Can You Hear the Lambs Screaming, Clarice?

It's been rainy and/or overcast the past few days that I've been here. I think that I brought the bad weather with me from North America. (I heard this past weekend was just gorgeous up in Maryland.) The good thing about being unemployed, however, is that when it's raining, you don't have to do anything you don't want to. So, no trudging through a torrential downpour to do something that you didn't want to do in the first place, such as go to work and quibble about discovery, or run an errand or something.

Today, for example, I'm hanging out on my couch and watching a tv movie called "An Unexpected Life" with Rizzo from Grease, S. Epatha Merkerson, and Ru Paul. A strange combination, to be sure, but after running around in the rain yesterday, I'm enjoying chilling like a villian for a little while. (Plus -- I'm learning a lot from the spanish subtitles.) I'm contemplating what to do next: either to go for a run, or to take a bath in the jacuzzi tub. Tough choices.

My apartamento is generally nice, with a few quirks. One of the things that you never know when you rent an apartment are those hidden things that you only figure out after moving in -- like really low water pressure or lots of noisy neighbors. My apartment in Brooklyn had such bad water pressure that I always felt like I was living out that episode on Seinfeld with the low water pressure bad hair.

This apartment doesn't have the water pressure issue -- exactly the opposite, in fact, as I've soaked the entire bathroom each time I've showered. No, it's just noisy. There's a unnaturally loud waterfall in the back alley/courtyard. Even with all the windows closed, it sounds like a mini-Iguazu Falls. But, I've gotten used to it. I discovered today that the back of my building abuts an elementary school. Holy cow -- are these kids or soccer hooligans? Starting at what seemed like the crack of dawn, the kids were acting out some sort of schoolyard Lord of the Flies. Or, so I assumed because I can't actually see them. I could only hear them screaming and howling and guffawing at about a thousand decibels. Not exactly music to one's ears when nursing a hangover. It was so loud that even with all the windows closed, and I was in another room in the apartment with the doors shut, you could still hear the shouting.

This went on for a few hours, and oddly enough, this phrase popped into my cloudy head: "Can you hear the lambs screaming, Clarice?" It occurs to me that it is not normal for Hannibal Lecter quotes to pop into one's head when thinking of kids, but this is how my strange, pop-cuture filled brain works. I wish that were on tv right now -- I'm sure I'd learn a lot of Spanish from the subtitles.