A Walk-through of an American Garage Sale: Humanity's Trail of Tears

A Walk-through of an American Garage Sale:
Humanity’s Trail of Tears

Pre-Sale

I was tangentially part of a Garage Sale this past weekend.

Somewhere between my delusions; elaborate and detailed daydreams of a future life of luster weaved with an influx of 500 wind-fallen dollars and waking up at 6 A.M. on a Saturday to stock my inventory of chattel for the municipalities’ Mexicans, I found myself questioning the notion of this whole Garage Sale business.

The whole rigmarole is insulting. We scour our homes for items that we deem unfit for our households; us civilized and sophisticated square feet barons of urban sprawl. With the exaggerated promises of riches we recruit our family members into a hunting party to help us undergo the tiring expedition to locate, extract, and gather any and all of the out of date, unfashionable, ratty and tattered, blemished, broken, stained, abused, and otherwise neglected bullshit that we have been too lazy to artificially inflate the value of, and haul off to, Goodwill. That’s right; we would rather publish our home address and aim it towards the poor and criminally inclined (statistically speaking, of course) and commit a weekend to the practice of broken Spanish with strangers, in the heat, than to cheat on our taxes. You know, Civilized and sophisticated.

(After constructing our great pile, naturally, in the middle of our living room, the patriarch, like a worker ant carrying five times his body weight, loads up with broken electronics and hole-ridden-clothes, carrying the kill piecemeal to the garage. Since, inevitably, the actual sale will keep getting delayed, the hauled carcass’s will fester and (eye) sore from sitting stagnant and being too long in the way. But, that’s okay; we have a few extra inches of closet space and you really can’t buy that kind of real estate! I digress…)

Like a Jewish jeweler of the Upper West Side we scrutinize over each and every item in its entirety, all the while mentally calculating worth. We inspect everything that we ourselves don’t value to keep and, like an insurance claim adjuster, we arbitrarily set a price. We compare against fair market value (of which we are hopelessly unaware) and try and rack foggy memories for what was paid when purchased new (as if one could actually account and depreciate for the value of crap) and then we list the price- We are exceptionally proud of this part. Like kid’s playing dress up in Daddy’s clothes, we are participating in the American economic model and imagining ourselves profitable business men.


The Actual Sale

In the morning, invariably, the first two customers of any respectable garage sale will be black and they will not buy anything. That’s okay; we will see many people on the sale’s first day and will need the energy our first dark and bitter guest will provide us. After pouring a second cup of coffee we prepare to face our second patron; the depressing darkness of early morning that reminds of the precious and much needed sleep that has been nailed to a cross made of mismatched wood, sacrificed for a few extra bucks.

Then, like a biblical omen welcoming the holy morning, the sky opens up and glorious and optimistic light shines. We are committed, refocused and ready- We will have a great sale!

What we aren’t prepared for is that, en masse, people will come and treat our backyard’s like a Ross or a Marshall’s. The invited attendee’s will rifle through our things, disorienting the gypsy-like displays, shoplift and only want to buy the few things in the actual garage, within eyesight, that are not actually for sale. Who signed me up for this? Is that part of my probation?

For all of that, the actual interaction is the worst part. Believe it or not, great anxiety is caused by having someone rummage through your offerings. We immediately second guess our economic acumen and being reevaluating prices.

Is it too much?

What if they balk?

Are they putting that shirt back?

Motherfucker, you’re gross and your clothes suck, you better buy that tattered polo I ruined and no longer want!

I am a pretty fashionable and good looking man. Again, I digress…

Finally, when a customer has tired of wiping Cheetoh’s over the linens they will then send a diplomat, their 7-year old son, and lowball an offer in an attempt to open up negotiations (as cash-only race’s are want to do). We will stand proud.

“Prices are firm”.

Not only do we have the conceit to believe that our contemporaries, our neighbors and peers, will want to buy the hopeless junk that we do not want, but we are wholly insulted that they would have the gall to try and cheat us by countering with such predatory and cheap counter-offers!

At what point did the human principles of commerce and exchange become lined with such bulky arrogance?

I’m not sure how this backwards and unbecoming human behavior pattern came to be. I think with my newly minted $400, I am going to get a booth at TGI Fridays and really investigate these profound academic questions.

by Jonathan Gonnet

You know how shit is.

He reached for the toothpaste and remembered he squeezed the last of days ago. He eeked the last of out of the cap and rubbed it on his teeth with his finger. Bar receipts and random shit from barely remembered nights littered the resting place of where a toothbrush used to lay. Hygiene had been disturbed.

A dream

I walked unobstructed from the entrance of the cave, low hung and rounded at the top like that of the typical door of a house, where it opened up like a bottle, refracting light impossibly (in my science’s mind eye) like a bottle too, to what I imagined had to be the earthen core. Bright white snow made up of the ground, beautiful white, undeterred in keeping its cherry no matter how many people walked on her.
“Why have I never seen anything like this!?” I thought to myself as I scanned the den from left to right and up in an effort to take all the sensory shrapnel in, it was like being at a 21st century rave party on ice (hosted by Disney, no doubt).
“Because you have never been invited to anything like this.” Came an audible answer from a beautiful woman clad in a bikini and gloves. She had the long flowing brunette characterized by the Italian Rennaisancial beauty with a body imagined by those perverted with lust for Mermaids, curvy and busty, with contoured, smooth legs in the place of scaly fishparts.
“I’m sorry, what?” my irrational and surprised reply at this psychic womans terse reply.
“Why, simply, because you have never been invited to anything like this.” Parroted the would be talking fish mermaid thing, with the sweet innocence and naaivety of the snow around us we inhabited.
“Well, I can’t imagine you are speaking to me, as you would have no reason to assume I have never been to a party such as this and I neither initated a conversation or look upon you in demand of a reply.”
“You can imagine, which is why you exist and why we are here. It is becoming clear to me why, exactly, you have never seen anything like this, hehehe”
“Be off, reprobate promotional booze woman and speak when spoken to!”
It was at this overture that I decided to take my leave and walk about the biosphere, explore where exactly I am and the consistency of that around me, hoping that a rapp upon the walls would not be answered with the thunk of hollow glass.

Michael Vick: Pariah or Messiah?

Michael Vick: Pariah or Messiah?
A critical look at the interrelationship between society and the Original Man.

I was doing some light reading as I watched the game last night when I stumbled upon a clue as to why I root for, am fascinated by, and thoroughly enjoy (if not completely identify with) the much-maligned, beaten down, and flawed entertainers of our generation. Michael Vick and his ilk, in your humble author’s perverted opinion, embody the tragedy that is the flawed Human Condition. These fallen and, sometimes broken, angels are the tragic characters in our weak and misunderstood script.

Ah yes. I know you, noble reader, and I know that as soon as the above premise, emotionally swollen and thoughtfully tangled, is revealed and allows you to slowly gain understanding, your pupils spreading across the whites of your eye like a droplet of wet ink on a fresh sheet of paper, scribbling your thoughts to me, that you will turn your head in disgust. Humor me, your old friend, and sneak a peek out of the corner of that little orb and let me show you what I mean.

These unfortunates I spoke of earlier, they are all creatures of an extraordinary talent. Sometimes the result of a rare and innate gift and other times the calculated result of hard work, focus, or determination, but always the reality is of an excellent ability that is unknown to the vast, vapid majority. What separates the graceful heroes of antiquity and our befallen contemporaries, beyond the luxury of time, which is extremely adroit at refinishing written history through expertly applied glossy coats of perfection over the chipped and grainy reality, is the bad luck of living in an overpopulated world where the majority of it’s denizens can only be classified as ignorant and weak.

This army of the weak strives to mute the individual, who is often viewed as an antagonist due to the nature of the organizational structure created by the weak masses, and conscript him to their ranks. We, the persecuted belligerents (ah, now you see how, by betraying my orientation, I can shine such lucid light on this unique perspective and motives therein.) - We, the persecuted belligerents- aggressive, open-minded, curious, courageous and all together truthful (to a clear fault) - while providing the fuel to move the machine forward, are, sometimes, beaten to dust and ash by the brute force of billions of agreed upon judgments, opinions and moralizations.

Now, how do these cheap and timid souls conquer the cutting edge? Good question and I am glad you asked. Let me first unsheathe for you a weapon in your fight to understand:

Any action in the name of morality, no matter what the driving emotion, is really just an attempt, varying from the thinly veiled to the obfuscated, to impose the will of the weak over the strong.

You see then that the ubiquitous moralizations drawn, like brackish water from an underdeveloped well, from our societies pervasive folk lore and (Christian) godly traditions, are released upon the dominant and truly noble men- those who act with an accurate sense of self worth, who do not need, nor seek, the herd’s approval, but instead act in accordance within his own self-subscribed values based in real time and couched in positive incentives- to drown them in negative light.

It is my position that, for the sake of the humanity I love, my befallen idols deserve the deepest of sympathies. In spite of, though admittedly, sometimes purposely, finding the course to be against the grain of societal pressures, they have the strength and integrity to define their own rules- to legislate their own personal laws- and the courage and the sense of purpose to Execute and Live. They have not only been overpowered and slain by our weak society, but, like Achilles’ dragging of Hector’s body around the walls of Troy for nine consecutive days, they are desecrated by our faux moral and chicly-Christian society.

This is why I rooted for Mike Vick yesterday. By rooting for those who You are told to hate, standing by the bewitched as You attempt to tie up and burn their careers, at (a) stake- for what? There is nothing of substance to gain. (see what I did there? That is tricky and a bit of written gymnastics). My vocal support for Michael Vick is not an admittance that I could give half a shit about fighting inferior animals, as some have surmised, but, simply, a show of solidarity for and support in an ever-evolving society of Masters.

Ookie- Get well soon.

I Remain,

Jonathan Gonnet, Original Man.

TY' IIIIIIIII' IIIIIII IIIIME is on myy siiiide

At a certain stage in a man’s metamorphosis, you develop a ¼ life crisis. Well, maybe you adjusted and well nourished great thinkers-and-doers of our age didn’t, but I certainly hurled headfirst into one. As another day slips through my fingers and my grand aspirations, ideals and goals shrink on the horizon, I admit those difficult feelings an otherwise proud man would keep hidden in those well worn crevices we are known to have.

My best looking, most energetic, carefree days are, probably, over. I will never become a demigod of physicality with, seemingly, all the wonders of the world at my finger tips, otherwise known as an NFL football player and I’ll probably never harmonize my way into the American Fabric by way of musical Rock star prowess. The odds of a billionaire’s future seem, well, 1 in a billion. I’m a self aware man, if nothing else, after all.

As I swaggered with my new Lil Boosie through the ivory and scarlet aisles of Target last night with my Kevin Durant aquatics, navy blue and checkered work socks pulled just beneath where my knee met pajama striped shorts expertly matched to an accidently dyed pink shirt bred from the unfamiliarity’s of domestic exercises, I stumbled upon a creation that (uh, maybe) would definitely change my life forever!

Like Prometheus stealing Fire from the Gods to bestow upon mortals, I hurriedly grasped at the cheap Coffee Maker and ran to the safer and familiar confines of the bra and panties aisle to better assess what I had given myself.

Time Continuum. The final and least understood of experimental physicists conundrums. I had single handedly brought about the advent of the Time Travel Age! What I, in fact, found, was a way to gain an extra 2 hours in the day, and with it, finally helped to start the healing process by answering the lingering pain brought about by the question, “Why aren’t there enough hours in the day!?”

After gaining my composure, I slowly venture out of the thong aisle with my Black & Decker Time Machine safely under my arms. I need to find fuel for it so I go to the food aisle, strolling through the various assortments of gourmet beans and flavors from around the world, uncomfortable, nervous, and self conscious, like a man browsing double penetration and ass to mouth DVDs hoping he doesn’t leave with an unsatisfying pick.

Finally, after what felt like two hours (get it, get it? I’m a subtle genius, guys) I get home to my laboratory and set my alarm for 6am, two hours before I would have normally awaken the past two years, and the beginning of the time I have gained because of the ability of my new machine to keep me from sleeping my life away.

I won’t go on boring you with the details of how my coffee making skills leave a lot to be desired, but rest assured dear friends, I’m faring well. I’m sending this pioneering note at 2:17pm Jonathan Time, but in my new alternate reality, it is only 12:17pm. I hope to not return to Jonathan time (and alcohol) for quite a while.

Before you feel too bad about me and my situation, don’t miss me or mourn for me too much, I’m chasing my dreams and taking back the horizon, one Morning at a time!

-Jonathan R. Gonnet
The Neil Armstrong of the 21st Century

Big Picture

A Pragmatic Look at the Big Picture or
A Treatise on Effective Communication, Critical Thinking and You

Presented by Jonathan Gonnet

A lot like Heart Health or Offensive lineman in football, thinking critically and moving ideas forward doesn’t get talked about much and is only really noticed when NOT properly or effectively functioning, and usually by then it’s too late!

I want to touch on a subject that is the foundation to any and all successes you will obtain, through your career or personal life. It is just as important to the everyday activities we perform as well as each of our individually specific long term goals.

I know this is important because I know each one of you, and I know all of us consider ourselves Masters of our own Universe who house deep-seeded passions, hopes and dreams for not only ourselves, but for our loved ones. I preface with all of that, to let you in on something someone told me a long time ago. The dirty secrets of success in America is simple: In order to succeed, in whichever way one defines success, one needs to be able to perform a modicum of mathematical functions, develop an excellence in writing and speaking, and most importantly, be able think on a critical level.

The two parts of communication I want to focus on are those that affect us the most: The ability to write and speak coherently and the faculty to read and listen for meaning.

In an increasingly flat world where there exists more competitive resources (read: employable and qualified people) and more competition for our clients, being able to communicate and execute ideas, and at our age and experience level, is no longer a luxury but a baseline necessity. Being able to write and speak in a business professional manner is a valuable skill, not only for the bigger picture for those interested in management, graduate business school or other high rungs, but in the present and now, in order to qualify ourselves as the consultants we claim to be and to instill confidence with some of the larger outfits which gain more importance and relevance with the decline of the small and medium businesses.

Remember this idiom: Professional behavior begat professional behavior and before you know it, you are wrangling in the big account and being counted on to spread information to your peers and colleagues.


The corollary to written and spoken communication is the active listening and comprehension of what you read and hear. Because the majority of directives are communicated through email, the biggest opportunity in this realm is in the absorption and retention of what we read. A lot of times, because of how busy we stay, emails get overlooked, deleted, or pile up unread. A lot of simple questions can be answered by just staying current with your email. Read everything that comes in your inbox and refrain from deleting items that there might be a chance will be needed in the near future. I usually clear out my inbox at the end of the month because within those 30 days, I will frequently revisit old emails for information and direction. This is important for the big picture, when you read everything that comes in your inbox, you are empowering yourself with sometimes company wide information and initiatives. This effectively loops you in the corporate conversation, an important dialogue and flow of ideas and messages that is not necessarily given out by invitation.

It is really easy to for us, as sales people and a gear in a bigger machine, to be myopic and short sighted. I hear a lot of “Why can’t SO and SO” and “Why isn’t X and X this way”. The best way I recommend and what I do is to look at things, not only for our jobs, but in life, and try to understand the mechanisms and flow from the top down, thinking critically. The relationship between cause and effect is a very strong one, a fact strong enough that Newton was compelled to legislate it into a physical law.

For our roles, each and every directive we get, is to accomplish a bottom line objective. In organized businesses, there is no wasted movement. So, in other words, everything we do is not for our health, but for a reason. The best thing I’ve learned throughout my career is to try and decode what exactly that reason is and to drive to accomplish that underlying goal. If we can understand the macro level of what goes on it makes understanding our roles and expectations much easier, you can sometimes even accomplish MORE because you are employing your own creative thinking and problem solving skills, and you derive more fulfillment in your tasks allowing you to work harder and more productively. You then are no longer performing an arbitrary task, but you are tackling your job with awareness; you are building a career!

Lastly, have fun with it! Make it yours and add an indelible imprint. For example, I like to wax on and on and practice writing, as you can probably tell by this presentation. I am of the opinion that mastering these things will enable you to not only be successful employee, but a happy and individual.

Apollo Power & Light can suck a funky dick!

From: Gonnet, Jonathan [mailto:jgonnet@dallasnews.com]
Sent: Tue 9/7/2010 4:13 PM
To: Customer Service
Subject: Problem

I need the attention of a supervisor. I created an account for electricity and 8 days later, my electricity STILL has not been turned on. This has turned in to a huge ordeal as my pregnant fiancé and infant son are stuck in an hot apartment without electricity!

My payment was received the 1st. It is now the 7th. The earliest I am able to cool my fiancé and son is the 9th, and that’s even at $100 extra!

This is an injustice and is morally wrong. Please rectify this situation immediately and have someone call me.



From: Customer Service [mailto:customerservice@apollopowerlight.com]
Sent: Tuesday, September 07, 2010 4:24 PM
To: Gonnet, Jonathan
Subject: RE: Problem

Dear Jonathan,

Thank you for your message.

I have sent your message to both our Operations Manager and also the President of our company. We will get your account situation figured out and someone will contact you.

Regards,

Janet
Apollo Power & Light




From: Gonnet, Jonathan [mailto:jgonnet@dallasnews.com]
Sent: Mon 9/13/2010 1:46 PM
To: Customer Service
Subject: RE: Problem
Janet-

I can understand and appreciate that due to the inclimate weather this weekend your company has probably been under more pressure and has been further stretched thin to accommodate and help the clients and accounts in the direst need of your immediate support or face financial or bodily harm. I am not an unreasonable man, I can appreciate that.

The fact remains, though, that it has been over 6 days since your email and I still have not been contacted, as promised, by anyone; you, the President, or otherwise.

Flash floods or not, I was left in the precarious position, with my fiancé and 8 month old son, of having no electricity and air conditioning in our one bedroom apartment in the sweltering days leading up to the relieving deluge.

I need an explanation as to why it takes 8 days to set up electricity. I need an explanation as to why a sales rep would tell me 3-5 days, if that were the normal business cycle and, most importantly, I need an explanation as to why Apollo's employee's were handcuffed to the rigid and unmoving policies, flying in the face of reason, rationality, and the possible harm of an infant.
I want just compensation for inconvenience and costs, whether through service or monies. My family had to relocate to an in-laws house one night and in a motel another. I can provide receipts if need be.

Please allow me an audience with a decision maker, the ear of a C-level executive or a manager that can make this happen.

From: Customer Service [mailto:customerservice@apollopowerlight.com]
Sent: Monday, September 13, 2010 3:13 PM
To: Gonnet, Jonathan
Subject: RE: Problem

Dear Jonathan Gonnet,

We are sorry to hear you did not receive our two voice mail messages regarding your account, and that you feel your account was not handled properly. After researching all dates and pulling the original 9/1/10 recording, we have found the following:

9/1: 12:13 pm – a call to customer service was received to set up an account again with an agreement to pay via ACE for normal service. During that call, you were asked if you wanted “expedited service for an extra $100,” which you declined. Additionally, the represented stated that it would be 3-5 business days for activation once payment was received.

9/1: 07:04 pm – a payment sent via ACE received.

9/7: call to customer service for verification of start date (09/09/2010).

Because your payment was received after normal business hours, 09/02/2010 is considered the first business day, leaving 09/09/2010 as the 5th business day since 09/06/2010 was Labor Day holiday. However, our records indicate that as a courtesy we cancelled this date and sent a request to move your start date from 09/09/10 to 09/08/2010. We received confirmation from Oncor that your services were activated on this date.

In regard to our customer service representatives and the policy in which they are required to follow, we understand that you feel they are rigid and do not allow the representatives any movement; however, start dates are based on the customer’s decision as to whether normal or expedite service will be satisfactory, and also timelines provided to us by Oncor. In your case, you did select our normal service and you elected not to pay the needed priority fee. At this time, we find we did begin your services as promised to you during your 09/01/2010 call.

Regards,

Janet
Apollo Power & Light


From: Gonnet, Jonathan [mailto:jgonnet@dallasnews.com]
Sent: Mon 9/13/2010 3:37 PM
To: Customer Service
Subject: RE: Problem
Janet-

Payment was made on 9/1. The fact it is considered 9/2 was not messaged. Regardless, if the 3 day, which one were to have a reasonable expectation of it being, were to hold true this wouldn’t have been an issue. There is not way to excuse payment being made on 9/1 and power being turned on 9/9.

While your records indicate that the power was started on 9/8, I am not so sure as I had to make other arrangements after being told by a sales rep it was impossible and the earliest possible, even with a $100 payment, would be 9/9.

Unfortunately, I’m sorry to hear that you don’t recognize Apollo’s responsibility and participation in the severe inconvenience of a family, and most importantly, an infant, and that you are unmoved.

Fortunately, as an informed citizen with a happy talent for composition and vehicles with which to reach an audience with my message, I do have some recourse in that I can make sure future clients of Apollo are aware of how much you care about existing account members (and their families).

Thanks for your time and efforts with this matter

JG



From: Customer Service [mailto:customerservice@apollopowerlight.com]
Sent: Monday, September 13, 2010 4:20 PM
To: Gonnet, Jonathan
Subject: RE: Problem

Jonathan,

Apollo is a caring company and we all have families like you do. We are sympathetic to your situation. In fact, it was important to all of us to make sure ONCOR got your power on as quickly as possible once we were made aware of your situation. We all checked to make sure your power was on September 8th, and ONCOR confirmed that it was.

Because of the weekend and the holiday (when ONCOR did not work and connect people) the timing of your connection was at the long end of the spectrum. It was still within the parameters that we gave you on the call. Yes, we pulled the recording and listened to the call to make sure you were treated with courtesy and told the correct information.

While I can understand your unhappiness with the timing of your power being turned on, we did everything that we could given the time constraints of the weekend and the Labor Day Holiday. Our Apollo Customer Service Manager, Amanda, tried to reach you by phone and left a voicemail.

As a company, we do care about our customers. We work in conjunction with a long list of pledge agencies throughout Texas who help our customers with their bills if they are having financial difficulties, and we keep people powered up on the promise of pledges from these agencies. We contact our customers three times before a disconnect order is ever sent and we try our best to treat our customers with the same humanity with which we want to be treated.

Jonathan, we appreciate your business and we wish you and your family the best.

Kindest regards,

Janet
Apollo Power & Light






Janet-

On paper Apollo may be the greatest humanitarian company in Texas. You help the less fortunate, you give 3 phone calls before cutting off power (though it would ring the hollow ring of a token if this is done with the same effort that was put forth in getting a hold of me), and you probably do your global due diligence and duty by using Green energy, but the fact remains that when given the opportunity to have a ‘corporate values of compassion or sense of community’ tire meet road, you didn’t even start the engine.

I understand that you feel like you, as a company, are compassionate because there are some corporate policies in place to help the less fortunate. I also understand, and it is readily apparent, that it nothing more than a nicely shaded, highly theorized umbrella with which to shelter yourselves from responsibility.

I am an unsatisfied, unhappy, and unresolved customer and I will have to do what I feel is right and that is to voice my concerns for those who currently are and who are thinking about becoming Apollo clients.

You don’t need to feel obligated to respond, but, again, thank you for your time and your attempts at reconciliation, but we can agree to be in disagreement.

JG

Hater's gonna Hate

I am a rather small man.

There is a new urban music artist that everyone seems to be clamoring over. People are telling their friends they like him by way of his music. His gregorian chant-like nonmetric hooks drive ladies gaga, for a lack of a more clever term.

I hate Drake.

I don't hate him because he "sucks", though I believe he does, I hate him because I am petty.

Ok, I admit, begrudgingly and through my teeth, that there are some songs that I enjoy that Drake might have created. So you can see now that it is not an issue of creativity or of music, but of a perceived slight.

For someone who gives off the scent of a bitch boy douchefuck, he has a shit ton of money. I resent that with a fierce and irrational emmotion chemically created between my bowels of hate and my jealous mind.

A man who played a cripple on the idiot box's 6th layer of hell (with only Vh1, E! and MTV burning in Dante's 7th) and has the mulatto's worst of both worlds complex, he has all the fame and money I feel is entitled to me.

I know in my heart of hearts that resentment should not lie to the one who manipulates a flawed system to their benefit, which Drake has by aligning his torn ACL with Baby and Wayne, and that I should not cry to the heavens of injustice, but in this case it is just too hard.

I hate the player who is winning in my favorite game. Harrumph.

Maybe I need to get to work. Yes, I think I will do just that.

I'm not as small a man as I once was...

NOLA 5:00 AM Death March

I almost exited this world, Friday July 9th. It was a very scary situation, let me try and recreate it for you, my would-be mourners (or so I would hope).



It was 5am and the wet New Orleans sky hung around us with a brighter hue than a typical Texas late night. I lead a tattered group of friends back from Bourbon Street with the end destination being the hotel so that we could rest our weary feet, minds and hearts. We had already walked Cohn home and successfully retired him to his bed so that he could recollect his consciousness and motor skills, both of which had escaped him earlier in the night.

So, there I am, stumbling about with the casual air of an idiot who has just made his regular idiot’s deposit at the craps table of my local branch casino, flanked on both sides with CJ the affable Asian and an umbrella yielding Pig Face who has the curious habit of walking on his tip toes with his head angled, resembling a Mexican Oswald Cobblepot. Bringing up the rear is ADHD personified; the aloof Shitty (that is his pledge name), drunk and doing honor to his name.

Now to the Action.

As I crossed the metal barriers on the median that intersected Canal St, I saw an economy sized car swerve and speed up next to us in a hazardous manner! The car door is thrown open, as if blown outward by an air cannon, and a black man with a disproportionate body (his arms were twice the size of the rest of his make up) pounces from his seat and ambles toward us, audible grunts and spittle reverberating in his nostrils, like a gorilla in the NOLA mist.

“Who threw that shit at me, was it you?” he yells, pointing a curved human-like finger at me.

“Uh what?”- I reply, confused and reactive more than heroic, at this juncture.

“One of y’all in the blue shirt. Which one was it?” he demands.

At this point the predator had honed in his threats on two people, me and Shitty. I take a quick look around and it is then I see why; Shitty and I are both wearing a blue shirt.

So, I resume being confused and, because I was emboldened, both with 190 Everclear slushies and reinforcement, by way of my three friends, I become a mouthy, insolent visitor.

After a bit of back-and-forth laced with confusion, annoyance, and disgust, the teased animal retreats back to his Nissan, rifling through the dirty laundry housed in his seat.

“Y’all from out of town. (how did he know?) This is the Murder Capital of the World, you better recognize where y’all at!”

“This ain’t the Fight capital. This ain’t the Talk shit capital. MURRRRRDAAAAA Capital.” [emphasis his]

At this taunting, it is only then that I realize the degree of seriousness and danger. Me and my ilk have made the grave mistake of wandering past the railing and intruded on a wild animal’s environment. We, while outnumbering by a ratio of 4:1, were undeniably the prey in danger as strangers in a strange land. At this revelation I change my tone and I began to gush apologies as death seems like the odds on favorites result. The apologies seemed to appease him so, his pride and manhood affirmed, he beats his chest and speeds away into the New Orleans night/morning.

Walking back to the hotel in the quiet shock of almost being mowed down in a random event that nobody knew anything about, our heavy silence is finally broken a minute or so later as Shitty begins to laugh.

“Oh my god, that was crazy. Did y’all see that? I threw that napkin right at his window and it stuck hahahahaha”.

“Um. Wut!?! You fucking idiot, why didn’t you say anything/take responsibility/you’re a bitch/etc” or some streaming response like that was all I could muster.

Shitty owes me a near death experience. Any thoughts on how I can collect?