There’s this special type of list that our great state makes–but it’s on you to check it twice.
Not knowing anyone naughty? That’d be nice…
“Did you see on NextDoor that there have been a pair of registered sex offenders lurking around downtown?”
In typical Mom Fashion, my dearest mother just had to ruin my peaceful lunch by bringing up yet another “likely benign” thing for me to worry about in this world.
I gently rolled my eyes, and then turned to acknowledge her apparent concern.
“No, Mother, you know that I stay far away from that website. NextDoor is essentially tantamount to a Karen Convention.”
“Well, you should be on there so you aware of what’s going on in your neighborhood. Especially things like this where there’s a pair of perverts on the prowl in these parts,” Mom replied.
“Cool, cool. I really would like to enjoy the rest of my meal with a bit of Zen, so, ya know…” I attempted to subtly change the topic.
“You know you do have two young girls you should be worried about,” she said, obviously not getting the hint.
I realized that she wasn’t going to drop the matter, so I figured the only way to get her to let it go for now was to acquiesce.
“Well, I’m not on NextDoor, so I guess you’ll have to fill in me in on the details as best as you can.”
“I thought you’d never ask!” she said a bit too excitedly as she whipped out her iPad.
“So, let’s see here…” she skimmed over the NextDoor post. “Ah, yes, so there’s a taller skinny guy. Looks like he was following a couple of 12-year-old girls all over downtown PBO, and they had to seek refuge in the ice cream shop.”
“Oh, good, so it had a happy ending at least?” I couldn’t wait for this story to be over, obviously.
“Nope, he followed them in there, and the owner had to call the cops.”
“Great, so the authorities handled the situation, and at least got his shady ass off the streets for a few days?”
“Not exactly. Cops came but said that he wasn’t technically doing anything wrong, so they didn’t do anything about it. I guess they just contacted the girls’ parents to come pick them up.”
“But surely the police officers at least shared a Type-2-Diabetes-Special Banana Split with the girls, since they were all there anyways, right? You know something like this would at least help take a slight edge off of the traumatic experience.”
I reminded Mom of what I was talking about by pulling up this classic pic on my phone:
“What? No! Please take this seriously. I need you to do what you can to protect my grand-babies!”
“Fine, fine. So I won’t be taking them to the ice cream shop any time in the near future. Apparently it is too ‘child-predator-friendly’. I get the message.”
“Thank you,” Mom said.
After a brief awkward pause where I was waiting for her to fill me in more, I decided what the hell and prompted her for the rest of the story that she had started.
“Okay, so that was Pedo #1. Didn’t you say there was a second guy?”
“Oh yeah, but the post didn’t say much about him…they just shared his entry from NC Sex Offender Registry.”
“Super. Just text that to me so I can be on the lookout for the guy…”
“Wow, check out the jawline on this guy!”
Later that afternoon I had finally gotten around to looking at the official NCSOR page for the second guy. Take a peep at this dude and you’ll see exactly what I mean:
Amiright? Or amiright?
“Hah, hah!” I thought to myself out loud. “That dude almost looks like a bulldog.”
I continued chuckling softly to myself, while in the meantime some gears started spinning in the back of my head.
“Why is the word ‘bulldog’ jarring something in my memory?” I wondered.
I continued working on my project, trying to put it out of my mind, but a piece of me seemed fixated on the idea.
“Have I met this guy before? Nah, it couldn’t be the dude who hit me up for sliced-meat money at the gas station downtown…”
My inner dialogue unfolded slowly over the next ten minutes or so.
“His name was what? Terrance? I bet I can prove that it wasn’t the same dude. Let’s see…this guy’s name is…”
*zooms in*
“Ah hah! See there? Couldn’t be him–this guy’s name is Anthony,” I told myself, content that I had shut the book on the matter.
*moments later*
“Wait, that wasn’t his name, though that’s what My Beautiful Bride would call him. I think he went by his initials…what were they again?”
I flipped to an older post of mine to confirm the facts of that particular encounter.
“A.P.! He said people would him see him on the streets of PBO and call out, ‘What’s up, A.P.!’ Yeah, lemme prove that this isn’t him…let’s see what his initials are…”
*scrolls down*
“See, I told you so! His initials are ‘A.M.’ I don’t know this ‘A.M.’ character.”
I could feel that I was on the verge of resolution, when it occurred to me that there was more than one way to skin the proverbial bulldog, and likewise there was more than one way to construct an initial-based nickname (think M.J.–aka Michael Jackson/Jordan).
*zooms back out and scrolls back up*
“Oh…well I guess if uses his last name, this guy–in theory–could technically go by ‘A.P.’ But still, it is highly unlikely this is my du–“
*eye gets caught by something embarrassingly obvious*
“Oh, right…A.P. also said people would see him on the streets of PBO and say, ‘What’s happening, Bulldog?’ Oh, jeez.”
Yes. Yes, I do know this guy. I tried to prove the anti-null hypothesis,1This is the opposite of the regular null hypothesis, in which the assumption is that two things being compared are the same until proven otherwise. and put the full burden of proof that they were one and the same on my shoulders.
Despite all my skepticism, I am forced to admit that I have, in the past, financially supported this guy.
I think at this point, you probably should hop in my time machine to an event that happened right about this time last year, and either refresh your faithful memory, or get up to speed, you lackadaisical infidel.
Just click this link to read about how The Bulldog Wanted Baloney. You’ll Never Guess What Happened Next. Don’t worry–I’ll be waiting right here when you get back.
…
…
…
Oh, hello! There you are! Welcome back to the present day.2Technically this occurred back in October 2023, roughly 4 months ago.
While you were gone, something else caught my eye about our old friend, Bulldog.
*scrolls to the bottom of the screenshot*
What was his first (and, seriously speaking, only one that might be humorous) offense? Oh, just a little Felonious Indecent Exposure.
Let’s just say that I had no idea how lucky I was last year. Thank the good lord I never caught a glimpse of the Bulldog’s…uh…um…er…”baloney”…
Content created on: 10/11 February 2024 (Sat/Sun)
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