inconspicuous

After a long day of incident reports, I got home and put on my neon yellow shirt, a pair of reflective running pants, wrapped my knee, and went outside for an evening jog around the neighborhood.

 At the top of my road I could see a bit of smoke, which usually means that people are hanging around in their driveways with a barbecue, so I hung a left and went around the long way to avoid them. By the time I circled around to the top road, the smoke had turned into an enormous billowing black cloud. It looked like a house fire, so I headed that way. The neighbors were standing outside watching, and as I trotted by I asked, "Has it already been called in?" The neighbors shook their heads, so I stopped and went to investigate. The road dead-ended at a pair of wooden gates covered in signs that said NO TRESPASSING and BEWARE OF DOGS and MONITORED BY SURVEILLANCE CAMERAS, and the smoke was pouring out from behind them. I called 911 and walked up to look through the chains, ignoring the little camera pointed at me. Inside there was a bonfire covered with lumber and what looked like door frames, and it was raging out of control, with nobody around to watch it. There were construction vehicles parked around the place, and it was in a little cleared area, but with trees and neighbors so close, it did not look safe. The fire department dispatcher said he was sending some trucks out even if it did look like a deliberate fire on private property, because open fires are illegal unless they're for cooking food, which a bonfire covered with door frames definitely was not.

I hung up and told the neighbors they were coming. One of the men said, "Thank you for calling that in, for real. The company burns stuff all the time. Toxic chemicals, everything." Hang on, now. What kind of people were we dealing with here, if none of the immediate neighbors were willing to call the fire department over frequent raging toxic bonfires? 

The fire trucks showed up with all their sirens on. The firefighters jumped out, cut the chains, opened up the big gates, and hauled their hoses out. A big shiny black truck pulled up, with a big angry man with neck tattoos at the wheel. He parked on the road and ran over to confront the firefighters. I realized I was standing around in the middle of all this wearing a day-glo yellow t-shirt and reflective leggings, and that I was all over the surveillance video reporting the fire to 911. I turned to hoof it out of there, and saw that every neighbor for two blocks was standing in their driveway, watching the scene. I walked casually past them all, telling the ones with curious eyebrows what was going on and reassuring them that their houses weren't going to burn down. While everyone was looking the other way, I ran the last bit to my house and got inside. Hopefully the neighborhood's disinclination to report things extends to not pointing out which house the dumb haole lives in when the goon squad comes around.

And now I have to get a new jogging outfit, unless I want to get mowed down by a big shiny black truck and dumped on a bonfire.

Exciting week over here.