The Fairly Odd Parent
Have you ever had one of those days where something so bizarre occurred that it took a long time for you to even believe it happened?
Well I did and today was that day.
I was downtown patronizing one of my usual places when my buddy, the shop owner, asked me what I was planning to talk about on my evening radio program on WIBC-FM.
I told him I just got a breakdown of the murder stats in Indy from January to September 30, such as times and days and was going to discuss it with the audience.
He asked what I found and I told him that we would talk about things like the time, day and hour of the city’s murders. And I casually, off the cuff, said the day a murder was most likely to occur was Thursday at 10 p.m. (When I double-checked my notes it was Sunday at 11 p.m., but you get the point).
That’s when the bizarre event occurred.
A woman was there with her son who looked about 11-12 years old and she got in my face telling me she didn’t appreciate me talking about the city’s murder rate because it scared her son and because it was Thursday and they lived downtown so he thought he would be a murder victim. My jaw dropped to the floor.
I told her that I was a political commentator and this is what I do for a living, but she wasn’t having any of it. She told me that I should be more sensitive about who was around me and stormed out of my friend’s place. (Note, they had been there for an hour looking around and not buying anything and the son was completely embarrassed by his mom).
Had she stuck around I would have pulled up my notes from my phone and told her that the chances of her pre-teen being a murder victim were slim to none, because the data showed that Indy’s most likely murder victim was a black male in his 30s, a description her son did not fit, since he was white and not in his 30s.
Also had she stuck around I would have told her the data showed that there has only been one murder in the downtown area between January and September 30. I also would have told her that unless her son was involved with drugs or guns, or getting into an argument his chances of someone popping a cap in him were also slim to none. And I didn’t even get into the discussion that most victims and suspects have a pre-existing relationship.
All I know is that she stormed out with her son. The best I can hope for is that she swings by the proctologist sometime soon and has that giant pole pulled out of her butt, because she definitely needs it, among other things.
