why I love living in SoCoMo

Friday night the hubby was outside fixating on his new truck when our alley neighbor drove through. First let me explain what I mean by 'alley neighbor'. We've lived in our house for over 5 years now. There's an alley next to our driveway. The alley is a way for people on another street to get to their garages. It's also the only way to get to one house. We're not sure how this works - the house isn't actually on a street. What is its address? I've never ventured back there, and for the longest time I thought the only thing back there was the one house - I never considered people would use the alley to access a garage.

There are people driving back there all the time. Mostly people in beat up hoosiermobiles sporting flowing mullets and smoking cigarettes. I always thought these people were going to visit the alley neighbors who surely were cooking up meth - why else would there be an ongoing stream of cars driving back there? They owners have always been pleasant towards us, I just assumed there were meth addicts. Whatever. Not my place to judge, right?

Once the weather got nice and a cute little Bosnian grocery opened up on the corner (it carries beer) odd folks started walking down the alley to the store to get beer and whatever else at all hours of the day. I'm talking a parade of freak show looking people - guys with limps, missing teeth, stringy hair, cut-off clothes - some with one or two oddities, some with many more. I don't understand fully what happens back there because I've never been - I envision a cave of some sort where unkempt folk squat and cook over an open fire. It makes no sense, it's just what happens in my head.

We've had interactions with the alley neighbors once or twice. One time he rang the doorbell at 3 am to tell us our dome light was on - thanks dude, I'd rather have a dead battery then to have the shit scared out of me in the middle of the night. But it's nice, I suppose.

Okay, back to Friday night. Alley neighbor stops his car as he's making his way back to talk to the hubby. Apparently one night he was 'shitty drunk' and decided he wanted some tomatoes from our garden, so he helped himself to a few. Hubby, amused and I think relieved, laughed it off and said he could take some any time he wanted.

Hearing hubby tell the story was of course hilarious, as he was able to do the hoosier drawl perfectly. I also found it hilarious that our 'shitty drunk' neighbor couldn't live without tomatoes of all things while drunk. White Castle, I get. Greasy pizza, awesome. But tomatoes? Not what I reach for when I have the drunken munchies. If he wants tomatoes that bad, have at it. As long as I don't come home to another boat motor on my back porch I'm good (that's a story for another time).

Only in SoCoMo, my friends.