Water Balloon Fight

Yes, even though it didn't break 80 degrees today, we still had the long-awaited water balloon fight. It was the North End vs the South End of the Block in a Titanic Tsumami del Agua....my water bill is feeling the pain, I'm sure.

The leader of the pack from the south end of the block, whom I will call Izzy, went to the store and got 150 water balloons after we used up the couple dozen regular red party balloons I scrounged up at the Dominick's on Ashland. Fortunately, the South Enders only filled up about 30 of them, which took forever, and prompted my North End buddies to holler "Scaredy Cats! Scaredy Cats! Hurry up already!" about 500 times in the waiting. We North Enders, having shot our meager water balloon supply, were armed with a garden hose and a Super Soaker. General D. from across the street wisely suggested we lock the front gate, thus adopting the classic siege strategy...I began thinking of Masada, the Alamo, the Warsaw Ghetto, and other less-than-victorious military moments in siege history. Can anybody think of a situation where the beseiged outlasted the surrounding enemy??? I was drawing a blank. Does Sarajevo count?

Anyway, I think we'd have to call our situation a draw. Izzy was disappointed we locked the gate--he and his three or four pals would run up, hide behind the lone large tree and fire. When they got bored or wanted to get wet, they'd come out and take better aim.

Between rounds one and two, everyone came in the yard and played with the sprinkler and the garden nozzle, even Izzy's big sister and his littlest sister, who liked the "mist" setting on the garden nozzle. We all enjoyed that, and some of us pretended to take showers on the "shower" setting, the next favorite. I imagine Mr. Married and Mr. Worrisome both got an eyeful (though I took pains to wear my baggiest t-shirt, least interesting shorts and a grandma-worthy bathing suit underneath...I swear I need a burka on my block, and it pains me to say so).

Next posting, look forward to an account of the pro-immigrant, pro-amnesty, pro-legalization march down Ashland Avenue this morning, probably the largest demo my hood has seen since the last meatpackers' strike in the 30s and also, like some of the big anti-war demos I've attended, a shockingly large gathering of people that probably didn't make much news. I'd guess the crowd at between 5,000 and 10,000, yet as usual, it was mostly Spanish-language media in evidence. I'm sure the march made headline in all the local SPanish media: TV, radio, print (heck, it was two big radio station that cosponsored the march to being with, in response to a newspaper article), but I'll be very interested to see how much play, if any, it gets in the English-language media here or elsewhere. Stay tuned.