Glendora Police: Protecting and Serving RaiderNation

Well Tuesday-Thursday came and went without a post and somehow we all made it through.

So here's the weekend in a thousand words.This is pretty much the best picture in the world. The only thing that could make it better is a boy and a goat playing on a trampoline.




Tuesday Cyndi and I had to go to court because we were being sued by some rude people who either thought we were rich or had more insurance than we do. They were after us for about $50,000 dollars. In case you're American, that's a lot of money. If you knew the details of the accident, and were me, you would probably have some horrible things to say about them but I would tell you to mellow out.

I got into an accident back in 2003. It was a non-injury accident and my car had minimal damage. The other guy's car was a mess though. The entire passenger side of his car was scraped or dented from the front to rear fender. That's right, just scraped and dented. It was a very minor accident, or I guess a major fender bender, but everyone was okay. Nobody went to the hospital, nobody got hurt. His car was obviously going to need a lot of body work, but there were no screeching tires, no air bags deployed, not even a skid mark- just a guy that initially wanted to fight me. I guess I should've let him punch me because he later decided that he should sue us. We've known since June and since then, off and on, I would worry about it. And off and on I would pray about it.

Okay I'm going to subject myself to a bit of scrutiny here, it might sound weird, but I kinda' pray all the time. However, I'm not the guy who goes around asking for a bunch of stuff or outcomes that clearly favor me. If I ask for anything, its' for the ability to conform to what God wants and whatever I need to do what I'm supposed to do. I don't know if that passes Evangelical muster but that's me right now. I like to know what to do, and when I'm praying, it's often for that.

For example, my wife and I can't have a baby. We don't know why. She's had miscarriages and no one can seem to tell us why. My sperm does what it's supposed to do, and does it quite well according to doctors. My wife's parts are all in order, and we have sex. But no babies. No one can tell us why.

I want babies. Cyndi wants babies. God knows we want babies, but still, no babies. All I know to do is keep having sex and hope for a baby, but at the same time know that we may never have biological children.

As sad as I get about that, or even when I'm nostalgic for things that never were, I'm glad about who/ where/ what I am. It's not a matter of "focusing" on the positive, or pretending there's is nothing to be sad about. Neither is it a matter of looking at crap and saying it's not the big smelly steaming pile of crap that it is. I mean in the bigger picture, I see it all, or I think I at least see as much as I can, there... or here.. or wherever it is. I want babies, but more than that I want to be who God wants me to be. That guy might have bilogical children or not, adopted children or not, kids that just come to live with us 'cos they need a place to stay or not. I don't know.

So we were being sued and I didn't know how to pray for the whole mess or even what the right thing to do was. To be honest, all I knew was that I didn't know anything except that we would be okay. So our court date was coming. God knew what I wanted to do but I had no idea what God wanted to do. Really all I knew was whatever happened happened. And what happened was they settled for a very small amount (comparatively) and our lawyer forgot to tell us. Seriously. They settled for $6500, a generous appraisal of the cost of their car, but it slipped our lawyer's mind to tell us. Well, it slipped the insurance company's lawyer's mind to tell us. To coin an Evangelical phrase, "It was a God Thing." But then again, it would still be a "God Thing" if we were in the hole fifty large. It's a "God Thing" that we don't have a baby. It'll be a "God Thing" if we do.

I haven't said every thing is a "God Thing." In fact I only use that phrase to obliquely poke fun at the idea of saying winning the Amazing Race is a "God Thing" but losing it would be the devil's work, or to subtly counter the idea that filling your womb with a dozen embryos and having a litter of children is somehow more God's will than not.

I am with God, that's what I know. I am in God, so sue me. In all of creation right now, any one of us knows pain. And any one of us can imagine ourselves alone in suffering.

If there were such a thing as the Christ, he wouldn’t allow this type of suffering, the worst there is, our suffering, to exist. If the Christ were real, none of us would be suffering the way we are. That is, we would think that if we could even conceive of any suffering other than our own. So we mostly, most often, lead our lives desperately pursuing our own relief. And eventually in one way or another vainly demand, “Are you not the Christ? Save yourself and us!” It falls short, we get no answer, so we press on to the next vanity, looking for relief: more knowledge, deeper thinking, a better job, a bigger house, a better church, a life with purpose, a death with meaning, always looking for something to dull our senses, but always frustrated because creation seems so resistant to treating us as its center and relieving our pain. Then we die, knowing neither God nor ourselves, knowing only that despite our best efforts, despite all of our striving and desire for "God Thing" moments where we get what we want, death wins. Ha ha. Unless, of course that's not the way it is.

Oh, another thing. Last night on route 66 I saw a Glendora PD convention behind a black SUV. I have no idea why the couple was pulled over or what they did that required they sit on the curb rather than in their car. I also don't know why it took so many cops to pull over and then let go what looked to be a teenage couple. Not knowing any of that I am not going to say it happened because they were brown. It may be that the GPD loves the Raiders too and they want to have a tailgate party with every black or silver SUV and truck in Glendora with a Raiders window decal driven by a Latino. Whatever the reason for the line of cops, driving by, I was struck with an interesting idea: I think it would be fun to find out how often the GPD uses multiple units to pull over minorities versus non-minorities and young people versus older. I don't know how to do that though. So, any muckrakers out there can use this idea.

Do what you need to do, you don't even have to credit me as your inspiration, but find out how often Glendora uses single units for traffic stops, how often they use multiple police units in traffic stops and why. Maybe compare the demographic information between them all and get radio traffic transcripts to see what they say that leads to four units being necessary rather than one. It should be interesting and maybe even get you as the plaintiff in a civil rights law suit against a town that could probably use one. Wouldn't that be cool?

In other news: I'm taking my computer in to be fixed so I may not post for a while. That's just as well I suppose. I have a few hundred pages to read between now and Tuesday. Be good.