trick

Sometimes, if I'm in a quiet room with someone else, and neither of us are talking, I like to look over to them and silently mouth words so that maybe for a split second, they think they are deaf...
"Julian, What are you doing?"
"Did you think you were deaf?"
"No."

I think they did, really...

so close...

I got home from work rather late tonight, and came home to my dog Penny acting rather antsy. I therefore thought it best to take her for a short walk. Penny is getting old, so I had to half drag her up the first hill before we were able to turn onto the nature trail behind my house. She usually finds a little energy after that first hill. We came upon the trail, and I was flooded with memories of dramatic encounters with deer and confused neighbors. But I was in the mood for a walk, and ventured into the darkness anyway.

However, almost immediately into the walk, I noticed a small shadowy creature gliding towards me, and a dark colored cat stopped in a patch of light several yards in front of me. He sat down and looked at me and Penny. Penny was sniffing around and didn't see this fellow, or she surely would have gone into attack mode. The cat had some long hairs sticking up off his upright ears, kind of like a lynx, if you've ever seen one of those. He stared at us for a second, and I thought that he might say something. He just had that fantasy-ish look about him. I stared back, and asked him if he could talk. He quickly cocked his head to the side, and responded, "that's quite bold of you to ask a cat if he can talk." He had a sharp, intelligent-sounding voice.
"Yeah, I know," I said, "but you just had that look about you..."
"Like I come from some other world, and I can lead you there??"
"Exactly!"
"Well, I do come from some other world, but only cats live there, so I don't think you would like it."
"Oh." I was a little disappointed..."Could I just come and visit for a couple of days or something??"
"umm...I don't know if that's a good idea...no one is really gonna want to put you up for the night."
"You don't think I could stay with you?"
"Eh...yeah, maybe...I'll IM you or whatever."
"Alright, you want my screenname?"
"Sure."
"It's, ouch1308...what's yours?"
"Silverglider73"
"cool....ok.....you don't think I could just come and visit for a little while right now do you??"
"Look buddy, I said I'll IM you..."
"Yeah...sorry, I just wasn't doing anything right now and....."
He interrupted, "I actually have to go....but...yeah.... it was nice meeting you....."
"Alright, well, I guess I'll talk to you online then."
"Yeah, sure.....bye."
The cat bounded off into the woods. I looked at Penny, who surprisingly, hadn't reacted at all to the talking cat. I asked her if she could talk, and she didn't say anything. Well, I have a feeling silverglider73 is not going to IM me. I should have played it a little cooler and not been so forward...scared him off. Well, I'll know that for the next time I come across any animals from other worlds.

I mean...

So I've been working at starbucks to bring in a little money while I look for a something more permanent. Today was actually my first real day after training, and I was working at the register. There was also a coworker who was working at the register next to me. Naturally, we got to conversing, and we started discussing the nature of the internet club that had some kind of organized event in our store. We were lightly making fun of the group, even though we had no real idea what kind of internet site they were involved with. Eventually, I brought up the fact that everyone on the site is old and lame. Honestly, no one there was over 40...so we're looking at about 20, normal looking, middle aged people. This is when it clicked in my mind, that my coworker was also a good bit older than me...probly much closer in age to all of our customers. I suddenly felt awkward, and probly should have just left it alone. But I proceded to ask her how old she was. She explained that she was 35 years old. So I say, "I didn't mean like...old...." and she was just like, "it's fine..." Then I just nodded, and we didn't really converse much after that.