carrots and masturbators

I live in a nice, sweet, sleepy little town that uses up pages of its newspaper to argue over whether the police cars should be blue or white (pages and pages) and whether road construction should begin on this street or that street and what that will do to parking and neighborhood shopping. We are talking about exciting stuff here, folks.

So last night I get home from work to find the newest edition of our town newspaper on our front stoop. I am happy to report that due to our warmer temperatures I was able to open my front door without pushing aside piles of snow. Its the little things that count.

I settled down onto the couch with my copy that is only slightly soggy due to sitting in melting snow puddles and begin reviewing budget forecasts, complaints about snow removal, more on the road construction and parking issues and settle on the police blog (yippee!). Last week's edition had some traffic violations and drunk teens and compared to our life in New York City, this is pretty serious stuff. I know I shouldn't laugh because these poor individual's mistakes are aired in such a public forum, but just 'cause I shouldn't, doesn't mean its not funny.

I really liked the one where the 22 year old gets to his car and hears a hissing sound, which is the air escaping from his slashed tires and then someone drives up and they get into a fight. The police are called, the guy who drove up flees, and the 22 year old goes to wait inside his brother's house. When the police arrive the smell of marijuana is so strong that they arrest both guys, even though one of them is the tire-slashing victim. Ahhh, college students.

There are a couple of reports of cabbies being stiffed after taking their passengers somewhere, and even a kid who brought a pellet gun to school. Blah blah blah. These are a little sad, but nothing serious.

And then, we get to one of the final ones. I won't dare paraphrase, because I would surely ruin the integrity of the log...

Pervert reported
For the second time in as many weeks, police received complaints of a man masturbating in public.
A little before midnight on Jan. 25, a 29-year-old woman reported seeing from her window a white male of average height in his 20s, wearing a dark-colored winter hat with ear flaps, a dark ski jacket and dark jeans standing on her street near the town center. The woman said the man had pulled his pants to his ankles and made eye contact with her while masturbating.
As she called to her roommate to call the police, the woman said the man pulled up his pants and began walking back towards the town center. Police searched the area, but did not find a man matching the suspect's description.

That is the entire entry. And this is what follows. I sloooooowly slid down my couch onto the floor so as not to have to actually look out the window. It must also be noted that dear sweet hubbie removed all curtains from the house because he thought the previous owner's frilly white curtains were ugly. This results in perverts standing on the street being able to look into our house while masturbating, if they so choose. I was home alone, so I had no one to check for me whether said pervert was outside, so I proceeded to crawl around the house on my hands and knees to peek through the windows and make sure no one was out there. Then I spent the rest of the night sitting on the floor because from that angle no one could see me, and I couldn't see them.

Of course I UNDERSTAND that the odds that pervert would choose my house are slim, and I'm SURE the police are on the look out, and we DO live in a very safe neighborhood, but just in case pervert is standing outside, I'd rather not know.

This morning I email my friend, CRWatch, to ask her what I should do, besides get curtains, of course. Her response? " I think you should run to the store tonight and pick up some carrots. if the guy comes to your window, start cutting them in the window. See if he sticks around."

What would I do without her?