Neuroses Numbers 471 and 582.73

Let us begin with #471: You and I leave competing Target checkouts at the same time, you pushing a cart full of cereal and body wash, me wielding two Diet Coke-laden bags in each hand. You approach. I, heading for an alternate exit, approach you. You weave, foraging for your keys rather than paying attention to your place in space. You nearly knock me into my 12-year-old cashier.

Scenario 1: You continue on without acknowledging me or my 12,000 ounces of soda product.

Scenario 2: You giggle and tell me you're sorry, making a joke about not being sure you should drive home.

Outcome for Scenario 1: Because I am my mother's daughter, I don't pow you in the kisser, but I force an exasperated "Achhhhh" as you pass. I loudly observe to my shopping companion that people are "SO RUDE THESE DAYS" and she and I come up with at least five hypotheses in response to "WHAT WAS SHE THINKING?!?" I later have a dream that I key your Chevy Malibu while you cry, but not before dumping out your six boxes of Froot Loops onto the filthy pavement. I wake up smiling. I later achieve full glory by cutting you off in real life traffic while screaming something exceedingly lame like, "HOW DO YOU LIKE DEM APPLES, BE-OTCH?!?" Then I blog about it.

Outcome for Scenario 2: You and I share a laugh, a high five, and a roll of cinnamon Mentos.

I actually thought this through. In the Target today. I'm not right.

Now for 582.73. I am infuriated by stealing. When kids take soda and candy and condoms from stores, I want to grab them by their Pleasantville ears and have them spread their contraband on the counter while pouting and saying in black and white, "Geez, Ms. Likey!" I find it uncomfortable when I witness coworkers pilfering paper clips and Post-It notes for use on their NCAA pool sheets. But I will take, from anywhere and at anytime, any periodical that strikes my fancy.

Most recently I secured a rather stellar Good Housekeeping from my salon.* During the highlighting process I discovered a well-written article on anxiety. Eh. Take it or leave it. Under the dryer I noted a fantabulous pesto recipe that I will never, as long as I live, actually reproduce in my own kitchen, but HAD TO HAVE, PEOPLE. During the haircut I found a lengthy interview with some celebrity with whom I identify because of her difficult breakup/teen acne/oppressive beauty. By the blowdry I was sweating profusely due to my overconcoction of a plan to fold the magazine under my arm, all the while covering my tracks with a hastily-assembled toilet paper cast and a stealth diversion consisting of, "is that a spider on your chin?" to the now-hysterical receptionist.

Don't even get me started on the time that, as the anesthesiologist asked me to count down from 10, that I made her promise not to confiscate the Self I had taken from the waiting room. I couldn't have been more happy to see it safe and sound. After the colonoscopy was over.




*naturally, it shall remain nameless. I watch Court TV. I know how this could go down.