The phone conversation that I had on the drive home from work today began with a 30 second pre-recorded message which repeated for about 2 minutes. Then went something like this…
Operator: “9-1-1, what’s your emergency?”

Me: “I just observed a vehicle nearly cause 3 accidents in the span of about a minute.”

Operator: “Really? What’s he doing?”

Me: “Well, he swerved into another lane and cut someone off. Then he changed back to the same lane and ran a lady completely off the road. He then passed me on the right, going off the road himself, went into a slide and nearly hit me as he came back on the road. He then ran straight through a red light.”

Operator: “What’s you location?”

I gave her the location, an address I believe to be in the city of Elk Grove.

Operator: “I’m going to transfer you to the police department, please hold on.”

About 20 seconds of pre-recorded message later…
Operator #2: “Police department. What are you reporting.”

Me: “I just observed a vehicle nearly cause 3 accidents in the span of about a minute.”

Operator: “Really? What did he do?” Notice this is only a variant of “What happened,” and in no way sounds like, “What direction is he headed?”, “What kind of car is he driving” or ” What does he look like?” I could have provided all three.

Me: “Well, he swerved into another lane and cut someone off. Then he changed back to the same lane and ran a lady completely off the road…”

I tried to brush off my frustrated feeling of déja vu as I repeated my story, again, for the second time. “He just ran through another red light,” I added.

Operator #2: “Where are you right now?” I gave her my location which by now was nowhere near where I last saw Dale Earnheart Jr.

Operator #2: “Hold on while I get an exact location for you.” Which, again, sounds nothing like “Could you see what he looks like?”, “Did he have any distinguishing marks?”, or “Did he have a large number ‘8’ painted on the side of his car?” (Yes, yes and no.)

Me: “Actually, that’s the location for me, but the last place I saw him is in the intersection of Calvine and Elk Grove Florin.”

Operator #2: “Really? That’s strange. I don’t show an intersection of Calvine and Elk Grove Florin.”

Thinking I knew exactly what was going on, I recalled that Elk Grove Florin turns into South Watt right at that intersection. Does the Elk Grove Police Department really not know that Calvine crosses Elk Grove Florin? Every day as I drive up Calvine I believe I come to a sign that says Elk Grove Florin.

Me: “Oh, how about South Watt then?”

Operator #2: “Oh that’s the county. I’ll have to transfer you to county P.D. Hold on.”

Click…Busy signal… which I listened to for the entire drive home and another 2 minutes as I sat in the driveway just in case some idiot from Elk Grove Police was still on the line and noticed the incessant “Eehhnt–eehhnt–eehhnt–eehhnt” and thought “Someone might be dying right now, I’d better see if I can help.”

It was then that I remembered a similar incident that occurred a little over a year ago on almost the exact same spot. I was driving the family to dinner at a nearby restaurant when we pulled up alongside a neighbor of ours who just happens to be a sexual offender, happens to be not registered and who, even when he’s not at his most paranoid, thinks that it was we who spearheaded the efforts to have him removed from the neighborhood. Well I guess he saw our pulling up alongside him as an opportunity to try to run us off the road less than 100 yards from where today’s episode occurred. We avoided his lateral efforts and minutes later pulled into the restaurant parking lot where we spotted a Sacramento Police Department cruiser and flagged him down. We gave him the history of our neighbor, told him what had happened and even provided a description of the car and plates.

Officer: “Oh, Elk Grove Florin and Calvine? That’s the city of Elk Grove. You’ll have to call Elk Grove P.D.” He then headed inside to eat his dinner.

Standing alone, today’s 5 minute phone call to 9-1-1 only to be connected to a busy signal was an insult. Paired with the previous incident and the realization that the left hand has no idea what area the right hand is patrolling makes me wonder where our tax dollars are going, but more importantly, makes me wonder why I even bother calling 9-1-1 in the first place. I’ll just let the guy go and hear about the hit-and-run death on the news that night.

At least I’ll have the pleasure of saying, “Hey, I saw that guy.”