S H U T U P ! ! !

I'm not sure that there's a noise I hate more than the noise of a leaf blower. The noise is worse than the mounting cries of a colicky baby. Right now it's ridiculously loud on my street in Midtown Houston: there's an 18 wheeler "resting," its generator wheezing, on the curb in front of Zorca's townhouse, a collection of sirens screaming over some misdemeanor or fire somewhere, a leaf blower on MAXIMUM POWER!, and a car alarm going off. And horns -- lots of car horns. This racket completely unnerves me.

I've just been reading about how stress results in the body's becoming vulnerable to disease. This noise creates a mounting stress level in my body. I want to tear that leaf blower person's head off!!

And just like that: the 18 wheeler's gone, the cops or firemen have apprehended the problem, the leaf blower's exchanged his menacing mechanized dragon for the rake (a comforting scrape, scrape against the concrete sidewalk), the car alarm quits, and people drive nicely again.

City living...Urban living, I think it's called now. There's a real estate company in Houston with this name: Urban Living. The agents should record this noise and play it for prospective urban livingites. Just to make sure these people migrating from the suburbs can handle it.

If all the suburbanites are coming into the city, maybe it's time for the urbanites to head for the suburbs.

Then again, I bet there are way more leaf blowers in the suburbs. In fact, I think leaf blowers were invented for the suburbs.

Gah.