Expletive Deleted

As you may have noticed, I don't swear on here. I'm not exactly sure why, I just don't.

But there is an awful lot of that sort of thing going on at work. From both sides of the door.

Here I use words like 'snap' and 'frack' and 'efargulate' and other nonsense that I make up as I go along. I guess I don't really want to offend anybody who might be reading this.

In the Academy they teach us "If it feels good, don't say it." and "Don't sink to their level" and that using profanity is "unprofessional". And those statements are for the most part, true.

But sometimes you have to get under their skins just a little and rock them back on their heels to get them to calm down and behave themselves. There are times when being calm and cool and professional just doesn't cut it. In order to gain control of a situation sometimes you have to get in their face and shout "Shut the frack up and sit the frack down, snaphole!" And they will drop back in their seat, stunned. And once you have their attention you can go back to being professional.

And alot of these punks don't seem to realize that I have been doing this for awhile and anything that comes out of their mouth holds very little shock value for me. And they quickly learn that anything they say I have already heard and already have a snappy comeback for.

While I was doing my Del Norte walk this evening a couple of the knuckleheads started shouting obscenities at me out of the Hive windows. Ignoring them at first, I finally raised a hand and showed them the universal sign that they were #1 in my book.

They seemed to take umbrage at that and one of them made an unverifiable allusion to my sexual preference. I raised my hand again and replied "Go BLEEP a BLEEP, boy!"

This seemed to make him angry and he said "You can't talk to me like that!"

I repeated my gesture and my statement.

He said "I'll file paperwork on you, BLEEP! What's your name?"

And all he heard back was laughter as I walked on down the fence line.

I know it wasn't professional. But then I knew if he wasn't locked in a cell he wouldn't have the balls to talk to me like that to my face out on the yard. And false bravado is a refuge of the coward.

Later on in the evening I had to deliver something down to the Hive. On the way out somebody shouted out their window. I turned slightly and he asked me (how do I put this delicately?) to inquire as to the dimensions of one of his body parts.

I just waved a hand and replied "I don't have time for small talk!" and walked away. Someone in another wing thought that was pretty hilarious and was still laughing as I left. And the one who asked me the original question suddenly had nothing more to say.

So that time being professional worked just fine.

It's a fine line, sometimes. You have to know where and when to cross it and who with.

Friday (Yayy... Friday!) will be Watergate Day and Eat Your Vegetables Day. Pfui. How many of you remember Watergate? It will also be Dump The Pump (?) Day and the National Day of Prayer For Law Enforcement Officers. We need all the help we can get, sometimes.

The Institutional Mouth

It still amazes me sometimes how supposed "adults" will act and speak. I suppose it shouldn't after all of this time, but it still makes me shake my head now and then.

Supposedly, I'm one of the "cool" officers. I don't start any crap and if you ask me calmly and politely for something and you have it coming, I will do my best to get it. But some of them just don't get that. And they seem to think that I won't remember who talked to me like I was some sort of trash just the other day. But I do remember.

And when they don't get what they want, they cuss at me some more.

I wish we were allowed to bring recording devices inside the fence. I'd record what these little punks say to me through the door or the window and send a copy of it home to their mother.

Wouldn't she be proud of her boy then?

Sometimes I do cuss back. It's unprofessional of me, I know. But when you are in a foreign country, you have to learn the native language. The same thing applies. And what they don't realize is that I have been around alot longer than they have and have a much better command of the language and I can cuss them right into a corner and make them look very very young and very stupid.

But that's not really all that hard.

So let's sum the whole thing up. I'm the person who brings you your food. And your clothes. And your mail. And gets you on the telephone. And gives you recreation. And toilet paper. And gives you showers.

And you want to talk to me like I'm a dog and expect me not to do anything about it?

I don't fuc*ing think so.