Thursday, October 3, 2019

Incineration Without Consideration



I have never tee-peed a house. But I have been tee-peed.

I grew up in a town where the kids soaped and egged and forked their neighbors. But here, it’s all about the toilet paper. But let’s step back for a moment and analyze this. Youth buy dozens of rolls of toilet paper at local stores…..drive around in the dark….determine a victim….quietly get out of their vehicles and throw the Charmin repeatedly in the trees, bushes and lawn…

I understand tee-peeing sometimes is seen as a form of endearment. You tee-pee a teacher you like….or maybe it is the other way around…..You tee-pee a teacher you don’t like.

In either case, the person who receives the gift of a snow white yard has the choice of either investing labor...or just ride out the storm. If you clean it, they could come again tomorrow night. Just wait for the tee-pee season to pass.

I have to reveal the worst piece of advice I ever got after being tee-peed. A friend said the easiest way to clean up was by taking a lighter and igniting the end of the toilet paper …letting it burn up into the tree. Stupidly, I took the advice. Toilet paper is highly flammable. The tree ignited----the flames licking the side of my house as I scrambled to hook up my yard hose. I fortunately put out the fire and stayed off the front page of the newspaper.

Seriously now for a moment. Call me a curmudgeon. Tee-peeing, in my view, could be dangerous given the spate of reported break-ins and vandalism in our region. People are on high alert about their property.

If you are intent on continuing this tradition, be forewarned. And take my advice. 

Don’t ignite an oak tree.

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