the shoe-lace incident

My friend went on this date last night and she came back from it alone (which tells you something) but in recalling the events of the evening, she divided the date into 2 parts: before she realized he was wearing two different color shoelaces and after she realized he was wearing two different color shoelaces.

Before the incident, things were going pretty well, they were at some cute coffee/pastry place, she thought his pattern-baldness was endearing, he even touched her hand out of nowhere, and according to her, “It didn’t feel weird, it felt safe.” (these are her words!)

But then she drops her spoon and while grabbing it looks under the table at his shoes: and yeah, the world changed, of course. “One green. One red,” she whispers back and forth in disbelief. “One green. One red. Like Christmas colors? Holy Christ.” Ok, she’s been under the table too long, she has to pull things together.

She picks her head up and peers across to him: but he doesn’t look the same. “Gosh, was he really that bald a minute ago?” He smiles at her (whoa is that a crown?), “Everything ok?” he cups his hand over hers again, but this time it doesn’t feel safe, it feels clammy and dangerous. She fakes an itch on the back of her neck just to get out from under his thick paws. (Oh man he really needs to cut his fingernails). One green. One red. “Who was this guy?” her mind was racing, “Was he a clown?” “What other conventions does he break cause he thinks he’s super-eclectic?” And it just went more and more downhill after that.

But I assured her (while cupping her hand in mine) that it was better that she found out about his shoelace-habit early on, God forbid she’s married to this guy and he breaks out those shoes: one green, one red. Talk about a dealbreaker, right? Argh!

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Can someone please remind me what the etiquette is when a person clearly has a piece of food on his face cause, the other day, I’m eating lunch at this soul food place with some coworkers, one guy orders corn-on-the-cob, so yeah, you can do the math. I tell the guy when I notice he has a kernel of corn just above his upper lip, “Hey, you have a little piece of something over there,” and he gets visibly offended, “Yeah I know, I was about to wipe my face, calm down there.” All my coworkers laughed, I felt pretty embarrassed, all because I was trying to do the right thing and avoid his embarrassment of having food on his face! But instead it got all twisted, you know, and it was sort of implied that I was in love with this guy or something cause if I noticed the corn on his face quickly, I must have been watching his face pretty intently (that’s ridiculous coworker logic for you!)

Things have blown over at work but for the time-being, I’ve been on a courtesy-hiatus when it comes to this: now if I see anything on anyone’s face that shouldn’t be there, I keep my mouth shut. Let someone else point it out cause I’m done. Just know that other people may use the fact that you have food all over your face against you (cause it is pretty funny). They might say something snooty like, “Dude, you’re all over the place,” or “Ever heard of a napkin, Einstein?” Whew! It’s a brutal world, for sure.

sizzling dishes

I always thought it was slightly funny: you’re at a Chinese restaurant or something, drinking tea, eating fried rice, everything’s pretty mundane, and then all of a sudden the waiter comes out carrying a sizzling dish and WOW, a hush falls over the entire place, you know, everyone’s wide-mouthed, little whispers of “ooh, it’s sizzling” and “I wonder what she ordered?” are in the air, and we all just watch super-intently as the waiter delivers the dish (presumably from God himself) to the lucky table-recipient.

As you may or may not expect, my mom just loooooves sizzling dishes.  Loves em.   Yeah I’m pretty sure she’d order anything as long as it’s sizzling, an old shoe maybe. “It’s a new twist on a old favorite!” she might say, slurping down a shoelace like it was spaghetti. And I’m all hiding my face of course cause it’s embarrassing, right, when someone at your table orders a sizzling dish and suddenly all eyes are on you.  That’s why just to be safe I ask the waiter, “Is this dish sizzling?” and usually his eyes would light up, “Well it could be” and I just shake my head, “No thank you,” and they get sad, of course, but they can just sue me, really, is how I feel about it.

Tiny addendum: The only thing worse than sizzling in my mind is when it’s someone’s birthday at your table (or maybe yours God forbid) and just when you’re all having some serious-esque conversation about abortion-rates, whathaveyou, the waiters start stamping out of the kitchen in a line wearing awkward grins, holding a cupcake, clapping and wailing, “Happy Birthday to you!” like it’s gym-class (people from other tables start clapping along, multiple babies are crying, it can all be a real mess. for real). Don’t you think?