I was driving to work. I cross the Morisson Street bridge every morning, which spans the Willamette river. This bridge is a narrow four lanes, and has absolutely no shoulder, and is very busy in the morning (which will matter later).
As I am crossing, I see this guy standing on the sidewalk on my side of the bridge. His hair is a little wild, and he is dressed in worn green fatigues, so I guess he is probably a homeless person.
As I pass him, I see that he is gripping a bulge in his pants, about down where his thigh is just above the knee. He is hopping up and down and squeezing this bulge. On his face is the oddest combination of panic and pain. He looked like a cartoon. You know those cartoons where someone gets a weasel in their pants, and the weasel is just this bulge running around in the pants while the character jumps around trying to get it out? I swear to god that's what it looked like. The bulge was the right size, too. Very weasel sized.
And then I was past him, and turning to get on waterfront street, and he vanished from sight. If there had been any shoulder at all, I would have stopped to see what was wrong, but stopping in that spot would be incredibly dangerous.
I just wonder, what was going on with that guy? Was he crazy? Did he drop a lit cigarette in his pocket? Did he have a beaker of acid that suddenly broke? Did he actually have a weasel in his pants?
I will never know. And it's bugging the crap out of me.
Posted by ClaudiaTherese (Member # 923) on :
Hope it wasn't a rat, though that's a possibility. Posted by ludosti (Member # 1772) on :
That is really strange...
I must admit, as I read "As I pass him, I see that he is gripping a bulge in his pants", I thought
When our kittens were tiny, they would try to crawl up pantlegs....
Posted by T_Smith (Member # 3734) on :
If you had stopped, what would you have said?
"Hey, is that a weasel running around in your pants?"
"Um, I couldn't help but notice you squeezing that bulge in your pants."
"Do you need any assistance with that bulge?"
I think you would be very limited on what you could say to him. Personally, I think it was a mouse trap. Makes you wonder what kind of bait people are using nowadays.
Posted by mackillian (Member # 586) on :
Now I can't get it out of MY head.
I also saw a strange thing on my way into work. I passed two cars pulled over up on the curb and two women talking with a toddler standing alone on the street. It was fairly apparent that the women had seen said child alone on the corner and stopped to help the kid out.
As in, child wasn't being kidnapped. Most likely, said child was being KEPT from something awful happening.
I hope that kid's okay. I didn't see a reason to stop as two adults already had.
Hmm.
Not a creepy as a bulge, though.
o_O
Posted by Erik Slaine (Member # 5583) on :
Gives new meaning to "I wouldn't touch that one with a ten-foot pole"!
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
T_Smith
Posted by Four thirty (Member # 5639) on :
Every morning as I drive to work I pass a fellow dressed as a minister, I guess, all in black with a white cross embroidered on his shirt. He walks barefoot on the shoulder of the two lane highway, alternately praying and shadowboxing. He's fairly well groomed, and doesn't seem to be homeless, but he certainly doesn't seem to be all there. I'd love to know his story.
Posted by TheTick (Member # 2883) on :
quote:I saw the oddest thing today, and I can't get it out of my head.
It's obvious your guy felt the oddest thing near his crotch, and couldn't get it out of his pants.
Posted by Storm Saxon (Member # 3101) on :
T, that was funny as hell. Posted by jebus202 (Member # 2524) on :
Hey I saw something odd today slash... your face.
Burn.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
Sorry Slash, that was the bulge of my ear piece that I was wearing to keep in touch with the van tailing you. It was digging into my leg hard so I got distracted and didn't notice you driving by until it was too late. Now that our cover's blowen will have to find a new way to constantly track your ever move.
Hobbes Posted by Geoffrey Card (Member # 1062) on :
Dude, Hobbes has ears on his thighs.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
No that was only the trancievier, I had an ear-piece.
Hobbes Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
Oddly enough I found a cartoon today which has a picture of a postman delivering letters and the postman is lying on the ground, convulsed with laughter, trying to reach a small bulge in the back of his shirt.
On the garden gate a sign reads: "Beware of tiny dog."
I put it up in my locker only this morning. Perhaps this man had a tiny dog up his pants?
Posted by qsysue (Member # 5229) on :
I often see odd things on my way to work that I can't get out of my head too. But they're usually things like old blind homeless men almost getting run over by a school bus, or guys on motorcycles getting hit by motorists.
I bet it was an alley rat.
Posted by Annie (Member # 295) on :
Hey, I lost a weasel somewhere around the Willamette river a couple days ago. Anyone seen it?
Posted by Elizabeth (Member # 5218) on :
Slash,
This vivid scene reminds me of a T. Coraghessan Boyle novel called The Tortilla Curtain.
The novel is about two men, one wealthy, one a poor, homeless Mexican illegal alien, and how their lives collide when the rich guys runs over the Mexican man.
Not uplifting, and yet, I love his writing.
Your image just brings me back to that moment in the novel. (shudder)
Posted by monteverdi (Member # 2896) on :
It's hard to explain.
I'd been way up there for hours waiting for a sign. And what isn't one when your waiting. All my 'four o'clock in the morning' courage was gone and the sun was up again, cars starting to thrum in the burbs like everything's gonna be OK, then the gull set me free. She came in out of the dawn like a crack through mother of pearl screamin' 'free, free, free' and I was off.
I must of busted my leg on the sidewalk. Or else found a new circle in Hell, one where you get to live right where you land until you get it right.
There should be a smiley for all of this jumpin' up and down holding your leg, maybe just a black hole...no, a white one - one you can never see but that's always there.
Posted by Morbo (Member # 5309) on :
You could have updated the old Mae West line:"Hey, is that a weasel in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?"
[ September 10, 2003, 10:08 PM: Message edited by: Morbo ]
Posted by Zevlag (Member # 1405) on :
Four-thirty: Don't believe I know you; Welcome to Hatrack!
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T_Smith
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