So last night, I went downtown to the Flying Saucer to meet Jackie and her friends for a beer (which really turned into three or four given that they had Sierra Nevada IPA on tap). As I crossed Sundance square, I saw three people held hostage on a park bench by a busker badly performing "Just Like Heaven." Then, as I stepped into the crosswalk at Fourth and Main, some asshole in a Mercedes jerked out of his parking spot and through the red light. If not for the techno pumping out of his car, I probably would have been nailed. Of course he wouldn't have noticed, unless the impact had made him drop his cigarette or phone, which he was operating simultaneously. He was obviously commanding the car by the power of sheer concentration, so it's understandable that he didn't notice athe red light, let alone a human being stepping into the sanctioned walking area.
The other thing that happened was that when I got to the bar, I saw this girl I graduated with. I don't think I have ever spoken to her, but with characteristic creepiness, I know that she was a Chi-O, an Ad/PR major, and from Overland Park, KS. Anyway, she was sitting at this table with this dude, and the dude looked like he was in his early-to-mid 30s, and when I saw him, I thought, "Whoa, that dude she's with is old. He must be like, 32 or 33!" and then I realized that 32 or 33 isn't really that much older than someone who is 27 or 28. I never thought I'd feel old until I had kids. The fact that going to the Flying Saucer and buying expensive craft beers was something I did when I was 21 and 22 didn't help anything either.
This is why I shouldn't go out on Sundays.
--The Robo-Pirate
p.s.
I had a beer called Old Scrimshaw, brewed in Fort Bragg, CA. It tasted like your grocers freezer, like licking a Lean Cuisine package.
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3 comments:
1) operating a cellphone and motor vehicle simultaneously should be banned if it takes an act of congress to do it. ("oh shit, he's not gonna stop...i gotta call you back." CRASH!!!!)
2) i am 48. i don't feel old. (i do, however, feel _mortal_...there's a difference.) i have friends who shuffled off this mortal coil when they were a good deal younger than i am now, and i'd be willing to bet that they felt neither old, nor mortal. (silly them.)
3) i've known plenty of ppl who had kids before they were 21 (including one of my own children). i've never asked them whether or not they felt old. i'm imagining that if i did now, their answer would be something like "fuck you, old man." then again, i'd be delighted to be wrong.
had a very similar discussion with my peeps over a few beers just last week. at 26, i'm one of the youngest of my crew, though a lot of my pals had kids and got hitched out of high school. with that came the inevitable jobs, house-buying, groceries, bills, misc. responsibilities, etc. all the while, i was sitting in some stuffy dorm room at some god-awful college contemplating the most economical way to make a gravity bong out of one of those five gallon pretzel barrels.
despite all the outside factors and major responsibilities they faced, even my (as for how i've always viewed them) uber-mature married and baby-havin' peeps said they STILL didn't feel like an adult until sometime after 30. maybe that's a shade different from "feeling" old, i'm not sure, but the MOST important thing to remember out of this whole discussion is cell phones + driving = self-centered ingnorant douchebags. if i had a nickel for every time some verizon-toting motorist clipped or just flat out nailed me when i was still a bike courier, i'd still have a lot of scars.
real quick: i just had a chance to check out your "buffoonery (spell?)" piece on the rafting trip and i was laughing so loud that everyone in my office gave me the kind of look you get when you're laughing very loudly at something. hi-larious!
A secret I wish someone would had of told me, your body starts slowly falling to pieces at 29. Sadly, the over the hill at 30 saying came about for a reason. So live it up now, in a few years your back's gonna hurt after a night out.
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