More of my glorious complaining
Read at your own peril.
1. Today I met two former co-workers for lunch. That’s the good news. The bad news is that sitting at the next table was this guy, who I will refer to as A to make the following narrative slightly less confusing. I hadn’t seen him since this event went down and I wasn’t sure how I would interact with him when I did. All he got from me, incidentally, was calm, slightly frosty silence. He didn’t like it. I don’t care.
Classically, A only acknowledged the man at the table specifically and just included the women in a broad greeting on his way out the door. His companion (B) managed, in a somewhat impressively bumbling way, to knock a bottle of soy sauce off the table behind him and splatter sauce all over my coat and my male lunch companion’s jacket. While B mostly ignored what he’d done (too important for manners no doubt), A decided to finally address me by name to borrow my napkin to wipe off my male companion’s coat.
2. While walking from the restaurant to the CVS, I ended up at the intersection with a woman who lives in my community and is quite possibly one of the most annoying people on the face of the Earth. Twice she has managed to corner me and talk my ear off about whatever is foremost on her mind until she manages to steer the conversation to her various infirmities and then asks if I have a car. This query is followed by complaints about how she really needs some nice person to drive her around on some errands sometime. You will be unsurprised to learn that I never, ever take that bait.
Today, she was at an intersection with me and started talking as we started across the street and…I’m not going to lie to you. I just walked away while she was in mid-word. I couldn’t take it. She would have talked me to death, followed me into the drug store still talking to me, and then followed me most of the route home until she has to peel off toward her apartment.
3. A man was in the CVS—when I finally decided to venture out again—methodically crop-dusting the place with farts. I am a pretty speedy shopper but today I flew through the store.
Holler (updated)
I’m not going to write about this.1 I’m just going to link to it and let you read it.
Thank you, Corry Lee Smith, for ruining my evening.
Edited to add: I should have checked Hillbilly Savants sooner because I knew there’s be some excellent writing about this over there.
1. Subject to change. Expect me to hold forth in the comments at least if I cannot contain myself properly.
Open
This place mysteriously closed a while back with a sign in the window saying it was closed for renovations and would open in a week. That sign stayed there for a long time. I heard someone at the post office next door say the owner had a heart attack in the restaurant and died. Now the windows are covered with paper, the storefront wall has been refaced, and this ghostly OPEN just hovers there.
Another instance when things weirdly come together and appear to be sending me a sort of message
Not that I believe in that shit of course.
I was telling someone recently that I would like to learn how to fight. I don’t mean karate or something like that. I mean I would like to learn how to use my fists in an unmistakably efficient manner. I would prefer never to have to employ this newly acquired skill1 but it would be nice to know that I have the ability to land a good punch because then I would be able to telegraph that knowledge in the nonviolent portion of whatever encounter led me to think lovingly of violence in the first place. Useful, that.
So I just came across this article offering a bullshit, unfounded, grasping-for-straws reason2 for why left-handedness exists at all:
“The endurance of left-handedness has puzzled researchers, because it is linked to disadvantages including an increased risk of some diseases. But University of Montpellier experts, writing in Proceedings B, say it could be because they do well in combat.”
And there you have it. I am now compelled to hone my fighting skills because I would be so exceptionally good at it.
Many of you will see that as a natural progression of my already bad temper and rotten attitude. A handful of you will be genuinely surprised. All of you should be afraid for your lives because I will start issuing beat downs forthwith as soon as I am in fighting trim completely assured that there is absolutely nothing to be afraid of.
1. Because violence is so inconvenient. And there’s all that actual contact with other people and you know how I hate people.
2. Please be sure to read the entire article to discover that once again, they have absolutely no idea why left-handedness persists.
Your silhouette will charge the view
What, in the name of God, is this song about?
I was listening to it while driving back home from an interview and it occurred to me that like almost all popular music known to mankind much of the music with which it is contemporary, it might only make sense if one is high.
