There was a poop on our doorstep this morning.
It was the weirdest thing. Our ground floor is a little above ground level (which is weird, now that I think about it. I wonder what's underneath), so there's a small flight of concrete steps with an iron railing up to our front door. And on top of the top step were two little brown logs.
I thought I was seeing things. Ace was dreamy enough to take my car to the car vet today and on top of that surprised me by taking it for a wash and vacuum. But so he shuffled a lot of stuff from my trunk to the house while I was still inside making Amazing Cranberry Scones. He says he didn't see anything this morning.
And yet there it was.
There is an orange cat who lives in the apartment complex. Mainly I only see her wandering around late, late at night. I suspect she sleeps under this Japanese wood deck that's sort of in the middle of the complex atop a bed of stones and vegetation. Friendly and meowey - extremely skittish, won't take food, but will come sniff your finger and came inside and investigated my living room once when invited. And I've seen the cat sitting on my top step, I think because I get very good sun there. But why would the cat poop on my top step?
Also, it looked too big to be cat poop. I've cat sat for friends, and have scooped my share of litter, and these logs looked bigger than what I'm accustomed to scooping.
I don't think anyone in the complex has a dog, though. And who would let their dog climb up to my front door, poop (it's not that big an area, and the poop was right on the edge), and climb back down?
So I took a closer look, and it was definitely poop - it was even kind of hairy. The only time I see hairy poop, really, is when I'm trail running and come across mountain lion poop - that's hairy, because (I assume) the lions are noshing on entire ground squirrels and so forth. But why would there be hairy poop here, in the middle of a busy street full of apartment complexes...unless...unless! A mountain lion came and visited me to poop, and then returned to the mountains.
Is it possible? We've already seen at least one occasion of a mountain lion breaking into a dorm room to take a nap, and then leaving. Why not wander down the hill to take a dump, then go home? It's not like I've never been running out in the middle of mountain lion territory and had to cop a squat. Eye for an eye, y'all.
But Ace's theory is different, and at least as plausible.
I have a crazy neighbor.
When I first moved in, I met a sweet old man riding his bicycle into the complex. He'd left his cell phone in a store or something, and we made small talk about my being new, and he made some jokes about being senile, and he offered to give me some books he bought from the library for a dollar and he welcomed me to the place. A day later he left a bunch of books hanging in a grocery bag from my front doorknob.
After that, I started my new job and seldom saw him. But at night, when I'd be brushing my teeth, I'd hear noises from through our shared wall. A high pitched, virulent barrage of expletives. Shut the f*** up, you motherf***ing c*******er! F***ing c***!
Seriously, the worst stream of the foulest language you can imagine. I assumed this poor old man had an abusive caretaker and made a mental note to check up on him.
My other neighbors were friendly, as I'd meet them at the recycling area or in the laundry. "People seem nice," I said to one guy.
"Yeah, mostly," he said; "it can be a little noisy, though."
"What do you mean?"
"Oh, I don't know, I guess you'll see."
I was installing shelves in my closet, which also shared a wall with his apartment, and heard it again - "Leave me the H*** alone, you motherf***ing c***! F***ing b****! B****!" Again, I shook my head - he had one heck of a nasty caretaker.
I finally bumped into the little old man as I was walking to my carport, and said hi. He didn't say anything, till after he'd passed me and I heard him muttering under his breath, "f***ing b****. C*******ing motherf***ing c***." It wasn't an abusive caretaker! It was him! The sweet little old man!!
I invited all my neighbors to my housewarming. None actually attended, but several stopped by. (One was on a chili powder and lemon juice detox thing and didn't want to be tempted.) He asked how I liked the place and I said it was great. But then I prodded.
"What do you know about..." I cocked my head towards the little old man's place. He shook his head, "I don't know, man."
I said, "I have a theory it's like a Tourette's thing." He shook his head again. "No, I work with some kids with Tourette's. It's not like that."
So I remain baffled. I still think it's unintentional, but the little old man scares me. It's otherwise silent over there, except for the one time I heard Lionel Richie really loud, and he's totally on top of his holiday decorations, with Christmas wreaths and Halloween doodads. So I can't believe he has a blackened heart.
I guess he's a little mad, and maybe lonely, and sometimes I think about how I could reach out to him. But at the same time, foul language really freaks me out, and I'm afraid to approach him or even say hi anymore for fear of tripping his wire.
In any event, since Ace moved in a couple of weeks ago, we have twice gone to sleep to the sound of hard rock music (heavy bass) booming in from his place. Ace wonders whether we make too much noise conversing in the evening and it's retaliation; I wonder whether maybe the guy has his stream of invective bottled up all day and needs to just let it rip at the end of the day and puts on the music to cover it up. For whatever reason, it was pretty loud last night, and I was only able to ignore it because I was super tired.
Am I wrong about the sweet little old man? Could he in fact be a wicked old man who's depositing poop on my stoop?
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