neverwhere

I am currently sitting in Starbucks. Yes, Starbucks. Go ahead and sue me (aside: the Supreme Court will probably let you since they think it’s just fine for people to sue tobacco companies for being ‘misled’ by light cigarrettes. It’s ok for self-destructive morons to sue but not for women to sue for equal pay if the pay discrepency has been going on longer than 6 months, no matter that it was just discovered? Another rant, another time….). This is the closest coffee shop to the house, it’s cozy, and this is how I marginally reduce the cost of heating the house.

But… I left my headphones at home. I am now subject to incessant, nauseating xmas music that does not succeed in drowning out the banal, vacant prattlings and yammerings of all those posing with books and notes, as if they actually know how to read. Granted, I’m posing with a laptop, but while not complaining about everyone else, I’m writing and sending cover letters…

I want to disappear them all. Or at least disappear their fingernails-on-chalkboard noises. I need a universal human mute button.

I’ve just learned that Catholics are going to become a “thing of the past.” Who are these people? Of the couple immediately next to me, the woman is “reading” (I have to use that term loosely here—she’s really just holding) a 1000 page book about Mac OS Jaguar, and the guy has a book entitled “Synthetic Fuels.” The woman is in all denim: denim shirt, denim vest, long denim skirt with embroidered flowers near the hem, longer oversized denim shirt for a coat and… wait for it… a denim purse. I can’t see her shoes but they’re probably denim too. I wish I were kidding; I’m not. And apparently she doesn’t like Catholics. Oh wait. She’s moved on to cosmetics, survivalism, and the earth. And dying animals. And meat.

For 2 seconds, she pretended to read with a pen. The guy’s not even pretending.

Now, mind you, I am no better than any of these people. But I’m way quieter.

I just realized I need some obnoxious looking noise-cancelling headphones for xmas. I can then blissfully comingle with other starbucks patrons.

She’s moved on again to Edison and the light bulb, and how it’s a study of one man’s inner search and somehow it’s related to Jesus and poverty. Huh? I think I have to leave before my current misanthropic mood grows to dangerous, threatening levels.