It was Tuesday night. I had completed a full day in the cab, a full night of play rehearsals, and just chatted up my guitarist at a bar where he's the doorman. I was tired. I was going home to get five hours of sleep before performing a similar schedule on Wednesday. I drove up Coal Ave. past Broadway when I saw a morphing figure waving in front of me.

I was not in the mood. I moved into the next lane to avoid the figure, but it then jumped in front of that lane. I had to stop or run it over. I stopped. The figure turned out to be a young wild eyed man with long scraggly black hair and full beard. A little Charles Manson in Albuquerque. As he scuttled around to the driver's side, I noticed that he was bleeding from the head. Okay, this guy need's to go to the hospital, I thought. I cracked my window.

"Hey guy, are you all right?"

"I just tried to kill myself!!!"

"Okay, okay. Do you need to go to the hospital?"

"No!!! I need to go see my girlfriend in Austin!!!!"

Before I could answer, he ran around the front of my car. My instant reaction was "Fuck that!" He reached the passenger side which was fortunately locked. Once he had reached the door, I hit the gas and drove away, leaving him to harass another vehicle. Just another freak in the freak kingdom.

Rehearsing for a play sucks up my nights like cabbing does during the day. I simply didn't have time to experience and process the incident at Virginia Tech. I didn't have time to listen to the students or faculty or families. I didn't have time to listen to the experts or read the papers for in-depth coverage. I didn't even have time to watch the media cover the backlash against the media's coverage of the story (we are post-modern bunch, aren't we?). By chance, I flipped on the news when they showed Seung-Hui Cho's recorded manifesto about the rich brats and so forth. After twenty seconds, I thought 'Yep, he was crazy.'

That was also the same response to the guy who blocked my car on Tuesday after he said he had to go to Austin with a bleeding head. He was crazy. There are more crazy people in America than you think, and they come at you from out of the blue.

I imagine people are discussing what should be done to prevent another VT incident, and the truth of the matter is that you can't. Gun control? Please, this is America. We've got an amendment and everything. Crazy people come at you from out of the blue. You don't know when someone is going off their meds. You don't know when the voices will take over. You can't stop all the madness before it starts. Anyone who says they can are getting paid to try.

In Albuquerque, most of the bloody killing sprees that occur are done by the mentally ill. Last year, a guy went off his meds, shot & killed two cops as well as two employees at a motorcycle store. A local hospital called the police about the man's disturbing behavior beforehand, but it did not stop the carnage. It might of enhanced it.

He killed four people. Cho killed 32 people. The real difference is the magnitude, but the situation is the similar. Bad chemicals got in their brain and took over (read your Vonnegut, America!). Maybe it took a day. Maybe it took a few months. Maybe no one was paying attention to these crazy folks. Maybe people were. With more & more people in America, it's next to impossible to keep tabs on every mentally ill person. They will come at you from out of the blue.

The guy who stopped my car on Tuesday night might of had a gun. He might of been doped up some bad drugs. He might have not been taking his drugs. I had never seen him before in my life. There was no way for me to stop this random moment from happening. It simply happened.

When I got home that night, I noticed that my bizarre encounter left blood stains on my car. I spent the next ten minutes wiping off the thick reddish brown goo. I got most of it, but you can never wash off all the blood of madness.

Chris Jungle will never drive anyone to Austin from Albuquerque to see their girlfriend, sane or insane.