The Illicit Gelatin Trade

The folks down the street are allegedly engaged in an undocumented entrepreneurial venture. They might even be indoor farmers ... and while they never tend to the lawn outside, I am certain that there is a great amount of care provided to any vegetation that may exist inside.

I usually avoid going near their property, but since my daughter left an item of value on top of a car, and since that item was not still on the car when she arrived at her destination, and since that item of value was not on the street when I came home, I had to check with the neighbors to see if anyone found anything.

Unfortunately, nobody in any other house had.

Damn.

As I was walking towards their house, a car pulled up and a guy jumped out of the passenger seat and ran up to the door. He was inside for a bit, but when I rang their bell he was on his way out. He seemed awfully surprised to see someone standing on the landing.

"Hi," I said in my best don't-worry-I-don't-have-a-warrant tone.

His eyes were somewhat wide and he seemed to be about as uncomfortable as I was at that moment. He was holding two small dark plastic bags in his hand and he kept that hand turned away from me, but he glanced in their direction.

"Umm ..." he stammered, "I don't live here. Let me get them." He darted back into the house to summon the owners, then came back to the door. The bags were still in his hand. "They'll be here in a second," he assured me.

At this point I could not not look at the bags in his hand. He glanced at me, then at the bags, then back at me. He was nervous. That split-second of silence was apparently too much for him to bear.

"I just came by to pick up some ..." he started.

His eyes darted back to the bags again. He now realized that he just committed himself to describing the contents of the bags. This was clearly more thought than he could muster at that moment.

"Jell-O."

With that he darted past me and to the safety of the waiting car.

All this time I suspected their home business involved the buying and selling recreational pharmaceutical products. Who would of guessed that they are merely dessert distributors!