3:00 am this morning or thereabouts. Sleeping soundly.  I'm suddenly jarred awake by the sound of what else: obnoxious music.  This time, they started this nonsense at that hour of the night.  Unbelievable.  But it wasn't the people on the next street behind me.  They have been eerily quiet ever since the third police visit in the same night that occurred 8 days ago.

This time, it was a pickup truck parked in front of their house 5 houses down from me.  They were out in the STREET, drinking and having no cares that they were both blaring the music so loud that I could hear it in my bedroom some 300 feet away and also that they were drinking in public, not even thinking that police might come.  Well, I had the decision to either call the police or go down there and deal with it - I opted for the police.  My methods of dealing with people who don't give a damn about anyone else are not the best, so I figured to let professionals do it.

But after 30 minutes police hadn't shown up.  Called again, police are busy.  I thought it strange at that hour of the night, that late you would think even the worst trouble-makers are sleeping or passed out.  But I guess not, especially in a city this big.

It was 71 minutes after I made the phone call and the sun was starting to show faint rays of light that they finally showed up and shut them down.  What they actually did about it, I dunno.

So, I was very tired this morning and I was supposed to show up early at church to finish the membership training class.  But I had missed the last 2 times to finish this up - for valid reasons - but I decided to go regardless of extreme fatigue.  This s*** going on in my neighborhood is wearing thin on me, though, I  really don't know how much more of this I can take.  It's ridiculous that I have to call the police multiple times in a single night to come out and tell the same party to quiet down.  It's unbelievable that some freaks could just park on the street and have a  party - in the middle of the street at 3 am.

So I'm finally a member of the church and now opportunity to serve has arisen.  I learned some things in these classes about church liability that I didn't know before and some of it is concerning the fact that liability insurance usually only covers people serving in the church that are members, not non-members.  The situation that they had approached me about some months ago - security in the church during services - resurfaced.  I hadn't even thought about the fact that I would have to be an official member of the church to be in such a position, especially considering what security can detail.  I did security during services in the big tent while on the mission field - I was tall, muscular and not easily intimidated.  I'm still tall, not as muscular as I used to be.  Being intimidated isn't an issue, but dealing with people with wisdom and in a professional manner is something that I will have to take up again from my missionary experience.

You would be surprised the amount of trouble that will come at a big tent with an evangelist preaching and the amount of trouble-makers that are - looking for trouble.  There were a few occasions where I had to inform the individual/s that if they continued, they would be forcibly removed from the property, but mostly it was just talk calmly to them and that would take care of most situations.

Well, anyway, they are going to fire it up soon - no date given yet, probably get one Sunday per month.  That was the hold up, having enough people that they felt "qualified" to deal with such.  Or even wanting to deal with such.

The weekend over, I took a nap this afternoon but I'm tired and it's directly related to these people running these stereos late at night. Someone posted a link on my FB wall about how to build some sort of transmitter that kills electronics.  No thanks.  If it kills their electronics, it's going to kill everything else around.  But I did read on blurp about CB radios. I had totally forgotten about that.  I don't even know if CB's are still capable of the mayhem they can cause' on TV's and stereos.  I remember as a teenager, we would stop in front of a house that had it's front window open and you could see the TV on.  Key down the mic on the CB and the screen on the TV would blank out completely.  When we spoke into the mic, you could see these huge lines moving up and down on the screen.

The same was with car stereos - though I think that was radios, I don't know if it would have the same effect on a CD player.  I'll have to look all of this up, though I already have a CB radio, I don't have a linear amplifier - it cranks up the output and you really need one to make it work well.

Wait and see thing for me.  The people the next street over did nothing over there this weekend and the deal on the street down from my house had never happened before or if it did, they didn't have the music turned up that loud.

And with that? The weekend is - ended.  6 pm, winding down and thinking about work tomorrow.  Mostly in terms of taking my Christianity with me and fending off the enemy.

G'day

ben