everybody’s out. it’s like entire households empty into the street.
it hit 70 here today, which is why i mention it.
every druggie, every crazy, every dealer, every person who’s been going stir-crazy in their lil rowhomes just rolls out onto all available sidewalks and stoops (even stoops that aren’t theirs. like, um, ours) and makes noise and litters and spits and fights.
i’m not saying that it’s a bad thing that people are outside. it’s great. it’s great that winter’s finally coming to a close, and all us humans are reveling in the mild weather. it’s just that all the usual debauchery that usually goes on indoors (fightening, drunkeness, fighting) is suddenly made public, and i never seem ready for it.
it’s kinda like…well, it’s kinda like that feeling that some of us who don’t have the extra money to get regular professional pedicures but who’d like to (i’m in this category) are suddenly faced with the option to wear flip-flops. or sandals. (i guess this would just apply to those living where it’s only warm half of the year) the bottom line is that you’re just not ready for it. you slip them on, and you feel a little too naked, a little too exposed. just not mentally or physically prepared to expose your feet and toes to the world.
that’s how i always feel about our neighborhood once the weather gets warm. i’m just not ready for the craziness. the noise (specifically the fighting) and the thumping bass from all the sooped up hondas and black-tinted caddies plus stoop boomboxes makes it hard to keep your windows open. hard to sleep, esp., even when they’re closed.
i don’t know if this is cities in general, or just east baltimore. oh and now that i think about it, don’t get me started on the friggin ice cream truck. that thing starts its rounds around, well, we actually heard it for the first time today, and i swear it doesn’t stop blaring its crackhead version of “pop goes the weasel” or whatever it is til october. i kid you not. plus it’s out til past 11 p.m. now you tell me: do you think a rickety old “pop goes the weasel” half-assed ice cream truck that’s still out near midnight is just selling ice cream? my thoughts exactly.
also? dirt bike gangs. one just passed by. i forgot to mention the dirtbike (and four-wheeler) gangs. another story for another day.
lunch at 11:30 