Fight Club

I happened upon a transient argument today while on my way to the store. It involved two people I will name: Hobo 1, and Hobo 2.

Hobo 1, as far as I can tell initiated the argument by running into, or nearly ran into Hobo 2 with his vehicle, a dilapidated van; a fair reason for Hobo 2 to be upset.

Hobo 2 screams obscenities at Hobo 1 - as I mentioned, probably for good reason. This is when I enter the scene.

Hobo 1 thinks Hobo 2 is a a**hole, while Hobo 2 thinks that Hobo 1 should go to hell.

Hobo 2 thinks that Hobo 1 is drunk, while Hobo 1 thinks that Hobo 2 is drunk and high!

Hobo 1 knows where Hobo 2 lives so... Hobo 2 should be scared, but Hobo 2 knows what Hobo 1 drives and wrote down his license plate number, and make and model of car and is going to call the cops!

A little ways down the street Hobo 2 ran into his friend Hobo 3. Unfortunately, I was on the other side of the street, but I do know that Hobo 3 vehemently agreed with Hobo 2 - that a**holes should not drive drunk and that Hobo 2 should call the cops.

At which point both Hobo 2 and Hobo 3 got a good laugh.

The Doors

As usual, a hobo, was screaming his rants at the top of his lungs in the park the other day.

"This city's got a Morrison St.! We've got a Morrison Bridge! There's a Morrison Park!; but they don't play no Jim Morrison!! What's up with that?"

Free Portraits

Yesterday, we decided to go on a run.

It was a bit difficult however, considering that some blowhard stole my old man's new Nike shoes. So, we decided instead to take a long, brisk walk, and pick up some even newer shoes on the way home.

On our walk we encountered a couple of girls offering "FREE PORTRAITS". Sweet! The artist works at a porn shop on the other side and town, and didn't have anything to do to that day, so she and her friend decided to offer free portraits. Both were artists, but the one doing our picture was "actually good" - according to her friend. The only stipulation was that we had to allow them to take our picture, and a picture of the portrait before she handed it over.

We positioned ourselves on the concrete, with the sun glaring in our eyes, and modeled for the artist. During the 1/2 hour session she spent much of the time paying particular attention to detail, shading, turning the paper this way and comparing her drawing with our reality, as any artist should, to ensure the accuracy of the intended subject.

As I was sitting there, I was very concerned she wouldn't get my eyes right because I had to squint due to the sun. As she didn't have us move, I assumed she knew what she was doing. I thought about our friends as we waited, who got a portrait of themselves on their honeymoon in Canada. It is a pretty awesome rendition, and I've always been jealous that we didn't have a similar beauty of our own.

Now we do:

Sherlock Holmes

The other day me and my hubby were walking around town, when we happened upon a wandering dog taking care of business on the little patch of grass on the sidewalk.

It's owner was hiding in the hedges in front of the apartment building nearby. She had found a little crack between two hedges, between which she positioned herself, presumably in order to keep an eye on her dog, but pretend to be invisible to other humans.

It wasn't working; we could see her from 2 blocks away. We ignored her.

As we approached, our respective dogs greeted one another. Suddenly from behind us we heard her exclaim, "Boo!" and began giggling uncontrollably!

"Did I scare you? Did I? Did I?"

"You got me," I admitted.

Picture Sherlock Holmes of the female variety and you can imagine what she looked like. She was average height, 40's, detective hat, frock shawl, khaki shirt and button up shirt. I even think she was smoking a pipe.

On our way back home later, we encountered her again sifting through the grass on someones lawn. Sifting, inspecting, smoking, call it what you will, but she was on the ground, her nose in the grass picking up and inspecting each individual shred of grass.

Uri-nation

I'll tell you the perk of living downtown:

When you open your window on a clear, cloudless, beautifully warm evening to both appreciate the weather and allow some fresh air to seep into your home after weeks and months of being shut-in - you are only greeted by the stale stench of hobo urine wafting in from the side of your building that the drunk used as a makeshift toilet because he's either too drunk or too lazy to mozy down to the public toilets installed for the express purpose of providing a place for the hobo to do his business. I guess they reserve those for defecation only.

Happy Fathers Day to everyone with, or without a toilet to piss in!

School Spirit

I'm walking around downtown the other day sporting my college shirt, not necessarily because I have so much school spirit - I mean the letters are cracking and the sleeves are bleached, but because it fits and it was on the floor near me I decided to wear it.

So, I'm minding my own business, of course, as usual, and a rather large man starting walking towards me. Not towards me in the sense, that he's on the sidewalk walking the opposite direction - but towards me, in front of me; looming...

He's wearing mustard yellow cut-off's - not traditional cut-off's i.e. mid leg, straight edge - but mid thigh, decoratively cut triangle style.

Then, in a high pitch, valley high school girl accent he shouts, "Goood-uh colleeeeeeeeege-uh! Yes!" and pumps his fist into the air.

Not an hour later, a couple of guys starting yelling at me: "Go Vikings!" I just ignore them, for one because I don't encourage hobo's or strangers, and two I don't have school spirit - which they picked up on, because they continued chanting: "Vikings! Vikings! Vikings! What? You don't got no school spirit?"

Then today! I had another large man approach me, and shout in my face (yes, I'm wearing the shirt again, okay...!) "Gooooooo Vikings!"