Man, what is it about the Seawall? There's just something about that place: nuts on the run from all over Texas wind up there because they just can't run any farther.
If we can liken the state of Texas proper to a margarita, Seawall Boulevard is the bath-salts-crusted rim of the glass. (And hey, some say that the margarita was invented on the Seawall, so the analogy almost makes sense.)
Anyway, here's the latest dispatch from the frontlines...
Imagine it's around dawn on a Saturday morning. You're a single woman alone in an apartment on Galveston's Seawall Boulevard. You wake to the sound of someone kicking in your door and then, here he is coming after you, a tattooed, wild-eyed kid dressed only in boxers and literally growling and hissing.
He then tries to bite your neck and hits you a few times before you are able to escape and make it to the parking lot. A couple of neighbors beckon you into their car, thank god, but this goddamn inked and pierced Hot Topic vampire is still chasing you. He even bangs on the car's windows as your rescuers drive you away.
According to the Galveston County Daily News, that's what happened yesterday. The story goes on to say that police soon spotted 19-year-old Lyle Monroe Bensley, a.k.a. the Neck-Tattooed Nosferatu, in the parking lot.
After a short foot-chase, Galveston cops took him into custody, whereupon police say he confessed to being a vampire. He was charged with felony burglary with intent to commit assault and is still being held in lieu of $40,000 bail. (The woman suffered minor injuries and refused treatment at the scene.)
Okay, there's a lot wrong with this picture. First, where was his cape? We know standards have slipped since gentlemanly Count Dracula's day, but boxers? Come on.
Second, he was obviously no real vampire because he was outside after dawn. Any real vampire would have turned into dust. And third, when he was being chased by police, he ran. A real vampire would have turned into a bat and fluttered away, squeaking with maniacal delight.
It might be the weirdest crime on the Seawall over the past couple of years, but we're not sure. Here are a few more:
There was Clifford Lee Bradberry, who loved to bang five fingers in his Kia Rondo while watching surfers hang ten in the waves.
There was Gregory Chambers, who allegedly made it his hobby to smear his own poop on the windows of a Seawall Wendy's.
And there was the anonymous homeless car thief who stole a couple's car as they were unloading supplies for a day's pier-fishing. On finding their baby in the car he just stole, the man brought it back and delivered them a stern lecture on the perils of leaving a child in a cold car.
And then there was this desperate booze-fueled crack-rock fracas that ended with a woman claiming that her former drinking buddy had bitten off her lip while patrons and staff of a nearby bar did nothing. Sort of a Kitty Genovese case on a much smaller scale....
We're not even going to get into other Seawall lore, like the organized crime in the Balinese Room, the felony against good taste that was the Flagship Hotel, or the adventures of Hurricane Bear during Ike.