Give a cop a hug, or not.

After 54 years of living under the radar, 2009 is Yogi’s year for pissing policemen off. Earlier this year I got growled out via a loudspeaker from a cop car about 15 feet away from me at about 5:45 am.

Last Friday, I took a late lunch downtown and went for a run. On my walk back I crossed a street midblock about a block ahead of a police car. He pulled up to the intersection to the stop light facing north. I was going north, I wasn’t even thinking of him, I looked east and west and thre were no cars so I started across the sidewalk without a walk light. He honked his horn and yelled at me.

I went over there and asked him what was wrong. He was very angry. He said “I can’t believe that you jay walked right in front of me and now you are going cross that street against the light with me sitting right here.” I said sorry about that. He waved his arms and yelled, “Yeah well what up Bro” and burned rubber taking off.

So, I am a little puzzled. He wasn’t worried that I was doing anything that was endangering myself, him, or others. I was disrespecting him! By serial jaywalking!

I have been walking and running extensively around downtown and surrounding neighborhoods for 17 years. I hardly ever cross streets at intersections. Do you know why? Because it is dangerous that’s why! The cars turning don’t look for pedestrians. I cross mid block generally. No turners.

What is wrong with our policemen! I don’t think they are feeling the love. I’m not either.

I’ve always got along great with policemen until this year. I think that have very stressful jobs and are underpaid for what they do. My best friend in high school, Jeff Russell, eventually became an Albuquerque policeman and died in a car crash while on duty in 2002.

Anybody have any ideas about what we can do to make our policemen feel more secure?

6 thoughts on “Give a cop a hug, or not.

  1. Kathy

    Dang, guess that cop was having a bad day. Yogi you do seem to be ticking these Tulsa cops off lately. Behave yourself. 😉

  2. Sometimes Stephanie

    You’re such a rebel.
    It sounds like the problem is that they feel unappreciated and/or loved.

    If I were you I would carry around star stickers and give them out like prizes whenever you come across any law enforcement officer. Two for those that “catch” you breaking a law. Maybe create a little celebration dance to top it off.

    Yeah… that’s what I would do.

  3. irritated

    Create a distraction before you jaywalk. When I need to jaywalk I’ll often yell, “Donuts!” and point in the opposite direction.

    Works every time.

  4. Denise

    I haven’t been yelled at by a policeman in a very long time. In 1985 I was given three tickets in about as many weeks and could not believe it. One was a military policeman on the navy base, one was a motorbike officer and the other was in a police car. None of them were very nice to me, in fact downright nasty, and what I did wasn’t anything that bad. On the other hand my Dad was a police officer so I have a lot of respect for the police and still do for 99 percent – we’d be in deep you-know-what without them. I grew up with loads of police officers visiting our house, and we lived in a police house until I was 15. We had a lot of police dogs and their handlers visit us too who were friends of my Dad. I absolutely LOVED all those German Shepherds. They did their job when they had to but they were really good to us kids, treated us a lot better than those three policemen treated me during that month in 1985, says I with a laugh 🙂

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