I’m pretty much a legend at my local police department. I might even say this story is an urban legend…except that would indicate it is not true and I’m here to swear that it is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help me God. I love to tell the tale of The Burglar and The Baby almost as much as every detective in the Burglary Division. And so it goes…

Once upon a time, in the spring of ’89 when the flowers were blooming and the robins were singing, I was exactly 9.5 months pregnant. I kid you not–this child was supposed to be born in early May and my calendar told me it was nearing June with not one sign of labor. I was doing everything I could think of to have this baby…eating Mexican food, taking castor oil, standing on my head, riding roller coasters, and drinking a nightly concoction of bat wool mixed with eye of newt…all to no avail.

I was walking my five-year old to and from school every day in one last ditch effort to force the unpunctual squatter from my womb. One morning as we walked home, my highly-developed, keen observational skills noticed a car, occupied one time with a white female, in our neighbor’s driveway. It was that kind of land-barge car that looked like it had been in a demolition derby and it was definitely out-of-place in that drive-way. I also took note of the TV sitting on the sidewalk next to the car and the unkempt-long-haired-criminal-looking-guy toting loot out the door. In police work, these are called clues and I knew right off I had just become a pot-bellied, porcine, eye-witness to a crime.

I ambled casually across the street with said 5-yr. old in tow and watched as the burglar noticed me noticing him. Because criminals are smart, he knew I knew he was not the lawful owner of that TV, so he jumped in the land-barge with his skanky-legged girlfriend and lay rubber to make his get-away. Now, what I knew that he didn’t know was this street was only one-block long AND it was a cul-de-sac AND he went the wrong direction to get away. He wasn’t going anywhere except to the bottom of the street and right back up again. Like I said, criminals are super smart.

Now, because I had lots of vicarious police experience, I knew I needed to make a note of the license plate number on his return trip up the street. I got his tag number and dashed home as fast as my swollen feet and ankles would carry me. As we neared the house, I sent the 5-yr. old ahead to wake up daddy, who was about 5 hours off the midnight shift and about 3 hours into deep sleep. In good police-kid fashion, she burst into the house waving her arms around screaming at the top of her lungs, “Emergency! Emergency! Call 9-1-1! Call 9-1-1!” Now, I’m here to tell you that our personal police officer popped out of that bed like bread from a toaster and immediately began gathering towels and hot water to deliver The Baby. I guess, that was the only emergency he could imagine happening at our house that day, although that would have been a blessing and not an emergency.

Once the fog in his head cleared, he called the station and straight-away an officer was 10-76 to my location. I miraculously remembered the tag number and was able to give a decent description of The Burglar and the skanky-leg. Within 30 minutes, the police found The Burglar, the car, and all my neighbor’s worldly-possessions along with goods from 64 other burglaries.

Twelve hours later, The Baby was born.

I’m sure you are wondering what happened to The Burglar. They had him over a barrel thanks to the hard work of an exceptional albeit elephantine eye-witness and he subsequently confessed to 65 home burglaries and went to prison. And The Baby? Well, he grew up to be a police officer, of course!