Don’t run from a bike cop.

Or if you run from a bike cop, get creative – try zig-zagging, sudden halts, or hopping a fence. Do not run in a straight line on pavement, huffing and sweating while a bored seasonal officer pedals along five feet behind you.

Seasonal officer Nate Hollis remembered the summer’s first foot patrol wistfully.

“It was retarded,” he said.

Nate Hollis resembles Jim Parsons (Sheldon Cooper of “Big Bang Theory”) in both looks in demeanor: sullen and laconic, with a mean dry wit. He’s a second-year seasonal looking to transfer out of Dewey; but while the states of the union weather the financial crisis, he’s content to spend another summer in southern Delaware.

Hollis issues a lot of open-container citations. Since many aren’t aware Dewey has an open container law, he’s willing to let a lot slide – if, for example, a Junebug holding a Solo cup seems blissfully unaware, Hollis lets him go with a warning. If, however, he dumps the drink and runs, the chase is on.

Such was the case on a night in early June, when a twentysomething tossed his vodka-and-cranberry and took off sprinting. Hollis had no trouble closing the cap on his mountain bike. He spent half a block trying to talk the suspect down; eventually, he just taunted him.

“I said ‘What do you think you’re doing? I’m on a bike,” Hollis said.

Eventually, the runner wised up and ducked between two parked cars. Hollis, still fresh, had no trouble catching up to the winded suspect. As he snapped on the handcuffs, the suspect told Hollis he was a lawyer. Recalling this, Hollis drew in a breath and released it slowly.

“They’re always lawyers,” he said.