Ever wonder how simple events lead to angry overreaction?

Does an errant snowball merit revenge?

Last night, a producer and I were carpooling home after a long day of snow coverage. Rounding a corner into Irvington, we noticed a car stopped, all its doors open and people throwing something into its trunk.

They piled in and drove on.

One block later the car stopped. A man hopped out, grabbed a bicycle out of the open trunk and heaved it onto the snowy sidewalk. He hopped back in the car and they drove away.

Huh?

Was the bike stolen? Why would a thief throw a bike away only one block after grabbing it?

We decided to follow them.

The Audi with California plates had no 4-wheel drive so it was easy to follow. Just two turns and two blocks later, it stopped. 2 men and 1 woman in their 30's hopped out and headed for a large Irvington home.
We pulled up, rolled down the window and asked, "Did you just throw a bicycle out of your car?"

"Don't worry," one of the men replied. "We had to drop a bike at my cousin's. It's fine. It's fine. Don't worry."

Call us skeptical.
We didn't buy it.

If they were thieves, why'd they toss the bike so fast?
We wrote down their license plate and their address and drove back to the bike in the snow.

As we arrived, two boys were coming around the corner. One was pushing his bike. The other was walking.

"Is that your bike?" I asked the walker, pointing at the spokes in a heap.

Sure enough, it was.
The boys, about 11 or 12 years old, claimed that they had been having a snowball fight with each other. One snowball missed and hit the passing Audi. They insisted they did not hit the car deliberately.

But the one errant snowball triggered more than they bargained for.

The adults stopped, jumped out, stole the boy's bike and drove away!

They might have reconsidered when they realized we saw them.
At least they abandoned it fairly quickly.

The boy got his bike back in good shape.

We headed on our way wondering just who the real children were.

--Vince Patton

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