Kathy Poulos has a problem. Whenever the Spring Hill, Fla., mother of three leaves her house or looks out the window, she sees a Christmas lawn display of two reindeer having sex. Although the animals are merely white, wooden cutout figures, they are indeed posed, one mounted behind the other, frozen in a tableau of nostril-flaring excitement.
The man responsible for the display, Brian Long, Poulos' next-door neighbor, positioned his humping deer in good fun. But Poulos doesn't think it's funny at all, especially because school buses pass the deer twice a day.
"It's terrible," Poulos told the St. Petersburg Times. "They've got kindergartners that ride those buses. I think it's a terrible display for the holiday. That's not the first thing I want to see when I come out my front door."
Many other neighbors along Deltona Boulevard agree with her, and have complained to officials of Hernando County. Code enforcement director Frank McDowell III checked out the civic ordinances covering Christmas displays and found that the diorama doesn't violate any laws. So he cannot take legal action.
"I would hope that the individual that owns those deer would display them in a manner that's appropriate for the Christmas holiday and not in the manner that they're displayed," said McDowell, in the measured tones of a city employee.
Long, meanwhile, is enjoying the attention from his hoofed orgy, and says drivers slow down to gawk, with some even pulling into the driveway to take pictures. Schoolchildren on the buses stand up in their seats, pointing and laughing. And his son Kevin even brings friends from high school over to check out Dad's weird lawn spectacle.
"I call them dancing reindeer," Long explained. "I figured it would be a little different ... If they really come down on me hard about it, I'll take them down. Nobody's said anything to me about it."
For the time being, the festive fornication continues. Next holiday season, Long plans to add two more participants to the reindeer debauchery. "They might be voyeurs," envisioned Long, "just standing and watching."
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