So I’m at the deli counter in City Market, waiting my turn to buy broccoli salad. I’m doing my writer-thing, listening to voices in my head and giggling, because my characters are being really funny, and then I remember I need more pistachios, and decide to bail on the deli. As I turn, I see a big guy (taller than me, and practically wearing an “I DO GYM” sign on his arm muscles) pushing a cart with two small children inside, ages 1 and 2, and he looks right at me, smiles in a super-dopey way, and then proceeds to drive his shopping cart into a large display of baked goods, knocks the table over, sends boxes of cookies and muffins flying everywhere, and it is now Absolute Feckin Mayhem in the grocery store. And I am thinking, wow, that wreck was LOUD, and this guy has turned crimson, and the children in his cart are stunned into silence. Along with some other peeps, I take pity on this guy and help to bring order to the Baked Goods Wreckage, looking around me the whole time, wondering if I missed Cindy Crawford – but there is *no sign* of Cindy Crawford at the deli or anywhere else in the Baked Goods Wreckage. She must have fled the scene. Muscle-Man: [clears his throat, while his face = tomato, and let me tell you, cleaning up this mess was all kinds of awkwardsauce] Me: [might as well crack a joke] Well, that was pretty spaz-tastic. I think you get the award for biggest crash in a grocery store. Muscle-Man: [laughs in a relieved way, and stops looking so much like Crimson Tide] Yeah. Me: [holding up a smashed apple pie] Maybe you should buy this one. Muscle-Man: [laughs again, puts the pie in his cart beside the 2-year-old] Yeah. Me: [picking up the last of the cookies] That didn’t take long. Muscle-Man: Too bad this isn’t a movie. Me: Eh? Muscle-Man: Yeah, cause then we’d be on a boat to Mongolia or something, guns blazing. Me: [???] Uh, Mongolia is a landlocked country… you can’t take a boat there. Muscle-Man: Oh, I mean, Hong Kong then. Me: Um, okay. Muscle-Man: I’d at least ask for your number, if this was a movie. Or we’d have coffee or something. Me: Uh, what movie would THIS be? Muscle-Man: You know, those romantic comedy things they show on Valentine’s Day. Me: I don’t know of any romantic comedies where the people run off to Hong Kong, guns blazing, on a boat. That sounds kind of… not really rom-com material. Muscle-Man: Oh. Well, you know what I mean. Me: [???] Actually, I don’t. [a thought strikes me, remembering hummus-man in Natural Grocer] Are you by any chance a personal trainer looking for clients? Muscle-Man: [happy smile] No… but I have a personal trainer, if that’s what you mean. Me: There’s a trainer here looking for a new business partner. Yours could check at the Rec Center, if they’re interested. This guy does his work there. Muscle-Man: Okay, I’ll let him know. Me: [about to flee like Cindy Crawford] Muscle-Man: So you wouldn’t jump on a boat to Hong Kong with me? Me: Right now? With the Umbrella Revolution going on? That place is crazy. I think the last thing I need is to end up in some Chinese prison. Muscle-Man: [gives me a really weird look] Me: [time to scramble. I leave City Market sans pistachios, head to Natural Grocer, but I don’t buy hummus or nuts. I buy apple walnut granola, and go home and drink coffee, and work on Mark of the Pterren, and return to giggling over my characters, because Heaven] Me: [also, I do *not* like the Chinese government, so I’m uber-proud of all those protestors, because going to prison fighting for freedom is super brave and badass, and the Party of Mao can suck it]
Posted on: Thu, 09 Oct 2014 18:37:37 +0000
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