My
Tuesday night last week included urinating on a dumpster with homeless
guys. This same Tuesday night led to a Wednesday night which included
speaking with numerous strangers in Florida's 305 area code.
After work on tuesday, I went for a beer at He's Not Here. Then,
when the after work crowd broke up, I went to Linda's to pursue my recent
endeavor of clumsily trying to make some kind of progress with the witty
and attractive bartender girl there.
Three to four hours later, I emerged from Linda's drunker than I needed
to be on a Tuesday, but with the bartender's phone number in my possesion.
Naturally I was feeling pretty good, so when two unfamiliar homeless guys,
Dre and Alfred, approached me and pitched the idea of buying forties and
drinking them on the brick wall in front of Walker's Funeral Home, I figured
hey, share the wealth.
While Alfred waited outside, Dre and I went into TJ's Beverages where I
purchased two forty-ounce Schlitz Malt Liquors, pursuant to Dre's request,
and a 22 of Bud for myself. Both Dre and Alfred preferred Schlitz
Red Bull Malt Liquor to Schlitz Blue Bull Malt Liqour. I had not
been aware that there were two varieties of Schlitz Malt Liquor.
Dre said that Red Bull was smoother than Blue Bull. The kid behind
the counter said he thought the distinction between the two had "something
to do with the blend of ingredients."
We joined Alfred in front of the funeral home where Dre explained to me
that when a squad car drove by, it was important to hold the beer behind
the brick wall upon which we were seated. "This how WE do:
we drink on the shhtreet," he declared.
"Get
out the way, get out the way... MOVE," Alfred added purposefully.
Alfred seemed very exited and did a lot of excited talking when he wasn't
belting out Ludacris lyrics. Dre kept telling him to be quiet and
that "this is why you ain't allowed in there [TJ's Beverages] no more."
Dre told me that he is cousins with Kenny, the homeless guy who tells people
that he has no kidneys. Al speculated, "AIN'T NO MAN CAN'T HAVE NO
KINDEYS! IT IS NOT POSSIBLE! IT WILL NOT HAPPEN!
NO MAN WITH NO KIDNEYS IS WALKIN' AROUND OUT HERE, CANE OR NO CANE.
YOU GOT TO HAVE THE KIDNEYS..."
Dre reminded Alfred again about his verbosity and suggested that "this
right here is why you got that trespass and you ain't allowed in none of
these places."
When I finished my beer and got up to leave, I mentioned that I had
to pee and that I would probably stop in He's Not Here or NY Pizza to use
the restroom. Dre said don't be silly and that he would show me the
spot where they pee behind the Kinko's dumpster. "Cops can't see
you back here see," Dre explained as we both relieved ourselves in the
aromatic confines of the wooden enclosure that shielded the unsightly dumpster
from Franklin Street. He was right, no one would have suspected
that we were back there urinating unless they noticed Alfred standing outside
on the sidewalk animatedly jabbering though the fence at us about the fact
that we were back there urinating.
The next day I woke up, remembered about the dumpster, and wondered whether
it was a good thing or a bad thing that I showed no evidence of having
developed socially beyond the stage of college freshman. I
thought of all the more mature individuals who were at that very moment
crawling down I-40 to their soul-sucking cubicles and decided that it was
a good thing.
Later, I looked at the phone number. It was a long distance cell
phone number, legitimate enough since the bartender had recently moved
into town, but instead of 10 digits, it consisted of 8 neatly-printed digits
followed by an uninterpretable hieroglyph.
Interpretations
at lab ranged from "that's a percent sign-- it's her hip way of writing
double zero" to "dude, that is clearly a symbol for 'go fuck yourself'--
good for her." I tried a good number of the 100 possible combinations
of the final two digits, but to no avail.
It is
hard to say what could have caused the bartender's sudden lapse in penmanship,
but I do know one thing: once she finds out that I know a secret
peein' spot in front of Kinkos, that whole "hard to get" act will just
melt away.
Keywords: Panhandling laws,
how to panhandle, homeless, Chapel Hill, cartoonMuba, jaba, juba.
Spies! Matt Purdy, Chapel Hill
Weak
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