so the house next door has been abandoned for about a month now. one day crystal and i saw the family loading up an unmarked moving truck with a refrigerator, the washer and dryer, and couches. and then they were gone, leaving piles of trash on the street corner. there was no "for sale" sign, no potential renters coming by, no eviction notice on the door. they were just gone. for a month the house just sat there with the gate on the fence falling in, broken glass on the back porch, and the weeds slowly taking over. today when i left to go pick up finley from daycare, they were back. but something wasn't right. their van was stuck in mud in our side yard. there was a seven year old boy in the driver's seat gripping the steering wheel. the wheels were spinning, mud was flying, and the van was not moving. the doors were open and kids were throwing stuff from the backyard into the vehicle. i tried not to make eye contact and hurried out of the driveway. ten minutes later i arrived back home to meet crystal. the seven year old was up in a tall little tree in the yard. he was literally swinging from the branches at the top of this tree. there were six little kids under the age of five running barefoot up and down the street. the mother was nowhere to be seen. we left to go run some errands and get dinner. we seriously considered calling the cops, or at least child services. when we got back home there was a set of deep mired tire tracks through my side yard. they had piled dead leaves in the tracks hoping to cover the mess. there were bags of trash and leaves sprawled all around. the gate to their backyard was completely knocked down. they had clearly gone through our trash. i had a box from my new lawnmower sitting beside the trashcan in front of our house. i had filled it with trash and set it out with the trash can. it had been opened and rummaged through. thankfully no important information (mail, checks, etc) was in the box. it was just full of rotten food and pee filled pull-ups. this is the family though, whose kids would order pizza from dominos and leave the boxes (with their name and address still on the label) in our trash can at night. i'm still really weirded out about the whole situation. we've got a lock on our shed and a security system and i'm really not worried about any of that. it's just that i've never really experienced neighbors this odd. i really hope their gone for good now. i also really wish i knew the story behind all this mess. weird.

in other news. i made chocolate flavored generic carmex lip balm in a twist up tube in lab today. i can't wait to try it!

goodnight