What A Day. Er, Weekend.

This weekend was quite busy, what with Gasparilla and police tickets and homeless men. Surprisingly, all three were independent events.

First, the parade. What a disappointment! Don't get me wrong, had a lot of fun hanging out with friends and having a few beers in the warmth of the winter sun. But I barely saw any of the parade! That's not for lack of trying; there are simply too many people crowded around barricades and too many parade floats have shrunk to a ten-foot level - way too low to see if you are farther than three deep in the crowd. This was my view:

It's like a game of Where's Waldo trying to find the actual parade.

I did learn that to get beads, you have to have a Wingman. Enter Talbot:

My really really really tall Wingman.

There were some other amusing things to keep our attention, however. For example, this guy:

He looks like he's just leaning over to pick something up. What gave him away was that it took him over two hours to pick up whatever it was.....

He sat on the curb for close to two hours, passed out, before the parade even began! Eventually he reclined to a lateral position, during which numerous passersby stopped to take a pic with him.

Ew.

I won't deny we took advantage as well...

[I will insert this pic just as soon as Kameron gets it uploaded :)]

Myself, passed-out-drunk-guy, Kameron, and Ruth.

Of course I almost peed my pants when Ruth started tossing beads at him in an effort to loop them around his head, sort of like a passed-out-drunk version of horseshoes. Very amusing.

What wasn't amusing were the Porta Potties and their lines:

Yes, all of these people are waiting hours in line for a chance to hover-pee over a hole filled with human excrement.

Eventually we tired of standing around with dirty, drunk people, so we took off for dinner at Bella's Italian. It only took us about an hour to travel 2 miles in the post-Gasparilla traffic. We were way too exhausted to complain, however, and dinner was quiet as we all stuffed ourselves in energy-depleted response to the miles we walked during the day.

[I will insert this pic just as soon as Kameron gets it uploaded :)]

Six tired revelers ready to go home and sleep. We are such losers.

Today I made the poor choice to leave the house and run some errands. I got into a left turn lane, stopped at the light, and looked down at my purse absentmindedly thinking about my things to do.

The light changed to green while I was lost in thought, and as I looked up it changed to yellow. I thought, oh geez I'm holding up traffic and went. And immediately pulled over for the officer's lights behind me.

Seems I broke the law. Running a red light, you ask? Potentially causing harm or danger to fellow drivers, you ask? Oh no, something much more sinister than that! Apparently I was dangerously obstructing traffic. Yes, by holding up the light so that Mr. Officer couldn't get through legally, I broke the law. To the tune of $151.00.

Good thing I wasn't on the phone, listening to the radio, drinking a beer, or playing with my Gasparilla beads.

I'm really at a loss for words as to this alleged crime. So enough about that.

On to this afternoon, which to be honest might have brought my Karma Points down even farther (since my criminal offense earlier in the day, that is).

I met JoAnne at my Happy Place (Starbucks) for a quick coffee and chat session. It's actually the first time we've gotten together since my banishment from The Rock, not for lack of trying. When I walked in I passed a rather haggard looking gentleman sitting at a table outside, obviously homeless and on the streets for some time, who was sitting cross legged and talking to himself about something quite important. As I walked inside I brought this gentleman to JoAnne's attention, and we spent the first ten minutes of our visit discussing the many and varied possibilities about his life and who he might be talking to/about.

[Please Note: I already mentioned our Karma Stock plummeting; it really doesn't get any better from here, so just stop reading if you're getting annoyed.]

Once his conversation with [Jesus/Gandhi/Casper] finished, he wandered inside to a table where he had left his three quite filled bags (one was pink with Dora the Explorer) and sleeping bag (which we knew came from one of the employees at the Bucks, they are so humanitarian!). He proceeded to peruse his newspaper, and by peruse I mean repeatedly flip through the sections apparently counting and/or cataloguing the contents. At one point he jumped from his chair and briskly moved to the nice squishy chair where he could continue his OCD tendencies (which, I might add, went as far as the bathroom...I think he went at least 4 times while we were 'observing' him).

On one of his bathroom trips he left his newspaper on his table; since JoAnne and I had just been discussing my need for employment she felt it was completely acceptable to 'borrow' his Classifieds. I, of course, told her we promptly be going to Hell; JoAnne said we were merely borrowing and therefore no Hell would be needed.

Well you can imagine this poor man's reaction upon returning from the bathroom to find his paper was not quite the same (oh yes, he immediately went back to cataloguing it!). I kept trying to warn JoAnne, I really could not imagine what terror this man would rain down upon us and the poor hapless customers around us should he realize we were the thieves instead of the voices in his head. After recounting two or three times, he ran over to the squishy chair and began shifting through the papers there, intent to find the stolen artifact. It was at this point that I insisted JoAnne return the section while his back was turned, as we were surely going to Hell for torturing a helpless crazyman now (it didn't help my fear when the trio of Tampa's finest showed up for their coffee & donuts cliche; how do I explain to my father that I got a ticket and got arrested for harassing the homeless all in the same day?).

Since she could see him now, the squishy chair being in her line of sight, she made the right choice hurriedly folding up the paper and running it over to his table. Just as she sat back down with me, he scurried back to his table and found the section in question sitting right on top of his paper pile. I really do wish I had a picture of his face right then, it was absolutely priceless. He was so confused, so disoriented; he immediately unfolded the section and began laying out the pages on the floor in front of him. Poor JoAnne of course could not see this, she had to make due with watching me try and maintain composure as I watched him reassemble his Classifieds all over the Starbucks floor.

Eventually he was able to reassemble the entire paper the way it was, only crumpling up the front page of the classifieds and throwing it away (we decided it smelled too good, like JoAnne). He then proceeded to take that paper with him everywhere - to the bathroom (twice), outside for a cigarette (still cataloguing and chatting with Jesus as he smoked), even as he passed the officers waiting on their coffee (where he bowed to the male officer, I swear it he bowed).

Eventually JoAnne and I decided it was time to take our leave of this amusing event, and while we were saying our goodbyes outside another homeless gentleman rode up on his bike. As if to seal our deal with Hell, we turned to each other and said at the same time: "Look! It's his friend!" The guy then proceeded to ask us for change for the bus and then rode off into the sunset. We were saddened for a moment that he didn't join the man in the Starbucks, until we remembered that our friend still had [Jesus/Gandhi/Casper] to keep him company.

And thus concludes my eventful weekend of fun. I'm beginning to wonder if the ticket was actually some sort of Precognition Karma...