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2003-01-22 - 6:32 p.m.

Say, popkids, know what I L-O-V-E love? Being woken up at 2.30am by the sound of splintering wood as if the Special Forces are using a Daisycutter to pick the lock, and in a semi-awake state, thinking that someone has broken into the apartment, and going to open the shutters to plan my escape from the window only to be met by a sight reminiscent of the climax of Leon The Professional, with around 40 armed police guards in scary riot gear queuing up to get into the building and more dogs of the sniffing variety than the canine wing of the decongestant industries research lab.

I hear the words �The premises are clear� being spoken into a radio, and assume I�m the last person in the entire place needing to reassure the gathered militia that I�m not who they possibly think I am. I make to put my hands up, but someone in a mask makes a motion that I assume to mean �Close the fucking shutters, dipshit!� and I retreat into the flat, where my housemates, whose safety I was just about to come to in my train of thought (ahem) are already gathered. M had already popped his head round the door and caught a glimpse of about seven semi-automatics being pointed through next door�s threshold, and quickly got the message that it wasn�t some kind of military-themed kissogram when he was told to �Get the fuck back inside�.

Our neighbour was taken away, and we went back to bed, though it was pretty hard to sleep with the crack police carpentry division doing some on-the-spot door repair for the next three hours.

Through blurry eyes, I read on the news this morning that it was part of a raid on a drugs cartel, of which our quiet, polite, charming neighbour, who I saw walking his small daughter down the street every day, was a �kingpin�. It�s the kind of thing you�d prefer to know about � if only for the obvious discounts. One thing is that the weird sealing off of the road the other week and the strange intrusion into my room of the special branch were obviously the police just checking out how the land lay.

So I no longer live next to an international drug boss, which is all the more bizarre considering that I never even knew that I did until those giveaway clues � half of the metropolitan police force outside your window with huge guns � made themselves apparent.

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