Of All The People...

So I took MARTA (Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority --the f'ing train, alright?!) to work for the first time on Friday. I've been driving to and fro all week and it's been kind of a pain because traffic is really bad around that area, especially when I get out at around 5 or 6pm (it took me half an hour to go one mile on Monday, utterly frustrating). Plus, the quickest route is by taking the toll road which costs 50 cents each way and I don't know about you, but I am NOT accustomed to paying directly for my roads, that's what taxes and vehicle registrations and speeding tickets are for, right? So as a little experiment I decided to borrow Adrienne's student MARTA pass since she doesn't have class on Friday and ride the rails to work.

I must say that it was quick (12 minutes each way), convenient (the station is a block from my apartment and drops me off across the street from my work) and virtually painless (clean, air conditioned cars, no crazy homeless people on board). The only drawback is not having my car to transport me to any place of my choosing for lunch and I've also developed a habit of listening to The Big Show with Dan Patrick and Keith Olbermann¹ on ESPN Radio while eating lunch within the safety and comfort of my vessel. But, oh well.

Today there was none of that.

I instead decided to take the short walk over to the Perimeter Mall which is directly across the street from my work and have lunch at the food court. The mall is quite busy at lunch time as there are many office buildings in the area surrounding it and the food court is especially teeming with activity. All the tables fill up quickly and you'll find yourself sharing a table with some other stranger eating lunch by him or herself because of the lack of room. Plus, there was extra traffic today as the crowds anxiously lined up outside the Apple store to await the release of the iPhone at 6pm. There must've been 50 people in line. Crazy bastards.

As I was standing in my own long line for Chick Fil-A, a somewhat eerily familiar face caught my eye. I turned my head to follow this person back into my peripheral vision as he stopped a few feet to my left. The man in question was relatively short, rail thin, a slight curvature to his upper back (kinda like Mr. Burns from the Simpsons), and he was accompanied by a somewhat heavyset woman dressed in overalls. His face was so familiar to me, I knew it had been catalogued in my mind at some point but I just couldn't put my finger on who he was exactly.

And then it came to me.

I immediately reached for my phone to confirm my suspicions. Adrienne didn't answer. Dammit.
I kept staring at this man as he slowly walked away from me and toward the pizza place. "It's gotta be him", I kept thinking. "Definitely. But what's the deal with the woman with him? How could anyone want his company? Doesn't she know? And what the hell is he doing at the mall?"

I got my food and ate it quickly, all the time trying to remember some details from the case. It happened a long time ago, even though the press never let it die, and I never really paid much attention to it but you couldn't really escape it for a while; it was all they talked about. "Did it happen in Atlanta? No, it was in Colorado, I think. Was he from Atlanta?"

I walked around the mall for a while to kill the rest of my lunch break and ended up in the FYE store looking at (of course) cds. Finally, my phone rang and it was Adrienne calling me back. I immediately jumped to it.

"Remember the little girl that got killed, like, ten years ago. The beauty pageant girl. What was her name, JonBenet Ramsey?", I said.

"Yeah", she said.

"OK. Remember the creepy guy who confessed to her murder or to being at her murder or something like that last year but was later released because there was no evidence tying him to it?"

"Yeah. John Mark Karr."

"Was he from here in Atlanta?"

"Yeah, I think so. Why?", she asked.

"I just totally saw him in the food court at the fucking mall!", I exulted.

That creepy fucking look that you see in the picture above is exactly how he looked. Those dead, cold eyes and the child molester vibe were totally chilling. I have now stared evil in the eye and it was not good. That dude should be in jail for something, I don't care for what, he should not be allowed to walk among us. It's just a matter of time before he does something. And there he was, within reach. I could have done something, but I didn't.

All because Adrienne didn't answer her phone. Lives could have been saved.

Be frightened, very frightened. Evil walks among us. . . at the food court.


¹the only sport commentators who are journalists, make valid points, and most importantly, are not blathering conservative racist idiots like 95% of sport radio DJ-types. How did this become the archetype of radio DJs in general? Where did we go wrong that radio stations believe that only racist, narrow-minded, republican white males listen to commercial talk radio? I might have to explore this topic in another blog. . .

Pay Attention, This Might Be Important.

"Halloween: H20" has been on television every night for the last year or so --maybe even longer. I've only been paying attention to this phenomenon for that time span, ever since I noticed that it was on the premium channels on digital cable for what seemed like every night. And it HAS BEEN ON EVERY SINGLE NIGHT SINCE! I'm not sure what this means but it might be important, so please take note.

It's mostly on Showtime or Cinemax between 11pm and 3am but it also comes on Starz and Encore quite often. Why is this movie being shown so much? That's all I want to know. I mean, it's not very good. It wasn't a hit at the box office. It's the sixth sequel in a series that only produced one movie worth seeing (although the remake of the first one, written and directed by Rob Zombie that's coming out in August looks pretty good).

If you have any insight on this particular issue, please enlighten me.


In other news, some people have asked me what I thought of "The Sopranos" finale, so this is as good a forum as there is:

Quite frankly, as I have previously stated, I had no expectations going into it so I really feel that it was an appropriate ending. A lot of people were disappointed by the open-endedness of the finale and have gone so far as to call the move gutless by writer/creator David Chase. I disagree. I think that if you look at the entire series for what it was, it couldn't have ended any other way.

The series was never about taking the viewers by the hand and walking them down a clear path where the characters' motivations and the events befalling them were neatly layed out. And that's what made it great, it never pandered to the audience but it always kept them guessing. The show stayed true to itself and that's all that I can ever ask for from any art form.

And for the people that tuned in just at the end to catch some bloodshed, you should have been watching all along --way more people were killed throughout the span of the show than in the whole history of the New Jersey mob...

Annotations

A couple of things:

-"The Sopranos" ends Sunday night, as you might have heard. In fact, every media outlet has been speculating all week on how the series will conclude its run. Personally, I haven't really given it much thought. I've come to terms with the fact that David Chase, the series creator, has always done things his way, often with no consideration to the fans' expectations. I'll abide to the creator's vision and accept any ending that transpires. The dude must abide, afterall.

-Chad Johnson, the very amusing Cincinnati Bengals Wide Receiver, raced against a horse for charity on Saturday --and won. It wasn't an even, head to head race, the horse had to run twice the distance Chad ran (100 meters); but still, it's very impressive. People had tried it before and it wasn't even close. Chad, of course, talked trash afterwards. I'm not sure what this means in terms of human-horse relations, but I'm curious to find out. Stay tuned.