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Saturday, Distinctly lamb-like out there For those of you currently stuck in cold, snowy climes, allow me to mention that it's 70 degrees F in sunny Plano at the moment, with big beautiful cumulus clouds drifting lazily across the spring sky. Don't send the mailbombs yet. The weather has been cold, rainy and generally miserable all week, which is why I'm so struck by the sudden burst of nice conditions. And remember, I'm still going to be here this summer when the temperatures climb into the "Ninth Level of Hell" range -- at that point, you can cackle at me as vengefully as you like. Sumbitch -- how'd they do that? And since it's beautiful outside, and since I sit in a cubicle far from any windows five days a week, there's no way in hell I'm spending the day inside. Cleaning? Screw it -- I'll do it after the sun goes down. So I went out to pay bills, drop off the rent check, and generally drive around the area and see what's out there. I like doing this on weekends, because it's a good way of finding cool little stores, garage sales and other interesting places to go. It's also the way I found the nearest Taco Bell -- my lust for bland, watery tacos can be a frightening thing at times. Today's neighborhood crawl took place in Allen, the town northeast of Plano. It's kinda fascinating, driving around what was originally rolling wilderness and a sparse collection of farms and seeing how the housing developments are crawling across the landscape like an all-consuming ticky-tacky amoeba (ten points to anyone who can recognize that pop reference). A lot of the developments have been holding neighborhood garage sales, sort of an organized day where everyone who has the desire can haul their stuff onto their lawn and spread it out for sale. The only problem is, most of the stuff for sale in your average new housing development is old exercise equipment, clothing or baby accoutrements. Since I always think of a garage sale as a chance to search for antiques, old quilts and nifty costume jewelry, all these neo-yuppies getting rid of their Sharper Image trackwalkers and last season's Dior knockoffs just doesn't do it for me. However, I did stumble across something fascinating, in a stupid sort of way -- on my way home along McDermott, the road had been blocked off by a deputy and traffic diverted down a side street. All I could see over the deputy's shoulder was a collection of police cars, an ambulance and the tip of a green station wagon. Nothing was on fire, and I couldn't see what all the fuss about, but it's not smart to argue with a man in uniform who's packing, so I turned right down the side street. A left turn got me onto a street that ran parallel to McDermott, and as the traffic slowly inched past the side street that led all the excitement I could see the reason for the diversion. Somehow, and I haven't the faintest idea how they did this, someone managed to flip a van (not a minivan -- an honest-to-god brick-shaped van) on a two-lane residential street that's a block long with a stop sign at either end. Vans are not the lightest vehicles in the world, nor are they terribly unstable unless you try to turn right abruptly at something like 50 mph. Despite the propensity of Texan drivers to speed like hell, it's hard to do this on McDermott (especially at that spot, two blocks down from Allen City Hall) because it's regularly patrolled by Allen speed cops, and the parallel street I was on is a two-lane poky puppy with stop signs every couple of blocks. So I can only assume it took some truly stupendous driving to land that van on its side. Which wouldn't surprise me, this being Texas and all. And people wonder why I have personal liability on top of my car insurance.
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