It was like a really bad episode of Cops.

Picture Andy asleep at 4:35 a.m. Sunday. She�s tucked in deep under the down comforter, under the electric blanket, between the flannel sheets, swallowed in a cocoon of pajamas. She�s asleep � and she�s loving it!

Then from outside her window a drunken woman starts screaming (into, it turns out, a cell phone), �I don�t know where I am. My car won�t start!�

Said drunken woman proceeds to demonstrate by turning the ignition. Said car screams in mortal agony.

Meanwhile, Andy is no longer asleep. From inside the cocoon of warmth and happiness comes a very long stream of unhappy curses. Andy, with eyes still closed, wishes the drunken woman would go away or freeze to death or get hit by a semi �

Too bad none of those things happened. Instead, Drunken Woman screams into her cell phone the particulars of how she came to be in her current predicament: Drunken Woman was following someone to/from home/a party. Drunken Woman then plowed into the back of someone�s car �

Andy leapt out of her cocoon and flew to the window. Down below, Drunken Woman (in tight black flare-legged pants and a sleeveless gold lame blouse) paced beside her car. Andy�s car was fine (thank you, God), but Drunken Woman�s car was partly in Andy�s yard and partly in the neighbor�s yard. Wha� the � ?!

Maybe it was sleepiness, maybe it was just plain shock, but Andy couldn�t even find curse words appropriate to the drama unfolding in her front yard.

Drunken Woman continued to sob/laugh into her cell phone. Andy picked up her phone and dialed 911.

Unfortunately, Mumbles was working the switchboard that night. The 911 tapes recorded something close to the following:

MUMBLES: Aus swi merg com.

[Andy thinks maybe that last beer after the Aimee Mann concert Saturday night was one beer too many�]

ANDY: Uh, Is this 911?

MUMBLES: Yes. Whasmergsee?

ANDY: Yeah. Well, a woman drove her car into my neighbor�s yard. He�s not home. She�s screaming into a cell phone. It woke me up. (That last part was of course the real crime as far as I was concerned. The witch shoulda been hanged.)

MUMBLES: Do you have a description of the car?

ANDY: It�s a tan Lincoln Town Car. (Turned out to be a champagne-colored Saturn.)

MUMBLES: And the driver?

ANDY: She woke me up. Screaming into that cell phone�

MUMBLES: What�s she look like? White? Black? Hispanic�

ANDY: She looks like a crazed, blonde white lady. (Turned out she was a crazed, blonde white lady.) Marching around in my yard. No coat on. Screaming in her cell phone. Waking folks up�

MUMBLES: Yes, ma�am. Well send someone out.

So Andy put on her fluffy houseshoes. Put on her glasses. Put on a flannel shirt on top of her pajamas and went downstairs to peek through the downstairs windows while waiting on the cops to show.

Andy shoulda put on the glasses first thing. Turns out Drunken Woman�s car was about 5 feet from Andy�s covered front porch post. The center of Andy�s brain that houses all the curses is starting to wake up � but the phone rings.

It�s Mumbles.

MUMBLES: Ma�am I just need to clarify. The driver and the car were driven onto the property?

ANDY: She almost hit my house! She woke me up � and she almost hit my house. Her car is about 5 feet from the front of my house!

MUMBLES: So the driver is still at the scene?

ANDY: Yes! Can�t you hear her screaming into that damn cell phone?!

MUMBLES: We�ll send someone out.

Ten minutes later, the cops show. I�m rather disappointed that they didn�t give Drunken Woman a field sobriety test. I was rather disappointed that they didn�t shoot Drunken Woman to shut her up.

They did call a tow truck for Drunken Woman�s car. And whoever it was at the other end of her cell phone call finally showed up to take Drunken Woman home.

It was 5:35 a.m. before it was all over. The eastern sky had started to glow before I could fall asleep again.

Makes me want to buy a Tazer gun. If I had one, I would�ve open up my bedroom window and zapped her butt the moment she started hollerin� into that cell phone. Wakin� people up�

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