I was sitting in my office trying to get something done and I got a message from a friend of mine. I always keep the damn messenger service running for just such an occasion but this one was a little more unusual…
This is the abridged version of the conversation:
- Kevin: What are you doing?
- Tandex: trying to fix my invoice html so that it will work on Netscape properly.
- Kevin: oh… so you’re not busy, then?
I sighed for a second and looked at the mess I was making with my code. Having
an IE captive intranet made a lot of things easy and my coding was a simple experiment anyway...
- Tandex: ok, not really. What’s up?
- Kevin: We perpetrated a monstrous prank last night.
- Tandex: and?
- Kevin: It was mucho amusing.
- Kevin: It was this girl's birthday today.
- Tandex: ok
I looked back at my code trying to figure out which one was more interesting…
- Kevin: So last night we came in and filled her cubicle top to bottom with
balloons.
- Kevin: And then gift-wrapped her entire cubicle with bright yellow happy birthday
wrapping paper.
I looked again at my code seeing it take a sudden, far more interesting leap...
but I persisted with the conversation.
- Tandex: oh... ok... are you still at rSP?
- Kevin: Yeah, I start BFC next week.
- Tandex: ok
- Kevin: Why do you ask?
- Tandex: just wondering
- Kevin: What do you know about BFC anyways?
- Tandex: well, they make great fried chicken...
- Tandex: wait a minute…
- Tandex: wrong 'FC'
I smiled at my smartass-ness
- Kevin: So in other words, not a damn thing.
- Tandex: ding!
- Tandex: I know a girl who worked there… she seemed to enjoy the place
- Kevin: So, is that girl the kind of person who would enjoy working in the same kind of places I do?
- Kevin: OK...what was up with Embers yesterday?
- Kevin: She looked at me like I was some sort of
dead-freak-walking-zombie-puppie-killer.
- Tandex: what do you mean? She seemed fine to me? What did she say?
- Kevin: Dunno...just thought I caught a very unhappy vibe from her.
- Tandex: she was pretty tired. She got to bed around 5
- Tandex: that was probably it
- Kevin: OK, so she was the walking dead zombie...I feel better.
- Kevin: At any rate, I made a major ass of myself last night...even more so than usual.
- Tandex: what did you do?
- Kevin: There's this girl, Crystal, that we work with. She was there last night helping with the balloons.
- Kevin: She was already here when I got here.
- Kevin: So I show up and as it turns out she brought her (slightly) younger sister with her.
- Kevin: And they're both laughing and giggling like made.
- Kevin: Med I mean.
- Kevin: MAD.
- Kevin: Damn...anyways...
- Kevin: They were acting all drunk and stuff.
- Tandex: ok... and?
- Kevin: So I asked them jokingly if they'd been hitting the bottle, and they said no.
- Kevin: So we go on, and Crystal is acting much better.
- Kevin: But her sister is still acting like she's lit off her ass.
- Kevin: So the whole night long I'm making jokes about her being a drunk and
all...good-naturedly of course.
- Kevin: And then about 15 minutes before it's time for Crystal to leave....
- Tandex: then...?
I've always hated it when people lead you into something with a phrase like: "guess what?" or "then...".
Just SPIT IT OUT!
I suppose I could be more forgiving because it was typed conversation... I guess I'm a jerk.
- Kevin: ...she starts telling her sister what to do, in the way that a mother would tell her
10 year old child what to do.
- Kevin: And then it all suddenly clicks into place...
- Tandex: oh no
- Kevin: Her sister has a developmental disability.
- Tandex:
I was laughing too hard at him to type.
- Kevin: She's 20-something and has the mental capacity of a 3rd
grader.
- Kevin: Talk about egg on my face...
- Tandex: you are such a moron.
- Kevin: I felt like an ass...
- Kevin: Literally.
- Kevin: I felt so bad...
- Tandex: that is funny... that goes into the bin.... have to write this down.
- Kevin: I didn't know for sure until they left and I asked Ferguson and he
confirmed it.
- Tandex: oh my god....
- Tandex: Stimpy! you are an eeeeediot
- Kevin: I felt so bad that I spent probably 15 minutes this morning apologizing to Crystal.
- Tandex:
…More laughing at his expense
- Kevin: I swear, I thought that she was drunk.
- Kevin: She didn't sound stupid, she didn't slur, she didn't act
inappropriately.
- Kevin: She just acted really slappy.
- Tandex: You are a fucking idiot