Because of the stress that is inherant in police work, anything that can pull a laugh or break the tension is usually welcome just as long as when the dust all settles everyone involved is still laughing. Also, it is probably a good idea to remember that when it comes to humor, cops and most other emergency service workers march to a different drummer and sometimes the pranks that we find humorous may appear somewhat harsh or bizarre to the uninitiated.

There was the time that one of the guys found a mannequin in a trash dumpster while out on patrol. The legs of the dummy later materialized sticking out of the grill of a police car with a series of triangular pieces of white paper taped around the edge of the grill. It gave the uncanny appearance of a patrol car in the process of swallowing someone and they were low enough that they could not be seen from the driver's seat. The poor guy assigned to the car was out on patrol for almost an hour before he realized what had been done to his car.

I remember very well the time I came in one morning and was briefed by the graveyard shift about the events of the prior evening. Perhaps I was not quite as alert as I should have been or I would have noticed them hanging around even though they were free to go home. Walking down the hall I also failed to notice that my office door was closed even though I always left it open. When I pulled the door open I was standing nose to nose with a horse. I yelled and jumped back and even before I landed I heard the guys laughing and knew I'd been had. As it turned out, the night before some pranksters had stolen a full sized fiber glass horse from in front of a Western Wear shop and ditched it a block away. Our guys had found it and had decided that my office would be the perfect place to store it until day shift could return it to the storekeeper.

A good friend of mine was working as a receptionist in a doctor's office around the time Viagra first became popular. One night she was telling me about all of the items they were getting to promote the stuff. In talking further I learned that they had Viagra clocks, Viagra pens, Viagra watches and the list went on and on. Suddenly I was hit with what may not have been one of my best ideas. I decided to create a Viagra motif for my office. I already had a pretty good start as the walls were exactly the same shade of blue as the Viagra was.

Over the next few weeks she started bringing the stuff in to me.

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