The Weirdo Dam Has Broken

Three weirdos in four days! Seems like old times. The weirdo dam has broken, and Val is caught in the deluge. A stalking little girl on Thursday, a leather Johnny Depp parking-lot moonwalker on Saturday, and then Sunday's strange encounter at the Liquor Store.

Let the record show that I stop in for scratchers once a week at the Liquor Store. I'd go more, but they're often out of my favorites. Technically, it's a smoke shop, mainly selling cigarettes and vapes and "heavy" soda. It has a drive-thru window. The major part of the store is filled with shelves of assorted hard liquor, and we've always just referred to it as the Liquor Store. They have four or five of those fake slot machines that are considered "games of not chance." I've never played them, though Hick does at other venues.

The Liquor Store has always seemed a bit shady to me. No real reason, other than cars in the parking lot, but no customers visible inside. In my mind, they have a secret back room where they hold illegal poker games. Or maybe they deal in loan-sharking. 

Anyhoo... I was standing at the counter, trading scratcher winners for what turned out to be scratcher losers, when I saw a man approach the clear double doors. He was a medium-size, medium-age man, with medium-length medium-color hair. He was wearing medium-faded jeans with a medium brown t-shirt. Mr. Medium had two dogs on a loooong bright-orange lead, which was spliced to a black leash or rope.

The dogs were not big dogs, but overly-medium. One looked like a black lab mix, young and inquisitive. The other was obviously mostly pit-bull, in the standard pit-bull brown color. 

Mr. Medium unhooked the dogs from the lead, and opened up the door, leaving the long orange flat rope thingy lying in front of the door, strewn along the blacktop ramp/entrance area. They all came inside. The lab ran up to me, sturdy tail wagging, sniffing my right knee. I'm not afraid of dogs. I even greeted them with, "Hi, doggies!" And to be fair, that knee had just been anointed with the very special cream that The Pony got me for medicinal purposes. The pit walked on by, giving me a cursory look.

My attention was on picking scratchers, because they were out of a couple, and this was a new girl working. I lost track of Mr. Medium and his dogs. Then I heard the gal working the drive-thru window, who was out of sight behind shelves of cigarettes, exclaim: "Whoa! You touched my butt and surprised me!" New Girl giggled. I at first thought somebody might be working back there with Window Gal, but then guessed it was maybe Mr. Medium, or one of the dogs.

Mr. Medium suddenly popped up behind me, saying he hoped I won on every ticket. So it wasn't him. He was friendly enough. But he didn't act like he knew the people working there. 

What's up with that? How can a guy just walk into a Liquor Store with two dogs off a leash? That doesn't seem like a good business policy! They had no harnesses or vests proclaiming them to be service dogs. Mr. Medium had left the leash like a trap to snare the feet of elderlies who might be stocking up on their tobacco or vape or alcohol needs, or possibly seeking an under-the-table loan, or wishing to gamble.

Some weirdos raise more questions than concerns...