Skip to main content

Small Town Feud

There is a small feud building in my town.

The curvy road I live a few yards from converges at a stop sign with another curvy road, both ending at an odd T-shaped intersection. You can turn right to head to points south, or you can turn left to head into Small Town and places like My Favorite Place for Joe and the disappearing yarn shop. Turning right isn't a problem, but as is true with most intersections like this, turning left can try the patience of the most emotionally balanced driver.

One man in a dirty pick-up truck has solved the problem of waiting by going around the stop sign and driving on the grass, thumbing his nose or whatever at the established practice of waiting your turn in line, turning his back on organization and fairness. This spot of grass that he drives over seems to be easement, like a peninsula jutting out into the pavement, but the person who lives on the corner has taken action as if he owns the place.

When the man on the corner has trees trimmed, he drags the branches over to the easement and builds a barrier to keep the truck from by-passing the stop sign. In the past, these barriers have only been tall enough to prove a challenge to the driver. They have given him something interesting to drive over and grind into what is now just dirt and gravel. Before long, there is nothing left of the branches but a few stray twigs, and the passage is clear.

Well, the man on the corner has wised up, and his new barrier is half the height of my car. He has amassed so many branches he could have a bonfire to blaze all day if someone were to light a match. I have watched this pile grow over the last couple of days as I wait dutifully at the stop sign like a normal citizen, one who respects the rules of orderly conduct. You use your turn signal, you slow on the off ramp and not on the highway, and you wait your turn at stop signs.

I am now waiting for the reaction of the guy with the truck, the one who seems to have waged a full-fledged feud with the guy on the corner. I am waiting for Ernest T. Bass to throw stones. And I am waiting for the day the guy on the corner buries tire-puncturing spikes underneath the brush pile. This is going to be fun.

Comments

dive said…
Somebody ought to get those two guys and smack their heads together until they grow up.
Sheesh!
Gina said…
Get the popcorn!
dive said…
I think I'm going to have to watch "The 'Burbs" again.
Miz Minka said…
I'm bringing a lawn chair, a bag of pretzels and a six-pack. Fun-ny! (Well, not for the guy on the corner, but still!!)

Popular posts from this blog

Happy Birthday...

to me! Update: Since you have asked, I only got one actual packaged gift, a beautiful hand-made bracelet from a friend, but both girls were home for the weekend, and we had dinner at the lake and a relaxing weekend. Thanks to all of you for your lovely wishes!

My Sitemeter is All Bloated and Not Quite Itself

I'm tempted to let it sit on the couch with its feet curled up under a blanket, a hot cup of coffee in hand, a block of cherry almond bark Chocolove within reach, and An Affair to Remember spinning in the DVD player. I'm one of those obsessive bloggers, the kind who checks her sitemeter as often as possible throughout the day, the kind who gauges the quality of her writing by the number of readers who regularly stop by. I've become less interested in the overall number of hits and more interested in the number of repeat hits. The return visitors are the ones I long for. When my sitemeter reads forty at the end of the day, and the majority of those hits are webpals who have conversed, I'm happy. Forty may seem low to many of you, but I've only been at this since August. To me, forty is a jackpot. A few days ago, I sat down at my laptop and discovered a number somewhere in the eighties. Eighties! Yippee! Yeeha ! Hoo-rah ! I've been discovered by the webworld , o...

Ish People

Tell an Ish person to show up around 9 a.m., and you'll see them somewhere around 9 a.m. Tell them to show up at 9ish, and you'll see them anywhere from 9:05 to 9:20. You have given them license to dilly dally, and who wouldn't take advantage of that? The other night at the big shindig dinner party, one of the drummers said the rehearsal the next morning would begin at 9ish. "I am an ish person," he says. Immediately the clanker goes off in my head--oh, good, I thought. I can deliver my daughter a little late. No Ish person is early, so if you say 9ish, that does not mean give or take 5, 10, 15 minutes. It's exclusively a taking phrase. Take an extra 10 minutes to drink your cup of coffee. We won't mind. We're Ish people. Sunday's rehearsal started at 2:00. Because it was conducted by the same people who conducted the Saturday rehearsal, my understanding was 2-ISH. My daughter is worse than I am about taking liberties with Ish time frames, so she d...