I can always gage how much fun everyone had the night before by looking at the array of rubbish in the parking lot opposite my building as in my neighborhood are five bars, a dance club and a strip joint. Its not uncommon or unsurprising to see any imaginable collection of debris left behind.
Usually, therell be several empty, often broken, bottles and depending on what bottles there are and how many are left behind, the night was better for who ever left them there. If there are unbroken Bud light bottles, usually the night was only okay. If theyre broken, the night was bad. If there are cans, the night was lousy. If there are empty bottles of vodka, broken or not, someone had a blast. The better the vodka, the better time someone had.
Empty soda bottles or cans are an indication there was no fun had at all, however, true party animals go to Seven Eleven before the club gets rocking, which usually doesnt happen until at least ten or eleven. They snag a big gulp or a slurpee, some nachos or a taquito and hang out in the parking lot before they get their dance on. To see Seven Eleven trash is a sure indicator that whatever happened last night was truly legendary.
Bottles are the first hint as to how things went. The more odd things are, the wilder time was had. Empty plastic cups are an indicator that the party went out in to the parking lot after closing time. From time to time, Ive found Hawaiian leis and Marti gras beads. Ive found packaging for sex toys and once, I even found a forgotten pink anal plug in the parking lot.
Most common are the discarded fliers, advertisements for car washes with girls in short shorts and invites to next weeks parties. If you dont know where those come from, a dozen or more elves appear in the night while the lot is full and the party is in full swing. The elves jam them under windshield wipers and in to driver side windows. If youre unlucky, like I typically am, it rains that night so the flyer gets soaked. In the morning, in the sun, the flyer is still damp and the sun cooks it to your window or windshield. When I peel it off at noon when I leave to get coffee, it leaves a little paper square there. The only thing that can get that off is a carefully applied razor blade. Forget your finger nails.
The most confusing thing to find is packs of cigarettes with untouched cigarettes still in the pack. Bar savvy cats call it alcohol abuse when people spill alcohol, but typically, the bar savvy are usually too sauced to come up with a cute term for it when smokes go unaccounted for. I have to imagine they arent missed until the Sunday morning hangover arrives.
Unrolled condoms or torn condom wrappers in the grass or shrubs is enough to make anyone wonder how drunk do you have to be that the trip home would be too long to get down to the love making. Maybe its just some peoples way of killing that hour or so between the last drink and the drive home. But then one would have to wonder what they do for the remaining forty-one minutes of that hour of sobering up. I suppose that would explain the abandoned panties Ive also found from time to time.
To see a collection of shattered glass that used to be a window in someones car, not a broken bottle, is enough to make me really worry. Obviously it means that someones car was busted in to and probably someones stuff was stolen. Fortunately, my car looks incredibly low-rent. Theres nothing worth stealing in there short of my girlfriends adorable pink Hello Kitty pillow that I keep forgetting to bring in to the apartment. I cant even imagine a thief would even bother getting close enough to my car to take a look at the unfencable goods inside because it looks so bad compared to the silver Cooper Mini that belongs to a stripper who works the day shift, the over-sized and unsexual hemis that belong to the red necks who live on the outskirts of town, the repulsive Lexuses, Esclades and Jaguars that belong to the divorced slime bucket men that go to clubs dance badly with the cute co-eds who are just out to have a good time and the Tarsuses, the Accords, the Civics and the other mid-sized sedans that moms and dads buy their kids when they go to college thatll be dented, scratched and damaged after nights of buzzed driving. Given the alternative, a thief will bust in to one of those. Nine times out of the, those vehicles will have some kind of interesting stereo system or speakers thatll be worth the brick to toss through the glass.
Ive never found mouth pieces for sobriety tests which, I suspect, is because, in the parking lot people arent driving home quite yet so the cops havent collared them and either delayed or canceled their arrival at Dennys or the Coney Island. Which beats the alternative: trying to drive drunk to get after closing time food. Even if they pull it off, eventually, they wont, and thats the worst thing ever.
The parking lot and the junk left behind tells some kind of story that, when its paid attention to, is at least kind of a little interesting to think about. Granted, its not worth thinking that deeply about or paying that much attention to, but it beats actually going to the party, paying cover to go to the club or opening up and closing a tab for beer thats never worth the two seventy-five it costs to get it plus the tip to have it brought to you. Its not worth trying to find a table dealing with other people to watch the game to find out what happens at the five bars, the dance club or the strip joint at night.
Rather, I have more fun staying up until two-thirty or three to watch the crowd leave, cracking my window, just above the parking lot and catching what parts of a conversation I can hear. Usually, the most pronounced and easiest to understand words are the ones that are easiest for a drunk kid to say over and over again. Fuckin fuckin this, fuckin fuckin that. Its people like them that need to spend more time pouring over their literature reading than pouring themselves drinks. Their vocabulary is as stunted as the kids growth that started smoking at age ten.
If Im really lucky, I get to see people get arrested, guys get in fights over girls, girls get in fights over guys or just a good old fashioned screaming match that never culminates in a fight, just a lot of big talk and hurt feelings. Its hard for me to say which is my favorite thing to see happen in the parking lot. Unfortunately, if I fall asleep, I dont get to see that. Sometimes, Im lucky, or unlucky, enough to have some incredible jerk come along, pumping more decibels out of his car than he transferable credit hours with a higher blood alcohol lever than his grade point average. A guy like him is a mixed blessing. When he comes along, I get to wake up and see the show. When he doesnt, I get to sleep as soundly as I would if I was at my mom and dads house, which I think is kind of a rip off. If Im paying for a place in the city, I ought to get all the city action I can handle.
To be accurate, Im not sure Ive seen all the city action I can handle. Ive never gone home in the evening and said to myself, My god, I just want to get out of here. Which I think is kind of odd. Its amazing how much crazy stuff you can see before you reach some kind of threshold. Its not uncommon, while waiting for a bus, to have some toothless guy with black gums ask you for a cigarette, spitting with every s sound he makes. Its an every day thing to see a group of people hanging out, leaning on the planter in front of the bus stop, which, by the way, is directly across the street from my building. They might seem to be waiting for a number ten or eleven to the south side of town when I leave for work at 8:30 and maybe they left, but in the afternoon, when I get home, theyre still there. One has to wonder whats so great about that part of the world that either they dont leave or they come back.
Then there are the bums who seem to find me like moths find fires to fly in to. Got some change for some food? Im really hungry can be interpreted as Got some money for some beer? Im embarrassingly pathetic. For the most part, I dont mind the bums. I dont even mind being lied to. I know that for the most part they arent as hungry as they are thirty and I know that if I pass them what I have, itll go toward a forty of Cobra or Colt .45 or some other bottom shelf brand of beer. Ill pass them what I have because usually either before or after I do, theyll give me some priceless piece of bum wisdom. One time, I had a guy tell me and my girlfriend he had recently been paroled from prison, used to be a boxer and has thirteen children he supports by biting the heads off chickens. Thats worth buying a guy a beer.
The only draw back of being in the city is the cops who defend the law from ruthless and wicked people who park where they ought to not park. I can ignore the fireworks that were set off during the Pistons playoff run that was cut short last week and the gun fire I hear from time to time. But at least when the Fraternal Order of Police call to hit you up for money, you can respond by telling them that you were ticketed for a fifteen dollars for parking in a spot youve been parking in since you got to the city and never had any trouble with it and if they want money from you, they can hit the city that ripped you off for it. Usually, theyll take the hint, but they wont learn from it. Theyll ticket people for talking on your cell phone while skipping down the sidewalk and then wonder why Ice T makes a song called Cop Killer.
So aside from the cops, I love living in the city. I love the trash, the party-goers, the club-sters, the bums and the suspicious cast of characters who seem to be every where. I love broken glass and dead grass thats littered with cigarette butts, candy wrappers and apple cores. I love the gun fire and the popping of fire works, both of which follow a Pistons win. I love knowing that theres a Seven Eleven and a Coney Island open some where right now. I love walking in the direction of the smell of a church bar-b-que, finding it, over paying them for incredibly good food thats horrible for me, sitting at a picnic table with people I dont know and getting to know them while I eat.
I could live with out the ruckus on the nights I want to sleep, but you take the good with the bad. You find places to smoke and meet people. You find places that have cable so you can watch ESPN for free. You learn how to make a dinner out of popcorn and water. You pick up on certain survival skills you wonder how you ever lived with out. You learn how to skip out on a four beer tab without getting caught, even while buzzed. You meet people who have free bus passes and how to make a copy of them so you can ride the bus for free. You devise certain scams that make getting by on minimum wage possible.
There are more honorable ways to live, but at least Im not selling drugs or hurting anyone. Im not actually skipping out on tabs and screwing over waitressesIve just learned how to do it and I save that skill for when the food took too long to get to me, I wasnt asked enough if I wanted more beer, if I wasnt flirted with enough and if a pair of drunks who bothered me while I was trying to watch the Tigers wasnt bounced. Which happened once and I had to abscond with out paying. I felt as though I was justified in doing as much. Picture a fifty something man and his thirty something girlfriend, both drunk as skunks when they arrived and kept drinking while they were there. The man kept telling me I had a beautiful girlfriend and asking me if I minds that he smokes, which I thought was weird since I was already smoking. The woman kept telling my girlfriend she had amazing boobs. Its not an every day thing to rip working people off and its not the worst thing in the world to talk to an annoying drunk. So the next few times I went back, I over tipped the waitresses and the bartenders to try and earn back from of my wasted karma. Everyone else is trying to make it, kind of like I am. And the worst thing I could do in the world would be to set people back.
Usually, therell be several empty, often broken, bottles and depending on what bottles there are and how many are left behind, the night was better for who ever left them there. If there are unbroken Bud light bottles, usually the night was only okay. If theyre broken, the night was bad. If there are cans, the night was lousy. If there are empty bottles of vodka, broken or not, someone had a blast. The better the vodka, the better time someone had.
Empty soda bottles or cans are an indication there was no fun had at all, however, true party animals go to Seven Eleven before the club gets rocking, which usually doesnt happen until at least ten or eleven. They snag a big gulp or a slurpee, some nachos or a taquito and hang out in the parking lot before they get their dance on. To see Seven Eleven trash is a sure indicator that whatever happened last night was truly legendary.
Bottles are the first hint as to how things went. The more odd things are, the wilder time was had. Empty plastic cups are an indicator that the party went out in to the parking lot after closing time. From time to time, Ive found Hawaiian leis and Marti gras beads. Ive found packaging for sex toys and once, I even found a forgotten pink anal plug in the parking lot.
Most common are the discarded fliers, advertisements for car washes with girls in short shorts and invites to next weeks parties. If you dont know where those come from, a dozen or more elves appear in the night while the lot is full and the party is in full swing. The elves jam them under windshield wipers and in to driver side windows. If youre unlucky, like I typically am, it rains that night so the flyer gets soaked. In the morning, in the sun, the flyer is still damp and the sun cooks it to your window or windshield. When I peel it off at noon when I leave to get coffee, it leaves a little paper square there. The only thing that can get that off is a carefully applied razor blade. Forget your finger nails.
The most confusing thing to find is packs of cigarettes with untouched cigarettes still in the pack. Bar savvy cats call it alcohol abuse when people spill alcohol, but typically, the bar savvy are usually too sauced to come up with a cute term for it when smokes go unaccounted for. I have to imagine they arent missed until the Sunday morning hangover arrives.
Unrolled condoms or torn condom wrappers in the grass or shrubs is enough to make anyone wonder how drunk do you have to be that the trip home would be too long to get down to the love making. Maybe its just some peoples way of killing that hour or so between the last drink and the drive home. But then one would have to wonder what they do for the remaining forty-one minutes of that hour of sobering up. I suppose that would explain the abandoned panties Ive also found from time to time.
To see a collection of shattered glass that used to be a window in someones car, not a broken bottle, is enough to make me really worry. Obviously it means that someones car was busted in to and probably someones stuff was stolen. Fortunately, my car looks incredibly low-rent. Theres nothing worth stealing in there short of my girlfriends adorable pink Hello Kitty pillow that I keep forgetting to bring in to the apartment. I cant even imagine a thief would even bother getting close enough to my car to take a look at the unfencable goods inside because it looks so bad compared to the silver Cooper Mini that belongs to a stripper who works the day shift, the over-sized and unsexual hemis that belong to the red necks who live on the outskirts of town, the repulsive Lexuses, Esclades and Jaguars that belong to the divorced slime bucket men that go to clubs dance badly with the cute co-eds who are just out to have a good time and the Tarsuses, the Accords, the Civics and the other mid-sized sedans that moms and dads buy their kids when they go to college thatll be dented, scratched and damaged after nights of buzzed driving. Given the alternative, a thief will bust in to one of those. Nine times out of the, those vehicles will have some kind of interesting stereo system or speakers thatll be worth the brick to toss through the glass.
Ive never found mouth pieces for sobriety tests which, I suspect, is because, in the parking lot people arent driving home quite yet so the cops havent collared them and either delayed or canceled their arrival at Dennys or the Coney Island. Which beats the alternative: trying to drive drunk to get after closing time food. Even if they pull it off, eventually, they wont, and thats the worst thing ever.
The parking lot and the junk left behind tells some kind of story that, when its paid attention to, is at least kind of a little interesting to think about. Granted, its not worth thinking that deeply about or paying that much attention to, but it beats actually going to the party, paying cover to go to the club or opening up and closing a tab for beer thats never worth the two seventy-five it costs to get it plus the tip to have it brought to you. Its not worth trying to find a table dealing with other people to watch the game to find out what happens at the five bars, the dance club or the strip joint at night.
Rather, I have more fun staying up until two-thirty or three to watch the crowd leave, cracking my window, just above the parking lot and catching what parts of a conversation I can hear. Usually, the most pronounced and easiest to understand words are the ones that are easiest for a drunk kid to say over and over again. Fuckin fuckin this, fuckin fuckin that. Its people like them that need to spend more time pouring over their literature reading than pouring themselves drinks. Their vocabulary is as stunted as the kids growth that started smoking at age ten.
If Im really lucky, I get to see people get arrested, guys get in fights over girls, girls get in fights over guys or just a good old fashioned screaming match that never culminates in a fight, just a lot of big talk and hurt feelings. Its hard for me to say which is my favorite thing to see happen in the parking lot. Unfortunately, if I fall asleep, I dont get to see that. Sometimes, Im lucky, or unlucky, enough to have some incredible jerk come along, pumping more decibels out of his car than he transferable credit hours with a higher blood alcohol lever than his grade point average. A guy like him is a mixed blessing. When he comes along, I get to wake up and see the show. When he doesnt, I get to sleep as soundly as I would if I was at my mom and dads house, which I think is kind of a rip off. If Im paying for a place in the city, I ought to get all the city action I can handle.
To be accurate, Im not sure Ive seen all the city action I can handle. Ive never gone home in the evening and said to myself, My god, I just want to get out of here. Which I think is kind of odd. Its amazing how much crazy stuff you can see before you reach some kind of threshold. Its not uncommon, while waiting for a bus, to have some toothless guy with black gums ask you for a cigarette, spitting with every s sound he makes. Its an every day thing to see a group of people hanging out, leaning on the planter in front of the bus stop, which, by the way, is directly across the street from my building. They might seem to be waiting for a number ten or eleven to the south side of town when I leave for work at 8:30 and maybe they left, but in the afternoon, when I get home, theyre still there. One has to wonder whats so great about that part of the world that either they dont leave or they come back.
Then there are the bums who seem to find me like moths find fires to fly in to. Got some change for some food? Im really hungry can be interpreted as Got some money for some beer? Im embarrassingly pathetic. For the most part, I dont mind the bums. I dont even mind being lied to. I know that for the most part they arent as hungry as they are thirty and I know that if I pass them what I have, itll go toward a forty of Cobra or Colt .45 or some other bottom shelf brand of beer. Ill pass them what I have because usually either before or after I do, theyll give me some priceless piece of bum wisdom. One time, I had a guy tell me and my girlfriend he had recently been paroled from prison, used to be a boxer and has thirteen children he supports by biting the heads off chickens. Thats worth buying a guy a beer.
The only draw back of being in the city is the cops who defend the law from ruthless and wicked people who park where they ought to not park. I can ignore the fireworks that were set off during the Pistons playoff run that was cut short last week and the gun fire I hear from time to time. But at least when the Fraternal Order of Police call to hit you up for money, you can respond by telling them that you were ticketed for a fifteen dollars for parking in a spot youve been parking in since you got to the city and never had any trouble with it and if they want money from you, they can hit the city that ripped you off for it. Usually, theyll take the hint, but they wont learn from it. Theyll ticket people for talking on your cell phone while skipping down the sidewalk and then wonder why Ice T makes a song called Cop Killer.
So aside from the cops, I love living in the city. I love the trash, the party-goers, the club-sters, the bums and the suspicious cast of characters who seem to be every where. I love broken glass and dead grass thats littered with cigarette butts, candy wrappers and apple cores. I love the gun fire and the popping of fire works, both of which follow a Pistons win. I love knowing that theres a Seven Eleven and a Coney Island open some where right now. I love walking in the direction of the smell of a church bar-b-que, finding it, over paying them for incredibly good food thats horrible for me, sitting at a picnic table with people I dont know and getting to know them while I eat.
I could live with out the ruckus on the nights I want to sleep, but you take the good with the bad. You find places to smoke and meet people. You find places that have cable so you can watch ESPN for free. You learn how to make a dinner out of popcorn and water. You pick up on certain survival skills you wonder how you ever lived with out. You learn how to skip out on a four beer tab without getting caught, even while buzzed. You meet people who have free bus passes and how to make a copy of them so you can ride the bus for free. You devise certain scams that make getting by on minimum wage possible.
There are more honorable ways to live, but at least Im not selling drugs or hurting anyone. Im not actually skipping out on tabs and screwing over waitressesIve just learned how to do it and I save that skill for when the food took too long to get to me, I wasnt asked enough if I wanted more beer, if I wasnt flirted with enough and if a pair of drunks who bothered me while I was trying to watch the Tigers wasnt bounced. Which happened once and I had to abscond with out paying. I felt as though I was justified in doing as much. Picture a fifty something man and his thirty something girlfriend, both drunk as skunks when they arrived and kept drinking while they were there. The man kept telling me I had a beautiful girlfriend and asking me if I minds that he smokes, which I thought was weird since I was already smoking. The woman kept telling my girlfriend she had amazing boobs. Its not an every day thing to rip working people off and its not the worst thing in the world to talk to an annoying drunk. So the next few times I went back, I over tipped the waitresses and the bartenders to try and earn back from of my wasted karma. Everyone else is trying to make it, kind of like I am. And the worst thing I could do in the world would be to set people back.
Yeah i've ran into that guy too, nothing like a bums first words being "i was a prize fighter" what a idiot.
I'm guessing you live right next to the bus depot?
I see the same parking lot and think the same thing every day on my way to class at the EMU Business school right there.
yeah, ypsi has a crap of an underbelly, i've been looking at getting a place in the apartment building near the corner of washington and wastinaw, and you comments on the area are ones i had been having concerns about too.