Author: maggeh

Sara’s Dentist Appointment

“They had my mouth all stretched open, and my lips were cracking, so they kept putting Vaseline on, but it would dry out and get all stiff. They would just slap more on, like everywhere, without looking where they were putting it. I was laying there thinking, this is basically my personal hell, my mouth stretched open and my lips cracking as strangers apply Vaseline without discretion all over my face.”

Overheard: Entrapment

Scenario: At our favorite Irish pub, the bartender is crying. She has just unwittingly served an underage informant and is receving a citation when we enter. The officer leaves, and for the next hour, the bar is abuzz with the news.

Bartender: (distraught)I thought she was older than me! She looked just like you, Lisa. Like your age. She was all dressed up and she had, like, a work case, like she just got off work.

Barfly 1: That’s dirty pool, man.

Barfly 2: It’s entrapment.

Lisa: Why the hell would the girl agree to do that?

Barfly 2: They probably got her on something.

Barfly 1: Armed robbery or something.

Barfly 2: Exactly.

Barfly 1: They didn’t Mirandize you. You’re innocent! They didn’t give you your Miranda Rights. Right?

Barfly 2: No. They didn’t arrest her. It was just a citation.

Barfly 1: But she admitted guilt. They can’t use that in court. This is San Francisco, man. This is a set up.

Bartender: (Tearing up.) I know. (She begins to phone other bars in the area to warn them that they should be especially strict about carding tonight.)

Barfly 1: This is how we spend our tax money? To catch criminals like you.

Bartender: Yeah.

Barfly 2: You’re so bad.

Bartender: This is like the bar where old people go!

That Kind of Day

At an outdoor cafe, my bag rests near my chair. A woman walks by with her dog on a leash. She sees a neighbor and stops to chat next to my table. The dog wanders over to my backpack, sniffs it disinterestedly, lifts his leg, and pees.

Boulder, Colorado

We arrive at the car rental agency and they only have white cars. This is a problem because Bryan will not drive a white car. They remind him of his parents’ cars. We wait, in the cold, while the car rental guy retrieves a beige car. This, apparently, is sufficiently psychologically comforting. We settle in.

Me:What’s this barbecue implement doing in the back seat?

Bryan: You’re kidding. You’ve never seen an ice scraper?

Me: Where would I have seen an ice scraper?

Bryan: I don’t know. Movies? National Geographic?

Me: Right. What movie prominently featured an ice scraper?

Bryan: When Harry Met Sally.

Me: When?

Bryan: When they were scraping the ice off the windshield.

Me: That never happened.

Bryan: Okay. Fargo.

Me: When?

Bryan: When William H. Macy is scraping the windshield and he starts freaking out and beating the car because he knows they’re gonna catch him.

Me: … Are you enjoying your beige car?

Overheard: Respect on the N

Scenario: The N Line is packed and quiet. Passengers are jammed against each other, the windows, the doors.

Characters: Two men in their early thirties. They are strangers.

Guy 1: Man!

Guy 2: (Gives a low whistle.)

Guy 1: I saw someone assassinated in London. I have a healthy respect for crowds.

Guy 2: (Raises eyebrows, refrains from eye contact.)

Guy 1: Oh yeah. POP! Then the guy just took off running.

Guy 2: (Shifts uncomfortably.)

Guy 1: Respect the crowds.

Discovery

In the city, sometimes you’ll smell something in the air, and you’re not quite sure what it is. At first you think it’s a savory smell–Chinese food, or maybe pizza. Then, when you inhale deeply, you realize it’s the stink of something profoundly rotten, so rotten that you can taste it in the back of your throat.

I hate surprises.

Language Acquisition

An excerpt from Fussy, where Mrs. Kennedy is having a conversation with her little boy, Jackson:

“Me, driving: You know what? I think I’m lost.

Jackson, in back seat: Well, I’m not lost on my side.

Me: Seriously, I don’t know where the fuck we are.

Jackson: Don’t say that.

Me: Sorry.

Jackson: If you say words like that to me, I’ll learn them.

Me: Sorry, sorry.”