call it
I went to San Diego for a work conference and barely got off the hotel property, partly because of being busy and partly because we were marooned way out in the bay and you had to cross twelve streets to get just about anywhere. The times I did cross all those bleak and foot-traffic-free streets I was amazed at San Diego’s insane scooter investment. I think I stopped counting at eight different scooter companies, all stupid colors of the stupid rainbow, and literally just piled up and abandoned all over the place. I swear San Diego has more scooters than humans. City planners: COOL IT ON THE SCOOTERS.
One of the times I did leave the hotel, I walked past all those scooters and to a part of San Diego that the city actually touts as something worth seeing: Seaport Village. I apologize if you are a fan but Seaport Village is creepy as hell. I suppose it has a good view of the water and all, but only visit if you are a fan of a “gated community” feel and multiple opportunities to buy “Life’s a Beach” handpainted wineglasses for your bachelorette party. Good lord I could not leave fast enough.
Educational sessions at the conference were good but because I am shy and suck at “networking,” all the socializing and business-talk (ie: wine and complaints) was done with people I already work with. Two work friends and I bought a great deal of wine at the hotel bar one night, including rounds bought by the bartender* because we are cool and a round bought by some weird old guy because (a) we are cool and (b) we were lined up at the bar like so: cute redhead/cute blonde/cute brunette (ME), and he probably thought he had stumbled into some businesswoman porno. We said thanks and toasted him and he did not press for interaction (thankfully), so I did not have to shut anything down. Never forget that you are under no obligation, ever, to talk to anyone. This is Mimi’s #1 Life Tip and it’s shocking how many people have not internalized it.
*The bartender was the kind I do not like, who eavesdrops on your conversation even when he is not directly serving you and then tries to interject with his own uninteresting stories. He found out we are from Chicago and spun a tale of how he loads up on multiple cases of Old Style when he visits Chicago, in order to lug it back to San Diego.
- It was news to me that Old Style is not distributed nationally
- I don’t care
- Dude, why? It’s not that good.
Speaking of shutting dudes down, I got in my first airplane fight!
Mid-flight, the guy across the aisle from me started to watch a documentary about sharks on his iPad, with the sound on and no earbuds. ON A PLANE.
I stared at him pointedly for a while, my whole body turned to make it clear what was happening. He kept glancing over and smiling nervously. After about four of those glances I asked, “Would you like to borrow some earbuds?”
Shark Douche: No, thanks.
Me: I really think you should. Or I could get some for you from the flight attendant.
SD: I’m good.
Me: Or, alternate plan, you could turn off the SOUND and use closed captioning.
SD: Why though?
Me [slowly and through extremely gritted teeth]: Because. I already know. A lot. About sharks.
IT’S IN THE CAN
Aaron and I went to one of the films in the Buster Keaton retrospective at the Music Box (The General) and I had forgotten how strangely modern certain moments of the film are. There’s a whole physical/romantic comedy thing where he’s trying to stuff the female lead in a sack to sneak her somewhere, and a whole thing where he gets frustrated with her ditziness (but not in a mean way, at all). There’s also the deadpan “oh god this again” of Buster Keaton that is pretty much a 1920s Jim Halpert. It made me want to watch more silent films. (At least the good ones. They are not all gems, of course.)
Not silent, but here is one of my favorite Marx Brothers bits of randomness:
I feel due for a strange interlude; maybe I’ll have one this summer. Strange interludes are often in the summer, it seems? Maybe because it’s a bounded stretch of time with weird weather (at least in the Midwest). I remember the high school summer where I worked in the video store all day and watched film versions of Hamlet at night. I was involved in a flirtation with a girl drummer in a local band called Dolphin Rape, I wrote a lot of poems, and I ate a lot of Taco Bell bean burritos and carrot sticks dipped in mustard. What’s the 40-something version of that summer? Tell me and I will make it happen.
—mimi smartypants wants to smile for boring girls, would walk a mile for boring girls.