Hill Hippie has a good point. To paraphrase an episode of Will and Grace, when "the gays" move in they bring cute shops, byobs, and property values go up. I can't imagine the teenage boy pissing on the tree in front of my house last night is making my property value skyrocket. The calling each other "f***ing homos" in the middle of a street football game isn't much of an incentive to move here either. (Of course I won't complain about playing football in the street. Better that than spraypainting or huffing glue in an alley somewhere. )

I don't know what my point is here, except to say that years of teaching have taught me that kids are products of their environment, and if their parents are out to lunch, kids will be destructive and violent. Calling the police is useless unless the parents have to go down to the station and pick their kids up.

And hey, if they're playing football in the street, there's even a chance that thru traffic won't so closely resemble the Indy 500 ... better'n speedbumps they are!

I registered to post about this since it happened to me yesterday, but I see there's already 7 pages dedicated to it.

I was walking home with my girlfriend from the Wine & Spirits on Ridge after a quick dinner at the Adobe last night. We walked past three kids in black shorts, baseball caps and white t-shirts. I briefly looked all 3 in the eye since I could feel them sizing me up, and all 3 looked at the ground. Once we were near the corner of Lyceum, I heard one of them call me a "fairy." I kept this to myself until we got home.

They're dangerous in big groups; a group of 8 beat a friend of mine with a brick. In small groups, though, the most they'll do is wait until you're too far away to bother with them. If I'd been with someone other than my girlfriend, I doubt I would've let it go. And that was for their benefit. She's what I like to describe as "excitable." Besides, I had to wine to drink.

Obviously, they were holding an ad hoc Mensa meeting.

Typical. They won't say a word to your face, but when you're a safe distance away they become a bunch of touch guys. And you described the uniform to a 'T'. However, now that its getting cold they will start donning oversized jeans and black hooded sweatshirts. I would like to drop these punks off at 3rd and Indiana. Then we'll see how tough they are.