The Other Mystery

In my last post, I touched upon the fact that I have this other mystery going on. THIS IS THE STORY OF THAT MYSTERY.

So the other day I got the following super generic text message from a Wyoming telephone number: ‘What up’.

Naturally, I responded, ‘Who’s this?’

Response: ‘Rob’.

Again, naturally, I assumed that it was the Rob with whom I made acquaintance this summer while in Wyoming (Actually I met two Robs, but only one whom I would ever really expect to hear from). The Rob that I wouldn’t consider it odd to hear from, however, would probably not say ‘what up’, but that didn’t strike me as odd at the time. What did strike me as odd was that this was a Wyoming number. So I asked what was up with that.

I got back: ‘I live here…’

I replied: ‘Oh no way! When did you leave Kentucky?’

I got back: ‘You must have me confused with sum 1 else, I’ve lived here for 10 years!’

AND HERE BEGINS THE MYSTERY.

So I stare at that for a minute, and probably I should have just not replied, but as I said in my last post, I hardly ever get to deal with mysteries, for good or for ill, and as result I can’t help meddling when I get one (unlike the Scooby Doo kids, who meddle despite [or maybe because of] the staggering frequency with which they are confronted by mysteries).

So I ask, ‘Which Rob are you?’

And get back, ‘From Walmart in Cody’.

I’m aware of the Walmart in Cody, yes. I used to get my paychecks cashed there before my employers began a direct deposit program. Also I purchased a compass that sticks to my windshield there and ‘High Plains Drifter’ on DVD. Also, once when I was at least 5/8 in the bag I bought 2 pounds of beads, a sun dress, a mango, a lamp, and a phone card there. On at least two occasions I filled a prescription there. But met a fellow named Rob? Sorry, not ringing any bells.

I asked how he got my number and he replied ‘I worked on your truck a few times over the summer in the tire and lube express’.

Oh okay, Rob. Now I can completely understand why, in late February, more than seven months after you originally ‘met’ me, you might think it’s 1) all right to send me a text message and B) expect me to know who you are.

I sent back: ‘Oh right on’

He replied: ‘Cool you remember me?’

To spare his feelings I replied: ‘Yeah, I think so.’

So the next time I’m on my high horse talking about how I don’t lie anymore, you can all remind me that I definitely have legit fibbed at least once in recent memory. Because I do not remember Rob. Not even a little bit. The only mechanic I remember from my several trips to the Walmart Tire and Lube Express (twice for oil changes, as I did manage to put well over 3,000 miles on that truck in the 2 months that I had it in Wyoming, and once for a fuel system cleaning) was a woman named Stormy. I remember her for several reasons. 1) Her name was Stormy- which in addition to being a pretty unique name also made me think about The French Connection, because I thought maybe that was Detective Buddy Russo’s nickname (it’s actually Cloudy) 2) she’s a lady mechanic, which is not something I see enough of, and 3) the first time I went for my oil change, when she was asking me the vehicle year, make, model, et cetera she said, ‘this is a Chevy, right?’ and I said ‘Ford, actually.’ Totally calmly because it’s a mistake that anyone could make, but she got all flustered and was like ‘Oh my God I’m so sorry!’ probably because she has to deal with American car enthusiasts (read: rednecks) all day who would almost certainly kerfuff about that sort of mistake, being especially partial to one make or the other. But even were I to receive a text from Stormy, whom I remember with definite clarity, I would still think it was weird. Rob, of whom I have no memory whatsoever? Even weirder! Also that he listed working on my truck as a reason for having my number, not the reason I should know who he is. As it was always Stormy who checked me in and took my phone number, I have to assume that he went fairly unethically out of his way to obtain this information. Like how Coach Riley went unethically out of his way to get star player and notorious cake-eater Adam Banks to play for the Hawks, when really, he should have been playing for the District 5 team (THE MIGHTY DUCKS) all along–a blunder perhaps good enough to fool all the other pee-wee hockey coaches in mid 1990s Minneapolis, but not a shrewd lawyer like Gordon Bombay. It never pays to leave Gordon Bombay’s impressive legal track record out of your calculations (just ask Coach Riley or the varsity team from D3).

Mighty Ducks references aside, it was totally weird to take down that number in the first place, and then further weird to let me know that that’s how he came upon it.

I asked why he thought to text me.

He responded, ‘Thought it’d be cool to get to know a new person’.

Touche, Rob. I guess on some level, this is always a cool thing, but I ought to have mentioned before that this whole shenanigan festival was taking place well after 8pm, a time by which I have almost always shotskied myself into bed, and on this particular night I was down with the hellish cold of which I have previously made mention, and so was especially not inclined to continue with what I have always found to be an exhausting pastime (texting); in fact, I’m super impressed I managed to get as many out as I did, given my inability to text faster than one or two words per minute. This last text I opted to ignore, because I just couldn’t even wrap my sleepy Nyquil-logged mind around it. Rob was having none of that. After waiting about 5 minutes for a reply he further ventured: ‘What do you say?’

I felt that after carrying on with this nonsense parade for so long, I ought to at least give him some closure, so I wrote back, ‘Listen, bro, I’m sorry I’m not more conversational right now but I’m sick and mostly asleep. Have a good night though, man.’

I get back, ‘Oh sorry hope you feel better! I’ll hit you up tomorrow then.’

Godammit, Rob.

True to his word, he totally texted me the other day with a cheery, ‘Me again!’ that I had no qualms ignoring. Unfortunately for Rob, by the time I got that text I was already dealing with the Dang Surprised Mystery, and I couldn’t very well deal with two mysteries at once (it never rains but it pours AM I RIGHT?!). The Rob Mystery really boils down to one question- Why does some one who never actually met me, only really met my vehicle (which is probably true of hundreds–nay thousands–because this vehicle is 31 years old) think that it’s all right to unscrupulously obtain my contact info, and then use it? The Dang Surprised Mystery encompasses many more questions and is really in many more ways a true mystery, so I’ve opted to shift the focus of my mystery solving resources mostly in that direction. Sorry, Rob. Or more accurately, you’re welcome.

Have I been a dickweed this whole time?!

So in my long hiatus I have thought of and forgotten many things to write about. Some things I have thought of and not forgotten but because I’ve been sitting on them for so long they feel very distant and I can’t quite remember why I thought they were funny in the first place. So today I did not have to work (a fact I only found out after arriving at work and being asked the truly fucking bananas question ‘did you not know you didn’t have to work today?’ by the woman who was working in my stead, to which I so longed to reply ‘no, I totally knew, I just get a charge out of driving up here in my uniform and clocking in on my days off’ but I totally didn’t because that would’ve been a really c’wording thing to say) and after a fairly productive morning/afternoon involving eating a bagel sandwich and finishing the Dark Tower series (reading them, not writing them, obvi. Also: Note to Mom: the last three books are totally great, you should definitely go back to the series. If you are interested, please let me know and I will send you my copies in the mail!), I realized that for the first time in a long time I was both off of work AND well enough to venture to the library which is actually open (something that it is not much of the time that I am off of work. Also, to address my ominous use of the phrase ‘well enough’- this refers to a totally bogus cold that I’ve had for like one week at least which has kept me wrapped in blankets chugging Alka Seltzer cold and zinc and orange juice on all my days off since it began). So, despite feeling like I didn’t have anything to write about, I figured I could at least go to the library and play this game: http://jimspages.com/States.htm that my Dad emailed to me, of which I cannot get enough, as those of you who know how much I love states will not be at all surprised to find out. Also, I thought that either on my walk to the library or sometime during my time in front of my computer some inspiration might strike me and I would be able to write something. And thanks to one-time Summer of One Thousand Bullshit reader ‘Dang Surprised’, it did and I am.

So one thing that I loved to have emailed to me is these messages with the subject, “[Summer of One Thousand Bullshit] please moderate” which means I have a comment on a post that I get to decide whether or not to let stand. So far I’ve never rejected a comment and can’t see why I would. Up until today I assumed that the only people who read this were my friends and family, which is why I love getting those emails, because each comment is like a little message from someone who I think is just great. Now I know that in the case of one reader I have been mistaken. This reader who identifies him or herself as ‘Dang Surprised’ (I’m inclined to think it’s a him) and lists his email as ‘ishereallythisstupid@holyshit.com’ and his URL as ‘surelyhecan’tbe.com’. The reason that I don’t think Dang Surprised is a friend or family member is because he repeatedly refers to me as a boy, which for the most part I believe my friends and family do not think I am. Sure, I may don men’s footwear for the most part (the exceptions of course being my I’m-graduating-from-college high-heeled sandals, my thrift store super sweet red shoes, and my job interview/grandma’s birthday party fancy party boots), and my voice tends toward the lower register, and yes, I drive what is clearly intended to be a hunting rig as a regular commuter vehicle, but I’m definitely not a man. Nor have I ever been. Nor, God willing, will I ever be. I wear a really feminine coat, for one thing.

So this is the comment that he left on my post about Planter’s Nut Brittle Medley: ‘wow how old are you little boy?  sounds like you just learned how to swear!! grow up dickweed’

This comment is just great. First, because it contains the word dickweed, which I think–even when being it’s being assigned to me–is a hilarious thing to call some one.

Had Dang Surprised picked any other quality of mine that he had been able to gleam from reading that one blog post, he could have severely damaged my self-esteem. Luckily, he managed to insult one of very few abilities that I have in which I am totally confident, which is my ability to incorporate swear words into sentences composed mostly of non-swear words. There are plenty of things that I have been doing for slightly longer in which I have no where near unshakable faith. Walking, for example. I am fucking terrible at walking. If you called me up and bet me one shiny dime that I would not fall while walking today, I would turn down that bet. I am not ten cents worth of confident in my ability to successfully walk any where or for any amount of time. Because I fall all the time!! But if you called to propose a wager of, say, 600 nickels that I would not regret my placement of a curse word today, I would take that bet. In fact by now I would already have done the math to see how many dollars that number of nickels equaled (most likely reaching one or two incorrect sums first, my ability to do simple arithmetic NOT being one in which I am especially self-assured) and then thought of something to buy with those dollars. That’s how phlegmatic I am when it comes to my ability to use cuss words.  Borderline arrogantly phlegmatic. Actually, probably a little bit arrogantly phlegmatic. Some times, I admit, I go a little over the top. Especially with the f word because that one is my special favorite. But implying that I just learned how to swear means I’m using it incorrectly, not merely too frequently. Like if you saw a little kid wobbling on a bike you might think ‘I bet that kid just learned how to ride that bike, because he’s not very good at it yet’ but conversely, you don’t look at Lance Armstrong and think ‘I bet he just learned how to ride that bike because he seems to be doing it fucking often. More than most adults, at any rate, or even little boys, for that matter.’ Check. Mate.

But really what I lerv about this comment is that it doesn’t have any commas in it. Had I authored this comment, it would have contained three commas. Not very many, maybe, but enough to make it sound way more professional. I will give Dang Surprised kudos for his use of the imperative ‘grow up’, though, because it’s one that I use often and facetiously as I think it is almost always a hilarious thing to tell some one to do. *Note: I tried about 200 spellings of facetiously before I landed on the right one. In fact, I didn’t even land on the right one, I typed ‘humorously’ into a thesaurus to find it after giving up any attempt to spell it after the dictionary redirected me to ‘feces’ for like the hundredth time. If any of you see my 10th grade English teacher around, please keep this to yourselves as it may make her feel shaky about her ability to teach 16 year-olds how to spell various vocabulary words, something that she is on the whole pretty good at. And if this post is about anything (questionable), it is about how people shouldn’t make other people feel shaky about their skills via the internet, or more specifically, my blog.

Another thing that I love about Dang Surprised is what a mystery he is. He uses a swear in his fake email address so he’s not just some prude who can’t abide cursing. Also, his use of ‘dickweed’ lends credence to this theory. While it is not strictly a swear word, I would venture to say that anyone who had a problem with a few shits and damns probably wouldn’t walk around calling people dickweeds all over the internet. This is another thing on which I would wager upwards of 600 nickels. But if he’s not offended by the swears, then what? The fact that I use them in an amateur manner? Well, clearly, but how so? Rarely does a mystery of this caliber fall into my lap. Typing that last sentence totally just reminded me of another mystery with which I have had to reckon recently, but that’s for another time. In the mean time, this one is quite enough to be going on with. WHO ARE YOU, DANG SURPRISED? And how, if you’re not a friend or family member, did you gain access to this blog? It is not, as far as I know, promoted by anything other than my facebook profile and one time by my sister’s twitter, neither of which, again, only as far as I know, reaches many people who think I’m a dude.

Dang Surprised, I urge you to expand upon your previous comment and help me to sort out the enigma that is your presence in the swear tornado that is my life.