Eric's sister Lisa and her husband Matt visited us in San Francisco this weekend so we did our best to show them all that the Bay Area has to offer.
We did an extended walking tour of the city on Saturday which included a stop in Union Square. Much to our surprise and delight Ben & Jerry's was doing a free ice cream giveaway in Union Square that day and we all got to try their new "Flipped Out!" ice cream bar gimmick product. It looks like a little cup of ice cream and you peel the top off, flip it over into the perfectly sized little paper bowl, and then it is like a brownie sundae thing with brownie on the bottom, ice cream in the middle, and caramel and chocolate on the top. It's actually quite good.*
We sat there enjoying our Flipped Out!'s on the steps in the square along with hundreds of others doing the same. There was a young fellow next to us talking to a friend and he started reading off the nutrition facts from the label.
"14 grams of fat, 380 calories, 4 grams..."
"Hey! Pipe down!" I jokingly shouted at him.
He clearly didn't appreciate my humor; instead, he froze as if I had slapped him. I felt horrible. He was probably 14 years old. He might have been on a "date" with the young woman he was sitting with. I am a mean person.
"I'm sorry - that sounded a little harsh. Please - carry on," I tried to fix it but the damage had been done.
I didn't hear him say another word the whole time we sat there.
*If you've ever wondered if those free giveaways are worth it for companies, consider the amount of airtime I have now given them for free. Well, for free ice cream.
Showing posts with label List of things you don't talk about in polite company. Show all posts
Showing posts with label List of things you don't talk about in polite company. Show all posts
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
God Bless Us, Every One
Dinner day two in Seattle was ten of us - some colleagues, some clients, and a few other interesting characters as well. I have been craving gnocchi for some unexplained reason and was thrilled to learn that this restaurant, in addition to specializing in gluten-free Italian food, also home-makes their own gnocchi from Yukon Gold potatoes, perplexing me briefly for the moment it took me to remember that gnocchi is made from potatoes.
While not focused on my gnocchi, I enjoyed the conversation of the group. We covered everything from sustainability to other aspects of sustainability and I once again made a mental note to actually learn something about this subject area in which I am asserting expertise.
One exchange that particularly tickled me went like this.
Me: If you could wave a magic wand and affect some change in the world in the service of solving global warming, without just directly solving it, what would you do?
DCTML: Are you familiar with "A Christmas Carol" ?
Me: Yes. So...?
DCTML: I would do that.
Me: [blank stare. what happened to all my gnocchi?]
DCTML: I would bring the Ghost of Climate Change Future to visit everyone in the present and show them the impact that they are having, but while there is still time to change their ways.
Isn't that simply delightful?
A colleague of mine then chimed in that fear is actually not the greatest motivator of human behavioral change and that smokers who were given antidepressants were able to quit because they were happier.
So it seems clear that the solution to global warming lies somewhere between reading more Dickens and putting the world on prozac.
While not focused on my gnocchi, I enjoyed the conversation of the group. We covered everything from sustainability to other aspects of sustainability and I once again made a mental note to actually learn something about this subject area in which I am asserting expertise.
One exchange that particularly tickled me went like this.
Me: If you could wave a magic wand and affect some change in the world in the service of solving global warming, without just directly solving it, what would you do?
DCTML: Are you familiar with "A Christmas Carol" ?
Me: Yes. So...?
DCTML: I would do that.
Me: [blank stare. what happened to all my gnocchi?]
DCTML: I would bring the Ghost of Climate Change Future to visit everyone in the present and show them the impact that they are having, but while there is still time to change their ways.
Isn't that simply delightful?
A colleague of mine then chimed in that fear is actually not the greatest motivator of human behavioral change and that smokers who were given antidepressants were able to quit because they were happier.
So it seems clear that the solution to global warming lies somewhere between reading more Dickens and putting the world on prozac.
Sunday, November 16, 2008
Blackberry with the bathwater
The Meet-The-Parents Dinner was to take place at a Mexican restaurant in a mall in the outer East Bay burbs. I drove us all the way out to there and needed a few minutes to check my makeup and hair before going in, so when we arrived I cruised past Guadalajara Grill and parked two lots away out of view to primp privately.
Applying makeup in the rearview mirror with the feeble glow of the overhead light is awkward to begin with, and it is made significantly more awkward when you realize that you have an audience: Eric’s mother, father, aunt and uncle had suddenly appeared about 20 feet in front of us and were all looking at us sitting there in the parked car as they dropped several postcards into the mailbox which we had unwittingly parked in front of.
Rather than wave, smile or behave like a normal person, I snapped off the light, slunk down in my seat and tried to be really really still, because that was clearly how to make the best of this situation.
They hesitated for a moment by the mailbox, and then drifted slowly back towards the restaurant.
“Do you think they saw us?” I whispered needlessly.
“They were looking right at us in a lit car at night.”
“No fair!” I whimpered. “That’s not supposed to happen!”
We joined them in the restaurant a few minutes later. No one said a word about it.
Once we’d gotten past the handshake/hug fake-out greeting, dinner was actually as close to fun as I think it could have been. Dinner conversation never made it around to unicorns but we did spend an inordinate amount of time discussing mice. Eric works with mice, his dad has had some hilarious run-ins with mice, his aunt is afraid of mice and told no fewer than 17 consecutive and uniformly boring stories about her experiences with mice, and then Eric’s mother, expertly facilitating the conversation, turned to me and said “Everyone seems to have a mouse story. Do you?”
I do. It’s a story I usually tell as a whodunit thriller set in my Philadelphia apartment that starts with my discovery that, mysteriously, there are large holes in the crotches of all of my panties in my laundry basket. The story explores possible roommate passive aggression and fabric-dissolving diseases before revealing that the culprit is a mouse, and the little pervert has eaten his way through my dirty underwear.
Better judgment prevails. I choose not to upstage Eric’s aunt: I follow suit and tell another boring mouse story that goes nowhere. Eric, familiar with the Philly mouse mystery, looks visibly relieved.
And so we made it through dinner without any major gaffes.
The Denouement
It may provide some insight into my overall state of mind that then the next morning I accidentally threw my Blackberry out of our fourth story window.
I was hurriedly doing a last straightening of the apartment before heading off to work for an early meeting and I noticed that the dining room tablecloth had a few crumbs on it. I figured I would shake it out the window a bit to get it cleaned up, as we always do, and so I gathered it up into a bundle, extended my arms out the window and shook it out. I immediately knew something had gone wrong when I heard the crack of something significantly more substantial than a crumb hitting the window below ours. My Blackberry, shattered, lay strewn not just around the street below but several key chunks had ended up in the open trash cans waiting to be collected, it being Friday trash morning. I opted against dumpster-diving and, in a stroke of extraordinary luck, the Verizon woman was able to treat the accidental death and dismemberment of my phone as a warranty claim and handed me a brand new phone on the spot. This may yet be a good weekend after all, I thought.
Applying makeup in the rearview mirror with the feeble glow of the overhead light is awkward to begin with, and it is made significantly more awkward when you realize that you have an audience: Eric’s mother, father, aunt and uncle had suddenly appeared about 20 feet in front of us and were all looking at us sitting there in the parked car as they dropped several postcards into the mailbox which we had unwittingly parked in front of.
Rather than wave, smile or behave like a normal person, I snapped off the light, slunk down in my seat and tried to be really really still, because that was clearly how to make the best of this situation.
They hesitated for a moment by the mailbox, and then drifted slowly back towards the restaurant.
“Do you think they saw us?” I whispered needlessly.
“They were looking right at us in a lit car at night.”
“No fair!” I whimpered. “That’s not supposed to happen!”
We joined them in the restaurant a few minutes later. No one said a word about it.
Once we’d gotten past the handshake/hug fake-out greeting, dinner was actually as close to fun as I think it could have been. Dinner conversation never made it around to unicorns but we did spend an inordinate amount of time discussing mice. Eric works with mice, his dad has had some hilarious run-ins with mice, his aunt is afraid of mice and told no fewer than 17 consecutive and uniformly boring stories about her experiences with mice, and then Eric’s mother, expertly facilitating the conversation, turned to me and said “Everyone seems to have a mouse story. Do you?”
I do. It’s a story I usually tell as a whodunit thriller set in my Philadelphia apartment that starts with my discovery that, mysteriously, there are large holes in the crotches of all of my panties in my laundry basket. The story explores possible roommate passive aggression and fabric-dissolving diseases before revealing that the culprit is a mouse, and the little pervert has eaten his way through my dirty underwear.
Better judgment prevails. I choose not to upstage Eric’s aunt: I follow suit and tell another boring mouse story that goes nowhere. Eric, familiar with the Philly mouse mystery, looks visibly relieved.
And so we made it through dinner without any major gaffes.
The Denouement
It may provide some insight into my overall state of mind that then the next morning I accidentally threw my Blackberry out of our fourth story window.
I was hurriedly doing a last straightening of the apartment before heading off to work for an early meeting and I noticed that the dining room tablecloth had a few crumbs on it. I figured I would shake it out the window a bit to get it cleaned up, as we always do, and so I gathered it up into a bundle, extended my arms out the window and shook it out. I immediately knew something had gone wrong when I heard the crack of something significantly more substantial than a crumb hitting the window below ours. My Blackberry, shattered, lay strewn not just around the street below but several key chunks had ended up in the open trash cans waiting to be collected, it being Friday trash morning. I opted against dumpster-diving and, in a stroke of extraordinary luck, the Verizon woman was able to treat the accidental death and dismemberment of my phone as a warranty claim and handed me a brand new phone on the spot. This may yet be a good weekend after all, I thought.
Thursday, November 13, 2008
List of things you don't talk about in polite company
I'm meeting Eric's parents tonight for the first time.
Let me be totally honest here for a moment: part of me thinks "Of course they'll like me. I'm extremely likeable" and then there's another voice that reminds me that our belief systems are almost completely diametrically opposite and they would likely disapprove of most everything I have ever done or thought should they ever learn of it.
In the interest of everyone having a good time, there are a few topics that are off-limits:
Let me be totally honest here for a moment: part of me thinks "Of course they'll like me. I'm extremely likeable" and then there's another voice that reminds me that our belief systems are almost completely diametrically opposite and they would likely disapprove of most everything I have ever done or thought should they ever learn of it.
In the interest of everyone having a good time, there are a few topics that are off-limits:
- God, Jesus, morality, religion, etc
- Sex and masturbation*
- Politics
- The economy
- Major US automakers and pension plans thereof
- And pretty much everything that happened in my life prior to the present moment
My plan is to stay focused on topics that can't possibly be offensive to anyone:
- The weather
- Whatever it is we are eating
- Unicorns
So it should be a pretty lively conversation.
*You'd think this would be an obvious topic to shy away from when meeting your boyfriend's parents, however Eric did bring up masturbation not once but twice with my mother when he met her for the first time in Chicago a few weeks ago, so I think it needs to be explicitly mentioned on the list.
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