Honest Conversation Is Overrated
Actual Human Interactions Witnessed Or Overheard
In Twentieth And Twenty-First Century America
In Twentieth And Twenty-First Century America
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When I met Zuzu, eight years ago, she was desperate for information about me. She quizzed me on exes, and jobs, and family, and blah blah blah. She asked me about my SAT scores, and I told her the truth. I got a 1510 when I took my SATs as a sophomore. My guidance counselor tried to persuade me to start reading through old SATs to learn more about them, in the hopes that I would retake the test, and get a perfect 1600. But I knew that the 1510 was a fluke, and I staunchly refused to retake the test.
Zuzu's son, Lot, has recently taken the new SATs. There's a new scoring system now, but there's a way to average them out to figure out what your score would be if you took it under the old system. His score would have been a 1500. Zuzu remarks how amazing this is, given the quality of education Lot's received in the public school system. He has revisionist history teachers who make up statistics to suit their needs, a calculus teacher who can't do simple addition, and an English teacher who confuses the words "alliteration" and "allusion", and talks about how one of her friends recently wrote a fantastic autobiography about William Shakespeare. This leads to me ranting about the various stupid people I've recently encountered. I probably go on for about fifteen minutes listing mundane people I've encountered on the street, my landlady who frequently calls to remind me what her name is and that she's my landlady, and the various geniuses I've met through poetry who can't so much as operate velcro sneakers. The three of us decide that we are much more intelligentier than your average humannoyed. After dinner, I head to the local liquor store (all the non-local ones being so very far away), and ask the man behind the counter for a Jack Daniels, pointing in the whiskey's general direction. He asks "Would you like a pint, or a half pint?" To which I reply "Whichever is bigger." I'm really glad I didn't retake my SAT.
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I've been spending a great deal of time at my grandmother's house the last few weeks.As a result, I keep missing garbage day. There are about four full trash bags on my back porch. I made it a point to be home Thursday night, so I could put said trash bags out. I failed to remember. But I did wake up early Friday, to the sound of what, I assumed, was the garbage truck, so I hopped out of bed and on to the arm of the couch, in order to look out the window and see if I had time to get the garbage out. Before I got a clear look, my right leg slid down the arm of the couch, and inbetween the couch's frame and the arm. Ow. Ow. Ow. Ow.
I tried to pull my leg out of the couch, but my ankle was slightly too large. Ow. Shit. Ow. I pulled and pulled and ow. I started seriously considering dialing 911. The problem being, my cell phone was on the other side of the room, and I was naked. Even if I dragged the couch behind me to the other side of the room, and reached my cell phone and my laundry, there was no way I could get any pants or shorts or boxers or anything around my right foot, what with it being inside the fucken ow couch. I reached into the dirty laundry pile, threw on a sweatshirt, and wrapped a blanket around my waist. Then, I called Divine's name until she woke up. "WHAT DO YOU WANT?" She called. "I need a knife or something. I'm stuck in the couch." "What?" I explained myself. She brought a knife. I cut into the arm of the couch and removed all the cushions. My ankle was stuck between a wooden slat in the arm, and a very pokey metal frame. Whenever I tried to pull my leg up or down, the metal frame would dig into the right side of my ankle, and the wood would scrape against the left side. Ow. Fuck. Ow. "Should I call 911?" She asked. I had now been standing on one foot for about ten minutes, with a blanket wrapped around my waist, and a sweatshirt on. If the paramedics showed up, I would, clearly, die of shame. "Yes. I think you should call 911." "I'm going to use your phone." She said. "I don't want to waste my minutes." I. Hate. Her. Ten minutes later, the paramedics showed up. My leg was still in the couch. I said "Just wanted to make sure you had a story to tell when you got home tonight." "This is nothing." The taller woman said, "The last guy--" The other paramedic interrupted. "Don't tell him. Then he's going to think we're going to tell the next person about him." "You aren't?" I asked. After taking a look at my leg, the inside of the couch, and the rest of my room, the taller paramedic decided she'd use some of the scrap wood left over from my busted doorframe and wedge it between the arm and the frame to get my leg loose. Unfortunately, every time she pried the wood in, the frame dug further into my, ow, ankle. "I don't know what else we can try." She said. So they called the fire department. Fifteen minutes later, four firefighters enter my bedroom. My leg had been in the couch for about forty-five minutes. I was still just wearing the blanket, the sweatshirt, and the couch. And I was still standing on one foot. Three of the four firefighters were of normal to above average intelligence. One of them had the intellectual capacity of a cactus with blunt head trauma. He was the one in charge. Every time he wanted to look at the situation, he'd lean his full weight against the bottom of the couch, squeezing my, ow, ankle even tighter into the couch cunt. "Please." I said. "Please don't lean on the couch that way. Could you lean on the arm, maybe?" The paramedics move all the non-couch furniture, and my laundry, and my books to the other side of the room. The asshole firefighter, again, leaned on the, ow, couch. "The frame is metal." He said. Fucken genius. "If we tried to cut through it, it'd spark like shit." I grimace as he, ow, leaned down again. "Good thing the fire department is here, then, huh?" "I guess we could saw through the wooden beam in the arm, but it's probably going to destroy the couch." "I think the couch has it coming." I said. So a firefighter went out to the truck, which must have been parked in Saskatchewan, given how long it took him to retrieve the battery powered saw. The battery powered saw which hadn't been charged. I had been stuck in the couch for over an hour. The saw didn't work. Fucken Genius asked me "Do you have any electrical outlets?" "No." I said. "I'm Amish. The TV and the computer run on hand cranks." The taller paramedic and the other firefighters chuckled. Fucken Genius leaned on the, ow, couch. Asshole. So another firefighter retrieved an electric saw, plugged it in, and sawed a beam in the arm of the couch. My leg popped right out. No bruise. No swelling. "We're going to have to take you to the hospital to check it out." The not as tall paramedic said, as the firefighters departed. "No." I said. "I'm okay." And I hopped up and down on the leg that had been caught in the couch. I really was okay. So I signed a waiver explaining that I was stupid to not go to the hospital, but then again, I'd gotten my leg caught in a couch, so I was clearly not qualified for MENSA anyway. Also, I missed the garbage truck. |
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