The Strike Is Long Over, And Yet...

OMG... this semester is just turning my into a foulmouthed lout, the type of which would make a horney sailor played by Eddie Murphy blush. I've always been a bit of a swearer, but it wasn't until recently that I realized just how much I swear.
Basically, I live in an appartment and my bedroom and living room windows overlook the entrance to the building. The very BUSY and LOUD entrance to my building. Since I have moved to this neighbourhood, I have had to leave the comfort of my toasty beddy-bye on about 5 occaissions in order to go downstairs and ask someone doing a Night At The Roxbury impression to turn the base in their car stereo down at 2 AM.

ON A WEEKNIGHT.

I don't get out of the bed on a weekend. Too scary. Wanna know why? Because when you do that, you see that the person in question is doing something like masturbating while waiting for their date, or is just openly drinking in the car and then you have to take the liscence plate and call the police and avoid the pointy racial/sexist epithets being hurled at you. Epithets if you're lucky.

When we put in the air conditioner, this problem will by and large disappear and I will sleep once more. But, with the coming spring weather, a new loudmouth problem has emerged: 7 and 8 year olds who use the F-word more than a faultering Yuk Yuks MC.

At first I thought, who is the effeminate and verbally abusive dad yelling at children as a they come off of the school bus? But upon further inspection, I realized that there was no dad out there. No dad, no mom, no auntie Sveta or uncle Uri. But there was a horde of unsupervised urchins on the front lawn and patio, cursing the sh*t out of one another. I heard variations on the F-bomb that George Carlin hadn't even thought of. Through the mirale of hyphenation, these kids proved to me that there are now 47 words you can't say on television. Although, apparently, it is okay to scream them at the top of their lungs into my home office during business hours.

Jeeeeeezz.

Yeah, so this has been going on EVERY school day from the time the bus arrives, around 3:30, until the sun goes down - weather permitting. And we're less than one block to a giant park. AND there is a sign in the front of the building prohibiting children from playing on the patio. (But it's not in Russian, so...?) So, one day, I go out onto the balcony and say something like, "Hey guys! Do you think you could watch the language? I don't have a problem with you playin out here, be as loud as you like. But I'm getting tired of hearing the F-word every three seconds." And they stop. And just stare at me up on the 4th floor. Like I am some sort of abomination. Like a cat that grew wings and started whistling atonally. Or a baby who started projectile vomiting the host in mass. About 20 seconds go by. No one moves. No one speaks. I'm thinking, shouldn't they be cussing me out? "Guys? Do you think you could stop yelling swear words out here? I'd appreciate it." They don't say yes or no. One kid (the leader?) does a head bobble that I need a bunch of trained behaviourist observers with high inter-rater reliablity to tell me if it is a nod or a shake. They go back to playing. I go back inside.

I JUST sit down.... "F**************************CK SAM!!! YOU'RE SUCH A F*************CKING FAT *SS!"

Clearly I need to find out who the mothers are of these little Artful Dodgers and find a way to appeal to, and failing that, punish her for this. Why? Well, upon consulting the draft that I was working on, I found that it had a few f*cks and fat-*sses in it -- you know like when someone is talking while you write and you end up writing down snippets of what they said in your output?

Note to self: proof read EVERYTHING written between 3:30 and sundown TWICE.