These days, I don't think that I'm that easily shocked, at least not by matters sexual and sensual. One doesn't get to be almost 47 without some of the shine being rubbed off the ol' doorknocker, as it were.
Nonetheless, one thing that never ceases to give me pause--and bring a little color to my whiter-than-white cheek--is finding a used condom left unfurled on the sidewalk where anyone (and, per usual, yours truly) can stumble upon it in broad daylight.
Oh, I don't mean to go all family values on your medieval self, this being an election year and all. Still, I was surprised to discover not one but two used rubbers in flagrante near my office building today.
Granted, I don't work in Shadyside or Squirrel Hill or "dahntahn" even. It's not a neighborhood nearly as nice as other places in Pittsburgh, chiefly being a "pre-loft conversion" warehouse district stuck smack in the middle of some ol' robber-baron (rubber-baron?) mansions--Henry Clay Frick's Claymore is just around the corner, for example--and what might be generously described by a Democrat as a disadvantaged area--and by a Republican as a slum/investment opportunity.
It's a little bleak, but I've seen worse, although apparently not lived worse, if I'm taken aback by a little lust's labor's lost.
Still, the prevalence of two tugs of fun, evidence of the quickie that dare not speak its name (but does at least plan ahead and wear protection), makes me think twice about staying too late at work on a moonless night. I'd hate to round a corner in a hurry, lest I get smacked in the face by a flying prophylactic. Worse, I'd hate to slide into home (as it were) on a farflung French letter--ribbed for your protection but perhaps not intended to provide safe traction on, uh, slippery surfaces.
Spending my time making good employ of some petroleum products of my own--gas for my car, for example, to drive myself to work--is seeming like a far more attractive proposition. And better for the environment. Mine, at least.
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