Moving day

Most of you’ve read some, or all of my stories about, Raccoons, opossums, skunks and snakes. I’m not sure how many of you know, that ANY wild animal can be mean. I mean, plum mad-dog-mean! Where do you think the expression “mean as a snake”, comes from? Somebody didn’t make that up, because it DIDN’T apply. I know “mean as a snake” first hand, if you remember. Well, I came upon a creature, one Saturday afternoon, a few years back, that was meaner than all those others put together! I’m talking about an animal so mean, when this animal goes on safari, the lions roll up THEIR windows! Yeah, that mean.
What I’m going to tell you, is more of a public service announcement, than a story. I hope some of you can learn from my misfortune (or poor judgement, you can decide that). Friends and neighbors, this was truly horrible! I’m just now able to talk about it, six or seven years later…………I think. So, with one last look over my shoulder, to make sure I’m alone, still whimpering a little bit, when I recall another little piece of the story. I think I’ve made it back far enough to tell this story. So, with every light on in the house…………………………
Gather ’round children…….This whole horrible sequence of events, was put in motion, a week or so prior to the actual commission of these atrocities. When, against my sober judgement, I told a lifelong friend, who was supposedly getting a divorce, “you bet, I’ll help you move your stuff out of the house!” Now, we’ve all heard the joke about the “redneck’s last words” right? “Y’all, check this out!” Apparently, “you bet, I’ll help you move your stuff out of the house!”, is the suburban version of that.
It’s a week later and we’re driving down the street, towards the scene of the cri……..I mean, house, when it dawns on me, to ask the first sensible question of this whole ordeal, and I’d find out shortly, a very important one, too. “Is she going to have the decency, to be gone?” “I hope so”, came his reply. “I hope so too, this could be awkward, if not.” Turned out to be the understatement of the century. I’m watching, anxiously, as we approach, to see if her car’s there. I breathe a huge sigh of relief, as the house comes into view, and there isn’t a car in sight! And the garage door is open, just waiting for us! I hear him sigh too, and wonder, to myself ‘why would he be nervous, he’s done this before?’ The truck hadn’t even come to a complete stop, when I jumped out, tools in hand, ready to get his stuff, and get gone! (Well, it turns out, there was some dispute over what was and wasn’t going. They never tell you that, ahead of time.) so, I rush down the basement stairs, and start dismantling the sectional sofa ( that he said was his). Now, the way this house is laid out, is kind of like a box canyon, you know, where the cavalry always met their demise, due to lack of a way out. By the time we heard her car pulling into the garage, there was no way out. (See the parallel?) so, I’m behind the sofa (remember, I’m taking it apart, not hiding, yet) when, in walks the creature I spoke of earlier, it only took a few seconds for the first, heated, confrontation to take place. It became very apparent, very quickly, my team was losing, and, that basement was getting very small. He had a box, that he was filling with knick knacks off of a shelf, all the while, she’s chewing him up, like a bulldog with a bone. You remember, in Jaws, when the shark is trying to chew through the cage to get at richard Dreyfus? And became so preoccupied with trashing the cage, that Richard Dreyfus swam to safety on the ocean floor? While she’s trashing him, I abandon the shark cage (sofa), and swim (run) towards the ocean floor (the stairs), and would’ve made it, had he not gotten his box filled up. So he heads for the stairs too. Doing the polite thing, I step aside, so he can carry his box to the truck, just then, she found a hockey puck, that he forgot. She aimed that puck at the back of his head, and let fly a fastball, that would’ve killed him had it hit him, but, her aim was off. It really would’ve wrecked their flat-screen tv, lucky for them, it hit me instead. I thought I’d been kicked by a horse. Im not sure if the sound I heard, was the puck, breaking the sound barrier, the puck, breaking my leg or me screaming. He kept running up the stairs, she screamed and ran after him. I grabbed two armloads of what I knew to be his stuff, and started limping towards the stairs, hoping I could get out before she remembered I was there. So, she gets back down before I even get to the stairs, points up the stairs at him, and screams “I f***ing HATE HIM!” God help me, I was getting ready to agree with her, when she remembered, I came with him. Have any of you ever been in the ring with mike Tyson? I haven’t, but I’m sure I was close that day. Here she came, with both fists, there I was, with both arms loaded with his crap. I’m not sure how many times she hit me, but, I can tell you, I was happy to hear that her son had called the police.
Well, my team retreated to the bar to lick our wounds and tell our tales. We ran into my dad there, and told him the story. He laughed at my stupidity, and when I asked him why he thought it was stupid, he said “I bet you anything, he’ll be living there again by next weekend.” “No way, neither of them are that stupid!” “Man, I hate it when he’s right, but at least I didn’t bet him.”
If anybody ever asks you to help them move their stuff out of their soon-to-be ex’s house, have something else to do.