So I am sleeping this morning, one of my favorite things to do, and I am having pleasant dreams about being attacked and having my wallet stolen, and being shot at with a Gatling gun, whereupon I awaken and realize that there really is a Gatling gun noise coming from outside. Bleary-eyed, I put on my glasses and reach over the boy, who would sleep like a rock through a volcanic eruption, and peer through the window. The construction workers were out there with their helmets on and their jackhammers laying our parking lot to waste. These are the workers who must have left a note on my car last night kindly informing me that my car would be blasted to smithereens if I did not move it by tomorrow morning. They weren’t kidding about tomorrow morning, it being ten minutes shy of six a.m. when I look at the clock.

I guess Lawrence has a serious concrete problem. I totally sympathize. I dislike concrete as much as the next person. It’s all non-porous and grey and rocky without having the virtues of being a rock. It keeps in the cold during winter and heat during the summer. Concrete is much uglier to look at than things like bricks or solid gold, something that the designers of Wescoe Hall did not take into consideration. Concrete is directly responsible for the blood shed and scraped knees of millions of little kids learning to ride bicycles. I agree that this concrete menace should end. These men are doing fine work, don’t get me wrong.

Couldn’t they maybe wait, though, until after the sun has risen? Like, after most of us have gotten that precious ten minutes of snooze sleep after the alarm clock has sounded? They could enlist the helpful light of the sun in their mission against concrete. The birds could sing sweet melodies set to the jackhammer rhythm, and everyone would be happy. Everyone, that is, except the people who didn’t move their cars in time.