Johnny Blaze in the News

Scanning through the news this morning I found one of my roommates doing what ze does best:

Storage Unit #198

Here are some things I found when Pim called from Florida and gave me the combination to "our" storage unit.

1. My spare car keys.
2. The bubble machine
3. The NCLEX prep material stuff I was trying to lend to Blake months ago but couldn't find in my basement. (It's ok, he passed the test anyway).
4. A box labeled "other people's stuff," that contained (among other things) a binder of music for a show I never did, Danny's mom's copy of "Life of Pi," Danny's copy of "Choke," which I borrowed around the same time, a deck of cards and some comic books. (Maybe Steve's?)

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My upstairs neighbor threatened, in printed word, to take our boots if he found them in the foyer again. And to not return them. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, this grown man is threatening to steal my boots and hide them in his apartment.
If it weren't in all caps and bold I would have thought he was flirting with us.
I was going to hang the letter up with his other one from last summer but Laura says it makes her too mad. And I want Laura to be able to use the bathroom. Which is where we hang letters.
I'm over it. He has a lot of anxiety about the front hallway. I don't. So he wins just by caring more. It's way easier this way.

Coffee Shop

Last night Johnny, Laura and I were all home at the same time because I found out my student's improv show is next weekend. This almost never happens so to celebrate we walked to Java Jo's . That morning I had stopped there for breakfast (as usual on days when I teach) and to pick up a bagged lunch to bring to school with me. I noticed that the soup of the day was "Italian Wedding," and knew without the slightest hesitation that I would probably be back for dinner. So I was. This day has been brought to you by Java Jo.

As we sat at the table and talked it became clear that the large Latino man sitting nearby was not just talking on his cell phone. He was free styling in a low monotone. The free styling went on for about twenty minutes at a time, would be punctuated by something along the lines of, "please make them play that, homey, don't make me beg," and would begin again.

At first some of it was actually kind of good. Nothing like the stuff we used to "kick," at McClellan house parties, but hey, not everyone can be us, right?* The longer this went on the more colorful the language became and the less creative the content. Also, the volume increased and the flow got less cohesive. So we kept overhearing things such as, "Eff this, eff that, eff my effing gat. I'm not effing kidding." And "eff eff eff my n***** , pull that effing trigger." And "I'm hungry. Where's the food at? Do you have enough food to feed me? Do you have enough food to feed my crew? You don't have enough food to feed my team. You don't have enough food to feed this country. You don't have food to feed this town**. This town is going up."

Jen the Coffee House Girl had to go tell him to quiet down twice and eventually escorted him out. When he began walking I saw that he was drunk. I wondered if anyone was actually on the other end of his phone. Because sometimes in the past I too have pretended to be on my phone for various reasons. Just never that long.


* I am so sorry.
**At which point Laura and I made eye contact and I said, "a town is smaller than the country, he should have switched those," and Laura replied "you should go tell him that."