Last night I was home and awake for about 1.5 hours. Before I proceed any further with this train of thought, I should give you some background:
- we are <u>not</u> in the habit of finding dead creatures in our apartment, and
- our building is a safe and quiet building, inhabited primarily by older people and families. Noise is generally created by a kid practicing piano.
So, back to the 1.5 hours I spent at home. In that time, I (not in this order)
1) discovered a dessicated baby gecko in the bathroom - a room we use quite often, as you might guess, and a room that was sans gecko in the morning
2) ate prepared soba noodles from the grocery store
3) watched 7th Heaven, taped earlier in the evening
4) was annoyed by a loud horn
Number 4 was the true strangeness of the evening. Soon after we got home, we hear the annoying sound. Is it a car alarm? Is it a fire alarm? Is it an emergency siren? Was there an accident, and someone's head is stuck against their car horn?
Looking down from the lanai, I could see people coming out of their homes. It was sort of funny, and heartwarming, seeing people walking out of different buildings, all confused. It was difficult to place the source of the sound. Sam and I then listened from the other side of the building where, again, people were coming out to investigate the source of the sound. We decided to go down to check it out as well, with cell phone in hand, in case emergency personnel needed to be called. Oh, the sweet quiet in the elevator - the sound of the horn distant and faint, not taking over every molecule in my body.
Downstairs, we found more people, not visible from above. Some were in the breezeway by the elevator, others were clustered by the source of the sound. Ah hah! A Chevy van, with the hood raised, in our parking lot! Still making the sound, but identified.
And in the breezeway - the culprits. Our building manager was telling a young man that he better just sit down and wait. One of the women in the breezeway, who it turns out had the same head-against-the-horn visions that I had, walked over. She told us that the young man and his companions had tried to break into the van, thus triggering the horrible sound, and then tried to hide under the stairs. But she had spotted them, and then it was our building manager to the rescue. I liked him before, but now that I've seen him take charge of hooligans....
And right after we heard the story from the woman in our building, the magic of the Chevey cluster worked. The sound stopped. And clapping ensued.
Posted by Shokufeh at October 7, 2003 10:26 AMthe word lanai always reminds me of the golden girls. i don't think you should use it anymore; you have to wait until you are at least 60. you are anything but bea arthur.
Posted by: meisa at October 7, 2003 11:38 AMI didn't know they used it on the "Golden Girls." Everyone uses that word here, but the only other time I've heard it is on "King of the Hill," from the Hills' neighbors.
Posted by: shokufeh at October 7, 2003 01:18 PM