An epic about fatties, skinnies, whores and fighting crime.

Last night I represented my office at the National Night Out Against Crime at an undisclosed precinct in the Bronx. I was there with another representative from my office to hand out literature and assorted items to members of the community to inform them of crime prevention, etc.

Let me say before this epic blog continues that I have not been to Afghanistan, Iraq, a Chinese prison or Darfur, but I believe that only those places could top what I witnessed last night.

5:00 I arrived at the park for the festivities and noticed a stage set up, a few amusement park-style rides and numerous booths set up for different community organizations. Lots of police were standing around, mostly gawking and making lewd comments to each other about the 14 year old girls walking around (absolutely true). There was also an amazing amount of fat people. People who think the Midwest or Texas have the market cornered on fat need to check out one of these events.

Also present were members of the Explorers program. This is a program that takes young kids (middle and high school age) who want to be police officers or are interested in law enforcement and makes them subjects of ridicule to their classmates. I think the motivation behind the program is noble, but not since high school kids were allowed to do after-school karate has an activity done so much to cock-block teenagers. If George Bush wanted to ensure abstinence among high schoolers he would simply mandate that kids do one of three activities:

1) Dungeons and Dragons

2) Karate

3) Explorers

Kids marching in berets with fake rifles and shirts that say NYPD are asking to be the targets of bullies.

5:30 Our booth was now set up and we started handing out literature and coloring books to the kids. Now, I don’t mean to stereotype or generalize, but Indians (dot, not feather) steal coloring books from National Night Out Against Crime booths. One family of AOL tech support must have taken 12 coloring books. At one point I threw one at them and yelled, “The outsourcing stops here!”

Then the captain of the precinct made his rounds wearing his captain’s hat. I think nothing eliminates the respect for a police officer than a hat, which hasn’t been seen since Sean Connery was walking the beat in The Untouchables. But when a lucrative pension is waiting, you wear the hat.

At this point in the evening the band, Mixed Nuts (I’m sure you’ve heard of them) started jamming. They played several oldies and had two people dancing. One was a fat kid (of course he was fat) who was actually very funny and probably a couple of years from coming out of the closet. The other dancer was the scariest woman I had ever seen. She was about 5’7” and weighed 80 lbs. She danced like she was in a trance, which was probably narcotic induced, but she loved Mixed Nuts.

While all this was going on I was handing out coloring books. But several adult men were taking coloring books “for their kids,” who were conveniently “at home.” I have already made a call to Dateline telling them that they should track these men.

I also saw a group of Italian yutes (12 year olds with wife beaters, gold chains and hair gel), who were complaining about all the “f-ing cops.” So I asked them, “What were you going to do if the cops weren’t here, drag one of the black kids out back and beat him up for dating your sister? Get back in the Bronx Tale DVD box where you belong.”

6:00 I went walking around to different booths. I got to the FDNY booth (Fire Department) and they were handing out coloring books as well. I particularly liked the picture of the St. Patrick’s Day Drunken fight, but I don’t know if it should be in a children’s coloring book. I then observed one of the amusement park rides – one of those huge inflatable castles. Fine, family fun. But the guy operating had multiple tattoos… on his neck. Now I don’t mean to stereotype, but I don’t want guys with neck tattoos operating kids’ rides. Neck tattoos are God’s way of saying, “He/she has been to prison or will be going very soon.”

Then there was the presentation of some award to the Bronx Puerto Rican Day King and Queen, which is like being the Number 1 seed for next year’s NYC Puerto Rican Day Parade.

6:30 The greatest assault on the senses that I have ever seen. A girl, probably between 15 and 17 strutted in with her family. I am not saying she was dressed like a whore, but I am pretty sure she lost her virginity during the second trimester. As I learned, her name is “Charlie” and she is a singer and she is set to perform.

So Charlie gets up on stage and tells the crowd that she is about to release her debut album on Sony records and that this is her first single – I believe the title was “Drink Me Up.” Or something subtle like that. And then she pulls an Ashlee Simpson – total lip sync. And the song flat out sucked. And note to Charlie’s publicist, bare stomachs are only sexy if the stomach does not jiggle.

When Charlie finished she gave the text book send off: “God Bless, keep supporting the Bronx, I grew up here and knew the struggles. Keep love in your heart. I love you all.”

And then I vomited. It is sort of weird to grow up in one of the better precincts in the Bronx and then say, with your family there, “I know the struggles.” Why not just say, “Mom, Dad you fuc-ed up, but now I am banging a producer 15 years older than me and can’t wait to embarrass you as a low level Lindsey Lohan.”

7:30 Mixed Nuts stopped playing when their back up music (AKA Microsoft Windows) stopped playing. It got dark and we gave out all our literature so at 8:05 we packed it up and headed home.