Bad Boys

It took me two years of living here, but I finally had reason to dial 911 and call the cops on some damn fool today. The heat must be flushing out the crazies, the news here is appalling, what with that Emcore shooting last week and all. We live in a nice part of a rough patch of town. We knew this when we bought the place. This area of town is very integrated. Expensive neighborhoods right next to very poor, high crime areas. There are drive by shootings within a mile or two of our house.


The kids and I walk most mornings of the week. We have two routes: one goes south to a very nice new neighborhood that's cut off from the rest of the city. It's surrounded by desert, arroyo, and Kirtland AFB. It's a dead end. The other route goes around the outside of our neighborhood to the community center and park. Both seem very safe in my book, and I'm very critical of the "safety" of this town. Today we did the south route.

We've just left the neighborhood, and we hear this awful noise approaching. A POS black car comes barreling out of the mobile home park across the street (think: integrated), flying over the speed bumps and throwing sparks. One of his rear wheels is tireless. As in he's driving full tilt on his rim. Or somebody's rim; he probably stole the car. So I think: what an ass. Then he turns into the other mobile home park across the street. We keep walking, and we hear him again, much closer. He couldn't figure out how to get out of the mobile home park and comes back the way he came, flying out onto Juan Tabo. He loses control, spins 270 degrees, and flies past us into Volterra, which is the dead end. He must be going 60 mph. So I call 911 and describe the car, location, and tell them he's gonna kill someone. They HUNG UP ON ME. Sure enough, 5 mins later, he comes flying up Juan Tabo again, almost hitting the construction crew on the side of the road. I never saw another car chasing him. Never saw a cop. Never heard a siren. But, I did see his rim marks in the road on our way home. He'd gone through our neighborhood, too. Later that morning we went grocery shopping, and no kidding, his rim marks where gouged into the asphalt on the roads we took home. We could see other places where he'd spun out as well. Unbelievable.