Something To Do

[Q. G. Pennyworth]

So, there's this story from 2015 where a man from Senoia, Georgia drove a truck through his own house. And sure, you see stories all the time about accidents where a driver fell asleep at the wheel, or hit the gas when they thought it was the brake, or thought they were in reverse when they were in drive, or what have you, but this was none of that. He drove his truck through his house, clear through from the back yard to the front, intentionally.

This made the news, in several outlets. There are photos.

Some iterations of this story accuse -- and I shit you not this is his real name -- John Paul Jones Jr. of driving through the house because he was frustrated nobody wanted to buy it, but I'm mostly interested in the version of the story that CBS46 went with. I found it because of the fantastic final line: "Jones is not being charged with a crime because there's nothing against the law about driving a truck through a house, as long as it's your truck and your house." It got passed around social media, because of course it did, and eventually wound up in one of my random feeds, and I had to go track it down.

This version of the story refutes earlier reports, saying Jones wasn't mad at the house, but just frustrated in general. He'd just gotten off the phone with his wife, he's been out of work for a year and a half, one thing just led to another.

It's important to know that Jones is a contractor. He fixed all the damage to the house in two days. "I've been out of work for the past year and a half. Needed some work," he told CBS46. "It didn't pay anything, but hey, it kept me busy."

And yeah, that's pretty fucking funny. The bit where he tells the cops he did it because he needed air conditioning is great. But like everything, if you look at it long enough, you start seeing pieces of bigger things in it.

So I'm sitting here, reading essentially a "news of the weird" post, and I'm starting to think about the economy in Georgia, and the private contracting economy across the country. I'm thinking about the recession that never really ended, not for poor folks, and I'm thinking about all the people who bought "fixer-uppers" in 2007. And then I think about certain breeds of dog, the ones where they need something to do or they will tear holes in your yard and destroy your house.

And I think about this guy, John Jones, generic as can be. And I think about how he needed something to do.

http://www.cbs46.com/story/29084151/frustrated-man-takes-anger-out-on-own-house