Plastic People Patrol on the Prowl

I suppose you've probably figured out by now that we are a bit of an odd family. It might have to do with having been military for so long and moving around so much that we have to make our own fun or at least come up with some innovative ways to entertain ourselves.

The Plastic People Patrol started several years ago when we lived in Texas. We were riding high on the dot-com bubble and were living in a fairly upscale neighborhood like all the other stock-option people in Austin. We had just finished hanging up our Christmas lights and were heading to the pool (Austin was 80 degrees at the time) when we walked past a house and were stopped in our tracks. The lawn (which was the size of a postage stamp in this zero-lot-line development) was absolutely FILLED with "internally illuminated" Christmas decorations - plastic people. How the communist-led neighborhood association had let this one get past their keen radar was beyond me! It was a sight to behold!

This family had the traditional nativity scene with Mary and Joseph and Baby Jesus PLUS the wisemen, their camels, Santa and sleigh and all 9 reindeer (Rudolph included), Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, a full choir, an army of nutcracker soldiers, 3-foot-high candles, a snowman army, candy canes, and a Grinch. It was so red-neck, the ginormous modern house to which the lawn was attached was incongruent. It should have been a single-wide instead of a 5-bedroom, 3-car mortgage broker's dream. Even the Mercedes parked in the driveway now seemed out-of-place situated among the Plastic People population.

We counted up the number of Plastic People in that yard that year and came up with 34. The next year, the group had reproduced somehow (maybe Snow White and one of the dwarves?) and stood at 36. We started riding around the neighborhood and other developments in southwest Austin looking for another house that beat that record of 36 Plastic People. The Plastic People Patrol was born and a family tradition was launched.

That year in Texas, we decided the 36-count Plastic People home deserved a tribute for starting a family tradition so we printed up an award on Christmas paper, tucked a twenty-dollar bill in the envelope with it, and left it anonymously in the mailslot of the front door of that house. The Plastic People Patrol had awarded it's first annual recognition award!

Now, every year we go on Plastic People Patrol looking for the house in the county that has the most Plastic People included in their holiday exterior illumination display. Lighted things like Christmas trees, hanging icicles, and wire figures do not count. Plastic People have to be made out of plastic to qualify. With the advent of the blow-up holiday decorations, we've included them as qualifying Plastic People since they do contain some sort of petroleum-based or synthetic product in their covering and are illuminated internally. No matter the size, though, they only count once. A 14-foot inflatable carousel, while impressive, cannot count twice.

We've seen some interesting decorations in our yearly quest to find the winner of the Plastic People Award. The house that turned it's trampoline on it's side and put lights around the outside edge to make a 12-foot wreath was inventive. The house that just left up the Halloween decorations and added Christmas decorations to the mix was a bit schizophrenic. Some houses rival Clark Griswald's and you have to wonder what the electricity bill runs for the month of December.

It's been several years now that our Plastic People Patrol has been in operation. Families in two states and three counties have earned places in the Plastic People Award Hall of Fame and been awarded certificates placed in their mailboxes. Son has hit his teenage years so we are now making it a team effort among his group of friends. We'll be making our final enumeration tour one night soon. The boys will be piling into the Denali, hyped up on energy drinks while Mom (that's me), hyped up on Prozac to survive 5 teenage boys hyped up on energy drinks crammed into an SUV, drives them by all the houses they have noted as contenders. Head counts of Plastic People will be executed as a group and the contender with the highest population will win the coveted 2007 Plastic People Award and the cash award of $20 that accompanies it. A family tradition survives another year and perhaps will be passed on to future generations.

Are we weird or what?