From Diane Setterfield's The Thirteenth Tale

People disappear when they die. Their voices, their laughter, the warmth of their breath. Their flesh. Eventually their bones. All living mempry of them ceases. This is both dreadful and natural. Yet for some there is an exception to this annihilation. For in the books they write they continut to exist. We can rediscover them. Their humour, their tone of voice, their moods. Through the written word they can anger you or make you happy. They can comfort you. They can perplex you. They can alter you. All this, even though they are dead. Like flies in amber, like corpses frozen in ice, that which according to the laws of nature should pass away is, by the miracle of ink on paper, preserved. It is a kind of magic.

--Diane Setterfield



Saturday, December 1, 2012

Success!

This is just too funny not to share. 
Okay, backstory:
Scott's sister and her husband live in Lexington on Supr road under a mile from a prison and about a quarter mile from another youth correctional facility. They have a little farm (5 acres or so) between two subdivisions. Very quaint. The street is tiny. It winds and twists like a drunk snake, had no shoulder or sidewalks and has a speed limit of 45 MPH.  It kinda looks like this first picture.
Their driveway is right after a twist in the road and at the middle / top of a hill. 

We went to their home this evening to watch a movie after their ward Christmas program, so we got there about 6:30. It's getting to be winter up here, so it was totally dark outside. Also, their house is about 150 years old and the chimney started falling in last week when they tried to have it cleaned, so they were heating the house off propane, but they ran out and have not gotten more. So it is pretty cold inside (it was .5 degrees warmer than outside). 

Bethany had to run an errand while Neil put the kids to bed, so Scott and Jaedyn and I played quietly downstairs. We saw flashing lights coming from the road in front of their house.

When Bethany got home, the police had to pull out of her driveway to let her in. A car had broken down right in front of their property and the police was there to help protect the car from other motorists while the tow truck came and they car's driver got a ride home. 

They had left their projector at the church from their ward Christmas Party that afternoon. So Scott and Bethany went back to the church to get the projector while I put Jaedyn to bed in a back room. When Bethany and Scott got back the flashing lights had moved a little, but it was just the tow truck that had arrived and the police were still there to make sure no one crashed while the car was being loaded. 

Scott was cold, so while Bethany gathered some leftovers for us to feast upon while we watched a movie, Neil got his new neon orange jumper out for Scott to wear. Evidently it's super warm, down filled or something. So Scott puts it on and Neil says wouldn't it be hilarious if I put it on and started walking around the neighborhood. We had a good chuckle and expanded the imaginary prank to include being in front of the nearest correctional facility and waiting for cars to see us and then dive into the side of the road. Ha Ha Ha. It would be awesome! Can you imagine? Neil says can you imaging how many people are going to call the police? Ha Ha Ha.

Then we sit down to watch the movie.

The lights are still outside flashing in the driveway half way through the movie. It's 10PM and we pause the movie and wonder about going out and asking what's going on. The tow truck looks more like some weird utility vehicle now, maybe that car crashed into something? No, Scott says it has K-9 written on it. But the consensus is that It's probably nothing and their pet dogs will scare away anyone who tries to actually come up the 60 yards of driveway. The big black lab is nice enough looking but the German Shepherd is kinda scary when she's coming right at you. So we start the movie again.

The movie ends and there are still flashing lights in front of the property. Neil has not fed the dogs yet and needs to do that, and check the mail. Ugh. So he gets the jumper from Scott and goes out.



Proceed to the prank:

Neil walks out to the road to get the mail in a bright orange jumper and moseys up the the police in his car who is innocently checking his iphone.

Neil knocks on the window and asks what's going on. 

The officer looks up and nearly jumps out of his skin. 
Then he tells Neil that he's helping to patrol the area because two convicts escaped the correctional facility at 7PM tonight.
 Cue the link to the news. No, there should be no need to worry, but please stay inside. 

Neil got the mail and stumbled back into the house laughing. He still didn't feed the dogs.
We got into the car, locked it and drove off. We did see some patrol cars, and an officer on a bicycle as we left the neighborhood. 

We are safe, but oh, how we laughed on the way home!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Rofl, I love that story. He told me to lock the house doors too. Soon after, they left.

Anonymous said...

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medieval.woman said...

So glad to see you online again!