my big fat yap

Yesterday I inadvertently dissed the counter guy at McDonalds. It was a subtle diss, and it may have escaped his notice, but I immediately felt like a bitch for it. I had gotten a vanilla cone (quick parenthetical editorial:: plain cones, I have ruled, are the very best cone style. Not that sugar cones or waffle cones are yucky –they certainly are not—but plain cones are the best. Y’know the clinching factor—it’s the grid section at the base of the the cone, where the ice cream seeps down into and you wind up with perfect cone > ice cream integration. The only edge that waffle cones have is that they hold a mega buttload of ice cream…but I’m going to rule in favor of plain cones nevertheless) and he was doling out my change. He paused in the middle of this transaction and says “Have you seen the new penny??” He says this all eager-like—either I have the look of an avid numismatist or he is one…or both. Anyways, he shows me one of these coins (looks like this ) and I respond “ Looks like a seal for Justice League” And he said “That’s what I said!!” In retrospect, I see that I could have, and should have, let him have the last word here. But for some odd reason, I felt it incumbent upon me to produce a response of some kind. So I said “OH.” It’s not so much what I said as how I said it. In that singular syllable, I very clearly conveyed how I felt about our newfound concord. Disappointment could be heard, certainly, but the more discerning ear could pick out the more nuanced undertones of "ohmilord If I am mentally simpatico with this schlomo than my q rating has gotta be lower than I thought..SUB-subterranean" -brand disappointment. As soon as I heard the "Oh" I felt bad about it. I'd not intended to be a snotty bitch. But there were no reparations to be made.. . one of those situations where further discourse would just botch things even more. What do you say? "Oh, I didn't mean to infer via my tone that you are some kind of dork loser. Oh, NO, sir!!" I had the good sense to shut my trap at that juncture. I grabbed my cone, and my .17 cents and bolted.

Maybe it was due to yesterday's accidental snobbery that I found myself so chatty today. I think, more often than not, I keep to myself. But every so often I surprise myself with these days where I feel like blasting total strangers with a max dose of wit and charm. I think the outcome of that Psych 101 quiz I took many moons ago (CSC freshman year, specifically) was on the mark..I am an ambivert. Well, I think I part of the reason I was extra-amiable towards the W B Mason sales rep I met with was that he was young, apparently single*, and not too shabbly aesthetically. But I had to be making amends for yesterday when I opted to chat up the unicycle guy in the parking lot. There was no romantic ulterior motive there, I assure you. Though there is something liberating in having a unicyclist in your parking lot to chat up. I made this corny joke , which he didn't even get , yet not only did I not have any corny-joke regret, there was none of that uncertainty that naturally accompanies talking to strangers. Not that I'm shy...but if you totally don't know a person, there's no way of knowing if striking up an unsolicited convo is going to evoke a mean "why the fuck you talkin' to me??" type reaction. But dude was on a unicycle for chrissakes. I don't think surly people ride unicycles, and besides: isn't riding a unicycle in a public area a sort of invitation for comment anyway??

*this means I spotted no wedding ring. But really you can't go on that as an indicator of fair game anymore. This dude--a ring-free dude-- at Staples who was answering my questions on a laptop uttered the words "my fiancee" about a dozen times.. I mean, we were looking at a laptop that was the same brand as the one HIS FIANCEE owns and he was talking of his personal experience of the brand. So there *was* context. But still, his verbage...it just seemed like he used the phrase excessively...like he could've trotted it out there initially and then proceeded with the easier pronoun "she". But he said it quite alot and that made me suspect that I had been eyeing him like a fattie looks at a Twinkie. I very well mighta been.