Last night, after departing from a date who revealed she was actually married (but separated), I pedaled home to Bedford Ave. On North Ninth, near the intersection with Kent, there was a fire on the sidewalk. I made it to Berry before I realized I should probably put it out. The New York "whatever" that has crept into my character is a surprise to me as well. The first thought was "Eh. Ignore it." The second was "I should call the cops." The third, inevitable conclusion was "I should just take care of this myself."
It's hard to explain what exactly was on fire. It was relatively small, and seemed to be burning some sort of fuel, maybe wax or oil. There was a cardbord box folded into some sort of altar-like shape which hadn't quite immolated yet so I'm guessing that this was both intentionally set and had been done so recently. I grabbed a cinder block that sat nearby and smashed this thing until I suffocated the flames.
I'm sure I just ruined (or completed) somebody's interactive social engineering installation art project. Whatever they'd postulated in their thesis, it was moronic.