Meanie lady on the block

I never wanted this to happen, but I am now officially the mean lady that lives on my block.

Last night I'm sitting in my studio, minding my own business. I start to hear some ruckus out in the street. I look outside and there are 2 boys. Youngish boys, probably around 5th or 6th graders. They have a can of Sprayable fun foam. They look mischievous. And then they started spraying the Stop sign at the end of the street. It's broad daylight, mind you.

They know it's wrong, as I'm watching them they are working fast as to do it without anyone seeing them. But yet, must think they are invisible, as it's broad daylight!!

They move on to the street sign, behind my hedge row so I can't see, but I can hear their giggles. They want to run, but they are so excited, looking for more. It's quite funny now, thinking back on it.

HOWEVER...Here is where the meanie comes out in me. If they think they can get away with that, they'll think they can get away with anything. What if, down the road, they end up using spray paint? This was done recently in my neighborhood so I felt a sudden urge to scare 'em up a bit.

I find myself moving quickly down the stairs, out onto the porch, down to the side walk. I walk briskly towards them, they see me, and start to run- just out of my site, behind a parked van on the street. They peek their little heads around to see if I'm still coming. My arm goes up, and there is a flick of the hand that says- "Come here. Right Now."

They start walking towards me. I'm surprised, and realize, I must look really serious, or really mean.

I give some stupid and nervous lecture about how it's wrong to do that, it's defacing town property, I'm sure they wouldn't appreciate it if they knew the boys were doing that, and if they don't stop I'm calling the police. The looks on their faces made me know they were scared shitless. (at this point, I felt a little bad, but a little good knowing that my lecture was working) At this point, I asked them where they live, I said I wanted to speak to their parents.

One of the boys, the bravest one, said "We'll clean it". I said" Yes, I would like you to clean it up!" I start walking back to my house, they go to the stop sign. They yell to me" I don't think we're tall enough!!" I said- " Get your parents, get a ladder, I don't care how you clean it, just do it."

Minutes later it was cleaned up, off of both signs. Afterwards, I felt like really- it's no biggie, it would have probably washed off in the rain, yadda yadda yadda. But since we've lived here, there have many instances of kids messing around with the local signs. Streets signs on our corner have been bent, dessert/cake has been thrown at the speed limit sign by our driveaway,

spray painted signs down the road. Enough is enough.

And we've had trouble with older boys that live up the street- one day they were walking by and one of them was throwing a plate up in the air and catching it. They were in front of our driveaway when the boy missed catching the plate and it smashed to smithereens in the street. They kept walking. We watched this out the dining room window while eating, but it was Joe who got right up and went out there and demanded that they boy pick the plate pieces up. See, it's not always just me!

You'd think they'd know by now, they can't get away with shit like that on our corner. Nothing had happened in quite some time. I was surprised to have to deal with this little quandry, last night.

I've also been known to anonymously call the police to complain of noise, last summer, when some high school kids were sitting in a parked truck with some very very loud base that shook every window in my house for an hour. Enough is enough.

I'm so mean.