There are some tightly wound people out there. Unwound, in this case.

[ForrestGump]

The person who's putting me up recently placed an ad to sell a relative's old Macintosh along with its monitor and printer. The ad said that it was an old Mac and a great first computer for a kid, and that it had games, Microsloth Office, etc. Selling for $50. No mention of Internet.

The buyer was a woman who wanted it for her eight-year-old son and she also got all excited about the desk that it was sitting on, so my friend sold that for another $45. Today her pig of a brother showed up and demanded his money back, all $95 of it, even though all he had in his vehicle was the computer and its peripherals. He was incensed because the Mac wasn't able to connect to his cable modem. Not only was there no mention of the need for the Internet (nor that the computer was NOT to be used by a child but by this disgusting Jabba the Putz), but what do you expect from a $50 computer advertised as being an old model? The brother had, on some earlier day, picked the computer up because it didn't fit in his sister's car, and my hostess said that he was even angry then and really pushy.

A screaming match ensued, most of which I didn't hear. My host was very, VERY even-tempered and controlled, whereas he was totally unhinged, so it was kind of a one-sided screaming match. This f***er must weigh about 400 pounds, and not in the Samoan-football-player way (more like the Limbaugh way), and was red-faced (could've been the yelling, I s'pose), red headed, and ugly as anything (again, ugly behavior could've caused that). Goatee, too. I know plenty of DUers have one, but -- c'mon -- I think future history will prove me right when I say that it's the mullet for the new millennium and thereabouts. So, yes, one day all you goatee devotees will be apologizing to '80s mullet-bearers for their tonsorial transgressions. But I transgress. Uhhh...digress.

At a certain point in his tirade of disreason, I went out to join my charming hostess and look menacing. The negotiations broke down, to make a long story short, and she went inside to the tune of his threats and X-rated epithets -- forgot to mention that he was wearing some gaudy T-shirt the loudly (very loudly) proclaimed the name of some Christian day camp -- and I followed after telling him "get out of here, f***wit," the kind of thing I'd never normally utter but, hey, he wasn't anywhere near normal. I made a point of slamming the door as an exclamation mark of sorts.

A few minutes later, my friend decided that she'd give him $50 and take the computer back. Apparently he took advantage of the break by approaching the next door neighbor (she's just like a sitcom neighbor, seriously -- ALWAYS in the driveway and ready to talk or be nosy...I don't even know if she ever goes inside) and angrily telling her that he was going to leave something on the porch tonight that wasn't the computer, kill the bitch, etc, etc, etc, Very Christian of him. Also very smart: aha...tell the witnesses what you're going to do, and make actionable threats to everyone within earshot.

He had some teenage type with him. My friend said she felt sorry for him if he was her son. Not that he bore much resemblance to the pig, but his features could be easily the result of that slug's buying a mail order bride from Manila, probably the only way he'd ever get a wife.

I counseled my buddy to not give him any money, because he did not deserve it and because, even if he did, there's no way I'd show him any kindness with his behavior. But she opened the door and made the offer, anyway. He wanted the whole $95 and things deteriorated for a while because he seemed to fail to grasp the idea that half the price was for a desk that he had and, indeed, she would not take back. And then she told him that if he brought it to her on the porch she'd give him $50.

Something about this seemed to tick him off -- maybe the big coward was afraid of her (or of me, though I was staying behind the door until it seemed like my bootiekicking expertise might be called for) - and he again threatened her with bodily harm and property damage, at a volume that the whole block probably picked up. Instead of doing the world a favor and blowing a coronary artery or vertebral arteries, he started screaming out a bunch of incoherent nonsense and told her that he had her fifty dollars right here -- she opened the door to come in just as he had the computer lifted high above his head...standing there like some vengeful hero of the all-you-can-eat buffet line, blubber rippling in the breeze, he was quite a sight. She closed the door as the computer plummeted downward.

A screech of tires followed immediately as the corpulent coward fled the scene. The neighbor -- omnipresent and omniscient -- noted that he had no plates on his new car, some monstrous black SUV that further added testimony to his obvious penile insufficiency. I was on my way out the door to get his license plate number but he was out of there too quickly and, of course, running out there in the seconds before he took off might have sent the wrong message, and then I'd have to beat the ever-loving sh*t out of him (leaving him completely colorless). Great -- just what we need -- another raging nutcase tooling around in an oversized SUV.

I hope he was so angry that he wrapped that SUV around a power pole. If he died tonight, so much the better. Whatever, I hope he gets what's coming to him, and if he does it's going to hurt. My wife used to be shocked that I could ever wish bodily harm or death on someone, and I see her point, but -- hey -- I'm just being honest and that's who I am and how I feel. What's more important is how you live your life, and I just need to look at her and then look at me to see who is the better person, when it comes down to it. I might wish harm on scummy people -- good people get hurt all the time, so why shed tears over some subhuman that, if I were a god, I'd gladly smite? -- but she actually does harm to decent people. Such as myself. :P

My friend's afraid. She thinks he's a tough, big guy who probably did jail time. I doubt that he did because I have a feeling that strident blowhards like him don't last long in prison. I've seen a lot of people like him -- a wannabe 'bad dude' who's trying and failing to compensate for multiple insufficiencies, including intestinal fortitude. All mouth. He was a total butterball, probably afraid of the girl he was berating, and - though it's possible that he'll be dangerous -- I find it hard to be truly afraid of someone like that. Aware of their danger, yeah, but does a pathetic lump like that truly inspire fear? No, just a concern for property and an awareness that unhinged pantywaists regularly hurt and even kill people. Of course, people like that are perhaps the very kind you should be most afraid of -- perhaps 'concerned over' is a better word choice. One on one, someone with far less preparation than me could probably take the lumbering wimp.

So, do you think there's ANY possibility that this waste of DNA could be anything BUT a Freeper type? I expected a Bush sticker on his SUV, but he didn't even have plates yet. He had all the hallmarks and, though Democrats and liberals can also be utter scum, I just don't see a progressive person flying off the handle in quite that way or being quite that hate-filled a ball of trembling rage-crossed-with-fear.

I say this with full admission that I can get very angry and I that am not afraid to defend my position (thus far it's been primarily my own welfare or that of others) with violence if I have to. I am not a lovey-dovey liberal flower child type...more what I might call a 'John Lennon Liberal' who thinks peace is just dandy but who'd rip your lips off if it was called for. It's the only way of living that really makes sense to me, actually -- I guess games theorists call it a 'bourgeois' strategy, as opposed to that of the eternal hawk and that of the eternal dove. I could've stood belly to belly with that belligerent behemoth but I have the emotional and mental control that a freak like that will never have. I could've easily hurt him -- if I didn't have grounds to defend myself, how hard do you think it'd be to provoke him into it? -- but, as in the past, my mind told me that doing so is neither A Good Idea nor becoming to a real martial artist. What I really DID want to do was to call the police and get him slapped with a littering fine -- it took me a while to clear the street of bits o' computer -- but my friend would have none of it.

Oh, and to all those lurking Freepers who scoff at the idea of Raging Liberal: (i) f*** you, and (ii) there's no exaggeration here and I am rather more capable than average, having studied and trained in martial arts for two decades, of putting a hurting on the human body and even dismantling parts of it. And (P.S) do the world a favor and go play in traffic.

I don't know why it's so hard for those mofos to accept that some liberals are (or can be) anything but pacifistic and serenely accepting of humanity's foibles. Liberals study martial arts, too (given fundamental differences between us and Freeper types, we probably derive far more from it), and liberals own guns.

There was (and is) a BIG part of me that wanted him to come back so I could tear him to pieces (and/or call the police), and that part of me has come to the fore at other times, when the reality was that the outcome was typically mediated through my reason and calm logic such that potentially violent situations are defused. Still, I can't deny that part of me wants the contest and the opportunity to hammer that sonofabitch back to the fourth grade. Part of it's probably that I passionately hate bullies of any kind and -- like all neocons, really -- this scumball was a classic bully-coward.

Raging Gump!

So, anyway, I've moved her car a block over, barricaded (with bowls of cactus) the gates to the back yard (and my motorcycle!), changed the outside light to a stronger bulb, etc, etc, etc. I've done too much of this before, but it seems a good idea even though usually nothing eventuates. I've been previously stalked and pursued by an armed deviate who repeatedly threatened my life -- I've also defended myself against that particular f***wit -- so this is feeling too similar for comfort. What's the bet that, if he does show up as promised -- most likely to attack the trashcans -- he'll be wearing camouflage? F***ing idiot.

Of course, I don't have a gun, so my only weapons are not up to par if the worst happens (and of course, if he meant us actual harm, he'd bring a gun -- he's not man enough to go in without one), so Plan A is that he comes unarmed and I beat the crap out of him but Plan B is that I do my best not to die. :-)

Sick people out there.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

1. That was long verbose and eloquent...but in my heart I know

you are a brick shithouse and could have kicked the motherfucker's ass to Siberia...I hope he doesn't come back, but if he does, I pity the poor fool. Did you call the police?

[ForrestGump]

2. I'd never inflict that definition of 'Ugly American' on the poor Siberians

:D

No police....I wanted my friend to call them to report the incident, without doing a formal police report at the station and -- most importantly -- to ask them to do drive-bys over the next two or three nights. She won't do it. Not yet, anyway. She doesn't want to incite him any further...I'm telling her (and I'm pretty sure I'm right) that he won't know, and if they say they have to tell him she can always tell them to forget it. I'm sleeping in the front room, though, and I've rigged all sorts of little devices outside that should provide some warning, just in case.

You never know, right? Definitely best to prepare for the worst even if the likely outcome is a big nothing.

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

4. Yeah I think you're doing the right thing

[LearnedHand]

3. Ah, what a beee-YOOOUUU-tiful rant!

What was your question? :evilgrin:

Actually, several things stand out about your story. One is that you all should have called the cops in the first place. If some 300-pound fat asshat is standing on my porch, threatening my life, I'm calling the cops RIGHT NOW.

Second, I agree; he's all bluster/blubber (most likely). In fact, he's probably the decon of a local church and is just taking out all that religious fury on you.

Third, and this is the scary part, I'm seeing and hearing about more and more of this rage -- American on American -- and I realize the bastards are winning. They have unleashed so much rage and hatred among us that WE ARE NOT watching them because we are too busy hating each other (Dems and Pukes, libruls and neocons, etc.)

And I think we've already passed the point of no return; I think we cannot now quench those flames of hatred without some kind of uprising. I hope I'm wrong.