After trying to make my body move enough to pass it off as dancing at a show my friend Tricia and I went to (a real person, not just me spelling my name differently to try to pretend I wasn't alone), two exhausted patrons of the arts headed home. Even tired, Tricia and I talk a lot. So we were describing the evening with a dramatic point here and an arm flail there.
"If Carrot Top and Bryan Adams were to have a child, the bass player would be it," I decided.
"Yes, but with a hint of suspicion as to whether or not Bob Dylan was really the father," added Tricia.
As we laugh away at this possibility, we pass by a man wearing more layers than necessary on an early Fall evening and holding torn plastic bags of varying shapes and sizes, not giving much indication of what they contained. I was driving, so of course I was scanning for hazards and checking my mirrors constantly and noticed the man (plus, a couple had just stumbled onto the road near my car, so I was extra alert). Continuing on with the conversation, I glance in my rearview mirror to see what the man was up to.
That is where I see it.
The man's plastic bags sit on the sidewalk as their owner starts running after the couple, across the street. I can only make out the figures as the little dark shapes weave throughout the street.
"That man is chasing those people!" I announce to Tricia. "We should turn around."
As I make an illegal u-turn and go back, I start wondering what I am going to do if I find the man still chasing the couple.
Throw open my door as the car is still moving and yell, "Hop in!"
Park my car, lock my doors, and call the cops.
Jump out and chase the man...see how he likes them apples (Apparently I am scary enough to run away from).
When I was u-turning, I had to wait for a city bus to bumble on by so by the time we got back to the scene, the man had re-claimed his bags and the couple appeared to have been rescued by the bus.
Honestly, though. Chasing people? How rude.
*The conversations between Tricia and I weren't remembered exactly, but the gist is accurate.
