First Story of 2006

ALL TRUE.

We went down into the City for New Years Eve; A little snow, some outdoor Ice Skating and a midnight countdown with 15,000 Canadians. Nice.

Anyway, we were driving home around 1am. All the roads here are at least dual carriageways and Shirley points out that not far in front, a cop car keeps changing lanes. She's very observant like that.

Next thing, a little red car scoots left at the next junction and the cop car (lights now blazing) pounces. Ha! Running a red light? You're nicked mate!

So we, being manx, decide to take the left and have a peek at the poor (probably drunken) sod being chastised. I suggest Shirl pull out the camcorder and capture the typical American scene on tape.

But Canadian cops radio back to base before getting out of their own car, so nothing has yet happened. Boring! So we decide to do a U-turn and drive by again, hoping for better footage. Hmmm, still nothing happening.

However, the copper obviously got some bad news from HQ. As we drive past yet again two other cop cars have miraculously appeared. The wrong-doers car is now lit up with 3 sets of headlights and menaced by 6 Magnum wielding cops, safely shielded by their open doors. Two other cop cars handbrake into position to block off the entry to the road. They are sweet enough to let us pass. Clearly, we are British, and are therefore not involved.

Which means we have to go ROUND THE BLOCK to get more footage of the scene. By which time there are FOURTEEN cop cars, lights blazing, guns-a-toting and we can't get within 50 feet of the scene. Bastards.

We try approaching from another angles, but we start to feel a couple of the cops blocking the road are eyeing us (and our camcorder) suspiciously. We really should get a smaller model.

I wonder if the 'gangsta' was thinking "my god, manx people are soooo nosey!"

We'll miss this place.