The last leg of my walk was a greatest hits album of Bracknell absurdity: burglars with bin bags, missing false teeth, Harry Potter film sets, and a showdown with a bloke known as “Half a Thumb.” But tucked between the madness were the moments that mattered — the ones that stitched my life together.
One morning Crown Row Post Office was literally orgasmic. I was on patrol with my saviour Pete Carter and we discovered that the phone lines had been cut. We then left after Pete ensured that he had loudly announced on the police radio that everything was fine. He then set up observations on the scene and we simply waited. Watching some roof slates cascade down the incline was stunning enough but the appearance of a bloke’s head with fully laden black bin bags full of cash was enough to give me a stiffy. As we rounded up the burglars I excitedly exclaimed – “This is fucking better than sex!” I was in my early 20s and still relatively naive.
A yomp over to Harmanswater and the New Town Pippin – still the ugliest looking boozer in town. Turning up to an injury road traffic accident one Friday on the nearby zebra crossing I dutifully picked up the debris after the injured party – an elderly chap who had been crossing the road – was ferried to hospital by ambulance. My roadside haul included a pair of false teeth. It had always been drummed into me that one of the most obvious threats to a career in the police was the handling of property. Bagging the gnashers I thought no more of the property jinx. The next day an anxious daughter asked where her dad’s teeth were as he couldn’t consume anything other than soup at the hospital and he was ravenous. The poor bloke had to wait until Monday when Stan the Man the property man was back at work and could open the main store. He’d been away for the weekend uncontactable and there wasn’t a spare fucking key!
I couldn’t resist walking past our former home in The Warren – previously the abode of Dodi Fayed’s mistress before he embarked on his tragic relationship with Princess Diana.
I did remember him since he had a deformed digit and he was subsequently forever known as “Half a Thumb.” Without making further eye contact I calmly replied, “Do you fancy getting nicked again?” He skulked off and I breathed a fucking massive sigh of relief!
Close by was Bullbrook Community Centre – the scene of the count where I won my first of my three elections before I decided not to stand again because of that colossal cunt Boris Johnson.
On a lighter note, as I wandered past Mount Pleasant — once the refuge of countless single cops who’d finally escaped the tyranny of single quarters, and affectionately christened Mount Everything thanks to the alleged Olympic level bed hopping inside — I couldn’t help but grin. The place always reminds me of Stonehead’s cave: our own low rent tribute to Gary’s flat in Men Behaving Badly, only with even less furniture and considerably more despair. Beyond the beer fridge, I genuinely struggle to recall a single item that qualified as décor, but that never stopped us piling in there to watch the telly, trade gossip and hide from the madness of the metropolis whenever the shift gods granted us a moment’s peace.
Heading into my old Priestwood beat I was reminded of an incident proximate to the back of the shops. A report of some yobs playing football with a tin can was causing a nuisance to a resident with a newborn. I instinctively knew that this would piss me off too. I was also with a probationer constable who was on his beat patrol with me showing him the ropes. After telling them all to move, all but one complied. My patience was already wearing thin. This little gobshite gave me some mouth and I simply replied, “If you don’t fuck off, I’ll shove that can so far up your arse that when you clean your teeth it will clank.” He promptly fucked off. Years later the same officer admitted that he was convinced that we would both lose our jobs. He was traumatised.
If you liked this little meander, you may like the book even more!
Blue Lights with a hint of Green
Laughter, heroes, villains, corruption, fraud, sex, selling soap, fast cars, the Conservative Party, the Great Wall of China, and an unhealthy love affair with Slough! Forget solving crime and maintaining order this was the real Police! The story of a cop who just wouldn’t follow the rules! Based, in part, on the active imagination and memoirs of a real-life ex-cop. Blue lights with a hint of green: inside the nick no one can hear you scream!
@ iankirke.bsky.social