I still remember the day, an innocuous Tuesday. An azure sky spread over the world like a protective cloak. Wisps of cumulous clouds hung above us like ornaments on a charm bracelet. Squirrels and rabbits played in my yard, dancing to whatever music is running through the head of a squirrel or rabbit if indeed any music is running through their heads, which would be pretty cool. I wonder if scientists have ever studied that, whether squirrels and rabbits hear music when they play.
Anyway, my point is it was a nice day. I was going to work and decided to stop at the grocery store on the way to get lunch. I knew exactly what I wanted so I would only need an extra 5 minutes. When I walked to my car if I had only noticed the burning, sulfurous magma of the underworld bubbling up through the earth, I would have known how wrong I was.
The drive up to the store was idyllic. Traffic was light and a good song on the radio pied-pipered me to my destination. I pulled into the strip mall parking lot and that was where the Devil’s minions began to pick at me like gnats. I started to make a right hand turn to drive past the pet store. There was a gentleman crossing the road in front of me. To say he was taking his time would be to say Michelle Bachmann is just a little eccentric. I don’t know the man’s name but I was calling him a bad word so for editorial purposes let’s just refer to him as Expletive. Expletive was taking steps equal to the length of a paramecium. In the time it took him to cross, 3 species of animals became extinct. When I was finally able to finish my right hand turn the Sun had completed burning all its hydrogen and was now burning helium for fuel. The dude was walking really slowly.
Although most of my extra five minutes had been used up I decided to press on. I drove down to the supermarket parking lot and made a right hand turn to look for a parking space. I should have been more observant. I should have looked to see if there was a sign at the front of the aisle that read “this aisle only for people who are willing to wait as long as it takes for the first available parking space rather than moving on”.
Sitting in the middle of the aisle in front of me was a car that was waiting to pull into the closest space. They were hindered in doing this because the car aside of the space had their doors open while they loaded groceries and pre-teen children. These two characters in my little playlet shall be now known as Nasty Swear Word and Word My Mother Wouldn’t Want Me to Say.
I couldn’t get around Nasty Swear Word and they were apparently willing to wait until the end of time to get that space. Word My Mother Wouldn’t Want Me to Say was moving at the same pace as Expletive had been moving. I knew now that no matter how quickly I purchased my tuna salad sandwich I was going to be late for work so I stayed where I was and waited impatiently for Word My Mother Wouldn’t Want Me To Say to close their doors and Nasty Swear Word to sssllloooooowwwwwlllyyyyy pull into the available space. I parked my own car and walked in to buy my lunch with several of the Devil’s sidekicks nipping at my heels. As I later pulled out of the parking lot they were still hanging onto the hood of my car chattering and making faces at me. I managed to shake them off about a mile down the road and was minion-free the rest of the evening.
You may be inclined to say I have exaggerated this story, but I want you to know it is 100% true. It happened just the way I have told it here and you’d have to be a communist or a libertarian to think otherwise.
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