Thursday, July 31, 2008

Older By Proxy

Our aging minds work in mysterious ways. I enjoy placing value on people, places, things or scenarios by finding a correlation between that and something... obscure that I can relate to. You, know... how can your younger co-worker even talk "smack" to you when he was born the same year that "Back To The Future" was released in theaters?! The nerve!

That was the obscure correlation today that I made with a new co-worker. Let's face it... when someone is new... you gotta make em feel new. You've gotta jump them in. In the military... its the only way. If someone isn't verbally slamming you, then you know something's wrong.

So, the young Airman began on a weak line of smack-talk that probably took him 5 minutes to rehearse in his head. I could see it cookin'. So's I beckon to another particularly saavy co-worker (one rich in music and movie trivia)...

(It probably woulda sounded something like this...)

"Hey, Mappy... the new fish over here is talkin' smack again. I can't take anything serious coming from the mouth of someone that was born on the same year as Back to the Future. Hey kid... 1.21 jigawatts! Why dont you run along to the clock tower--the Mr. Fusion will never kick in at 88 MPH! Its not like you were going to get any at the "Fish Under the Sea" dance anyway."

A tragiclly geeky and accurate demonstration of how someone like me would take you down a peg. Now, Mappy, whom is as just a much a douche bag as me... died laughing. See, fortified in our own inadequacies brought on by missed proms and Magic card collections, lies the the disturbing ability to make "zero" even lower.

4 comments:

Sagacious T said...

Oh man, that had me laughing so hard, I almost squirted Jack Daniels out my nose....which would have stung...

Jim Thomsen said...

I bet that airman's mom had the hots for him.

"Hey, twerp ... make like a tree ... and GET OUT OF HERE!"

Jim
http://jimthomsen.wordpress.com/

Anonymous said...

In your apparent arrogance, you are humble to a fault. Though I'm not a military man, I salute you.

Scott said...

Arrogant, no. Believe you me-- it's just a jagged dynamics that we adopt. It rarely leads to meaningful relationships with your peers... and is reserved for realized instances of true wit. Needless to say, that same airman was one of the only co-workers that showed up for my going-away party. I spent many many hours reaching out, mentoring and making real friends with that Airman. He is a credit to the Air Force. And as my friend--he is a credit to me.

So arrogance, no. Humble... most of the time