Danger Is My Middle Name

Yesterday on my way to visit Mickey and Minnie I couldn’t help but notice the cars parked on the side of the road for miles, with hundreds of people carrying heavy ice chests, impetuously walking to ensure a good spot out on the lake. On my way to work today, I traveled that same road and I was graced with an everlasting trail of empty ice bags, plastic cups, broken Styrofoam ice chests, spent firework casings, and other miscellaneous trash. Ironic isn’t it? Here we are celebrating our Independence and freedom yet this is the way we celebrate it; by trashing our country. We thank our country with litter. Happy Birthday America! Have an empty beer can on us!

For the Fourth, my best friend Tracy and I decided to go to the carnival a couple of cities over. We diligently paid our $5 for parking and we headed into the fairgrounds. Or so we thought it was a fairground. It turns out it was held in the fields of one of the most notorious schools in that area. After parking the car, we walked through this muddy field that was covered in straw. Apparently it was a feeble attempt to soak up the mud but failed as a sponge. We proceeded through a fenced area where the people surrounding us were BBQ’ing, playing Frisbee, badminton and other grass sports. Upon further observation, we began noticing plastic, paper, napkins, beer cans, soda cans, etc. that people had littered all over the grass. What is supposed to look like a clean comfortable park, was littered with trash and gang members. And yes, I do refer to gang members as litter because they are nothing short of garbage. Both Tracy and I thought for a moment as we were walking through, “Should we turn around and run for our lives or should we get our five bucks worth and move forward?” The cheapness in us decides we’d rather risk our lives and get our five bucks worth.

We walked around and found NOT much. However, we did walk by one booth where three men (hicks to be exact) were selling hunting knives as well as other types I don’t care to mention. How appropriate, we thought, in a gang filled park. As we walked by, one of the hicks holds up a knife consisting of a brass-knuckle-like object with a short blade attached to it. He puts his fingers through the slots and makes a jabbing motion and says to us, “It works real well as a defense knife.” We kindly decline so he asks us if we would like to buy a tazer gun, “You’ll need it around here.” he says. He turns it on and zaps the table and Tracy and I jumped from the loud sound it made. Then he laughs, opened mouth, revealing his missing teeth, “Did I scare ya?” Tracy and I hurried to the next booth which ended up being a real nice one consisting of gorgeous hand made jewelry. How that booth ended up next to the three psycho weapon zealots, we will never know.

We were done checking out the booths in 30 minutes so we looked on the map and saw there was a petting zoo. How cool, let’s go feed some barnyard animals. So we headed over there and stopped ten yards away from the barn. The blaring rap music, babies running around unsupervised, young men wearing their gangster colors, communicating in slang, and here we are, the only white people – two blonde hair, very short white girls. Were we crazy enough to walk through just so we could pet a few animals? HELL NO.

We were there two hours too long and decided to call it quits. We got our five bucks worth and decided to make a mad dash to our car in hopes that we would escape death. It worked and we high tailed out of there.

On our way home, we stopped at a liquor store down the road from the carnival. You’d think we’d learned our lesson after the fair. We walked in and saw five very short Latino men hanging around. As Tracy walked towards the back, one of them said, “Mmmmmm…Mamacita. Titties grandes.” Motioning big boobs with their hands, they laughed and turned towards me. I ran and grabbed Tracy and we hurried out the door, into my car and sped off. I told Tracy that we were not stopping anywhere in that town, no matter how hungry or thirsty we are until we get back home where we felt safe. We ended up downtown in our area and had a couple of margaritas. What an adventure that was, never to be repeated. Next year, I think I’ll just stay home and watch TV.

Tune in tomorrow and I will tell you my wild adventure at the Sublime show.