God's Speed To You, My Four Brothers In Blue.

Breaking into cars

I got paid to break into a car.

Nice lady has an infant and a toddler, along with a buggy full of groceries from walmart. She puts the infant into his carseat and puts the groceries in the car. For whatever reason, lays her purse and car keys on the driver's seat. The inevitable happened and her infant was locked in. Thankfully it wasn't blistering hot outside.

We used the break-in kit (officially called a lock-out kit) to start working on the door. If you've never seen one of these things, it has a small plastic wedge, an inflatable bladder, and a long rod that is also bendable.

To make a boring story shorter, We used the wedge to pry the top part of the door away from the frame enough so I could shove the bladder in along the back edge of the door and inflate it. We then stuck the rod in through the gap and hooked the lock, unlocking the door.

The baby was still sleeping, a little hot, but fine. No damage to the car, not even a scratch.

Mom did make the comment about buying one of the kits and keeping it in her trunk. I managed to bite my tongue, but I wanted to ask her how she planned to get it out of the trunk if her keys were locked in the car. It's a great thought, but not quite planned well enough.


This is why my keys stay on a carabiner attached to my belt loop. I've never once locked them in the car since I started doing that.

I broke some ribs today...

...but they weren't mine.

We were sent to a cardiac arrest call this afternoon, inside a local nursing home. The lady was old and we didn't get any of the circumstances surrounding how they found her in arrest. As is usual with many nursing homes, we were told CPR was in progress. The truth? 3 Dr's and 2 nurses were in the room watching her die. They'd placed a CPR board under her and that was it.

We immediately put the defibrillator pads on her and she was in a workable rhythm, but pulseless and it wasn't organized enough for a pulse anyways. Since everyone else was just standing around, I started doing CPR while the paramedics split tasks, one intubating and the other drawing drugs from the drugbox. The other EMT attempted to start an IV.

The cardiac monitors we use gauge how effective your compressions are. I was watching the monitor screen as I did CPR and I immediately felt 2 ribs pop, back to back. Within another minute, another 3 had popped as well. It's always a horrible feeling for me to do that. My only bit of consolement is that I was doing CPR effectively, the patient was very old and frail.

Once we got a tube dropped and finally got an IV, the first round of Epi and Atropine went in. No changes noted on the monitor, so CPR continued. We pushed the 2nd round of drugs a few minutes later and prepared to call the hospital to ask for orders to terminate CPR. We double-checked the lack of pulse and found good radials. By the time we got her to the truck, the pulse was gone again. CPR was resumed and I bailed out to drive my own truck to the hospital. My partner rode in to assist the other medic.

When she was rolled into the ER, she had a pulse again. Unfortunately, it was probably only the drugs working, I doubt she is still alive.

I'm not very used to this territory yet, so I can't really speak about how all nursing homes are, but my first impressions are not very good. I know not all are bad, but most of the ones I see are. This one is very clean and they were great about leading us to the room. It's just a shame nobody was actually doing anything to help the lady survive.

back at it

Back on full duty now. My first shift back was pretty uneventful.

Hope to get something interesting going on soon.

Why I carry a gun

Stolen from an email I received from my father this afternoon. Truer words couldn't be spoken and I wholeheartedly believe in this.

My old grandpa once said to me, "Son, there comes a time in every man's life when he stops bustin' knuckles and starts bustin' caps and usually it's when he becomes too old to take an ass whoopin'. Personally, I carry a gun because I'm too young to die and too old to take an ass whoopin'."

I don't carry a gun to kill people.
I carry a gun to keep from being killed.

I don't carry a gun to scare people.
I carry a gun because sometimes this world can be a scary place.

I don't carry a gun because I'm paranoid.
I carry a gun because there are real threats in the world.

I don't carry a gun because I'm evil.
I carry a gun because I have lived long enough to see the evil in the world.

I don't carry a gun because I hate the government.
I carry a gun because I understand the limitations of government.

I don't carry a gun because I'm angry.
I carry a gun so that I don't have to spend the rest of my life hating myself for failing to be prepared.

I don't carry a gun because I want to shoot someone.
I carry a gun because I want to die at a ripe old age in my bed, and not on a sidewalk somewhere tomorrow afternoon.

I don't carry a gun to make me feel like a woman.
I carry a gun because women know how to take care of themselves and the ones they love.

I don't carry a gun because I feel inadequate.
I carry a gun because, unarmed and facing three armed thugs, I am inadequate.

I don't carry a gun because I love it.
I carry a gun because I love life and the people who make it meaningful to me.

"Police Protection" is an oxymoron.
Free citizens must protect themselves.

Police do not protect you from crime; they usually just investigate the crime after it happens and then call someone in to clean up the mess.

Remember the average response time to a 911 call is over 4 minutes.The average response time of a Glock 40 is 1400 Feet Per Second.

Totally unproductive weekend

This is the view I've enjoyed for the majority of my weekend. I've lounged around and done not much more than torment the cat with the laser pen. No matter how dizzy he gets, or how much he runs, he always comes back for more. At least, once he catches his breath.

And yes, he will chatter if he can't get to the light.

The only other thing I've done this weekend has been going on the weekly grocery run at wally world, and drawing. Not much, but it's what I wanted to do, so I did it.

crummy week

Nothing fun or really remotely interesting happened this week. I was supposed to be helping out with a class but being on light duty threw a HUGE monkey-wrench into those plans. I was told that I wasn't even allowed to go watch. Well, fuck.

I got pulled away from the 911 center 3 days to kill trees for a chief. Let me tell you how exciting that is. I hated that job last time I was hurt and I hate is just as much, if not more, now.

The only good thing is that I had my sketchbook with me and sat down and drew a bit while waiting on the xerox.


I started some new exercises at PT thursday and they really screwed me up. I started hurting during PT, and it only got worse. Granted, I haven't really slept all that well since I was injured, but thursday night was miserable. I was up all night, my neck hurt, my shoulders even hurt, drugs didn't help either. I ended up calling out sick from work. Thankfully, capt seemed understanding. Or at least she was nice about it. She'd asked me to call her later that afternoon, I think it was 330 when she called me. I'd woken up a few minutes earlier and went right back to sleep once off the phone with her. I'm feeling better today.

Now I'm just worried about Monday when I go see my Dr. again.