I am up early and am going out to do some recon.

I'm back in.

Last night was Devil's Night which seems to be a western Ohio, eastern PA thing. It's the night before Halloween when the kids go out and settle a few scores with people. In most of the rest of the country the dirty deeds happen on Halloween proper.

No battle damage, as I had figured. Neighbor Bobs looks unscathed as does the rest of the neighborhood with the exception of Larry ande Helens, which got a dose of toilet paper and maybe a few eggs.

I had figured as much. They get clobbered every year.

The demographics of the neighborhood have changed over the years. There are a lot fewer kids of the age running around anymore as they have seemed to have grown up on me and left me with no one to play with anymore.

Over the years I have been good to the kids and they have in return given me a pass on Devil's night. They always clobber Larry and Helen's though.

I've picked up this laptop and I'm facing out the front window watching traffic. What I am looking for is a police car that will go down to their house for the annual 'Helen gets bent out of shape and demands the FBI get involved in the investigation' circus. Of course, she will dial 911 instead of the administrative line because this just has to be crime of the century.

When the cop heads back up the street I will walk out and flag him down and offer him a wastebasket to throw the complaint into and he will glare at me and surpress a smirk and drive off.

This happens every year.

They brought it on themselves by being mean to the kids.

I, on the other hand am good to the kids. Tonight it will be full-sized candy bars for the kids and hot buttered rums for the grownups.

Helen will get wind of it and she'll call the police on me for serving booze to kids and the cops will show up for about two minutes and leave. Word will go out among the adults that Helen called the police and their kids will overhear it and as the kids grow up, Helen will come out on the street and yell at them for being kids and the cycle continues.

She has just insured she'll get plastered for a few more years.

This does not mean I am completely safe, as over the years I have been the victim of some 'apply anywhere' mischief. I've lost a mailbox to 'mailbox baseball' and I once had some minor vandalism to my pickup, but when you think of it, that's not that awfully bad, considering I've been here almost a full 20 years.

Both incidents were attributed to a group of out of the neighborhood kids just passing through. Please to note I have never suffered any Devil's Night 'payback' damage.

I wanted a police report for the vehicle insurance people and instead of dialing 911, I simply called the admin line and told the dispatcher to send a cop when there was time because I just wanted a police report. The cop came and we had coffee and he wrote it up.

He was pretty grateful for the coffee and casual air over the incident. In the end, I fixed my truck myself rather than calling the insurance people as I could using the tools I had. I think it cost me under $50, which wasn't to bad for replacing a broken window on a pickup cap.

Helen, who also got hit that evening, as did virtually the entire neighborhood as usual over reacted and demanded the ususal Federal investigation.

As I write now the police car is going by and I figure she will have the poor bastard tied up for well over an hour with her carrying on, complete with moaning, wailing and gnashing of teeth.

Looking back on things, as a kid I lived near a major jerk that constantly called the police on kids and every Halloween he got just plastered, and suffered a lot of other damage during the year. My father hated Halloween because he just knew the jerk would try and blame my brother and I and we were instructed to stay well away from him and his house that night. ESPECIALLY that night.

When we got in after the night out he would make us retrace our steps (avoiding questions as to what we actually did)to insure we had an alibi when the inevitable accusations came up.

Truth is, we traded off Halloween duties with friends that lived a mile away. They did our dirty work, we did theirs and provided each other with alibis.

Here it is well over forty years later, the old bastard is still alive and still lives in the same place. About a year ago someone pitched a cherry bomb or something in his front yard in the middle of the night. I heard about it about a month later from and old friend. I instantly mentally checked my whereabouts of the time in question (I was at sea) to cover my ass in case he went into Alzheimers and accused me even though I live 600 miles away. Old habits die hard.

Still, I have to admit I laughed like hell when I heard the kids STILL make life miserable for him. You reap what you sow.

What is also interesting to note is that while growing up we only got hit once on Halloween. Someone stole our sign and the following evening it was replaced. Word came down later that the local Boy Scouts found the sign and replaced it after beating the living shit out of the vandals. Dad was involved in the local troop and they looked out for him in return.

I learned about living in a neighborhood from watching my dad. He contributed to the well being and safety of the neighborhood, got involved and it paid off in spades.

One of the biggest thing I learned is what to overlook. The other thing I learned is to be good to people.

It pays off.

In about a half-hour I will go out into the street carrying a wastebasket and get a dirty look and a smirk from the poor cop down at Helen's.

Tonight Helen will falsely report me for giving booze to kids, the cops will show up and drive off and Helen will insure she gets plastered again for the next few years.

You can't fix stupid





my other blog is:http://piccolosbutler.blogspot.com/