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.....It was damned surreal. I thought for a second that after all these years and rebuilding my life, I might just get clipped in some crossfire by some chickensh!t gangbangers over some bad dope deal or grudge.....it didn't seem fair. Does it ever?

hmmm ... well I have a similar story ... almost ... in 1999 I went down to Tulsa on a job interview ... I wandered around the city a bit, sans auto, since I was in town for just one night ...

walked through a shopping center and headed towards the Barnes and Noble where I proceeded to browse the technical books ... as it approached about 9:30 p.m. (IIRC), it dawned on me I needed to confirm my flight time with one of the guy's employees who would be returning me to the airport ...

so I headed out the door and suddenly felt a fair sense of forebearance, which has served me quite well over the years ... I shrugged it off, a bit foolishly perhaps, attributing it to being in a new city, job interview jitters, etc.

as I walked behind a Mexican restaurant I heard some commotion and saw a black BMW pull in behind a red Jeep Grand Cherokee ... I heard some yelling and paused to watch ... I was about 100 feet away ... then I saw the BMW guy kick the Jeep and thought "this is more serious that I first thought" ... then I heard "pop" "pop" "pop" and noticed the BMW guy was shooting a semi-auto pistol ... and yep, it sounded just like a cap gun outside ... and I had just come off the pistol range about a week before (haven't taken time to go for 3 years now) ...

well I wondered what to do ... any thought of intervention was quelled when a second kid took up a position about 25 feet from me behind the fender of a car ... and he began shooting at the other guy ... getting between two guys who might be shooting at each other is not a good thing ... 8) ... the mall across the street had closed about 30 minutes earlier so, thank God, there were few cars over there ... I stood there watching it, not really bothered at all, but it did dawn on me that I could "catch one" ... so I walked about 20 feet until the angle of the building was a protective "line-of-sight" and leaned back to see what was going on ... (I was not in the line of fire by a significant degree) ...

the BMW guy got in the car, backed out and and took off ... I thought it was over until I saw a few people gather ...

I went over and the kid behind the fender (I think) was on the ground with 2 bullets in him ... one in the chest and one in the leg ... he didn't appear to be losing much blood externally and was coherent ... then people stupidly started complaing about cars driving through moving the brass ... it wasn't complicated what happened and saving the kid's life was priority number one ... when a fire truck arrived with paramedics I walked away ... police had still not arrived ... probably 5-7 minutes after it started ... maybe 10 minutes ... can't be sure now ...

anyway the kid lived according to the online news I read a few days later ... the BMW guy was caught ... and the news claimed there was only ONE shooter!!! ... how do you like that? ... shows you how little the media gets right ...

once I got back to the hotel it did seem a bit surreal but amazingly it didn't bother me too much ... of course I wasn't the guy being shot at ... I did see a guy about 8 years back at a Western Auto with a .357 strapped to his side in Overland Park, Kansas ... I think that bothered me more than the shootout ... go figure ... he was just getting some oil ...

I don't know what you saw ... except maybe a preparation for a drive-by somewhere else ... that would be my first guess ... sounds like they were close to the door so let us know what you find out if it's reported ...