Jesus Christ! I think we just had a shooting next door!
 

Putting my sister to bed just now and there was an almighty, earth-shattering bang. Voices raised, cursing. Alarms going off. I thought at first someone was kicking our door in a drunken fury. The cops came up and seem to think, from what I could gather listening at the window, that either shots were fired or a pipebomb hurled, or both, at the house two doors down. Nobody appears to have been hurt, thank god.

That house has a history of being used as a sort of safehouse for junkies. The woman living in it died recently (very old) but apparently had druggies coming to the house all hours, according to my neighbour. It was boarded up when she died but the council has rented it again, amazingly it would seem to others involved in some sort of crime, which may explain tonight's attack, if attack it was. It certainly wasn't a car backfiring!

I'm shaking like a leaf, going to bed now. Will let you know what I find out in the morning. Hope we're not suddenly in the middle of another of Dublin's gang wars!

Christ, what a country!
:crazy:

Update: Yeah it's confirmed. Two shots and what they calla "black powder bomb" --- apparently makes more noise than does damage. Still fucking scary though! Hopefully won't happen again. I can do without that at my age!

Holy crap TH, that's really scary! I'm glad you and your sister are okay.

This stuff's always scary, kind of reminds of an incident I experienced about 10 years ago.

I was watching TV one night and the whole house shuddered like a juggernaut had gone past, but being a narrow side street this wasn't possible and when I looked out front there was nothing but just a few neighbours looking as well. About 5 mins later, there was the biggest explosion I'd ever heard and I was lucky that the windows didn't blow in. Again I ran in the street and car alarms and house alarms were going off and dogs barking and people in the street and yet nothing! Then I thought of the garden and dashed there and ****, two houses behind me had literally had their back halves blown off and the flames were two stories high. To cut a long story short, the fire brigade soon arrived and evacuated the whole street and after the fire was put out, it was discovered the next day that a gas cylinder used for BBQ's had caused the minor explosion before hitting the gas in the house and was the work of vandals. The devastation the next day was a shock as the two house were 70% destroyed and a whole load of others damaged with broken windows and burn marks on the houses, amazingly nobody died as the two houses were empty at the time. To this day, I'm paranoid where gas safety is concerned, as I would've never believed that a small gas explosion could've caused so much damage.

Thats gotta rattle you a bit. Hopefully it was just an isolated incident.

When I moved into my house in Midlothian, the first week the neighbor across the street got flash bombed and raided by law enforcement. Then, about 6 months later someone was shot down the street. I swear there were 20 cop cars, and I couldn't get out of my driveway. It wasn't a hard decision to leave all that behind and move in with my GF when she was diagnosed with the big C.

This is how we Brits see America;)

But on a serious note, that must've tough for you, as living with or caring for somebody with the big C is a demanding and hard situation to be in, I know because I've done it. Hope things worked out for her, as it's always important to have plenty of support around.

She's since beaten it, and has a clean bill of health now. She just went for her annual check up yesterday where they "probed" her nether regions. I don't even get to do that.

:p:

Thanks guys. Another update: as I was leaving to go to the shops this van screeches in and disgorges what looked to be a family, shouting and sswearing at each other. Suddenly the van roars down to where I was standing, two guys get out, who I assume is their mother comes screaming like a harridan out of the house (same house shots were fired at) and the whole thing escalates. I quickly walked back into the house (didn't run; no point attracting attention: when they revved down in the van they almost ran over my neighbour) and called the cops.

I waited for a while then went back out (I had to go out) and it was quietish. They all seemed to have gone into the house. Van was parked outside. Builder working on the house next door was packing up. I said "Getting out early?" He nodded and said he had seen swords ---- yeah, SWORDS! --- being taken out of the van, and did not want to be either a victim or a witness, so he was shutting up early and going home. Didn't blame him.

On the way over to the shops I called the cops again, let them know there were swords involved and gave them the reg of the van. I had hoped it was being searched in connection with some crime. It's gone now but I made sure to ask the police not to knock at my door if/when they did come up. Don't want anyone knowing who made the call!

Hopefully it'll all blow over. I think the van was driven by the woman's sons, and they were possibly coming up about last night/this morning's attack. Cops said no shots were fired (though they could be covering up) but there was definitely a massive bang, which was either a shotgun or some sort of bomb.

It's usually so quiet around here. Damn, we could do without this.

Anything else happens I'll let yaz know... :(

That's weird, its also how the rest of Britain sees London... :P

:laughing: