Shopping with men

Location: Valley Faire mall
Date: Sometime between Dec 14, 2006 and Dec. 23, 2006.
Time: mid afternoon.

My lovely girlfriend led me into a women's clothing store right before Xmas, to finish up some last minute gift buying.
We walked in, and I whipped out my handy game boy before turning to look for a place to sit.
There was no fewer than 5 dudes sitting in the entryway, looking like they were about to be kicked in the jaw.
"Whatup guys?!" I say, waving, they all look beaten...
One man, a nice Hispanic dude rocking a baby carriage (as in moving it back and forth, not "Rocking it," as in "Wearing it with style.")
I approach, holding my green game boy.
"Ahh.. the wait..."
"Yeah," he says with a scared laugh, as if any minute his wife was going to return and slap him.
"So dude, I brought a game boy to keep me entertained, but you totally brought a kid!"
"Yep."
"Trade?" I hold the game boy out in case he's not sure what I'm offering for his child.
No lie, he actually looks the game boy over, even ducks his head to see what game is in the slot.
"Sure," he laughs again.
"Sweet!" I say, as my girlfriend returns and leads me away from the store and the poor man she thinks I was harassing.

Nona's 10k Macaroni...

Location – Burlingame Albertson’s

Date – 12/31/06

Time – Noon

Setting – Looking for lunch.

I approach the deli stand, remark to myself – but still out loud, and in a bad Steve Irwin voice – “krikey, look at all the goodies Jim.”

No word who Jim is at this point.

I stand for maybe 30 seconds looking at their seven sandwich selections. A short, kind-eyed woman approaches from the meat cutter.

“Oh, sorry, didn’t even see you there, what can I get you?”

“Don’t know yet,”

“Well, let me know, we’ve got all the meets, fresh sliced…”

“Mmhmm, how about the BBQ chicken strips one, without red onions.”

“Oh,” she says, as she turns to look at the menu. “I don’t have that one.”

“Hmm.. ok…” I eye the salads, macaroni, garden and otherwise.

“How about…”

“A Caesar?” she interjects, thinking I like caeser salads.

“Hmmm… no, how about one of the macaroni salads…”

One, the Albertson’s Elbow Macaroni Salad, is 2.99 for some portion. Probably “liter.”

The second, with pasta that looks like little wristbands, is called “Nona’s Macaroni Salad,” and its $1 more. But so much more stylish looking.

“Are you Nona?” I ask as she spoons what I think is her namesake macaroni salad variety.

“What?”

“You, are you Nona?”

“No, we just have the two kinds.”

I paused, because that comment didn’t make any sense, especially given my 3-word simple question.

“No, its called Nona’s Macaroni Salad ($3.99/liter) are you Nona?”

She finally gets it.

“Haha, no,” she laughs. “It’s funny how they name foods isn’t it?”

In retrospect, it’s not funny at all.

“Yeah,” I reply. “Like, what guy’s girlfriend made that salad for him like, 20 years ago, and then he started a company and named the version after her.”
She laughs, not having expected this much to someone who should have been crushed by the lack of BBQ chicken with no red onions. I wonder if she DID have red onions…

I continue.

“But see, what they don’t tell you is that Nona has totally moved on from macaroni salad,” I say, with a hand flourish. My hands have come out of their respective pockety apartments.

“Haha.”

“Yeah, she graduated from making macaroni salad and got into tech. Now its ‘Nona’s Tech Stock picks,’”

She laughs more.

“Yeah, Nona is SO beyond macaroni salad,”

By this point she’s weighing my lunch, it’s a full $4.39 worth of Nona’s Macaroni Salad, the stuff that made her famous before she put $1,000 into Google.

“But her legend lives on.”
With one final click of a button, my lunch is ready for me to take home in its cute little clear plastic tub, and its cute little…

She starts wrapping it in saran wrap, no lid apparently.

“I’m out of lids,” she tells me.

“It was a hard year for lids,” I reply, she doesn’t respond.

She hands me my lunch and says “There are sporks in the basket near the meats.”

“Sporks? You have sporks? You just made my day!”

I grab one and leave to pay.

What are random acts of strangeness?

Everyday, millions of interactions are lost in the rolling, plodding, meandering progression of our lives. Other folks become just people to tell about what kind of taco you want, or how much you want to deposit into your account.
Or worse, they become nothing but a head with a hand, ready to take your money and hand you something trivial.
But what if we - as a society - began to embrace the necessary contacts and turn them into something fun. Who among us hasn't had their day bettered by someone who just took the time to say "Hi, how are you, I really like that color of shirt, it makes you look like a superhero?
And to that goal, I dedicate this blog.
So get out there people, start talking to strangers, and let me know all about it here.