Target Practice

While walking home from Crazy Mocha last night, a passing car squealed around in the middle of the street and POW POW POW let out a stream of -- what?

BB gun pellets. One of the baristas was pelted six times. No serious damage done, thankfully, but a number of questions are raised by an event like this.

1. Who does that? Fifteen year-old boys on a joyride? Sounds of "men giggling" were heard from the swiftly-departing car. What kind of man giggles, especially after causing pain to an innocent bystander? Donald Rumsfeld?

2. As they say in A Christmas Story, what if someone had gotten an eye shot out (or something equally unlikely but possible)? Wouldn't a carload of giggling men be laughing hysterically in court as they regaled the jury with their antics? Oh, the mirth.

3. It's good to know that people can drive down the street and open fire on someone else with a (fake) gun in the South Side and suffer no ill consequences. Not that I'm suggesting we need a detail of Pittsburgh's finest deployed to the South Side on a nightly basis (though they're already here as it is, just usually further down the neighborhood).

Instead, it sounds to me like a little vigilantism is in order. Who else sees the opportunity for armed pedestrians, arbitrarily opening fire on carloads of teenage boys and frat guys? You know; just for kicks.