SAA Ep.# 23: Being Bored in Public

Peanut butter kills people.

It's not a laughing matter at all. I work with kids. I know TONS of kids with peanut allergies severe enough to kill them. I know adults with the same problem. I'm related to adults who can't eat peanuts without needing immediate medical attention.

Me? Oh, I eat peanut butter on a weekly basis. Sometimes, if I've run out of money for groceries, I eat peanut butter on a daily basis. I'm quite fond of peanut butter. It's probably one of my favorite foods. You can combine it with chocolate. You can combine it with celery and raisins. You can put it in a sandwich or a cookie or a pie or cake...even the icing. My great grandmother even put it in ice cream--which was amazing. It works equally well with jelly, jam, bananas, AND honey. You can eat it with a spoon. George Washington Carver was a genius. Peanut Butter is like one of the most amazing and versatile foods in the world.

And it kills people.

In The DiVinci Code (which I only read because everyone said it was heresy), there was actually a dude murdered by peanut. Peanuts, in their raw, roasted, boiled, and butter form, are deadly. Like if you ever found a colony of people with peanut allergies and forced them to eat peanut butter, you would have peanuts as weapons of mass destruction. Have you ever just stopped to consider this--how a food that millions of people eat EVERY DAY means SUDDEN DEATH for other people?

I have. I have pondered it at length. It's one of the many things I ponder when I am faced with being bored in public.

Public boredom happens when:

1) I am in a meeting, class, lecture, sermon, etc. and am uninterested in the topic of said meeting, class, lecture, sermon, etc.

2) When I'm waiting for something/someone and don't have anything to do while I'm waiting.

3) When I'm at a party or other social event and there's nothing to do/no one to talk with...and it's too soon to leave without being rude.

There are a variety of ways to cope with being bored in public. In high school, when I had nothing to do and didn't have any friends (aww), I'd sit all by myself and write the worst poetry ever written. I'd also sit around and ponder the potential lethality of peanut butter. I was emo before emo was cool...or before it even existed.

Being a writer has made it easy for me to have things to do when bored in public, provided I have a notebook, post-it note, clean napkin, used napkin, old receipt, program/bulletin to write on. In class, in meetings...in...church ... I've often become bored with whatever the speaker is saying, and I've used the time to work on writing ideas or poetry. I will say that USUALLY when I become bored in sermons, I TRY to write poetry or ideas that actually have to do with the sermon topic. ...Don't judge me...

I've also made a habit of staring at the carpet, at the chair in front of me, at the back of the person's head in front of me, at the ceiling...you know, whatever there is to look at. Then, I'd let my mind wander, though it really is too small to be outside by itself...

In middle school, the carpet in the auditorium where I waited for my bus had this really interesting pattern. This was back in the early 90s when those Magic Eye pictures were just so gosh-darn popular. I remember staring at the carpet trying to make magic eye pictures come out. While there were no pictures, you'd be surprised what you can make look 3-D by crossing your eyes in just the right way. I always had a gift, a GIFT, I tell you, for seeing those Magic Eye pictures. Unfortunately, like most of my gifts, it is completely useless.

The sanctuary...I mean...WORSHIP CENTER of the church I attended as a child has THE EXACT SAME kind of chandeliers as the Worship Center of the church I attend now. I know this because I spent a large portion of my childhood staring at the church's chandeliers. I stared at them, wondering why there were these little circular brass loops at the bottom of them. Was that just in case we decided to host a team of acrobats? I mean, I'm sure they could have lots of fun swinging from the little loops--the chandeliers would have made AWESOME trapezes.

I also imagined what would happen if these chandeliers ever fell from the ceiling. Morbid? Yes...but entertaining. I wondered if the deacons would all leap up and form a human barrier, protecting the other people from the falling lamps of death. Would they start shouting, "Everybody out! Pastors wives and children first!" Or would it be a free-for-all? Every man for himself! Seriously, I had like an elaborate escape plan all worked out in my mind, just in case the chandeliers started falling. Then I got Spiritual and started planning how I'd put the welfare of others before myself--I started planning how I would place myself under the falling chandeliers before they took out the youth minister. Of course, then, I had to be on constant alert, just in case one of the chandeliers began to fall.

They never did...but it could happen. You never know. ...WATCH THE CHANDELIERS...

If you're not as creative...or morbid...as I am, there's always the old standby. Play with your cell phone. It's not exactly ethical, but cell phones have opened whole new opportunities in public boredom entertainment. You can pretend to text someone. You can actually text someone. This is especially helpful if you're in a social situation (like a bad party) that involves boredom. If you're texting, then you don't have to make small talk. As you may have guessed, I've been in this situation more than once...

If you don't want to pretend to text, you can play with the phone calculator. Seriously...do you know how many things you can calculate? You can calculate how many minutes you've been alive. You can calculate how much sleep you've had in the past week. You can calculate the number of ways you can use a calculator to alleviate social boredom! The possibilities are nearly endless.

You can even calculate how long it will take to kill someone with peanut butter....

SAA Ep. #10: Greetings on the Go

I recently got a new cell phone with one of those slide out mini qwerty (I love saying qwerty...I like taking every available opportunity to say the word qwerty) keyboards. I also finally joined the 21st century and got in on a texting plan, which has revolutionized my life. No more must I tell my friends (yes, even Socially Awkward Girl has friends...) not to text me because it costs extra money. I can now text to my heart's content and send my BFFs awkward messages about "lookn @ thongs @ store" when I really meant "lookn @ THINGS @ store" (for those who are texting impaired, that means "I am currently looking at things at the store for no apparent reason and decided to send you a text about it just because I can.")

I've only had the new (qwerty!) phone and text plan for less than a month, and already I've learned a few important things: 1) I really should turn my phone on silent when I don't want people to hear my silly "Monty Python" ringtone that loudly sounds every single time a person sends me a text. 2) Since I don't get much of a phone signal in my apartment, the most effective way to send a text from said apartment is to lift my phone over my head and carefully swing it back and forth whilst shouting "Whoo Whoo Whoo!" The shouting probably doesn't help, but it seems appropriate somehow. 3) I cannot walk and text (on my awesome qwerty keyboard) at the same time without endangering myself and others.

In fact, I've found that I have great difficulty walking and doing much of anything else. It seems my brain can only focus on one thing at a time. My brain can concentrate on moving my legs back and forth without causing them to trip over themselves (about 62% of the time...which is an improvement), but my brain can't handle any other activity at the same time.

I believe this is why I have such a hard time with greetings on the go. If you're from the South, you probably know what I'm talking about. I've heard that people up North just don't talk to other people...at least not to strangers. But down where I live, if you pass a stranger on the street, it's expected that you will at least acknowledge the other person's existence. Usually, this is done with a simple intercourse of phrases:

Person 1: "Hello. How are you?"
Person 2: "Well, hello to you as well. I am doing well. How are you?"
Person 1: "I am doing well, also. I just got a new phone with a qwerty keypad.
Person 2: (polite chuckle) "That is nice. Isn't this fine weather we are having?"
Person 1: "Yes. Yes it is. I hope it doesn't rain tomorrow."
Person 2: "Me too. I hope the remainder of your day is pleasant."
Person 1: "You too. Goodbye."
Person 2: "Bye, now."

Okay, so maybe most interactions are not that long, but most people (at least in the South) will at least say hi to another person they pass on the street.

However, my brain is only able to focus on walking. I find that when I pass people on the street, I try to say hi, but it doesn't work. I think the problem is, since my brain is working on keeping my legs moving, it doesn't have the capability to also control my speech. It tries to work out the phrasing for "Hello" and "How are you?" all at the same time. And if the other person speaks first and asks me how I am, then my brain is also trying to work out the phrase "I am fine." The end result is that I end up grunting out some kind of unintelligible combination of "Hello, how are you, I am fine." It usually sounds something like, "Hggggag." That's not a word. It doesn't even sound like a word. Qwerty, however, does sound like a word. An awesome, awesome word.

The funny thing is, even after hearing my nonsensical grunt, the other person always just keeps walking. It's probably because their brains are too busy trying to manipulate their legs that they don't have energy to even think about how ridiculous my response just sounded.

Sometimes strange things also happen when I come across people I know. For example, the other day I saw the pastor from my church in a store. I like my pastor, but I wouldn't say we're BFF qwerty texting buddies or anything. Plus, I'm used to seeing him at church while we're both surrounded by church people and doing church things. So we were both in an unfamiliar surrounding and therefore in a slightly socially awkward situation. What did we do? At the same exact time, in perfect unison, we both said, "Hi. How are you? I'm fine."

And we kept walking.

At least I didn't grunt some kind of strange unintelligible fake word at him.