Page 318 - NIXBOOK

For a couple years there was a weekly church youth group event at a big church in town, and it attracted a lot of teenagers. Turns
out that a lot of them skipped church and went over to the Dairy Queen across the street to hang out for a couple hours. This
was in the days before texting and social media had been invented, so it filled a need for kids to socialize. They had their parents
drop them off in the front of the church, and then the kids would pretty much immediately go over to the DQ and skip the
whole getting to know Jesus part. After a few months it started to get so crowded and raucous that the DQ manager had to hire
security officers to keep a lid on things, and the police were getting called almost every time to break up scuffles. We called
them the “Tuesday Night Fights.” And of course all the kids went back to church at pick up time, and you know their parents –
completely clueless – would ask their kids “So how was the youth group meeting? and the kids would probably say “Great! We
learned about Jesus! Eventually the youth minister gave up on the Tuesday night fights/meetings and peace returned to the
Dairy Queen parking lot.

Speaking of pre-internet, it was very common back in the old days for teenagers to hang out in groups in (certain) parks and
(specific) grocery store parking lots. The park meetings usually involved a lot of cigarette smoking and fight clubs after school,
and the grocery store rendezvouses were on weekend nights. Both kinds of events attracted the attention of the police regularly.
It was interesting to see how social media – the ability for kids to communicate online – pretty much completely replaced the
practice of kids congregating in large groups out in public anymore.

Burglary at a resident’s large detached garage. Stolen: 1 car battery. Specifically, a small six-volt battery from an old antique
English car. The owner and I were both all like what the hell, who would steal an old six volt battery?