[LOUD MALE SCREAMING]

March 30, 2012 3:30 PM

@Sheboyganscan attempts to transcribe everything that comes over the Sheboygan, Wisconsin police scanner. The fine folks at Something Awful have cherry picked a few gems.
posted by The Whelk (55 comments total)

Oh god, getting stuck in a tanning bed sounds like the ultimate nightmare.
posted by showbiz_liz at 3:39 PM on March 30, 2012

"teen created disturbance, left"

Yeah I had a good few years of that.
posted by griphus at 3:40 PM on March 30, 2012 [8 favorites]

Helluva lotta shit goes down in Sheboygan. Helluva lotta varied shit.
posted by pyrex at 3:41 PM on March 30, 2012 [4 favorites]

Sheboygan kids don't like school.
posted by New England Cultist at 3:47 PM on March 30, 2012 [4 favorites]

What on earth is "the house where kids who don't want to go to school go?" Is this just a viral tie-in for The Thief of Always?
posted by Sticherbeast at 3:51 PM on March 30, 2012 [3 favorites]

Poor kid has a stepdad who isn't a ninja. For shame.
posted by peeedro at 3:52 PM on March 30, 2012 [2 favorites]

I recently got my HAM License, and along with it, bought a Yaesu 857D for my truck. My morning commutes are much more entertaining now that I found the Dane County Sherrif Dispatch frequency - 155.685.

One morning last week or so, they got called for a boy who didn't want to go to school and had climbed out his bedroom window onto the roof of the house.

This week, they had a unruly 6 year old girl who slapped her mother.

Good times.
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 3:59 PM on March 30, 2012 [2 favorites]

I have an archive of these from my town:

"Woman called 911 from inside Kroger's [a supermarket], says she is drunk and needs an ambulance"

Man called at 9pm to report a hot dog vendor on the street without a permit

Man called at 10am to report trucks that were over the legal weight limit.

I didn't get the start of this incident, but
Officer: "we're complete, the kids were just doing some hardcore free running"

Dispatch: "Caller's 14 year old son was assaulted by a 15 year old."
Dispatch: "The 15 year old is now standing outside the caller's door asking her to bring her son out so he can assault him again"
posted by kiltedtaco at 4:05 PM on March 30, 2012 [5 favorites]

Another good read is the police log in the Carmel-by-the-Sea newspaper. A recent sample:

"Man on Dolores Street reported a woman drove by his store and yelled insults and curse words at him. He also found a sign glued to his window. Some damage occurred when he removed the sign"
posted by brundlefly at 4:08 PM on March 30, 2012

"9XX huron ave - woman's arm stuck in recliner" Hah!
posted by MegoSteve at 4:10 PM on March 30, 2012

Metafilter - Thinks she's part of the family; is not.
posted by pupdog at 4:24 PM on March 30, 2012 [9 favorites]

This reminds me that I had meant to see if there was online streaming for the Portland Police scanner. The local paper has one, but you have to use Real to listen. Jesus. Fortunately there's other options.

Of course, scanners have never sounded quite the same to me since You Are Listening to LA.
posted by cortex at 4:39 PM on March 30, 2012 [3 favorites]

I like to listen to the police scanner in my town. It's about 2.5 times the size of Shegoygan. As I read this post I heard, "Caller was a staff member of the hotel, states a waffle iron was stolen from the lobby, believe it was a guest. They would like a phone call".

What a fun world!
posted by PhillC at 4:42 PM on March 30, 2012 [4 favorites]

I just like the tone that these take when put into text. Like, whatever it is, it's no big deal and the cops are just gonna go look at it for a while but probably not really do anything. angry italophobe has mental issues; likes to sit by lake and watch seagulls. does not like seagulls.
posted by cmoj at 4:51 PM on March 30, 2012 [4 favorites]

This week, they had a unruly 6 year old girl who slapped her mother.

It's all fun and games until the kids get tasered [3, 4... seriously I just googled 'cops taser kid']
posted by delmoi at 4:51 PM on March 30, 2012 [1 favorite]

Many years ago, my mother got hooked on listening to an old police scanner she'd gotten from my grandmother, and when it died she bought a brand new one right away. The new one had not been on more than five minutes when she heard one of the local Blue Knights calling dispatch to say that he had my six-year-old brother "in custody" for doing something naughty in our neighborhood.

Good times...good times...
posted by briank at 4:54 PM on March 30, 2012 [2 favorites]

I've found the source of the disturbances.
posted by zippy at 5:03 PM on March 30, 2012 [4 favorites]

man, laughing at small-town people makes me feel kind of gross
posted by This, of course, alludes to you at 5:47 PM on March 30, 2012

Police scanners are amusing regardless of population density
posted by The Whelk at 5:48 PM on March 30, 2012 [6 favorites]

no, no thats cool. sorry i imagined connotations
posted by This, of course, alludes to you at 5:49 PM on March 30, 2012

They all sound like first lines of a David Lynch's script.
posted by surrendering monkey at 5:53 PM on March 30, 2012 [8 favorites]

As a small town person I can attest that police scanners are definitely something that small town people are into. We didn't get one until my parents became volunteer EMTs, but I guarantee that there was one in 90% of the homes in the township. Probably in all of Waushara and Marquette county, I can't vouch beyond that.



What. We never got cable TV.
posted by louche mustachio at 6:16 PM on March 30, 2012 [1 favorite]

So laughing at small town people makes me feel right at home.


(Sheboygan is way, way bigger than where I grew up. I mean, it's technically a city. The City of Cheese, Chairs, and Children, but still. A city.)
posted by louche mustachio at 6:21 PM on March 30, 2012

louche mustachio, my parents own a very small bit of land on the edge of Waushara County (Coloma to be exact).
posted by drezdn at 6:32 PM on March 30, 2012

"beaucoup hooch" is just the best thing ever, especially coming from a cop. I was so amused by it that I deliberated contemplated getting a police scanner for myself, but I realized that the reports probably drop off in hilarity pretty quickly as population size of the city increases.
posted by invitapriore at 6:36 PM on March 30, 2012 [2 favorites]

deliberated contemplated

Ahem! Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.
posted by invitapriore at 6:37 PM on March 30, 2012

There are apps for that. Seriously. I leave it to the reader to google it.
posted by Splunge at 6:43 PM on March 30, 2012

Drezdn - I am from Coloma. My parents still live there.

Your parents probably know my parents.
posted by louche mustachio at 7:30 PM on March 30, 2012

My favorite police blotter report comes straight outta Carrboro, NC. I am paraphrasing, but the report went something like this: Home invasion with theft reported at _____ Street on Tuesday afternoon. The resident reported theft of a pump action shotgun, seven thousand dollars in cash, and a 14 karat gold teeth grillz.
The streets don't get much rougher than they do in Carrboro.
posted by msali at 8:01 PM on March 30, 2012

The one about the angry italophobe and the seagulls is practically begging itself to be turned into a Seinfeld lost episode.
posted by Iosephus at 8:19 PM on March 30, 2012

The Arcata Eye police log was always a favorite.
posted by destro at 8:43 PM on March 30, 2012 [1 favorite]

While the teletypes are talkin' and the sirens roar
I'll be hoppin' on a freighter for a foreign shore
posted by Thomas Tallis is my Homeboy at 9:05 PM on March 30, 2012

Drezdn - I am from Coloma. My parents still live there.

Your parents probably know my parents.

Coloma is small enough that Drexdn's parents are probably your parents. Assuming of course, that you aren't Drezdn's parents....
posted by Pogo_Fuzzybutt at 9:31 PM on March 30, 2012

Listening to people calling the coast guard on VHF can be fun to:

Boaters: "we've run aground"
USCG: "what's your location?"
Boaters: "um, uh, hold on... [a minute of silence] ... I'm not sure."
USCG: "does your vessel have GPS?"
Boaters: "yes, hold on... [five minutes pass] ... We don't know how to use the GPS, but we're right outside the entrance to [name of marina]"
USCG: "do you have a landline?"
Boaters: "yes"
USCG: "what's the number?"
Boaters: "123-4567"
USCG: "And the area code?"
...
posted by tylerkaraszewski at 9:32 PM on March 30, 2012

Coloma is small enough that Drexdn's parents are probably your parents. Assuming of course, that you aren't Drezdn's parents....

It's so improbable that anyone else is from Coloma that you very well may be right. I mean, I don't recall having any children when I was seven, but it was kind of a while ago.
posted by louche mustachio at 9:39 PM on March 30, 2012 [3 favorites]

So, I'm fine folks then?

Oh... What? Who? What site?

And someone needs to make a decent kaiju game. Seriously. Because this is dead. Deader. Deadest.

And I do mean a kaiju game as in YOU are the kaiju, not fighting it. Had too much fun with Creature back in the day.

Oh, and while I am rambling, Sheboygan is a great word. Not as good as hugbees, but close.
posted by Samizdata at 10:20 PM on March 30, 2012 [1 favorite]

but I realized that the reports probably drop off in hilarity pretty quickly as population size of the city increases.

It does seem like a risk, yeah. I enjoyed the exchange I heard earlier that was like "A: we got a drunk guy down on Willamette. B: Okay, I'll go hang out with a drunk guy", but there was also the report of a guy headed westbound in a car having threatened to commit suicide which was, like, yay, can't wait to hear what happens there?

Not that straight up bad shit doesn't happen in small towns too, of course.
posted by cortex at 10:58 PM on March 30, 2012

fromthecruiser on twitter is fun if you're into these kinds of things.

Someone was up to mischief in Wolfville.

posted by !Jim at 11:26 PM on March 30, 2012 [1 favorite]

My favorite police blotter story went something like:
"3:40 AM Report of a naked man running down Xyz Street followed by a phalanx of skateboarders."
I specifically recall the great use of the word "phalanx" to describe this intriguing scene.
posted by zoinks at 1:21 AM on March 31, 2012 [5 favorites]

Some read like Hemingway short stories.
posted by Pronoiac at 1:35 AM on March 31, 2012 [4 favorites]

Interesting time to run across this, as I sit here listening to the Oakland police scanner to see if I can find out what's going on with the shots I just heard.
posted by slidell at 2:12 AM on March 31, 2012

No love for the small child whose parents scare her every day when she comes home from school? I pictured some awful mom and dad who hide in a different closet every day, waiting for her to walk down that particular part of the hall so they can pop out wearing scary masks and making loud noises, and then collapsing in laughter as they tell her how high she jumped this time. I can just picture the little girl finally getting fed up and telling her mom and dad she's calling the police if they do it again. Good on her for following through.

Of course, it could be some other, less adorable sort of scaring, but I'm going to choose not to believe that.
posted by troublesome at 2:12 AM on March 31, 2012 [1 favorite]

Aargh! Cobras! Cobras!
posted by arcticseal at 2:57 AM on March 31, 2012

I have no idea how these people got their sheboys wedged into their scanners, or why.
posted by jeffburdges at 3:53 AM on March 31, 2012 [1 favorite]

Bad boys, bad boys...
posted by Fists O'Fury at 5:20 AM on March 31, 2012

In Bozeman, Montana, the police blotter usually involved cows, elk, or drunk people passed out in a snowbank. IIRC we had one shooting in the four years I lived there - a guy hit his wife with a frying pan and she shot him. In the trailer park, of course.
posted by desjardins at 7:07 AM on March 31, 2012

In other news, we were married in Sheboygan County (in Kohler, but still).
posted by desjardins at 7:08 AM on March 31, 2012

The only time I ever visited Sheboygan, I rode on an elephant.
posted by briank at 7:14 AM on March 31, 2012 [1 favorite]

This all reminds me of one of my favorite headlines on a police blotter summary in our local paper: "Complainant Threatens To Eat Intrusive Chicken."
posted by anthom at 8:11 AM on March 31, 2012 [2 favorites]

This is significantly less fun in Chicago (I don't live in that zip anymore).
posted by a robot made out of meat at 8:47 AM on March 31, 2012

From the Wikipedia article on Sheboygan, "A man wearing top hat, sitting on a dead horse in the street."
posted by akgerber at 10:01 AM on March 31, 2012

See, my local police reports are filled with assaults and drunk driving. Not so entertaining.
posted by leahwrenn at 11:16 AM on March 31, 2012

I don't think my city even has a police blotter. I'd love someone to correct me, though.
posted by subbes at 11:23 AM on March 31, 2012

When I lived in Bozeman, MT, there was a terse entry about a bowhunter who, while stalking a bear, was attacked by a mountain lion.

From my local (Disclaimer: Friends with the guy that writes it.): "Assault: Two men were involved in a scuffle during a City Council meeting at City Hall just after 9:15 p.m. A 75-year-old man told police he was punched and then shoved over a table by a 66-year-old man with whom he had exchanged heated words about local politics. The 66-year-old told police he had said to the 75-year-old “you got what you wanted,” referring to firing of the city manager. He said the 75-year-old then swore at him and pressed a finger into his neck. The 66-year-old said he pushed the 75-year-old in self-defense but denied punching him. Neither party wanted to press charges."

This gets better when you know that said scuffle occurred between a sitting council member and a former council member.
posted by stet at 11:49 AM on March 31, 2012 [2 favorites]

SO GOOD.

Favorite: marsh - large group male teen monsters throwing rocks at large turtle.
posted by OsoMeaty at 4:04 PM on March 31, 2012