Here's what happened in the movie set of a neighborhood where I reside (urban readers, laugh with me here, not at me here): I'm walking back from a neighbor's house with a bicycle pump on my shoulder last eve. The neighbor needed air in a baby stroller, doy. I run into another neighbor who's grinning ear-t0-ear with "big news" that there was a break-in and a rifle was stolen. Apparently the thief was apprehended but not the weapon. So it remained a huge topic.
Of course, I'm the black guy walking around with a bicycle pump on his shoulder which from a distance looks a lot like a rifle, right? Hi, I'm dumb!
Anyway, I walk around the block with my bicycle pump on my shoulder and there are literally eight police cars and dogs and groups of excited people and everything except the TeeVee trucks. This is Big Ass News Here!
Today, the word on the street is that a gang of criminals had taken over a house and stole a machine gun. A machine gun!* When people engaged me I'm like, "I heard it was like 30 scary dudes with bazookas!" Just kidding. All into the evening people were talking about how everybody is being interrogated and how the police are fanning out through the whole neighborhood. So I decided to walk the entire length of the block with all the police cars to see what would happen. I walked it that block twice and, whaaaaahh, nobody even looked my way. And, as far as the "fanning," I never saw a police officer on my block--one block over from the crime scene--except at shift change.
So now people are scared-as-hell here. All chatty again, "Did you hear?" "Be careful!" "Lock your doors." "A gun!" It's like 9/11® anthrax-in-the-mail DC Sniper™ vibe again. What?! We're scared again? Dang, I wasn't ready be scared again. I THOUGHT YOU SAID THE CRIME RATE WAS GOING DOWN, TY! My bad. But, at least, people are talking to each other again, amirite?
I got a txt this a.m. that went something like, "this is why we need to have guns!!!" I was like, "what?!" What the hell am I going to do with guns? Shoot the paper boy or some poor housekeeper who left her purse in my house? There's eight police cars on the block what do we need guns in my house for? What am I trying to protect, a 800 pound 27" CRT TeeVee set? Nobody wants that 9 year-old piece. People put better TeeVees out on bulk trash day.
For the most part I didn't change my day-to-day behaviors after 9/11® or the DC Sniper™, then I'm probably not going to for this not even in the Montgomery Gazette yet event. Sorry, I ain't swallowing that pill. Statistics may "lie" but fear paralyzes.
What do you guys think?
* [FYI: Two perps, one at-large as of last eve., unsecured, unloaded assault rifle among items missing. Perps perhaps known to victims, blah-blah-blah, same old stuff that city folk don't even process anymore]*****UPDATE*****
Update from G-burg PD site: "Burglary Arrest - On 05/24/2010 at 4:45 p.m., a burglary was reported in the 200 block of Hart Mews. An unknown individual entered the unoccupied residence and removed property. Some property has been recovered. The suspect was located, placed under arrest and charged accordingly. Investigation is on going."
Boo!
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