three scenes from the neighborhood within the last 24 hours

Scene I:

Location: Union St., between Court and Clinton
Approximate Time: 6:48PM
Characters: Two Women

First Woman: "I don’t know what to do. I mean, Dr. ___________ [name of doctor that Julia and I go to] is such a pervert. I can’t go to him anymore."
Second Woman: "Really?"
First Woman: "Yeah, I mean, it’s not a gender thing – he just creeps me out."

Scene II:

Location: Union St., between Court and Clinton
Approximate Time: 6:49PM
Characters: Mother, Father, Toddler (in stroller)

Mother: "We can’t let him do that."
Father: "Stop the stroller."

[father squats down in front of child]

Father: (trying, unsuccessfully, to sound angry) "You cannot. Throw. Elmo. On the ground. Do you understand?"

Toddler: (laughing) "Yes."

Scene III:

Location: President St., between Union and Court
Approximate Time: 8:47AM
Characters: Woman, Cop, Small Crowd

[The characters stand in a semi-circle around the window of a brownstone. Two young raccoons are curled up behind the window’s guardrails in broad daylight.]

Cop: (presumably talking about the animal rescue service) "Yeah, they’ll probably take them to a park or something."

Woman: (horrified) "They can’t do that, children play in there!"