THIS is why I stay far, far away from my family
So last night I'm sitting at home watching my
Warriors lose to the Pistons when the phone rings. It's my cousin, on my dad's cell phone (I think. I don't know my parents' cell phone number. Is that sad?), calling from the annual get-together-at-Grandma's (fundamentalist Christian/bigoted/racist grandma, not paranoid schizophrenic grandma). It was 10pm or so their time, so I was a little surprised the "party" was still going on.
My cousin says "we just wanted you to know that my dad [my uncle] is standing here with a bloody face and the cops are coming in the house; we'll call you later."
Okay...
So a little while later she calls back, after the cops had gone, and gives me the scoop. Picture if you will blocks and blocks of hundred-year-old houses smushed up against one another, in a poor town in central Pennsylvania.
Here's an example. Imagine that you've got old people like my grandmother living in the majority of houses in the neighborhood, and 20-something heroin addicts living in the rest. Got it? Ok.
The annual Christmas shindig was over and my uncle went out to shovel the sidewalk so no one would kill themselves on the way to their cards. My dad was out on the porch probably smoking a cigar or something (he can't shovel things, back issues) when they notice some lady trying to park on the street and having issues with it (car was bigger than the space). This lady starts yelling up a storm, fuck this fuck that, who are all the people parking on the street, etc. It's a public street, mind you, first come, first served. My uncle goes down to tell the lady just to move along, there are other spaces, essentially "shut up and park" because it's 10pm and she's yelling loudly in a quiet neighborhood. It ends with my uncle telling her to kiss his ass, as he walks away.
Well, the woman finally gets a parking space and waddles into her house...the one next door to my grandma. Then her skanky white trash son comes out of his house and starts hollering about the parking space, as in "who the fuck parked here" and fuck this and fuck that. My uncle said something to the effect of "I don't know, I don't live here, just shoveling the sidewalk, go away, whatever." The young guy didn't like this answer and punched my uncle in the face. Uncle grabbed the guy's hair, put him in some sort of headlock, and shoved him into the snow and pinned him. His mother comes out and jumps on my uncle's back. Did I mention she's about 300lbs?
My dad, smart man that he is, was dialing 911 from the safety of the porch. The young fellow is hollering "Ma, get the pistol! I'm gonna blow this guy's brains out!" My uncle, smart man that he is, immediately let the guy up and ran into the house. But the cops were on their way, and the eventually arrested the guy for aggravated assault and making terroristic threats. Now we're waiting to see if the story shows up in the
local paper, because that's just the sort of thing they like to report.
Fun for all!
