Crash into Familiarity

Hurricane Wilma brought winter to south and central Florida (Tampa’s getting lows in the fifties now) so naturally I now keep all my windows open when I sleep at night. Well, last night, while sleeping the sleep of the sleepy, yours truly was awakened by the sound of two vehicles smacking into each other. After the sounds of metal abruptly meeting metal, this is what I heard through my open window.

“Fuck man. Watch where you’re going.”

“Is that you, Troy?”

“Damian? Shit man, how are you?”

“Pretty good. Sorry about that, by the way. I’ve had a few.”

“Hey man, me too. Good thing we hit each other, huh? That could have been nasty.”

They then exchanged insurance information and promised to call each other more often. Oh yeah, and apparently, Troy recently dropped out of college. He plans on going back next semester. And Damian’s driver’s side headlight is busted. This is a problem because he works nights. He’s thinking about having some guy named Dave take a look at it. From what I could gather through my bedroom window, Dave needs the work.

You see, this is one of the things I love about life. As long as you keep your windows open, take a few occasional walks, and communicate with the bulk of the people you meet, you will have a metric ton of cool experiences and/or overhear random shit that will make you laugh, cry, love and just generally believe that humans, though responsible for most of the world’s problems, are at the very least, fun.

To quote Peter from “Office Space”: ‘That’s what I’m talking about when I talk about America.’

Now everyone, put your hands on your hearts as the drunk homeless man who lives behind my office building leads us all in his rendition of the National Anthem. I know it doesn’t sound familiar to you, but keep in mind, it’s his rendition.