In every issue of this fine rag my hack team of wannabe journalists and I tackle some of the most laughable criminal acts that have recently happened in our area. Then - if we're doing our job - we write about those crimes in a way that makes you chuckle, or at the very least gives you something better to do than bitch and moan about the inherent sexism of ladies night.

Enjoy. - Matt Driscoll

No matter how much Joan Rivers' upcoming gig in Tacoma might tempt you to think otherwise, there's no doubt getting old is a bummer.

There's very little upside to getting older. Just look at all those poor saps in the Cialis commercials. I know that cowboy can get his truck out of the mud, but does his life really look happy?

Of course it doesn't. He's old.

Yes, getting old is a bitch - a buzzkill powerful enough to make people do some pretty daffy stuff.

While what, exactly, led to the daffiness in the following story has yet to come to full light, what we do know is simple: there's an old person involved, and this particular old person allegedly did some pretty crazy shit.

According to reports on The News Tribune's "Lights & Sirens" blog, on Wednesday, Oct. 26 state troopers had their hands full with an elderly driver who led authorities on a dangerous, misguided and mildly humorous mid-day pursuit.

The Trib's Stacia Glenn writes that at about 3 p.m. Wednesday afternoon "multiple" people called 911 to report an erratic driver on southbound Interstate 5 near the Pierce-Thurston county line - with callers telling authorities the vehicle in question was taking up three lanes of traffic. The Washington State Patrol's Guy Gill tells The Trib the driver, "struck a guardrail and a barrier on different occasions," and demonstrated, "very poor driving patterns to say the least."

It wasn't long before the Washington State Patrol was on the scene. The Trib reports that authorities, suspecting the man might be under the influence of prescription drugs, attempted to stop the erratic driver, but he only continued on in defiance - initiating an unusual pursuit that reached up to 80 miles per hour.

Coincidentally, according to The Trib's story, 80 is also how old the driver at the root of this story is. And it's not every day that state troopers are forced to bring out the spike strips to stop a high-speed chase involving an 80-year-old.

That's just what happened here, however, with police deploying the strips near Mounts Road in a dramatic attempt to stop the senior citizen gone wild.

Bizarre, right?

The end of the unusual fiasco?

Not quite.

Police tell the Trib that though initially the man pulled over, he was apparently only playing coy - taking off once again (on only rims) once troopers exited their vehicles and began approaching on foot.

Wily old bastard.

Unfortunately for all of those hoping for a Thelma & Louise ending, The Trib reports that the man "made it a quarter-mile before stopping and being taken into custody." It's believed prescription drugs did, in fact, play a part in the alleged crime. - Gramps McGee, Old-People Related Crime Correspondent