My Box, My Box My Box My Box. My Lovely Lady Box

All new Rockwell employees have to go through a boring hour-long environmental, safety and health class. Attendance would probably be much higher if they told the truth about it being a soft-core porn discussion. The instructor (I can't remember her name. We're going to go with Misty. It's a good stripper/porn star name) immediately annoyed me, because she pronounced important "impor-ant." I know I don't pronounce it perfectly, but impor-nt is better than impor-ant. It's like buh-ann vs. butt'n or mih-ann vs. mitt'n. I bet she says "buh-enn." We can never be friends.
Anyway, when Misty was telling us how important it is to re-use and recycle, she held up what looked like a box that business cards would come in. She explained that the box had probably been around for at least 5 years. She showed us where the box had been taped and re-labeled, then said she would pass it around. Then she said, and I can't make this shit up, "That way my box can get even more use."

No one around me seemed to even notice. I looked around for someone else that looked like he/she was having trouble keeping it together, but there was no one. Misty didn't skip a beat. This wouldn't have slipped by at ESP. Is it bad that I miss my old job because my co-workers enjoyed toilet humor and sexual innuendo? I really need to grow up. Until then, I will still have to mention the fact that Misty showed a slide with the same box and said, "Hey look! My box makes a cameo in this slide!" It's bullshit that her box can just phone in a role like that and she still probably made good money from it.

Finally, near the end, when Misty was collecting the other items she had passed around (bubble wrap, little tiny baggies, lube, etc.) she asked us, "Did everyone get a chance to see my box?"

We sure did, Misty. We ALL did. And it's really nothing to be proud of.

More Drama In Da Hood

I usually get the least sleep during the week on Sunday nights. I usually wait up for Josh, even if I go to bed. I end up falling asleep around 11:30 or so, which should give me a solid 6 1/2 hours of sleep, but there are always pee trips, noisy dogs and/or husband, and the asshole birds that hang out in the tree in our backyard. Last night, it was cooler outside than it was in the house, so I had the big bright idea to turn off the air and open the windows. That stupid-ass decision cost me any hope of a decent sleep.

Less than two hours after I fell asleep, there was a loud bang followed by shouting. My half-asleep mind immediately thought of gunshots, but after a few more bangs I realized it was doors slamming. The shouting went on for at least 20 minutes. F-bombs were flying everywhere. I couldn't make much out, but I heard the word "money" a couple times, so in my dreamy paranoid world, I assumed that they were fighting on how they would kill Josh and I before taking the money we found the other night. It sounded like the shouting was coming from those apartments.

When I fully woke up, I figured out that it was probably just a drunken or coked-up fight that would end soon enough. The shouting stopped for several minutes, so I started to fall back to sleep, already panicking about having to wake up in a few hours. As soon as I drifted off, the shouting started again, but this time there was also a woman screaming. Not screaming as in "yelling real loud", but actual shrill, wordless screaming. It scared the bejesus out of me. Josh was in the middle of dialing the police, but while he was watching out the window, 4 cop cars pulled up. We heard an official-sounding voice call, "Hey, you! Get back here!" followed by a lot more shouting. Oh yeah, and the whole time, the crazy male voice kept yelling, "F you!" over and over. Josh theorized that the perp (I learned that word from Cops) was inviting the do-gooder who had called the po-po to have relations with him/herself.

I stayed in bed the whole time, trying not to fully wake up, but Josh moved to the window to get a better listen. He said it sounded like the screaming girl was getting taken to the clink, too. She kept saying, "It's not his fault!" and while they were cuffing her, she started talking REALLY dirty about handcuffs and such. He couldn't see the apartment because a house was blocking the view, so he only saw all the cop cars in the street. We're wondering if the culprits were Trixie and Grill (a.k.a. Babydaddy) from Friday night. At one point, Josh entertained the idea of yelling at them to shut the F up, but I talked him out of it.

After all that, I slept like ass. To make matters worse, one of the dogs started growling in the living room just a little while later. They never growl, so I was sure some masked psychopath was trying to find the best way into our house to slowly eat us. As soon as I fell into a deep sleep, the goddamn birds started in. I shut the windows and turned on the fan for noise, but then my goddamn allergies started in. I sneezed about twelve times in a row and my nose started running. Once I got up to blow my nose, Maggie assumed it was time to eat breakfast, so she stood by the edge of the bed, whining and wagging her tail so her tags jingled. I talked her into going back to sleep, but by that point, I only had about 45 minutes before the alarm was going to go off.

What sucks about the whole thing (besides the obvious) is that we can't get the details from anyone because we don't really like or don't know the neighbors between us and the ruckus. The neighbors that we like probably didn't notice or had an even worse view than we did. The unobstructed views would have come from Mr. Seyba, who wouldn't have woken up because he is a troll and therefore sleeps in a cave he dug in his basement, the people who bought their kids a trampoline and let them light off bottle rockets for hours at a time from June 1-August 31, or other people we haven't ever bothered to meet. If I run into someone while I'm walking the dogs (although I may avoid walking them in that area for fear of finding more drug money or running into Grill), I will try to get the scoop. Until then, I would like to extend a great big "F You!" to everyone that kept me up last night, including those little shithead birds.

Thuggish Ruggish Bone

I hate our neighborhood. I don't understand it at all. To one side, there are lots of cute little houses with cute little families or cute little old people. We all smile and wave when we pass each other. That's all fan-f'ing-tastic, but to the other side are a bunch of ghetto apartments.

*in the ghettooooo*

We also have the drug dealer across the street, but we'll put them in the category of "cute little family" because the kid is pretty cute. And the drug dealer is perfectly nice and respectful most of the time, at least when he's not trying to get into our house at 4 a.m. because he thinks he's locked out.

Anyway, Friday night I was walking the dogs when I noticed some money blowing across the street. My first instinct was to grab it, but then I saw how much it was. I thought about leaving it there so whoever lost it could come out and find it, but I was worried it would blow away or the special kid that walks around with headphones, making weird noises, would find it or something, and the person would never get it back. Without giving it enough thought, I grabbed the money. I didn't think of the logistics of getting it back to the rightful owner.

It turned out to be a lot more than I thought. It was enough to be a full month's rent in those nasty-ass townhouses. It could have easily been someone's paycheck. Once Josh got home, after we got past how stupid it was to pick it up, we decided to go door to door. We agreed to only tell people that we found "something valuable," and that they would know it if they lost it. The tricksy whore (we'll call her Trixie) on our first stop ruined that. She kept pressing us until we told her that it was cash. She wanted to know how much, but we at least kept that to ourselves.

While we were at the next place, Trixie had called what I took to be her Baby Daddy (BD), who wanted to know if we found a hundred dollars. I just told him no. Then he wanted to know if it was fifty. I told him I wasn't going to tell him. Then he pulled out this HUGE wad of fiddies and hunnies and said that he might've lost some, but wasn't sure. Josh said something like, "Well, it looks like you're doing fine either way," which must've pissed off BD, because the mood turned sour. He kept asking us if we were absolutely sure it wasn't a hundred. I tried telling him our rationale for not disclosing the exact amount, but he didn't get it. I also explained that if we were keeping the money, we wouldn't be going door to door, trying to do the right thing. As we walked away, that asshole started talking shit about Josh, saying stuff about how the white boy could keep the money and how he didn't need it, etc. It took a lot for me to keep walking, but this dude was SO obviously a dealer and might've kicked (or capped) my ass for fun. The wad he had was easily over five thousand. He was wearing what were probably shorts, but looked an awful lot like man-pris since he had them pulled down so low. He also had what I think rappers are now calling a "grill" in his mouf.

Basically, me finding this money just about ruined our Friday night. We were all paranoid, because that f'er watched us all the way down the street. Based on the way the money I found was folded over, it could've easily been from his wad. When he pulled that thing out of his pocket, money could've fallen off. I definitely don't feel bad not giving him back his money. If you can lose that much money and not even realize it, while your girlfriend and her kids live in the crappiest townhouse this side of Wellington Heights, then you can go f yourself. The only thing that makes me feel bad is that it could be someone else's. Someone could've just cashed her paycheck and not put the money away, then when she got out, the money fell out of her lap. I guess there's no way of finding out. That f'er made me not want to knock on any more doors.

Since then, I've had two songs in my head nonstop. The first is obviously that stupid Nelly song... you know... "Smile for me Daddy," "What you lookin' at?" "Let me see your grill!" "Let you see my what?" You know, it goes on from there. It actually came on when I got in the car to get a movie right after the whole incident. I couldn't believe it. The second song is this silly Bone Thugs 'n Harmony song. I think it's called "For the Love of Money." In the extended version, the woman makes these dirty, dirty orgasm noises while the song drags on and on. Sadly, I know most of the words, but the relevant verse is one in which the protagonist, similar to the asshole thug trying to shake me and my man down, is a misunderstood drug dealer.

Standing on the corner straight slingin' rocks
Awwww, shit, here comes a motherf'in cop
So I dash, I ducks, and I hides behind a tree
Makin' sure the motherf'ers don't see me.

That? That's poetry, bitches.