Even the suit

video here

When I was first alerted to the sudden activity at Adams, there were:

• three white-paneled moving vans in the parking lot;
• an SUV pulling an open trailer, backed up to the school’s entrance;
• a large pick-up truck pulling a closed trailer;
• John Griego’s vehicle.

At the front door of the school, a cluster of workers stood talking with a man in a suit; near them were a large round table and two audio/visual carts. I could see into the cargo of one of the vans, which was about a quarter full (though of what I couldn’t tell).

They saw me, struggling with tripod and increasingly tremor-plagued hand, and immediately dispersed. The SUV drove off, pulling a trailer that held four to six A/V carts; and after securing his cargo and pulling closed the door, the driver of the van I could see into soon followed.

I glimpsed a bustle of movement at the school’s entrance; the A/V carts were gone – presumably inside what was like a horse trailer – and I watched as two of the men tried in vain to fit in the round table.

I looked back - Griego’s car and the other van had vanished; the final van then drove off. I turned back just in time to see the two men give up on fitting the table into the trailer; together, they hoisted it up into the bed of the truck - and just like that, they too were gone.

I tipped them off with my “Co-InkyDink” post, curious of how quickly the alarm might sound. Apparently, it cried a lot like “SPIDER!!!!!!!!” because they were all gone within fifteen minutes of sighting me.

Which I did not quite anticipate (…but which pleases me greatly).

People are always more candid when they don’t know the camera is rolling – and sadly, in this day and age, when isn’t it? But how they react when they do know the camera’s rolling is telling as well. And so even though I wasn’t ready, I pointed the camera at them anyway.

My apologies, readers, but regrettably, I did not win my race against time, and the fragments of footage I obtained were unusable.

But if my hobby in districthology has shown me anything, it’s that the suited variety of the species are frequently the alpha-males, asserting their dominance by pointing this way and that while others do their bidding. So for me, it was especially remarkable that one of the two men hoisting and heaving was the man in the suit.

Because you know you might be getting warmer when even the suit begins to sweat.