Option Period - Day 6

I'm typing this out a full day later ....

I dropped carol off at work and adolfo iv off at school. He didn't go all that gracefully. I left quickly enough so i had enough of my heart left...

I drove around the neighborhood. I watched all the kids file into Scarbarough H.S., which is just two blocks down. Most of the kids were dropped off or were walking in from 43rd street. I pulled into Georgi st to see if any kids were filing out of mangum manor specifically ... i didn't notice any. I cruised the streets looking at lawns, noticing which properties had old people sitting out front (quite a few), finding all the outlets to mangum, antoine, and 43rd streets, and listening most importantly...

so wonderfully quiet.

I took a good long drive down antoine. Not a starbucks in sight. A lot of small businesses, which was nice. I saw a lot of mexican 'La Tapatia-esque' places, but none with any character to speak of.

I dropped by St. Ambrose Catholic Church and picked up a bulletin. It's right around the block from our place. I would guess it's somewhere between .5 and .75 mi from the house.

I arrived at the property at about 9:30. I parked across the street and gave myself some time to walk down the block. All the surrounding houses were clean and well kept. The yards were well trimmed and raked. There was no standing water anywhere on the street. ****I mention that cause Maru/Mike's new house had some putrid standing water on the street in front of their place several days after it had rained. It was the ONLY water down the entire block.****

I struck up a converstation with who may become my immediate neighbor. Her name was anna, 60, and she was staying with her parents who had become too old to really take care of themselves. Her father was standing at the garage just smiling. He couldn't see too well, apparently. She gave me the scoop on most of the neighbors, and on the immediate block: most of our neighbors are fairly old; some have small pets, but most don't. A woman across the street home schools her two boys (aged 14,9). An older gentleman across the street came out of his house and shuffled around his driveway talking to himself.

Anna gave me a smirk, "He talks to himself, but he's the sweetest man. He comes over and watches my parents from time to time. He also happens to be the yard man for the church..." The older man goes back and forth on his driveway and then disappears around the corner of his house.

"He's probably going to come over later and ask who you were..."

We talked about her yard and about the pear tree she just planted smack dab in the front yard. The 'seller's' Rottweiller poked it's head between a break in a fence plank and stared at us. She turned, and then gave me a look that told me she hated dogs....or, at least, that particular dog.

"Do YOU have any pets?" she asked. I just smiled and said no. At that point, my inspector pulled up....

(to be continued.....)