Your overpriced trek hybrid bicycle is rolling south on Lincoln in East LA, near Venice beach. The front shocks (which you will never come close to fully compressing) eat up the slight variations on the sidewalk where you should not be riding but are because you can.

15 meters ahead a Small Dark Thing lies on the sidewalk, and you wonder if you should stop and look a The Dark Thing or turn right on Washington and head west to the beach. As you close on It, The Thing becomes a wallet, so you squeeze your top-of-the-line brakes (which you so donít need) and come to a silent stop above the wallet and what appears to be a date book on its left.

There might be money in it. And you might steal it for a chuckle. So you straddle the bike and lower yourself Ö actually lower yourself to the wallet and date book only to find thereís nothing inside this worn thing but a California disability card for a fellow we will call ìMerrittî with two current disability stickers and a photo on it.

Itís obvious Merritt was robbed for money he didnít have; everything about this billfold screams homeless. See how the leather bends from sitting in the street, the flatness of the credit card slots from housing no credit, the torn edges and faded bleached and leached from exposure. From his photo, Merritt is completely bald with a big open grin. Itís unforced.

You think the stickers may be a gift from Vietnam, because Merritt isnít old enough for geriatric ward. The date book has only one written entry, and it is repeated each Sunday until the book was taken and tossed: ìChurchî.

You spent 23 years in San Francisco before this, long enough so the homeless became translucent. Except when you hold their identity in your hands. Merritt makes you feel Öwell, just feel, and because you havenít ëfeltí in quite a long time, so you decide, thatÖsince youíre going to the beach anyway, why not turn the wallet over to the Venice Beach cops whoíve got a station right on the sand across from the boardwalk, not far from the volleyball nets.

So you get there and spend a lot of time trying to lock your overpriced bike with the cable in just such a way that they canít steal the frame or either wheel, or just lift up the whole bike and take that, so youíve got to stretch everything over, under around and through wheels frame, bike rack. Spent, you take a few minutes on a bench, then, fighting gravity, you lift yourself and take the nine steps to the station.

The door is locked, so you knock. You knock again. Nobody home. Nobody home at the Venice Police Station. O.K. Thatís a good thing. Means thereís no crime today; everythingís cool and the Venice Police are just chilliní somewhere. But then Merritt whoís in your right hand cargo pocket is bothering some vestigial area above the reptilian portion of your brain. So, you go see if maybe Bay Watch in the lifeguard tower knows where the cops are.

ìYoî

ìYeahî, Baywatch replies with the same blank stare used to scan the surf for drowning chicks.

ìI found this wallet, seeî and I wanted to turn it in and Öwell, the Venice Police arenít home.î

ìTypical. Well, hereís whatícha do.. Hang back over there again, and every 30 or 45 minutes or so, one of em shows up.î

Merittís world vs. 45 minutes of your life? O.K. Whatís premature sun damage and possible carcinoma in exchange for helping others? 30 minutes. No uniform. 45 minutes. Nobody home.

So you decide to back, but a few blocks away, bingo, a motorcycle squad, but not just any bunch of BMW R1100 RT-P bikers, but Los Angelesí dedicated movie squad. They donít just watch the movies, they watch the movies being made.

On location. Itís the essence of police work: put up barriers, hold back the stupid and curious, but mostly just wear these awesome riding boots and trim LAPD caps, keep their bikes on the kickstands, drink the nice Craft Services Coffee, eat the nice craft services breakfast burritos.

ìHey, sorry to bother you guys, but I found this walletÖî

They react like itís a block of glowing enriched uranium.

ìWell, uh, you ought take that over to the Venice precinctî, says McGiver.

I did, but there was nobody home.

They struggle to unearth another precinct in another world beyond Venice. You wonder where they stash these neat Bavarian Behemoths.

ìOK,î says Tom Skeritt, ìmaybe try the Culver City precinct.î

ìThatís quite a ways, and...î

ìYou ride that bike for exercise, dontcha?î

ìWell yeah.î

ìSo get some,î says McGiver, starting to get annoyed that he wonít get a nod from Nick Cage.

****

Tune in for next blogÖ.

"Culver City to the Rescue?"