Tuesday, May 27, 2008

There were four young men in the backyard next door--naked!

Okay, calm down. It was the two toddlers and their friends, in their New! Inflatable! Swimming! Pool! which has joined a hammock and a small bench in the carnival of fun.

The slacker dudes weren't around overly much, with the notable exception of one who was passed out on their front porch when I went out to mow Sunday morning. I mowed several strips, about 10 feet from his head, before he finally woke up and stumbled inside. So sorry if my mowing disturbed you, slacker dude who doesn't live here. (I'm really not sorry! Ha!)

The rest of the weekend was...well, long, hot and lonely. With a powerful surge of adrenaline at 1:30 a.m. on Saturday (yes, that's 1:30 A.M., meaning the FIRST 1:30 of the day) when someone KNOCKED ON MY DOOR. Pudge and I both nearly had heart attacks. It was some young guy looking for "Derek." (I don't think he was connected with the dudes next door, though, though my reason for thinking that is completely racist: all the dudes next door have been white, and this young man was black. I stand beside my conclusion, though.) He muttered a quick "sorry" (this was all done through the door, of course--I didn't open it!) and left quickly, and eventually my heart stopped racing, and I went back to bed. WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE? Why would you knock on ANYBODY'S house at that time of night--particularly when there are NO lights on? (For the record, this is the third time in the three years I've lived in this house that someone has showed up late at night looking for someone who isn't me. Does someone get drunk and forget their address, and give out mine instead, I wonder?) He didn't appear to knock on anyone else's door (and I'm sure 3carnations will be relieved to hear that I was happy that he didn't knock next door and wake the kids!) and I didn't hear the neighborhood dog chorus go crazy, so I guess he headed back from whence he came.

What else, what else? The party Friday night was fine, except for the moment when it dawned on me, looking around, that at some point I apparently became the only un-coupled person in that particular group of friends. You can imagine, as New Guy's departure becomes increasingly imminent, how fun THAT realization was.

Saturday I ran errands, Sunday I mowed, yesterday I bought some tomatoes and herbs and planted a little container garden, which was nearly washed away last night in the monsoon that hit. Wowza--that was SOME lightning. Apparently it hit something fairly close by (though not the house next door again, thank goodness), and I was awakened by a couple of firetrucks racing past my window at 4:00 a.m. I was awake for awhile, watching the light show outside my window, and at one point, the lightning was so bright and so sustained that the streetlights thought it was morning and switched off briefly.

So, that was my weekend. Long, hot and lonely--a perfect preview of coming attractions, I guess. It feels like it's going to be a long, hot and lonely summer. Sigh.

For those of you wishing to see pictures of my "prom king" costume, you may be in luck. My mother took some pictures at the time, and she'll try to unearth them. The picture-taking itself was pretty funny, actually--I was living next door to my parents at the time, and my mom wanted to see us all fixed up. So we went next door and she made us stand together while she took pictures of us, just like we were really going to the prom. I guess since I never went to my real prom, that was the closest she could get. Hee.

6 comments:

stinkypaw said...

Sure reads like there's lots going on "around" you... There's nothing worst than being woken up abruptly by a knock a the door or a phone call... and it's even worser (that's worst then wrost) when it's a false number or wrong door.

Can't wait to see that/those picture(s)! Hi! hi! hi!

Stefanie said...

Grr. Blogger ate my comment. Please delete this one if the first one decides to reappear. :-)

I was woken up by a lawn mower ten feet from my head this weekend, too. Except I'm not a slacker, and I wasn't sleeping outside in someone else's yard. Nope, I was in my own bed in my own house. I forget how close to my neighbors' yard my bedroom window is until their snow & mow guys show up in the middle of the night to shovel or show up bright and early to mow.

Also, I totally know the feeling of being the lone single girl in a sea of coupled-off friends. Try not to let it get to you. You do know you are fabulous, right? Good. Because you are.

3carnations said...

I never went to my prom, either.

I'm glad the crazy guy didn't wake up the kids, and I'm glad YOU'RE glad. ;) But someone knocking in the middle of the night...That would have Freaked. Me. Out. I doubt that I even would have spoken to him through the door. I probably would have hoped he would go away, and if he didn't, possibly called the police or something. Because I'm paranoid like that.

Naked toddlers in the pool? Swimming diapers, folks, that's all I've got to say.

On a kinda-sorta-not-really-related topic, we lived in an apartment for a while when I was a kid, and the neighbor across the hall used to come home drunk and without/unable to use her keys, and buzz our apartment to let her in. This made my mom incredibly angry. It would make me angry, too, if I hadn't been 8 years old and asleep (so it didn't wake the kids after all, I guess).

Wow. Long comment. Sorry. :)

shelleycoughlin said...

Yessssss! Prom King outfit!

lizgwiz said...

stinkypaw, let's hope Mom comes through!

stef, well, I don't feel particularly fabulous lately, but I think YOU'RE fabulous, so if you say I am...I must be. :)

3car, I went to the door mostly because I wanted to make sure it wasn't a neighbor in trouble or something. Plus I didn't want a stranger thinking there was nobody home. And Pudge went with me, of course. ;)

npw, we'll cross our fingers!

L Sass said...

If someone had knocked on my door in the middle of the night, I would have been cowering in a corner with a bat. Paranoid, much?