Tonight was National Night Out at our subdivision. We observed (celebrated? commemorated? attended because we had nothing better to do and just wanted to get the kids out of the house for awhile?) this occurrence at our subdivision's playground.
The whole affair was fairly docile. There were free hot dogs, hamburgers, soft drinks, cotton candy, and ice cream (which was brought to you by the fine folks at Big Expensive Grocery Store Chain Near You, who implores you to shop with us instead of driving an extra mile to Wal-Mart where you can get the same stuff for half the price. Now if only there was a way to do your grocery shopping at Wal-Mart without actually having to step foot into a Wal-Mart.).
There was also a disc jockey spinning the right mixture of classic dance tunes (Macarena, Whoomp! There It Is, Electric Slide, etc.) with some of today's edgier fare (Gwen Stefani's Hollaback Girl, Will Smith's Switch, etc.).
Oops. Sorry. Please, take this towel. I seem to have dripped sarcasm all over your nice shirt. Won't happen again.
Basically, there are two types of people in this world: those who become giddy and dash to the dance floor when they hear the first few notes of Electric Slide and those who recoil in horror, frantically searching for the nearest exit while trying to resist the urge to plunge pencils deep into their ear canals. Still, there is a morbid fascination in seeing these soccer moms, who were so prim and proper just seconds before, lose their shit and start flailing their arms about as if they were possessed by some demon seed. You can almost smell the embarrassment when the music ends.
And yeah, Zoey got out there and tried to join them. But at least she looked cute doing it. Plus she was too young to know any better.
There were also fire trucks and police cars at the affair, which the under-five set were treating as their own personal playground. The actual playground equipment had been overtaken by a group of early-to-mid teenagers who were just kind of hanging out on it. Dude. You're fifteen. You have no business hanging out on top of the slide (unless it's after midnight, in which case you're free to smoke pot there or deface it with graffiti).
And the purpose of this whole festival of fun (sorry, here's that towel again) was to "heighten crime and drug prevention awareness." The hell? How does passing out free hot dogs prevent drug use or crime? I know that scoop of chocolate ice cream made me feel safer when I tucked my kids into bed.
<WARNING>SEVERE PARANOIA AHEAD</WARNING>
If anything, wouldn't National Night Out increase crime? Think about it. Everyone's out of their homes, several cops and firemen are tied up babysitting children—it's an arsonist or a thief's wet dream!
Because Nothing Says Safety Like A Free Hot Dog
