Mr. W and I got home about half an hour ago, and as we drove up to our house, Mr. W saw neighbor A. sitting in his front yard and the two waved at each other. I didn’t wave, not because I was being a disgruntled biatch, but because by the time I turned to see what he was waving at, we’d passed the neighbor. After coming home, Mr. W grabbed a UPS packaged we’d received earlier in the week addressed to some unknown but with our address, and said, “Ugh, I hate to have to do this, but I’m gonna go talk to him and see if he knows who this is.” Neighbor A. does know everybody, he’d lived in that house since it was built, as he’d told us several times.
I said, “And when he asks whether you’re coming to his BBQ, you tell him you invited your old boss to go to the concert with us. Leave me out of it when he calls you pussywhipped.”
Mr. W skulked off and came back 20 minutes later. “He apologizes for what he said that day,” Mr. W told me.
I was surprised, because altho I expected some conversation about the BBQ, I didn’t expect the conversation to be about what was said that day on our driveway. “Did you tell him something? Why was that brought up?”
Mr. W said that he’d brought up the BBQ by jokingly chiding, “What’s up with you having your BBQ on the day of The Doors concert? I had invited some friends to go to the concert. I’m going to the concert!” Neighbor A. had said that yeah, he hadn’t realized it, and a bunch of people were giving him a hard time about it saying they’d rather go to the concert so he’s considering canceling the BBQ since HE wants to see the concert, too. And then he said he wants to apologize for what he said the other day, and that he shouldn’t have said that in front of me. (I have an issue with that it was said at all, but anyway…) A. said that another neighbor, Darryl, was at the mailbox and had overheard some of what was said. (I remember seeing Darryl, an athletic looking Harley-riding tough guy, walking from his house to the mailbox, and I know Darryl was also a named person that was attending the sausagefest. I had wondered whether A. got Darryl to attend by playing the pussywhipped card, too.) So apparently, Darryl went over to A.’s house and “smacked him up the head,” and said he shouldn’t have said that, and what’s wrong with him, not only calling Mr. W pussywhipped, but to say it in front of his wife? Supposedly, Darryl reamed him good about it. A. said he was kind of drunk and it must’ve been his Navy side coming out, and he apologizes for it.

I suddenly *really* like Darryl. I wonder if it’s a race thing (he’s also black, like Dwaine) that he did exactly what Dwaine had thought to do, which was march over there and set A. straight. I do think different cultures have different behavioral “codes” for social situations. This could be an interesting sociology study. I think my race, the guy would just tell his wife to chill and ignore it, who cares what the guy says.

But thanks, Darryl! You’ll never read this blog, but I send my gratitude out there for you.