Personalized Annoyance
Doing my usual morning routine, I could not help noticing a loudspeaker going outside. For a while, I thought it was the usual annoyance: a recycle/secondhand shop truck making the rounds, promising all kinds of stuff about what they’ll take off your hands for free (until you actually try to give them something and it turns out you pay through the nose).
But then I noticed that it was going on for a long time. And it was not changing in volume, as you would expect in a moving vehicle. Nor was it talking about what you could throw away.
Finally, I decided to check it out.
It was a politician. I had no idea there was an election. I don’t think there is one.
Nor was this guy on a truck. He was standing in front of my house speaking into a bullhorn.
I have seen this before in large apartment and condominium complexes, where hundreds or even thousands of people live.
But in front of my house? There were maybe a dozen residences where people could understand the idiot from inside their homes. We’re on a small street. Almost no traffic.
It’s almost like the guy figured, “Hey, let’s go annoy that foreigner and his immediate neighbors!”
I have never felt so close to buying a bullhorn, finding out where that politician lives, and going on a 20-minute tirade in front of his house about how politicians are pointless irritants in this society.
But yeah, I know… compared to what politicians in the states are doing, this guy was a mosquito next to a case of flesh-eating bacteria. Still, an annoyance is an annoyance.