This morning, I had a nasty encounter with one of the countless sketchy, lunatic assholes that float the edges of society here in Manhattan (like yours truly). Every day after leaving the station at Park and 28th, I hit up the nearby Scarfucks for coffee. I hate Scarfucks, but everything else available in the immediate vicinity tastes like colored water so fuck it.

Anyway, as I walked up Park Avenue, pretty much tuned out with German death metal blasting my eardrums, I noticed a scuzzy middle aged guy, dressed sloppily and holding an odd looking camera. He seemed to be taking photos of people walking down the street, without their permission and he was trying to be sneaky about it. Looking at him I figured a couple things were going on. He was either a crazy homeless person with a camera that may or may not have actually had film in it or one of those sleazy scumfucks that use those special lenses that let you take psuedo “X-Ray” photos by filtering the light and causing the resulting photo to look like it’s possibly seeing through clothing in a lame kind of way. There’s sleazebags riding the subway, holding their cameras by the waist, using these filters all the time. In short, I immediately wanted to pummel this guy into a twitching bloody pulp, but this is New York and you never fuck with the crazy people unless there’s no choice. He snapped a couple photos of me, but I kept walking, crossed the street and went inside the Scarfucks. After I had secured some coffee, I stepped outside the building to find the guy right in my face taking photos of me. I made to push the camera away and said something to the effect of “Get that fucking camera out of my face, you fucking asshole.” He stepped back, smiled and I kept walking.

Now, that German death metal I was blasting was about as loud as my mp3 player would allow, but I could clearly hear him bellowing at the top of his lungs, “Go home and fuck your fucking whore, you fucking asshole!!! Fuck you and you fucking blah…blah…blah”. I and everyone else on Park Avenue this morning could hear him screaming all the way to my office which is three blocks away. It was a great way to start the morning. I should have dumped my coffee on him. Then, the over-roasted crap Scarfucks tries to pass off as good coffee would actually have some worth.