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Charlie Hatton
Brookline, MA
Today feels like a ‘quick hit’ sort of day. So I’ll start this post now, and update it later with more saucy snippets. Or I won’t; only time will tell. But here comes the first bit now:
The truck where I get my burritos — which seems like it should describe something far dirtier than my weekday lunch — is notorious around these parts for having slow service. They’re consistently outclassed by the pizza truck, the falafel truck, and yes, even the Chinese takeout truck. Only diehard fans like me are willing to endure the wait for tasty faux Mexicano goodness.
“Either speed up that burrito, or shake those chimichangas, amiga.”
This week, the burrito truck changed its operating procedures. In the bad old days, we stood in line, waited forever, ordered at the truck, paid, then waited another eternity to get our food. Now, they have an attractive young lady walk down the line with a pad and pencil and take orders from customers standing in queue. She then takes the book to the truck.
Where it takes exactly as long for them to make the food, thus cutting the waiting time not at all. Also, we’re now asked to pay when we pick up the order, so that part of the process takes longer, too.
Personally, I think they knew this going in. I’m pretty sure the goal wasn’t to speed up the process, necessarily, so much as to give the truck customers a little eye candy while they wait. It’s still the same fourteen-minutes-per-burrito line — but if a pretty girl talks to you in line, it’s apparently supposed to seem shorter.
Fine. We’ll play along for a while. But if the guys in the truck get any slower, they’re going to have to put that girl in a bikini and toss her on a trampoline. I’m willing to wait for a tasty lunchtime meal, but if the damned thing doesn’t arrive until two in the afternoon, there’d better be a floor show. Either speed up that burrito, or shake those chimichangas, amiga.
There are times — rare, frightening times — when a small bit of my brain might soften just a bit on the issue of having children. I’ve never wanted kids — and really, when you read the things on this site, would you want me to want kids? I’m not the sort of person whose personality screams, ‘POSITIVE INFLUENCE DURING THE FORMATIVE YEARS!!‘
But we all have our small moments of weakness. Or dementia, or irrationality, or tequila-soaked intoxication. And so it was I found myself wondering recently, as I talked to a friend of mine who has a young son, what it might be like to someday own a child.
It was at that moment my friend’s boy walked over, looked up at his father, and proclaimed loudly:
‘Daddy, my pee tastes funny.‘
Yep, that’ll do the trick. Excuse me while I go X-ray my crotch for a few hours.
There are times when my lack of social grace can be a tad embarassing. Luckily, I have a wife and a few friends who’ve seen me occasionally act like a regular human, so my public faux pas aren’t completely crippling. Just humiliating is all. Oh, goody.
My latest social gaffe — that I know of, anyway — came on Tuesday night. I play pool in a league on Tuesday nights, because I’m just that sort of dirty reckless heathen. I know billiards is the ‘gateway game’ to snooker and punting clubs and betting the farm on Nicaraguan jai alai. I still don’t care. That’s how I roll.
“She wanted a greeting, not a life story. Also, she probably wanted to not be peed on, and I couldn’t guarantee that wouldn’t happen if I returned to her table.”
On this particular Tuesday night, I felt the call of nature and decided to take a trip to the little boys’ room during one of the games. Our table was across the large room from the bathroom area, maybe eighty feet away. I was in the middle of a close game in a tight match, so the walk gave me a chance to strategize and clear my head. It was a nice added bonus to being able to play without hopping back and forth and crossing my legs during every shot. I really had to go.
As I wiggled my way to the rest room, I passed a table where two people were playing. The person not shooting was a girl I’d played a few weeks before. She’s a very good player, and knows a lot of the players from leagues past and spending off-nights in hte pool hall. We hadn’t talked much during our match — crippling social deficiencies, remember — so there was no reason to believe she’d remember or recognize me. By the time I passed by her, I forgot she was even there.
So of course, she said something to me.
(Friendly people always throw me off. I’m beginning to think I was raised by wolves. Lonely, isolationist, clumsy hermit wolves. With howl impediments and mangy coats, living in caves away from the rest of the pack.)
Specifically, what she said was a cheery, ‘Hello, hello!‘
Just as I passed by, deep in thought, lost in my own little world, and full of piss and vinegar. Or in this case, piss and Guinness.
It took me a step to register that she’d spoken — and more preceisely, had spoken to me. I was past her already, but a sunny greeting from a friendly stranger requires a response, so I did my best to reply in kind. As I turned past the table, I looked back over my shoulder and said:
‘Hrrrnnng!‘
Or grunts to that effect. Basically, she said ‘hello’ and I made Wookie noises at her. And not in the good way.
Meh, what could I do; she caught me off guard. I don’t expect people to actually speak to me in public. Especially people I don’t know, and particularly people who obviously have normal people nearby they could be talking to. She’s lucky she got a grunt; I’m sure I’ve failed to register unexpected salutations hundreds of times, and just kept on walking. I don’t mean to be rude; I’m just an idiot.
I briefly considered whether there was any way I could fix my error. But I was now twenty feet away from the girl — screaming ‘HI!‘ from across the room didn’t seem measurably ‘better’. And walking back to explain the situation and my unfortunate pitiable condition wouldn’t help much, either. She wanted a greeting, not a life story. Also, she probably wanted to not be peed on, and I couldn’t guarantee that wouldn’t happen if I returned to her table. So I kept on walking.
And when I was done, I walked around her table the other way, to avoid any sort of spontaneous ‘fixing’ I might feel compelled to try. I’d much rather just chalk up another perfectly nice person who thinks I’m a douchebag, and get back to my sad little hermit wolf cave out in the hills. It’s just easier that way. Plus, the TV reception out there is phenomenal.
Permalink | 2 CommentsI learned a little something about myself today. Despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, I apparently do have a limit to the amount I’m willing to spend for wildly overpriced goods. Maybe that means there’s a faint glimmer of fiscal responsibility deep within me, after all. More likely, I’m just getting pennypinchy in my crotchety old age.
(And you young whippersnappers better git offa my lawn!)
At any rate, I’ve never spent much time worrying about cash. For much of my adult life, I was too poor to consider buying anything extravagant. Or anything non-extravagant, for that matter. Fretting about making more money would have been like worrying about growing a set of boobs on my back — it wasn’t going to happen, I wouldn’t know how to react if it did happen, and I’d be clueless about how to make the situation work for me.
(Hint: Two sets of mirrors and a velvet-covered back scratcher.
I’ve given this ‘boobs on the back’ thing way too much thought.)
Happily, my time spent huddling over bowls of Ramen noodles in a studio apartment has endowed me with plain, simple tastes. Some might even say ‘cheap’. So long as the mortgage is paid, the television works, and there’s beer in the fridge, I’m good. Sure, these days it has to be good beer — I’m not still in my Ramen noodle phase, after all — but I don’t generally go in for the extravagant things in life.
“Fretting about making more money would have been like worrying about growing a set of boobs on my back — it wasn’t going to happen, I wouldn’t know how to react if it did happen, and I’d be clueless about how to make the situation work for me.”
On the other hand, when I need something — or can convince my wife that I’ll be mopey and pouty-faced without it — then I’m not afraid to put some money down. The system has worked well for me over the years — spend a few months living on the cheap, then splurge on a cell phone or underwear or dog food or something, and go back to ‘save mode’ for a while. That’s plenty enough shopping for me; I don’t much enjoy the buying process in the first place. If I leave a 7-11 with a pack of gum and a Slushee, I consider that a ‘spree’.
So, generally speaking, I don’t pay too much attention to prices, because I’m not actually buying things. One of my few regular purchases, though, is gasoline. I need the car to get to work, so I can make the money to pay the car and insurance payments, so I can have the car to get to work, so I can make the money to… meh. Looks like my rat race is being run on a very circular sort of track. I hope I’m due for a pit stop soon.
But back to the gas station.
Today, I pulled my thirsty Nissan up to the pump, swiped my card, and began fueling. I go to this station a lot; it’s on my way to work, and while the prices aren’t the absolute best in town, they don’t seem to be gouging particularly hard, either. Today, a hit of regular unleaded could be had for $3.03. I nozzled up and let ‘er rip.
A few gallons in, I came out of my daydream and noticed the numbers rolling over. Twenty-five bucks and counting. Hrm. Boy, I remember the day when a whole tank was less than twe- I thought I told you whippersnappers to git offa my lawn!
Soon after, the pump pinged thirty dollars. The car kept on chugging.
At forty clams, I frowned. I’ve paid forty bucks for a tank of gas before — but I haven’t liked it. I’m no pricewatcher, but somehow shelling over two Jacksons just to tootle back and forth to the office for a few days feels wrong. Dead wrong. And still the pump kept pumping.
Forty-two dollars. Still going.
Forty-five dollars. How much gas does this car fricking hold, anyway? I glanced down to see whether I was accidentally filling the back seat with octane. I wasn’t.
Forty-six dollars. Surely that’s enough. Nope.
Forty-seven dollars. Can you hear me now?
Forty-eight dollars. Forty-eight fifty. Forty-nine dollars. And no sign of stopping. I don’t like where this is headed.
I watched the cents place swoosh past — ten, twenty, thirty, and more. There was no hint of a cutoff, no indication my poor car was near sated. At forty-nine dollars and eighty-something cents, I let off the trigger and cut the juice. The tally stood at forty-nine ninety-nine. Teetering, tantalizingly close, to my very first fifty-dollar tank of gas.
To me, the fifty-dollar tank of gas has become a symbol. A message that things have finally gone too far, that somehow this whole ‘industrial revolution’ and supersized consumerized economy might not be working out the way we’d planned. Fifty dollars for a car’s worth of fuel is tough to swallow. Unless that vehicle of yours is packing extra gallons away in a hollow axle or a second tank, dropping half a hundred at your local Shell shouldn’t even be a concern.
Yet there I stood, one thin penny away from the magical five-oh. Oh, what troubling times are these when high-octane fossil fuels cost more per ounce than street-quality crank. Is no method of mass pollution sacred any more?
I stopped to ponder why the fifty-dollar tank of gas matters to me so much, when I’ve blithely ignored other potential economic doomsday signs. The two-dollar vending machine soda, which incenses several of my friends, doesn’t much bother me. Likewise, the sixty-dollar baseball ticket — if I can afford it once or twice a year, great. If not… there’s always TV to watch it on. And the twelve-dollar burrito — which still causes a single angry tear to run down my friend’s cheek, any time we mention it — is just bueno in my book, assuming I’m extra-hungry and have just cashed my paycheck.
So why the gas thing? I have no idea. All I know is that I couldn’t physically bring myself to nuedge the trigger any further on the gas pump today. Ignoring the sexy allure of that nice round five-oh-dot-oh-oh on the display, I left the tab at $49.99, replaced the cap, and drove away. I found my limit. Fifty dollars to gas up is simply not going to fly.
Of course, now I dread what’ll happen in a few years, when prices have skyrocketed and we’re all jacking rocket fuel from the pumps into our hoverbikes. We may hit the ‘fifty-dollar tank of gas’ in the first half-gallon. And those hoverbikes have horrible city MPG, so you just know it’s going to cost a fortune.
Me, I long for the good old days of a few years ago, in that happy place between the oil embargoes of the ’80s and the out-of-kilter supply and demand wonkiness of today. Boy, in the mid-nineties, you could take fifty bucks to the pump and gas up three cars, with change left over to fill the lawnmower tank. Those sure were the days.
Now for the last time, get that goldurned hoverbike the hell offa my lawn! You’ll crease the astroturf with that thing, ya whippersnapper. Sheesh.
Permalink | 1 CommentWell, that was anticlimatic. Not to mention anticlimatalogical.
My softball team had a game scheduled today. Accordingly, I took the usual precautions. I brought an extra T-shirt and shorts to work. I packed my glove, bat, and sneakers in the car. I had my athletic supporter hermetically glommed onto my nether areas. Standard softball stuff, really.
(‘Hermetically glommed’. It’s a sports term. You could look it up.)
Only, the game never happened. Our softball match, scheduled at five, was pre-empted by an especially nasty summer squall raging through the area late in the workday.
And ‘rage’ it did. Around four o’clock, we noticed the skies growing dark and ominous. By four-fifteen, we had a lightning display showcase outside our office windows. The sky was as dark as I’d ever seen it before sundown — inky and dangerous, billowing with malevolent intent.
“You want to see one of those stern sober New England Puritan types completely lose it? Drop a few hailstones on his head, and watch him flail around all higgledy-piggledy.”
We heard of tornadoes nearby, and rumors of hail in New Hampshire. Hail! You might as well rain down the frogs and locusts, because we do not know what the hell to do with hail around here. You want to see one of those stern sober New England Puritan types completely lose it? Drop a few hailstones on his head, and watch him flail around all higgledy-piggledy. That Biblical shit freaks their world, man.
Anyway, it was all very impressive from where I was sitting. Except in our neighborhood, it didn’t actually rain at all. Not one drop, as far as I could tell. And by five o’clock, you would have never known it happened.
They cancelled our softball game, anyway. We asked why, when teh weather had cleared and the fields were dry. I didn’t understand the answer, really. They seemed to be worried the hailstorm would turn around and come back. Something about our softball game ‘angering God’ and ‘incurring the wrath’, something something. I’ve really got to get out of this all-Puritan softball league.
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