Little Ian, one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, stopped by today to hang out with me. He left his bicycle parked on the sidewalk out front and went around 'checking to see where the soil was dry' and directing me where to water next. We ate some blueberries and he told me that it was 543 degrees when he woke up this morning. "That's pretty hot," I agreed. He found a lot of places that seemed mighty dry, and I found a lot of plants that I had to explain didn't want very much water because they liked the heat and the dryness. "I'll make a gardener of you yet," I said.
"Well, I could be a gardener when I'm here," he replied. "When I'm here, then I'm gardening!"
And eating a lot of blueberries and strawberries and sticking leaves into his mouth too.
Well, off he went across the field to his house, leaving his bike parked out front on the sidewalk. Up come the latest crew of little badasses to move in to the apartments next door, and they stood there discussing whether or not to just take the bike, even though they knew who it belonged to.
Using my MOM OF DEATH voice, and a big old smile, I looked up and said "That bike belongs to Ian, sweetheart."
Exit four little thugs with their shoulders up around their ears. I rode the bike back over to Ian, told him to keep an eye on the thing, and came back.
A little later I was sitting here reading and I was hearing a 'chank, chank' kind of noise in the background. I figured the Biker was tormenting metal out in the garage and didn't give it another thought. Then the Biker came in laughing and said 'you know what those little assholes were doing? They were sitting on the back wall throwing rocks at our fire pit.'
Our fire pit does make an excellent 'chank' sound when you throw rocks at it. It's made out of a huge steel ag rim. But we're the only people who get to throw rocks into our fire pit. Not four little hoodlums, one of whom is the very picture of a skinny, skanky, freckled son of the Carolinas, bound for alcoholism, spousal abuse, and a lifetime of petty theft and gun crime.
The Biker caught them in the act and used the DAD VOICE OF MURDER on them, and they scurried away trailing 'I'm sorries' and snuffling.
I bet you anything we get egged this Halloween.
Neighbours. Don't we just love them?
ReplyDeleteOur latest ones are probably not the rock-throwing type, but include a Bulgarian "Crazy Frog" soundalike Granny, an old drunk who would probably give Richard Harris a run for his money (if Richard Harris were an Eastern European of course), their offspring, and lawd knows how many of their children - our absolute highlight being the baby whose colic-or-whatever-makes-babies-cry shrieks are always a "welcome wake-up-call" every day, including during my sacrosanct weekend lie-ins.
Sigh. The joys of renting. Jx
Ah, at least the hoodlums didn't nick the bike anyway, and said (or at least muttered) sorries and left, rather than jeering and throwing more rocks. Perhaps there's hope for them?
ReplyDeleteIt's the heat making them even crazier, sweetpea! I guess that's the only reason they could possibly have for messing with you and The Biker! xoxo
ReplyDeleteJon: Oh damn, don't I just know it? I remember the days when I was renting vividly. Like the time that I had just lost my roommate, didn't know where the rent was coming from next, and then that night, every single person in the apartments around me - up, down, back, front, side to side - decided to 'Git Down', and loudly, for HOURS. I mean I could hear every creak and moan. I have never felt so lonely, or so squicked out, as I did that night on 52nd and Powell Boulevard, le sigh.
ReplyDeleteInexplicable DeVice: They were little grade school kids, about 10, 11 or thereabouts, and I learned how to intimidate by way of tone of voice by raising my daughter, the Stainless Steel Amazon - and I learned how to project my voice to the cheap seats when I was in drama class lo these many years gone by. I can scare the fur off a dog at half an acre, and do it with a smile on my face. I guess high school - and parenthood - was good for something!
ReplyDeleteSavannah: These are new kids. There are a lot of new kids since the orgy of building high-infill apartments and single house 'insta suburbs' around here. Right next door, where once I only had five crazy as shit neighbors, an empty lot and five and a half hundred thousand semi-tamed rats, we now suddenly have sixteen single family rentals - figure a family of four in each one and that gives you 64 brand new reasons to wonder where the rural went. I miss the rats.
ReplyDelete