What Do You Know Joe?

I am not a fan of big crowds but am an avid people watcher.  I used to think the best place to spy on people was in crowds - used to - until I moved into my apartment here in East Providence.  I have now realized that I just needed to find a place with a couple of prerequisites to make my hobby a way of life:

1.  Have several windows that look out onto a shop owned by your landlord

2.  Make sure your landlord is married to a guy named Joe

3.  Make sure Joe spends most of his time in your landlord's shop

4.  Make sure you spend all your spare time spying on Joe while he's in your landlord's shop

Make no mistake, I find Joe fascinating.  He's quiet, has a weird Rhode Island accent mixed with another accent I can't place, and he smokes a lot.  Oh, and he comes over to mess around with a dump truck he owns and leaves either the dump truck or his personal vehicle running - for hours.  I'm not totally sure why Joe is so intoxicating to me, but I think it's partly because I can't figure out how many more hours he can possibly spend banging on his dump truck while his own truck runs in the yard.  Does he get side tracked by the banging so forgets he wasn't going to stay long?  Have all the cigarettes deprived his brain of oxygen so banging on the dump truck for hours feels right?  I just don't know.  

Sometimes Joe comes over and dicks around on other stuff like the riding lawnmower his son uses to mow the grass.  It sputters and snorts and I get a kick outta watching Dean take 2 years to mow on that POS as it bucks him around the yard.  I can't help thinking that if Joe stopped banging on the bed of the dump truck and invested quality time with the mower, Dean could ride more smoothly and in style!  I also think if my mom was over here she could have that lawnmower purring like a kitten in one afternoon, but then I wouldn't have anything interesting to snigger about once a week.

This is my kitchen window where I do most of my spying on Joe:

And here was the view from said window today:

Sometimes Joe stops banging on the bed and messes with the engine instead, and every day that truck seems to be facing a different direction, though I've never caught him driving it anywhere.

I was particularly bored today so I did a lot of Joe spying.  In addition, I was getting pretty lacksidaisical as the day wore on so I think Joe caught me peeping on him several times.  I don't want him to know how creepy I am so I decided to spy on him for a while from my bathroom while taking a leak:

See that small little opening?  I was pretty sure he couldn't tell I was spying anymore and placed my phone in the crack to watch him smoke his 100th cigarette while going into and out of the garage a dozen times:

It was satisfying - until I realized my basement was getting sore from sitting on the John for 39 minutes.  I turned my back for two seconds to shift position and look!

 

He disappeared!  I wonder if that's why he leaves either his car or the dump truck running; so he can make a quick dash away from my prying eyes!  Oh well, his personal vehicle is the white guy you see there so I know he'll be back.  Probably tomorrow.  For more hammering.  And smoking.  Did I mention I find Joe fascinating?...