In truth, it was a difficult day, as any fool could plainly
see. First there was the dead deer,
which required a police escort (two cars), which in turn required a security
vehicle to guide the police to where the deer was. My partner took his vehicle to meet the police and I took mine to locate the dead deer. The dead deer turned out to be a live fawn doing what fawns do (i.e. lie perfectly still without moving). Clearly, someone had NOT been paying attention in second grade, because I remember that exact class, as well as the pictures of fawns we all drew on construction paper. (You never appreciate the white crayon until you actually need it for something, and then war breaks out.)
I radioed my partner to apprise him of the sitch and found he was now reporting to a dead rattlesnake in a different location altogether. At least, on first report the rattlesnake was dead; then we were advised via radio that it was alive. All kind of resurrection was going on! A live rattlesnake outranks a dead
deer (especially one that is actually a live fawn), and events now required the personal presence of the Security Operations Manager (SOM). Since
my partner was busy securing the rattlesnake scene and acting as escort to
the two police cars, I was dispatched with my ride-along trainee to pick up the SOM and
proceed to the location.
With the two of them in my vehicle, I pulled up to a loading
dock wedged between two buildings set against a hillside. We were greeted with
the sight of two police cars, a security vehicle and about a half dozen people peering into a plastic garbage can from a safe distance. The three of us piled out of the truck and joined this group. It turned out that the building manager had caught
the snake quite a while ago and put it in the tall can in order to take it further up the hill and let it loose. He did this all the time, because snakes were attracted to the mice that were attracted to the garbage dumpsters on the loading dock. However, he thought we might like to see the snake first, so he called security. Everyone chatted for awhile, and then went back to work. I wrote up a full report, and this is it.
