FUDDY-DUDDIES EVERYWHERE, UNITE AGAINST LASER POINTERS!

SUM: A quivering red dot on my garage door shattered in a moment my illusion that I lived in the perfect neighborhood.

The Other Half and I were bidding a few friends farewell as they walked to their cars in the calm darkness. They'd come to celebrate our new, very fine rental house, with two cats in the yard -- plus cathedral ceilings and a great location.

"Did you see that red dot on your garage door?" Jason asked abruptly, breaking the stream of good-byes and have-a-good-nights.

We didn't at first. But there it was again. Small, piercing, insidious.

My only experience with those dots was through the television. Oh, I'd seen the shoot-em-up movies, with men looking down to notice little red dots on their chests just before being blown to bits.

Maybe I haven't moved into the perfect neighborhood, I thought. Maybe I've moved next door to a sniper. Those people have to live somewhere, after all. Just because there's no bell tower on my street doesn't mean that some crackpot can't get a little target practice in, using his new neighbors as the targets.

Stay calm, I thought. Let everyone leave, then dive into the shrubs, where you can shiver and cry like a naked baby in Iceland.

I was stretching my 911 finger when I saw them heard them. They were crouching behind the bushes across the street -- two snot-nosed middle-schoolers trying not to wet their pants with laughter.

And in one, pre-pubescent hand ... A LASER POINTER.

It wasn't the first time I'd been a victim. Walking from the office to my car late one night, I noticed the cursed red dot on my pants. I looked up to see three boys, all about 13, on bikes. I gave them my best I'm-an-old-fuddy-duddy-so-get-the-hell-out-of-my-way look.

"I'm sorry," one said. "I meant to hit the cute girl behind you."

I turned around. Sure enough, there's the office slut in her too-short, Ally McBeal get up.

It was confusing. The juvenile delinquents use laser pointers on new neighbors they obviously want to drive insane, but they also use them on busty young women they want to drive to the nearest deserted country road.

Better the country just adopt the same philosophy on laser pointers as school districts, movie theaters and stadiums across the country: Ban those public nuisances!

Sure, they were promoted on "Seinfeld." Some wiseacre fixed a dot on George's head and followed him, to the amusement of people all over New York. Yeah, that's great until George goes blind and ends up selling pencils on a street corner! Where's the fun and games then? Huh?

The issue was beginning to haunt my dreams. I had no choice but to buy a laser pointer and put it on my fat expense account so I could study the demon beam up close.

I got a key-chain model with five interchangeable heads -- an arrow, a star, a dollar sign, a target and a dash. I put a dot on Mr. Half's tiny bald spot. I wiggled the star around on the wall and watched my cats jump for it.

I took it to work and shined it on my fellow employees. I let other people play with it. Everybody seemed to really like it. How immature!

I brought it home and played with the cats some more. It was all in the name of research, you see.

Maybe I won't expense my laser pointer and turn it over to the company. Maybe I'll just hang onto it and do some more research.

Like studying the reaction of two neighborhood middle schoolers when a small, laser bearing device is shoved up their nostrils.

Now THAT'S fun with laser pointers.

~Heidi Nieland is a former staff writer for the Southeast Missourian who now lives in Pensacola, Fla.