Take That Unattended Luggage!

Kath the Cake Eater: Unattended Luggage Fighter and Cub Reporter

At precisely 12:52 p.m. CDT today, on my way back from Lake Harriet, I reached the bus stop that sits opposite the Cake Eater Pad. While I was waiting to cross the street, the sweet stylings of the Boss' Rosalita flowing through my earphones, out of the corner of my eye I noticed something was amiss. Something was resting next to the bench. Something that shouldn't have been there. Furthermore, it something that wasn't there when I went to the lake an hour and ten minutes earlier.

I am sure you, my devoted Cake Eater Readers, are asking, what could it have possibly been? A breadbox? A Chrysler? A disembowled smurf?

{insert heavy duh-duh-duh music here}

It was...

...an evil garment bag. An evil unattended garment bag.

Rather conveniently for the cub reporter angle, I had my digital camera with me, so I snapped off a few shots of the garment bag, before going into the house, where I faced a conundrum: to call the cops or to not call the cops.

You see, some idiot probably just forgot their bag when they were getting on the bus. It happens. Someone probably got a little too wrapped up while listening to George Clinton and the Parliament Funkadelic on their fashionable iPod and, in the midst of their grooving on this beautiful autumn Tuesday, forgot all about their garment bag as the bus pulled up. It could happen.

But the "authorities" have repeatedly warned us about "unattended bags," because, apparently, they don't like for our luggage to be separated from its owner: that's a bad thing because it generally doesn't bode well when this happens. Yet, I ask you, my devoted Cake Eater Readers, who in their right mind would want to bomb the bus stop across the street from the Cake Eater Pad? The only thing that's there, as you can see, is a bench, a Strib box, and a Lutheran Church about fifteen yards behind it. Besides the obvious choice of target--- the Strib box---the only other target of interest is the Lutheran Church. Who'd want to bomb a Lutheran Church? Yeah, sure bomb a synagogue or a cathedral, but a boxy Lutheran church? And ECLA Lutherans at that? That's just really not worth the effort. Particularly on a Tuesday.

Anyhoo...I was torn. Do I call the cops? Do I not call the cops? I wouldn't want to waste their time. So instead of debating with myself, while I stretched my hamstrings, I called the husband and asked him what I should do. He said, duh, call the cops. I agreed I would. I chatted with him for a little bit, asked him how his day was going, listened to him bitch about this ISP he's working with currently on this project, and then, after I hung up with the husband, called the police at 1:05 p.m. CDT. Of course I got the Cake Eater City Police on the horn and since the bus stop is in the Province of Minneapolis, they transferred me promptly to the Minneapolis police, who took my name, number and complaint and said, "we'll send some cruisers right over."

I hung up the phone, happy that was over with. Then, because I was hungry, I went into the kitchen and made some Cream of Wheat for lunch. 1:10 comes and goes and the cops don't show. 1:15 passes by with still no police as I pour the hot cereal into a bowl and get myself some juice. At 1:20, I'm settled in the chair in the living room, eating my lunch and watching the street outside, waiting for the cops to show up. The cream of wheat was exceedingly tasty---and it disappeared fast, because I was hungry. At 1:24 a Minneapolis police cruiser shows up! And it only took nineteen minutes! A moment later, a second cruiser pulls up behind the first.

Now, apparently the guy in the first cruiser wanted nothing to do with the bag. He left it for the dude in the second cruiser to take care of. The second cop pulled on what looked like a pair of baby blue rubber gloves and went to work on the bag, while the cop from the first cruiser stood out of the way.

The second cop went through the bag pretty thoroughly.

And then all of a sudden, the gawker effect kicked in on the street as the cars started slowing down to get a good peek at what was going on. This, apparently, coincided with the time that the second cop decided there was nothing to worry about with this bag, hence the first cop decided to mosy on over, closer to the bag.

About a minute later, at 1:27p.m., the second cop put the bag in his trunk, whipped his rubber gloves off like he was Marcus Welby, threw them into his car and got in after them. The first cop pulled into the church parking lot and then the second cruiser pulled in after him.

There apparently wasn't anything wrong with the bag, per se, because they sat there and shot the shit for the next fifteen minutes or so.

So, I feel somewhat righteous right now, having defended my local bus stop from unattended luggage that might or might not have exploded and destroyed the Strib box.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.

Posted by Kathy at October 25, 2005 02:47 PM | TrackBack