Sunday, 1 January 2006 04:37 pm
Hippo Gnu Deer
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deckardcanineYesterday saw me amused many times.
1. When I gave blood, my interviewer noted my "full eyebrow," as he called it. Every so often, someone not well acquainted with me will comment on it. Fortunately, the comments have not been insults since grade school. But the interviewer said that in his country, Ethiopia, it was once believed that a full eyebrow signified someone likely to assassinate the emperor. People plucked their eyebrow bridges to avoid getting killed, and pregnant women would pray that their babies didn't have them. Today, however, the prime minister of Ethiopia has a full eyebrow. My interviewer says he was not elected but got the position by force.
So, does the FBI have a file on me yet?
I didn't mind hearing all this, but it did leave me wondering how to respond. I mentioned that back when I worked for CVS, a customer who might have been from elsewhere in sub-Saharan Africa or from the Caribbean said that an eyebrow bridge is a sign of good fortune. The interviewer took interest in the CVS detail, saying that he used to work there and would like to again. That makes him the first employed person I’ve known to be nostalgic for CVS employment. Of course, there must be a bit of monotony in phlebotomy.
2. I and my family were going to see Capote in a theater that’s usually not crowded at all, but it was sold out when we got there. Instead, we saw Brokeback Mountain. The thing we may have liked best about it is that neither of the men is stereotypically effeminate. This is amusing because the last film my family saw in a theater was The Producers.
3. My sister, who returns to college tomorrow for her final trimester, initiated the Desert Island verbal game to pass time in a restaurant. You know: "If you were trapped on a desert island with only one [blank], what would you have it be?" One of her subjects was celebrities. I tried to think of an Olympic swimming champion to help me reach an inhabited land, but that idea got a raspberry. My final choice was Tom Stoppard, which surprised me a tad because I’m only a casual fan of his. Dad, meanwhile, suggested Tom Hanks because he has "experience."
Another item she threw out was books. My immediate thought was The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, but then I realized it didn’t have to be a novel. I ultimately went with an unspecified Norton poetry anthology, but before that I said a dictionary. At which my sister laughed and exclaimed, "You dork!" That’s me, all right.
4. To pass time at home, we played Taboo. If Taboo were a game show, our answers would appear in the calendar series The 365 Stupidest Things Ever Said. When my sister tried to get Mom to think of a checking account, she said you’d use this instead of a credit card. Mom said, "Credit card." But I can hardly say I did better. My dad had to hint at "towel." He started with "Upst–" (which he later said was going to be "upstairs," in reference to where we keep towels) but then tried a different tack: "You grab this when you come out of the water." I was still on "upst" and thought of "upstream" when I heard water. Without further ado, I said, "Salmon." With that, my family turned the minute glass on its side until they had finished laughing.
5. In the final minutes of the New Year, during periods that we didn’t find anything worth hearing on TV, I read from one of my Christmas presents, Richard Roeper’s 10 Sure Signs a Movie Character Is Doomed & Other Surprising Movie Lists. Sometimes the book is dull or disagreeable (Forget Paris is one of the 40 worst films he’s seen?), but for many of the good lists, I like to have the rest of the family try to guess. Our current favorite, however, was completely unguessable to us: the best porn titles based on legitimate movie titles. Ones like On Golden Blonde and Saving Ryan’s Privates had us reeling. The titles were probably the best thing those movies had to offer.
I think my soul darkened just from reading thru the list in one sitting.
1. When I gave blood, my interviewer noted my "full eyebrow," as he called it. Every so often, someone not well acquainted with me will comment on it. Fortunately, the comments have not been insults since grade school. But the interviewer said that in his country, Ethiopia, it was once believed that a full eyebrow signified someone likely to assassinate the emperor. People plucked their eyebrow bridges to avoid getting killed, and pregnant women would pray that their babies didn't have them. Today, however, the prime minister of Ethiopia has a full eyebrow. My interviewer says he was not elected but got the position by force.
So, does the FBI have a file on me yet?
I didn't mind hearing all this, but it did leave me wondering how to respond. I mentioned that back when I worked for CVS, a customer who might have been from elsewhere in sub-Saharan Africa or from the Caribbean said that an eyebrow bridge is a sign of good fortune. The interviewer took interest in the CVS detail, saying that he used to work there and would like to again. That makes him the first employed person I’ve known to be nostalgic for CVS employment. Of course, there must be a bit of monotony in phlebotomy.
2. I and my family were going to see Capote in a theater that’s usually not crowded at all, but it was sold out when we got there. Instead, we saw Brokeback Mountain. The thing we may have liked best about it is that neither of the men is stereotypically effeminate. This is amusing because the last film my family saw in a theater was The Producers.
3. My sister, who returns to college tomorrow for her final trimester, initiated the Desert Island verbal game to pass time in a restaurant. You know: "If you were trapped on a desert island with only one [blank], what would you have it be?" One of her subjects was celebrities. I tried to think of an Olympic swimming champion to help me reach an inhabited land, but that idea got a raspberry. My final choice was Tom Stoppard, which surprised me a tad because I’m only a casual fan of his. Dad, meanwhile, suggested Tom Hanks because he has "experience."
Another item she threw out was books. My immediate thought was The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, but then I realized it didn’t have to be a novel. I ultimately went with an unspecified Norton poetry anthology, but before that I said a dictionary. At which my sister laughed and exclaimed, "You dork!" That’s me, all right.
4. To pass time at home, we played Taboo. If Taboo were a game show, our answers would appear in the calendar series The 365 Stupidest Things Ever Said. When my sister tried to get Mom to think of a checking account, she said you’d use this instead of a credit card. Mom said, "Credit card." But I can hardly say I did better. My dad had to hint at "towel." He started with "Upst–" (which he later said was going to be "upstairs," in reference to where we keep towels) but then tried a different tack: "You grab this when you come out of the water." I was still on "upst" and thought of "upstream" when I heard water. Without further ado, I said, "Salmon." With that, my family turned the minute glass on its side until they had finished laughing.
5. In the final minutes of the New Year, during periods that we didn’t find anything worth hearing on TV, I read from one of my Christmas presents, Richard Roeper’s 10 Sure Signs a Movie Character Is Doomed & Other Surprising Movie Lists. Sometimes the book is dull or disagreeable (Forget Paris is one of the 40 worst films he’s seen?), but for many of the good lists, I like to have the rest of the family try to guess. Our current favorite, however, was completely unguessable to us: the best porn titles based on legitimate movie titles. Ones like On Golden Blonde and Saving Ryan’s Privates had us reeling. The titles were probably the best thing those movies had to offer.
I think my soul darkened just from reading thru the list in one sitting.