Well well well—how is your Christmas prep going? I finally made it to California, and have been Christmas shopping / Christmas prepping for the past three days. It’s going pretty well, actually, with the exception of yesterday, when a thing so absurd happened, this is really the only place I can think of to write about it.
Oh, before I really get myself started, I should tell you that my YA Novel, The Dirt
In other (yet equally awesome) book news, my friend and client Shannon Tassava's book has also just come out, it is very good, and I think you definitely should get it if you're a Stay at Home Mom (or know one who is getting a Nook or an iPad for Christmas).
Here is the cover and the link. Super-cute, right? It's called "The Essential Stay at Home Mom Manual: How to Have a Wondrous Life Amidst Kids and Chaos." She's a great writer, so I am positive you will like the book. I'm going to make another big announcement about this book on the 26th, so I just thought I would get you up to speed now.
So—ok, yesterday I was at Starbucks, waiting around for a conference call I had to get on, before meeting up with family members to go do some more shopping. I’m just saying that to contextualize this absurdity, so you would know why I was sitting there, and why I didn’t move right away. Remember, my computer is charging and I’m waiting for someone to call me, so I’m kind of stuck there, at least for ten minutes.
This guy sits down next to me who is clearly (shall we say) residentially challenged, but he’s a nice enough guy, and he starts chatting with me. First we talk about the weather—he’s from somewhere in the Midwest where they have tornadoes, so he likes California better. Then we move on to the impact of tornados on refrigerators and other things containing Freon, and this discussion is kind of losing me, but I’m smiling and nodding, and eyeing my computer so I can get it as charged as possible before my phone rings and I have to run outside to take the call (because I am so not one of those people who would do a whole conference call at Starbucks, and besides, I find it very annoying when people get on conference calls who clearly ARE at Starbucks, and you can’t hear anyone for all the background noise).
I must have spaced out of the conversation with all of the battery and phone watching, because when I tuned back in, he was talking about childhood stuff, and trying to figure out how old I was so he could determine if we shared similar childhood experiences (I think).
I hope I am adequately setting the scene for you, because after I say what he said next, you are going to be laughing too hard to remember anything else.
Oh yes, because the next thing out of “Homeless Perhaps On Purpose As a Political Statement” guy’s mouth is: we probably grew up at the same time—what are you, like—fifty?”
FIFTY, people. HE GUESSED THAT I WAS FIFTY YEARS OLD. Fif-ty. 50. Five Oh. FIFTY.
Let’s let that one sink in for a moment, shall we?
Dude, I’m not saying I look 30 years old, but I MOST CERTAINLY DO NOT LOOK FIFTY, and it is nine hundred kinds of inappropriate for you to guess a woman's age, and for that guess to be more than a decade in the wrong direction, is it not?! Also—I’m guessing this guy is single, because no one’s ever told him that when in doubt, LOW-BALL a woman’s age, or don’t even mention it. Or, maybe he WAS low-balling, and he thought I was really 75 but looked freakishly young? Who knows.
This is when I start laughing at him, tell him never to guess anyone’s age ever again because he is very bad at this game, and ask if he would next care to guess my weight, since clearly nothing is off limits. I may also have told him to get a shovel because he was going to need to dig himself out before I would listen to him anymore.
Then he says “No, I don’t want to guess your weight—you look fine.”
That’s when my conference call started, so I quickly packed up and left even though my computer wasn’t all the way charged, even though I would truly have loved to hear what came out of his mouth next.
FIFTY, people. FIFTY. I'm going to just leave you to chew on that, and go back to wrapping my Christmas presents.
FIFTY.
