Good Fences

Well, the Supreme Court handed down two extremely controversial decisions that has all of America talking about whether or not child rapers deserve to die with the handguns we're allowed to carry so I'm going to talk about my neighbor's party Saturday night.

So, there we are, my sweetie and I, trying to get some sleep in the relative cool of midnight after the awful 100 degree day we had, all windows open to catch the nighttime breezes, when we hear a car door slamming and maybe three or four men traipsing to my neighbor's back patio which is a scant fifteen feet over the fence from our bedroom window.

One man calls, "Charley, over here, Charley!" in a voice that would serve him well on any stage while giggles and "shhhhs" come from the others. Then, we hear the unmistakable sound of, "Hwwaaaaahhhh" followed by a play-by-play narration: "He's hurling. He's in the bushes. He's hurling in the bushes." Back to you, Tom.

This was not to be the last episode of the evening, either. An hour or so later, more car doors, more loud voices, more Olympic vomiting noises rolling around our cul-de-sac like thunder on the Cascades. It was truly one of the most disgusting things I've ever heard. If we were to have a contest about disgusting things overheard while trying to sleep, this would rank right up there. I just wasn't sure what to do about it--talk to the neighbor, call the police to get the drunk driver off the road, let it go until morning, let it go forever?

There was one thing I was sure of, though. Our neighbor was far too old to for these kinds of shenanigans (you can tell how old I am by the use of the word, "shenanigans." It's a wonder I didn't use, "high jinks").

Our neighbor is a youngish man--maybe late 20's, early 30's--who works as some sort of gardener, has a "roommate" and other than the neighbor's name that's all we know about him (we don't even know if the "roommate" should be in quotation marks). But we do know that he should be past the stage of vomiting parties with friends unless he wants a giant "L" marking his door forever, dooming him to a life of Friday evenings spent playing poker and downing six packs with the guys until he's long past fifty, devoid of any female companionship unless you count Sondra at 1-900-Get-Laid.

So, there we were, my husband and I, each on our side of the bed, listening to all this when we turned to one another and voiced the thought uppermost in our minds: "We'd better shut our window next time we're doing the mattress mambo; sound really carries."

So, about that contest--What's the most disgusting thing you've overheard from outside your abode whilst trying to sleep?