I Leapt from a Twelve Story Building and all I got was a Blister on My Pinky Toe

Movies are destroying our reality.

Nowadays, when a person passes away in a hospital, often times the first thing that we think is “they must not have gotten improper medical care.” Why? Because modern medicine is not to be trusted? No (for the purposes of this argument, I’m not including pharmaceutical companies).

It’s because Dr. House can cure just about any life-threatening illness in an hour.

I’m guilty too. I can’t tell you how many times I tried to use the “Vulcan Neck Pinch” when I was a kid. As it turns out, you can’t debilitate your friends with a simple touch on the shoulder (but don’t let that stop you from trying. It’s fun).

And I can’t imagine the shock that people get when they punch someone in the face and don’t actually knock them out (yes, I spend a lot of time being concerned about the face-punchers of the world). When the reality of it is that if a person is knocked unconscious by a blow to the head, there probably has been some serious damage done. At the very least, a concussion.

And yet we continue to jump from burning buildings. We trust that our SUVs are going to save our stupid lives no matter how recklessly we drive them (if they don’t, it’s a design flaw and Ford Motors must pay). We search in vein for amazing and spacious, yet affordable, apartments. We live under the delusion that Halle Berry has talent.

The reason that I bring this up is because of the ridiculous things that I heard on the news this morning. It had to do with the incident that occurred in New Orleans. In case you don’t know, an aggravated man (in a suit) threatened police with a knife after he punched a store clerk in the face (the clerk never lost conciousness). About 100 cops followed the dude down the street with their weapons drawn until the aggravated man made a threatening move and three of the cops fired, killing him.

All of this was caught on video, of course. And as we all know, if it’s on video and we see it, then we become divinely qualified as experts. So opinions about the shooting are flying all over the place.

Now, I’m not here to defend the cops (personally, I don’t like cops). Nor am I here to justify the man with the knife. My purpose is not to judge the situation at all.

But man, it’s quite interesting to listen to all the “couch commissioner’s” theories as to what the police should have done. There were all the usual ones, non-lethal bullets (which occasionally do kill people, how’s that for a lawsuit?), bean bags (not the kind for sitting in), discourse (always a popular one, after all, knife-wielding weirdoes are known for their sharp debate skills), let the guy go (this one always baffles me, and yet it’s always proposed)…

And then there are the ones that come from people who obviously watch too many action movies.

Shoot him in the leg! Or the arm! Better yet, position a team of CIA sharp-shooters in triangulated positions on the roofs of nearby buildings, when the word is given (via walkie-talkie with a phrase like “the chicken’s in the hen-house” or “go for green” or something), shoot the knife from the man’s hand! At the worst, he’ll lose a fingertip, right?!

I’m sure that somewhere there’s a police force out there who could pull this off, but not in New Orleans. I’ve seen the tape (most of it, they don’t show the part where he gets “taken out”). The New Orleans cops are just lucky that they didn’t kill themselves.

And this is the second time I’ve seen cops do this. They did here in LA not too long ago. So I have a question for the people who run the police academy; I understand that you’re trained to aim at the “center mass…”

But who the hell is training the cops to shoot at a subject while standing around them in a circle?!

When I was a kid, I saw an illustration of this exact phenomenon. It was in a book called “Truly Tasteless Jokes.” It was placed over a caption that read “Polish Firing Squad.”

While I don’t think that it’s funny to make fun of the fine people of Poland (or any ethnicity. Truly Tasteless Joke books were horribly racist, I hope they don’t print them anymore, but really, are kids nowadays going to get jokes about the Italian army? “There was a World War 2?!”) I think the point is made.

And every time I see cops do this, I can’t help but think of a certain country in central Europe.


Fun Fact: I woke up this morning with the theme song from “Smokey and the Bandit” stuck in my head. I have no idea why. But I did.

Here, sing along with the song in my head:


East bound and down, loaded up and truckin'
We gonna do what they say can't be done
We've got a long way to go and a short time to get there
I'm east bound, just watch ol' 'Bandit' run

Keep your foot hard on the pedal
Son, never mind them brakes
Let it all hang out 'cause we got a run to make
The boys are thirsty in Atlanta and there's beer in Texarcana
And we'll bring it back no matter what it takes

East bound and down, loaded up and truckin'
We gonna do what they say can't be done
We've got a long way to go and a short time to get there
I'm east bound, just watch ol' 'Bandit' run...

East bound and down, loaded up and truckin'
We gonna do what they say can't be done
We've got a long way to go and a short time to get there
I'm east bound, just watch ol' 'Bandit' run...

Ol' Smokey's got them ears on
He's hot on your trail
He ain't gonna rest 'til you're in jail
So you got to dodge 'im and you got to duck 'im
You got to keep that diesel truckin'
Just put that hammer down and give it hell...

East bound and down, loaded up and truckin'
We gonna do what they say can't be done
We've got a long way to go and a short time to get there
I'm east bound, just watch ol' 'Bandit' run...