The Firetruck, the Strawberry Pie, and Paintballs
Monday, August 17th, 2009 When we lived in Arlington, Texas on Ashbury Drive some of our neighbors wanted us to leave. Our family was just too strange. Not only did we raise rabbits, homeschool our children, and have way-too-many cats, we just acted different and sometimes the neighbors just couldn’t stand it. Take the incident of the firetruck for example.
Upon arriving home from a camping trip I discovered that the valve on our camping van’s propane tank was leaking. Propane was spewing out and there was no way to stop it. I connected a long copper tube to the valve, ran it about 6 feet away from the van and up into the air about 6 feet. Then I lit the propane. The flame was 6 to 10 feet long. I then set out a lawn chair and got a book to read during the long wait for all the propane to burn off. Our neighbor across the street peeked out and saw this conflagration. She almost had a conniption fit. “What was that crazy man doing now?!” her body language seemed to say, but not a word to me.
Soon the fire engine arrived lights on, sirens going. It stopped in front of my house. The firemen looked at each other and shook their heads. Some grinned. They sauntered over, looked around, looked at me in the chair. (more…)