Tuesday, October 10, 2006

Why My Neighbors Are Looney Tunes So, I thought it was odd when my neighbors built a giant fish head out of PVC and insulation tubes, and left it hanging out in their backyard for a few days. I thought it was a little peculiar when they constructed, in a symphony of clanking pipes and giggles, a fairly large party tent (like, ten feet by twenty, easily big enough to park two cars end-to-end). In the dark of night. I'll admit I was a little surprised, when I walked out my back door and saw it there, but at least it explained the clanking pipes. I remember, as I fell asleep that night, thinking: That sounds like the rattle of spraypaint cans. Which, given the bongo solo that had already awakened me once, was less startling than it might have otherwise been at 1:00 AM. And the next morning, the side of the tent was covered with a spraypainted mural; the sort of thing normally only seen on the walls of elementary school playgrounds, with a big smiling sun radiating a rainbow of rays onto a Peaceable Kingdom of smiling creatures. When I saw the mural I just laughed, and took a picture. The tent was gone in a few days. Sometime in the last two weeks, a very tall metal frame appeared where the tent had once been. It looks like a gymnastics rings apparatus; eighteen or twenty feet high, made out of one continuous piece of square steel tube that's about two inches on a side. Up, over, and down, like a triumphal arch built to commemorate an extremely modest accomplishment. On This Hallowed Ground, In 2006, This Lawn Was Mowed At Great Personal Cost, In The Face of Fierce Resistance, And Many Histamines. It also looks like a swingset for monstrously tall children, if you look at it just right. It stayed like that for a few days, just sitting there, with wire ropes attached at the top and pulled tight against stakes in the ground, a tensioned system of steel. Then, a rope appeared, tied off to the top of the structure, looped over and dropped all the way to the ground. Now, here's the thing about that rope: It's not your average rope. It's not twisted hemp or woven nylon, the stuff of industry or seafaring. It's a tightly woven cotton sheath wrapped around a fat cotton core, about an inch and a half thick. It's completely smooth along the entire length. There is only one application for this thing, at least that I know of. It's called a Spanish Web, and it's used in circus acts. This suspicion was confirmed last night as I arrived home, to the sounds of weird new-age music playing from tiny speakers. There were candles and tiki torches set up in a ring about the arch, and the neighbors were practicing an acrobatic lift next to the web, timing it to the music. So. My neighbors are circus performers. How many people can say that? 10:47:53 AM    comment []