Criminal Activity

            Yesterday I was in church as part of our 'Open June' season. I was sat by our inner doors which look out over towards the vicarage and the bit of Ponsonby Road between the church and the vicarage. A car then drew up containing two lads - late teens, early twenties- who were bobbing around listening to the music on the radio. Oddly, though, they did not turn the engine off nor did they get out of the car. Strange. One or two ideas were forming in my mind as I watched them, but then the puzzle was answered.
            A woman, 30ish, approached the car, and then suddenly, and I would have missed it if I hadn't been looking directly at them, she handed the man in the driving seat something, he gave her something. She put whatever it was down the front of her teeshirt, and walked straight off. The car then drove off immediately.
            In all the whole business couldn't have taken more than thirty seconds, and the hand-over less than two seconds. I knew that we had drug dealers operating around here, but I had never seen an exchange before. Mobile phones have changed the dealing business. You don't really need a 'drug den' or 'crack house' nowadays. All you need is a car and a mobile phone.
           I find it a tiny bit amusing that despite all their precautions - choosing a nice quiet street, doing everything with speed and forethought - I was able to see everything they were up to. They couldn't see into church because of the light differential, and assumed that no one would be there. Why should anyone be in church?