Defining old

Our neighbors down the hill are probably the definition of inconsiderate. They block the rumrunners driveway on a regular basis, their dogs bark all hours of the day and night, and every now and then their toddler escapes the house and wreaks havoc on nearby lights and lawn fixtures. Pretty much if you want neighbors, these people wouldn't make the top ten. Hell...they might not even make the top 100, but on a list of neighbors you don't want, you'd be sure to find them. Anyway, they have a son who just turned 16 apparently so they bought him a nice Pontiac Firebird. Thankfully for the rest of us they got him a V6. I don't think they told him this because he still leaves as if he were exiting the pits to save himself from going a lap down. Dario Franchitti just won the IRL championship and I think he takes more time exiting the pits than this ass hat does leaving the driveway. Normally this wouldn't bother me. And I'm sure in my younger days I left fast, or loud, or both. But normally I did it when people were awake. Usually around 5:30, shit for brains cranks his car (which is usually parked in the street not far from our bedroom window and almost blocking our driveway) revs the engine as high as it will go, then slams it in to gear with the gas still on the floor. At first I was pretty pissed about hearing the hum of a weak V6 scream by my window to wake me up...but I realized today when I left that the weather is turning colder, and cold is hard on engines. So hopefully one day during the winter this year he'll do that and the stupid thing will come apart on him. One can hope. Anyway, just before 11 the other night he came down the street at 90mph as usual, with his radio as loud as it can be, turns around in the circle and attempts a burnout. Normally burnouts don't bother me...but after 10:00 or so at night, any noise that isn't my TV or my wife talking to me really annoys me. So I step outside to see him celebrating over a single wheel burnout that's less than two feet in length. I thought about mocking form, or length, or the fact that it's just one tire that burned out...but I have a few marks on the block that speak for themselves. All done during normal business hours so as to not wake anyone up. Seeing a six foot geeky white kid celebrate over something like this annoyed me...mostly because this kid thinks he's black. So I said "Little late for a burnout, don't you think?" He looks up, makes some gesture and says "Naw Dawg...uh...I was just cleanin up da tires yo..." Yeah...he thinks he's Eminem or something. So I point at that those are better done during the daytime and he says "Sorry Dawg...guess you just don't undastand yo." At this point I had to go back in the house. This kid would have never understood that it was the middle of the night, that my rumrunning homey the firefighter has to be up at 5am to leave for work, or that he's just in general, a huge fucking tool. I walk back in the house to start watching the Daily Show and think "Oh shit...I'm old. I turned considerate of my neighbors one day...and I just yelled at one."

So there you have it...just over 200 days from being 30 and I'm slowly becoming my Dad. Ouch...I'm defining old already.