Tuesday, March 18, 2003.
Last few
CDs bought, all nostalgic:
Pink
Floyd - The Wall (no,
I never smoked pot)
Jackson Browne - Best of
The Tubes - Best of (I only like the stripper
song)
S#arp (Kpop) - Best of (they broke up this year)
Happy
Birthday to MIGHTY
ASIAN THUNDER,
a.k.a. Danny.
Too cheap for a T-shirt, eh?
You are going down, bish.
RESERVOIR PUPPIES
[Last week. In the woods by our house.]
I knelt down to look at the shoe tracks we'd been following in the snow into these woods.
"It looks like he ran up to this stream and then doubled back," I told Amy while brushing away some branches like a U.S. Marshal in search of Public Enemy Number One.
"He probably did that on purpose, to try to lose us," she guessed.
"Nah, it looks more like he was scared and didn't know where he was going," I profiled. Scared is right. Our little fugitive had been scared of a female inferno of Corean fury. Amy.
Through the still leafless trees, there was a large expanse of snow covered backyard. At the other end of one of those backyards was a house with a man standing in the window, his hands on his hips. Watching us.
"Don't look, but there's a guy in the house over there staring at us. We'd better go," I told Amy as the melting ice seeped into my dress shoes and through my socks.
A half hour ago, Amy had burst into our house exclaiming, "Scott, come over here quick!"
I thought that maybe there was a neighborhood fight or some bizarre accident. Not quite.
Some kids had pegged Amy's jeep with snowballs as she was driving home in our subdivision. She saw three kids around ten years old run away as she screeched to a halt and bolted after them.
They evaded her but we lived just around the corner, within walking distance even, and the cold Michigan temperatures failed to cool her temper.
"Those bastards, let's get them! Come on!"
So I joined her, still in my dress shoes from work, just not quite as zealous about exacting revenge as she was. I am sure that if I was in the car at the time, I would have taken it a lot more personally. Right now, I was just wondering what we would or could actually do if we found these mischief makers.
I didn't think we'd actually find these kids anyhow. They were probably long gone. Or possibly watching from a safe distance. In which case, seeing adults actually trying to track you down would make you think twice anyways.
So we left the wooded area and walked back to the main subdivision street. The shadow man in the house to our flank still watched us, probably wondering if we were tree-kidnappers and if he should call the Homeland Security hotline.
Then as we stepped onto the sidewalk near the scene of the puerile crime, we saw them. Three kids, one with the red jacket Amy had seen.
"There they are!" I said.
They ran behind a row of houses. I knew it, they had been watching us.
"I'm going to cut those bastards off!" Amy yelled and ran down the street and around the corner. There were some Indian kids playing a few houses down that just watched in surprise. It's not everyday you see a MILF running and screaming with murderous intent down your street in a big blue down coat.
I stayed back, just in case these rascals tried to double back on us. As I walked by the houses in our subdivision, I saw one of the neighbor's garage doors open ... and then a flash of a huddled winter coat behind a car. No way. They couldn't be that stupid. Probably not even the same kids. So I turned around and started walking between the houses.
Just as I was about to enter the backyard, I saw him.
He was taller than the rest. Maybe fourteen years old, and a little more surprised to see me twenty feet from him than I was to see him. He tried to act casual in that Eddy Haskell kind of way, and started walking again.
"Hey, what do you guys think you're doing?" I said as I approached him.
"Huh? W-w-hat do you mean?" he slipped right into fast-thinking scared teenaged boy in trouble "innocent" mode.
"Dude, we saw you. You hit my wife's car with your snowballs. She's an eye witness," I knew it was him.
"Oh, um, did we get you? Was there any damage? I mean, were just having a snowball fight," he didn't know what he was going to say. He didn't know what I was going to do.
I didn't want to scare him because if he ran, then what would I do? Tackle him and go to jail? Plus, being caught is scary enough.
So he babbled, denied, and lied some more. Then apologized for what he had just said he didn't do.
"I mean, what were you guys thinking? You don't throw snowballs at your neighbors. We practically live across the street from you. We know where you live. We could tell your parents or the police. Just not a good idea," I explained a little too sympathetically perhaps. I didn't even mention the fact that every other person in our subdivision is a lawyer. The other half are doctors, according to our house contractor.
I refrained from giving him tips from my own snowballing days (please, no porn references there).
Things like:
1) Do not throw snowballs at cars close to where you live.
2) Always have a backup or escape plan. Preferably over and under obstacles, walls, and fences that most adults wouldn't get through very well. Leaving tracks through fresh snow is not good evasive technique.
3) When you run, split up. Every man for himself. (They actually did this initially.)
4) Don't aim for the windshields. That's just dangerous.
5) When you get home, stay the f*** inside for the rest of the day. Cripes.
6) Avoid hitting "civilian" cars. They take it more personally. If you must, wait for a moving van, or truck, or especially, a brown UPS truck. The targets are bigger (like hitting the side of a barn ... or a truck) and the drivers tend to be on business runs.
7) Don't throw snowballs at cars in the first place. Because, sooner or later, you'll get some pissed off 22-year old UPS driver/drifter hopped up on illegal substances with a lot less to lose than you do. You'll also realize that a pissed-off 22-year old runs faster than a scared 12-year old. By then, you'll understand that reality isn't a Disney cartoon. It's more like Pulp Fiction, and until now you've just avoided the main characters. And you're not one of them.
Anyways, eventually Amy found me and talked to the kid himself.
"We were just having a snowball fight and ..."
"Yeah, right. With all three of you behind that tree throwing snowballs at my car?!"
I figured the other two kids got away, so I wandered into the backyard to look at their tracks again. As I turned around, I saw two huddled winter coats through the backdoor of the garage. I slowly crunched my way in the packed snow to the open door.
"Amy, the other two are over here."
The little punks turned around, embarrassed and frightened, realizing their head-in-the-sand hiding technique wouldn't make us go away. One almost ran, but really, what was the point? This was probably his house and his garage.
Amy knocked on the door. Told their mother, who didn't seem to care less, and we walked home.
The older kid apologized again and said bye. Whether he was sincere or not, I feel pretty sure he isn't going to mess with us again. He knows we know how to find him and we'll track him down until we do. Plus I didn't pull the moral parental thing on him. I stuck to pragmatics and mutual respect. I probably could have chucked a snowball at him right there and we'd all enjoy a real snowball fight. I miss those.
Sometimes it's better to make friends out of your enemies, or at least give them a reason not to dislike you.
(Of course, if I was in the car at the time, they probably wouldn't have found his body until the snow thawed this week.)
(Amy painted that cute picture. She's smiling like a K-pop diva.)
"That was fun," Amy said.
"Yeah ... it was."
Note to self: I need to get Amy a purse with Badass Corean Motherf***er engraved on it.
______________________________
MEDEA SIN HOT MODEL
Today's Hot Model is the always wonderful and patient
Bonnie has been a reader and friend for a long time. Amazingly tolerating my rants, whether medical or ethnic for years, while still speaking to me on occasion. I have to admit I have often wondered why she reads me, but never look a gift bear in the mouth, I guess. Considering her wisdom and welcome sense of humor, I appreciate her company all the more.
And I gots to give mad props to my other shizzlin' bizzlin' old-schooler, Denver Doug, The Wondering Jew, one-time archaeologist of forbidden tombs (damn that glory-hog Indiana Jones), and poet. I wonder why he reads me too sometimes. But I could always use the respectability they grace me with. Makes me feel a little better about myself in the morning after some of my entries.
(Click here to become a MEDEA SIN HOT MODEL.)
