Thursday, August 16, 2012

COPS: Ft. Lauderdale

An armed robber tried to avert capture by taking to the water from the beach right behind us! Fun!
A lot of people don't really like Ft. Lauderdale.  I'll admit it, I'm no Florida-phile, but Ft. Lauderdale is one of those places that make me cock my head to the side and chuckle.  It's so, so...weird.  Kinda glitzy yet kinda trashy with a healthy dose of Jersey Shore muted only by the innately slower pace of life in the lower latitudes.  If nothing else, it is a boater's paradise and a people-watchers heaven.

While we were sitting at breakfast along the beach the other day about twenty cop cars sped up from different directions and surrounded an area of beach just to the south of us.  "What the heck...?" we wondered aloud as our eggs fell from our forks.  More cop cars sped around the corner and came to screeching halts with the others.  If there was ever a question if your Florida tax dollars are going towards getting the "bad guys", let me assure you: they are! An episode of cops was literally unfolding before our eyes.  Neato! The waiters started coming out of the restaurant in curiosity and all the big-breasted and overly toasted runners and roller bladers* came to a sweaty halt to watch the scene unfold.

"They don't come out like this when someone drowns, right?" I asked the waiter.  "Nah" he replied casually  "a guy drowned last week and they just sent out one measly cop car".  We continued to stare at the beach wondering what the heck was going on.  Then the telltale sound of a helicopter blade could be heard as it swooped overhead.  "I'm guessing whoever it is, they either killed someone or have a gun" I speculated.  We all continued to ogle from the sidewalk to try and discern what was going on when two Miami-vice style speed boats stopped on the water. That's when we saw it.  A spec of a person flailing around in the ocean, struggling to swim.  The water police yanked the guy out of the water, cuffed him and off they went.  Dude tried to make a clean getaway by swimming to the Bahamas, except he overlooked one minor detail: he couldn't swim.  It made me laugh out loud.  Poor fella.

A very tan jogger came by and gave us the whole story because she saw the whole thing go down and was VERY excited about this fact.  Apparently the guy had robbed a woman at gunpoint, stolen her jeep, sped away and when the cops caught up to him (which didn't take long - tax dollars hard at work!), he ran into a bus stop, took out a palm tree and made a mad dash for the ocean. Gotta love adrenaline, or maybe it was the sunshine that got to his head?  Sunshine can do that, you know!

So yeah. Ft. Lauderdale is weird. But when I can see something like that transpire before 8am, all against the backdrop of a white sand beach and swaying palms - well, I also kind of dig it.

Pale invaders and tanned crusaders 
Are worshipping the sun 
On the corner of "walk" and "don't walk" 
Somewhere on US 1 
I'm back to livin' Floridays 
Blue skies and ultra-violet rays 
Lookin' for a better day.
-Jimmy Buffett, Floridays- 

Love,
Brittany, Scott & Isla

*Yeah, people still roller blade! Surprised me too!

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

Based on the number of wackos in this country willing to spray lead in all directions when confronted by the police, I'm grabbing the family and heading into a building or looking for other cover as opposed to gawking at a scene like this. It's not worth the risk of seeing what's happening with all of the other spectators.

Christy said...

Ha... Couldn't agree with you more about FLL. When I worked on Cruise Ships we often had turnaround days there. My friends and I would head off to the grocery store or Einsteins' Bagels and just watch all of the weirdness. Without fail, every week, something bizarre would walk/run/rollerblade or drive by while we enjoyed our precious hours off...
Men: Blue Lamé Go-go shorts are not attractive.

Laurie said...

at least it wasn't another face-eater!

Windtraveler said...

@Anonymous - agreed, there are a lot of wackos in the world today, but we were pretty certain we were far enough away from the "action". If there was any doubt, we most likely would not have gawked!!

Jill, Tim and Toby Dog said...

South Florida is a country onto itself. We lived in West Palm for a winter and the stories we have from those 7 months far outnumber the ones from YEARS we've lived in New England.

Fantastic Buffett quote - love that song!

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