The Really Crazy People

Back in 10 house again this evening. The Brute has the week off so they stuck me down there as a fill-in.

A very strange thing happened right after I got there. I was down in F-wing looking for something to read when I heard a voice behind me. It was Uncle T!

"What are you doing here?"

"I guess I'm working here with you!"

"Really?" (What the snap?)

"Yeah, when I came in Lt Baby Boy told me to go to 10 house, so here I am!"

I was bewildered. I wasn't complaining, but I was bewildered. He's assigned to the yard and they couldn't really pull him without a real good reason. And why they would send him to a house that already had a sergeant.....

But who am I to make waves? We went down to the office and drank some coffee and chatted for a bit. In the meantime, the yard guys were wondering where their sergeant was. And the confusion filtered up the chain. Lt Farmer called on the radio and Uncle T answered with my call sign, which was "T-5". When asked where he was he stated "Housing Unit 10".

A few seconds later St Francis called for T-5 and I answered and he got all confused.

By this time Capt CJ got into it and was demanding to know why there was no sergeant out on the yard and why we had two in 10 house. Lt BB backpedaled and said it was all a miscommunication and he was actually telling Uncle T that I was in 10 house, not that he was.

So Uncle T went back to the yard and we all had a good laugh about it. Apparently St Francis was scared to death that he was going to have to run the yard. Like he couldn't and hasn't done it a bazillion times before. But he's a big chicken when it comes to admitting that he knows anything at all. He plays that "I'm a big dumb doofus" card alot.

He's big and he's a doofus. But he's not dumb by any stretch of the imagination.

And so the night went on. I was lucky and unlucky.

Luckily Sgt Moon was in 30 house so I didn't have to worry about them. Unlucky because he wrote two violations and since he can't read his own, I had to go read them for him in that little oven of an office of his.

And while I was reading those violations, one of the "Security Aides" from CTC was trying to call me. CTC is where they keep the offenders that are way too crazy to be out in general population. I know almost all of those guys over there and they all know me, for the most part. They do get pretty crazy at times.

When I got to CTC they said that one of their offenders had made a remark about killing himself. So I trotted on down and it was old Willie. The story goes that Willie had been a cab driver years and years ago. A couple people had stiffed him on a fare and tried to run off. He followed them and killed them both and stuffed them into the trunk of his cab. He drove around with them in there for awhile until people complained about the bad odor and someone at the cab company opened the trunk. He was kind of busted after that. And already well on his way to being completely crazy.

So anyway Willie had remarked that he was going to kill himself and we were obligated to take him down to the Hive and put him on suicide watch. He was already pretty excited when I got there and got even more wound up when he found out where he was going.

And the more Willie gets excited the more he sounds just like that little Indian on "Go Go Gophers".
For an example of that if you've never seen the cartoon go here. Go Go Gophers.

Luckily someone else showed up for the escort and I had some more backup in case he went completely off the deep end before I could get him cuffed up. And we got him dressed and the cuffs on him and he went on his way without incident.

Then I got to fill out the Suicide Intervention form myself and run it up to central for the Captains signature.

Whew! That was more Sergeanting than I had done as of yet. Between Sgt Moons hot little office and the adrenaline dump when I thought I might have to wrestle with this big lunatic got me all hot and sweaty.

And the very last thing I did was to rinse out the coffee pot in the office. And broke it. Whacked it on the corner of the table and cracked it all the way down the front. Rats! So now I have to go buy a replacement carafe this weekend. The older guy on midnights with the Jimmy Swaggart hair is going to be really vexed with me until I get it fixed.

What a pain.

I would remark that this Sergeant business isn't all it's cracked up to be, but I know better.

So Wednesday is going to be Card Playing Day and National Chocolate Day. An annual flour fight festival, ''Els Enfarinats,'' has taken place in the Spanish town of Ibi in Alicante.
A spoof army dressed in full uniform and other bizarre characters engaged in a boisterous battle using flour and eggs as their weapons.
The 200-year-old event takes place every year on the 28 December to coincide with the Day of the Innocents, the equivalent of April Fools' Day.

How's that for a fun holiday tradition?