| John Montgomery
Presents This Week's |
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Creep Logo by Alan
Fraser
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| John Montgomery
Presents This Week's |
|
Creep Logo by Alan
Fraser
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I've learned not to take any chances with the young people who harass me on a daily basis. When a surly twenty-something cuts me off in traffic, I don't give him the finger. When those teenage losers on the sidewalk downtown hit me up for spare change and then curse me for ignoring them, I keep my mouth shut and keep on truckin'. When the newly pubescent kids from the middle school walk by my house at midnight with their ghetto blasters blasting, I just bury my head under the pillow and wait for them to pass.
Why this cowardly behavior? Partially because I can still remember what an obnoxious dickhead I was when I was younger. But mostly, because some of those guys are Deeply Disturbed. They carry guns and they kill people. I know it won't be long before my neighborhood has its own local version of the Trenchcoat Mafia, or Benjamin Smith, or the six-year-old gunslinging first-grader. When that happens, I don't want my name to be at the top of one of their lists in capital letters, underlined and followed by multiple exclamation points. Go with the flow, skim the waves, keep a low profile and you'll live a lot longer these days.
But when it's some decrepit, white-haired codger who's causing me grief, I get a little bolder. My typical reaction might be along the lines of, "Hey, you senile old bastard, perhaps your failing eyesight prevented you from noticing that you just cut in front of me in the checkout line! Now kindly step aside or I'll grab that Geritol bottle out of your hands and shove it up your wrinkled, liver-spotted ass! No antique nursing home refugee is going to get the best of me, pal. No, sir, not a virile, bronco-bucking stud like this one! Did you hear me, or should I shout louder into your hearing aid?" I could go on, but you get the idea.
Times change, however, and while I may be getting a bit older myself, I'm not too old to learn a few new tricks. From now on, my "See No Evil" policy has been expanded to include dangerous types of all ages. Because the old boys have risen from their rocking chairs and their new motto is, "I can kill you just as easily as those young guys can!"
This week, we had two (count 'em, two!) gentlemen way past their primes who regressed into youthful abandon by settling their retirement community disputes with guns. Flipping out and killing people is no longer only a young man's game.
Geezer Gunner number one is Kenneth Miller, of suburban Detroit. Ken, who lived in a senior citizens high-rise apartment complex, incurred the wrath of one the female residents there by saying something that has been variously described as, "sexual harassment", "inappropriate remarks", and a "filthy joke". Whatever it was, the lady filed a complaint and the residents called a meeting to discuss the issue. Ken, who probably thought that once he was retired, he wouldn't have to attend any more stinking meetings, was in attendance, but soon got upset and left in a huff. When he returned ten minutes later, he brought a .22-caliber rifle which he used to kill two women and critically injure another. One of the dead women, Alvita King, was the one who turned Ken in for being a pig. Alvita would have been better off to stuff some cotton in her ears or learn a few choice words herself.
After the shootings, Ken was holed up for a while in one of the apartments, negotiating by phone with the authorities. They broke in and captured him after he fell asleep as a result of taking too many painkillers. He is pictured above, on the left, being rolled away with his pain sufficiently killed. Along with his accusers.
Next, we move to another retirement community, this one in Peoria, Arizona, where we meet Geezer Gunner number two, Richard Glassel. Richard was also disgruntled at his fellow residents, in his case because he wanted his shrubbery to grow out full, and the "association" wanted to cut them back. The argument got so heated that a few months ago, they filed an injunction against Richard and got him thrown out. Before he left, he made his feelings known by destroying his home's interior with a chain saw, which included sawing through the bath tub and shower stall.
Nobody heard from Richard again until he showed up at one of their association
meetings (another meeting!)
armed with an M-16 rifle and at least two handguns. His yield was better
than Ken's: two dead and three injured. He got tackled by 40 of the residents
when his gun jammed. Richard is shown above, on the right, wondering about
the condition of the prison shrubbery.
So, have we learned any lessons from all this? Here are a few: