Recently a friend said to me, “I don’t think things that happen to you happen to other people”, to which I replied, “I think they do, I just don’t know if other people posses my honed appreciate for the completely absurd.” However, I spent last Saturday at Disneyland with a friend and her 12-going-on-25 year old daughter and we collectively determined that I am, in fact, a magnet for a disproportionate share of ridiculousness. And yes, the fact that we were at Disneyland was logistically weighted in this scientific calculation. The fact that they now sell beer at Disneyland may have contributed to my already dubious math skills. But that’s an entirely different post…
Fast forward to this afternoon. To when this happened when I stopped to put fuel in my Jeep Wrangler. For most, a mundane (and annoyingly expensive) but necessary task. For me, the most entertaining part of my day.
Indulge me as I paint the scene: As I’m standing next to my car staring blankly off into space wondering how sloths actually procreate (like, is it super romantic and tender because it’s so slow…or is one of them ever like, oh for the love of the species, can we just get ON with this?), I notice a very attractive, well dressed, specimen of male human walking towards me. I probably look scared because I suddenly questioned if I was actually having the sloth conversation with myself out loud. I quickly come to my senses and decide he’s just walking in my general direction, probably to his sports car with his supermodel girlfriend that’s probably right behind me and she’s probably wondering what’s wrong with the odd windblown woman muttering about sloths fucking. And then, he opened his mouth:
McHottie: Hey. (complete with Joey Tribiani “how you doin'” chin nod)
Me: Hey. (nervously looking around to confirm he was, in fact, talking to me)
McHottie: (stopping & awkwardly observing…something) Your car doesn’t have doors.
Me: (assuming this can only be a sarcastic attempt at initiating conversation for some yet-to-be determined other purpose) HOLY CRAP! You’re right! How the hell did that happen?!
McHottie: (blank stare, then…) Soo…how did it happen?
Me: (slowly processing that either this is a real question or I am being Punked) Huh. Ok. Well, it’s a Jeep. The doors actually come off pretty easily by design.
McHottie: Woah! (more blank staring) then with 100% sincerity: So, do you, like, ever think about setting the cruise control and trying to jump out when you’re going fast? Or, like, jumping onto another car?!
Me: Yeah, nope. Can’t say I do.
(At this point the pump mercifully thunked to indicate that my Hungry Hungry Hippo of a car was satiated, signaling that I had an imminent exit strategy.)
McHottie: I totally would. Like, All. The. Time. That would be SOOO epic.
Me: You probably shouldn’t own a Jeep.
McHottie: (thinking. hard.) Totes (Toats? Doesn’t matter. Not a real word...) Good thinking. Cool, later! (waves happily like we just had lunch and I’ll see him at yoga later, walks to his car, puts the pump back and drives off without even looking back to see my incredibly bewildered face watching for a telltale sign that the entire exchanges wasn’t a figment of my imagination.) I only determined that I wasn’t hallucinating from unleaded fumes because the guy pumping gas directly to my right made eye contact with a look that said “that really happened. I think.”
My guess? That guy’s not long for the gene pool without some sort of floatation device.
Also, I need to make less eye contact with strangers. Or maybe more. People are fucking awesome (and weird).
2 Comments
I truly believe you were looking in the mirror or some alternate universe, where you met the male version of yourself because if you knew you could live to blog about it, you would TOTALLY jump out of a moving Jeep.
Of course I would. Especially if I could land in a moving convertible! Preferably while wielding a weapon and saving a kitten, but I’m not entirely sure this lovely (and I do mean lovely) man understood that he wasn’t actually a character in a movie and that particular action has a high likelihood of causing premature death. I, on the other hand, grasp that concept. However, now I want to add stunt training to my list of shit to do before next July.