I live in a very rural part of PA. and I think that we corner the market on weirdos up here. There are all pretty harmless, but there’s a lot of strange behavior going on. Most of the locals don’t even seem to blink an eye at the weirdness, so that makes them weird too, at least in my book.
We’ve got one guy, simply known as the Squirel Man. Why ? Because he has a pet squirel. That’s not so strange, right ? But this guy carries it around everywhere with him.
My first encounter with Squirel Man was at a bar. I had gone after work with a friend of mine. I was sitting at the bar and I thought I saw something running around the bar, but I was drinking, so I didn’t think too hard about it. Then it happened again and it came right up to me, sat for a while, then ran off and sat on this guy’s head. I started yelling abotu rodents in the place and my friend said " Oh, that’s just the Squirel Man." No one else in the place seemed bothered, not even the owners. I was the only one bothered by that.
We have another strange fellow that works at a deli. He’s Indian, but I believe he was educated in England at some point in his life, so he speaks with an English and Indian accent , which sounds odd to this American, I haven’t been exposed to much. He also wears these very nice silk blouses to work everyday, he spills stuff on them and starts ranting about it. Why does he continue to wear silk shirts to work ? I asked him that very same question, his answer “I want the ladies to pay attention to me.” Uh, OK. He also make jokes that are only funny to him and I’ve seen him hop up and down in the deli when he get excited about something, a number of times.
There is an old man who lives a few blocks away from where I work (which is also a few blocks away from where I live). Every day when the weather is nice he sits on a chair in his front yard holding a camcorder, apparantly videotaping the traffic going past. I don’t know why he does it, but he’s there every time I drive by. Sometimes he waves at the traffic too. He also has a number of plastic milk jugs with holes cut in them hanging from the trees in his front yard.
Around from my house lives the “One Legged Lady”. She stands in her yard and yells at people driving by. She has gotten in trouble a number of time for throwing rocks and kids riding bikes in front of her house (and guess what is a game to the neighborhood kids). She use to drive an old beat up Camaro around the neighborhood but it was taken away from her a few years ago. Her latest trick is knocking on folks doors and asking for any spare beer.
There’s a couple of half-way type houses for people with mental disabilities, in town. Evidently they have some rule about having to be out of the house during the day. So the residents who are not employed just kind of wander all over the place.
There are 2 that came to mind when I saw the thread title.
“Library Dude” - whenever I go to the library, he’s always there. I get the impression that he stays all day. Lately I’ve been seeing him walk around town. He’s always dressed nice, with a backpack (filled with books, I presume), and he wears this little cap. He’s a big guy, and looks like an overgrown school boy. A little lacking on the social skills, but seems nice.
Then there’s “Pinky”. I’ve lived here 12 years and he always looks the same. Imagine a cross between Freddy Kruegar<sp?> and Curly from the Three Stooges with a permanent sunburn. He’s always somewhere on the main road thru town. Either walking on the side, standing on the side waving at cars, or standing in the middle waving election signs that were posted in the median.
Just found out last night that the guy who used to live two floors above me until 5 months ago, who lived 1/2 a block away from me until a month ago, who probably stole various meat items from my freezer (we never could prove it, but he was just odd enough)…beat an elderly man to death with a brick. My 8-year-old boy used to play with this guy’s dogs, helped him decorate the building for Halloween, exchanged Christmas gifts with him. He insinuated his way into barbecues or parties we’d have, he’d talk your damn ear off. He certainly struck us as weird, but not, well, homicidal. As far as I could tell, he did not own any socks. And he has a wicked bad combover.
If that’s not weird, I don’t know what is. Anyone got any ideas on how to break it to my kid?
I work in a library cafe and hear all the wierdo stories from security. The library is warm in winter, cool in summer, and so attracts various homeless people, and those with mental problems. The grossest of these was a guy who passed out twice in the reading lounge. He was intoxicated on mouthwash, and the generic stuff at that, not even Listerine. One time he “soiled” the chair he was sitting in. And there is a lady who comes into the cafe almost every day. She is always muffled up in several layers of sweaters and coats, with a headscarf as well. Must be awfully hot in summer. But she is clean and neat, and has money for what she wants, so who am I to talk?
When I was in elementary school, there was a big, old, falling-apart house next to the school, with an overgrown lawn full of junk. The house was occupied by an older guy with a long gray beard, who would sit on his front porch and play the bagpipes at full blast all afternoon, nearly every day. He drove around in a beat-up Chevy with a bumper sticker reading, “Blow It Out Your Bagpipes.” I guess this guy isn’t as weird as some, but he was a great source of humor for a bunch of 4th-graders.
My mother works in a library, and sees all sorts of strange characters, but I don’t remember her stories in enough detail to retell them here.
We had Peanut Butter Guy, who would smear peanut butter on the shelves. This was probably the same person who once, apparently, ate an entire chicken in the men’s bathroom, leaving a plate with all the bones on the floor. No one was sure who he was; he’d never been caught.
There was the person who left a live duck in the bathroom. The poor janitor was the one who was confronted with a very angry duck the next morning–the police had to come deal with it.
There was a guy who liked to sit in people’s cars, and would try all the handles of the cars in the parking lot until he found an open one. Then he would just sit. People would leave the library, and then come rushing back in, hissing that there was someone sitting in my car.
There was the guy who would come in, fall asleep, and snore like Darth Vader. If woken, he would say he was on medication, move to another area, and do it again.
In my hometown, we had the Purple Lady. She was a lovely elderly woman who always dressed entirely in purple. Her house, mailbox, car…all purple. She had little lavender calling cards that said “The Purple Lady” on them. She also worked a polling place at elections. Once I saw her being filmed outside my workplace–by a French film crew.
We have a Library Guy, too (as The Offspring calls him). We see him in the library often, also walking around town. He is always dressed in semi-formal evening wear: dress pants, dinner jacket, ruffled shirt, bow tie. At first I thought he must be on his way to or from some job that required such attire (maitre d’, maybe?), but I don’t believe that’s the case. Odd, but classy.
