Gratuitous Malkmus Reference

A couple of weeks ago I was working at home one day, as we academics are prone to do over the summer, and all of a sudden I heard a loud crashing noise coming from the alley next to our house. And then I heard a bunch of raking and started to smell a strange smell. So I went over to the window and looked outside to see that the friendly folks at the borough had decided to re-pave the alleyway:



It certainly needed doing, as there was a big hole in part of the alley and lots of plants growing out of the concrete that I was getting tired of weeding. But as they moved up the alleyway they started to do a worse and worse job, and t he weeds continued to grow through.






And then, about two thirds of the way up the alley they just stopped. In the words of the immortal philosopher Steve Sanders (while discussing his girlfriend Laura's request for him to hurt Brenda), our driveway doesn't go all the way to the street. Only I'm not speaking euphemistically.

For the next week or so I kept expecting the workmen to come back to finish the job, but they never have. And since its not technically our alleyway (even if we are the only people who use it) -- not to mention that they haven't really fixed up many of the other alleys in town -- I don't really have a leg to stand on if I complain to them. One of our friends has speculated that they must have had some leftover gravel from another project that they just dumped in our alley to get rid of it. And, you know, I'm starting to think they are right.