out to Ray “Got him!” and with that Ray ran around to the back of the house. Ray thought that daddy would need help with Joe since he was such a fighter. Ray stopped short when he saw the big man on the ground with little stars and birds flying in a circle over his head like an old Warner Brothers cartoon. He looked at my daddy with that “what have you done now?” look. My daddy just shrugged his shoulders and said “I guess he tripped when he came down the stairs.” Ray shot him a look and then the corners of his mouth went up and he said “Thank God because if you would have hit him with that there 2X4 we would have had a whole slew of paperwork to do.” With that they cuffed Joe and hauled him back to the car.

To read more of Trooper Bob go here: http://accidentalhousewife.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!83D9B59407F3C62F!1005.entry and here http://accidentalhousewife.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!83D9B59407F3C62F!996.entry