In what could be the most offensive email I’ve gotten ever, my well meaning and apparently addled father forwarded me “God Protects His Own.” It is just a short inspirational message about Meulaboh, Indonesia where the nasty Muslims wouldn’t let the peaceable Christians celebrate the birth of their Savior. So the day after Noel they had to all leave town to a nearby mountain to open their presents and whatnot. While they were gone God showed those meanie Muslims what-for and drowned the whole lot of them with a tsunami. Praise Jesus!

Fuck.

Does this really make someone feel good? To believe that God is a viscious son of a bitch? How the hell do you hear about hundreds of thousands of people drowning and the subsequent destruction and think, “Go Jesus!” That’s just fucked up. I just wish people were better at keeping in mind the humanity of humanity. Unfortunately, it is all too easy to forget when the other party lives halfway around the world or when they’re stupid bigoted mother-fuckers.

As I mentioned in the previous entry I decided to head to the gym. It was an impromptu decision and so I didn’t have my clothes. I wasn’t planning on doing anything too strenuous, so I just took off the button-down shirt I had on and was doing some light lifting in my wife beater and khakis.

As I was sitting down to do the bench the gym’s trainer came up to me. Marc has told me that he’s come up to him before and told him that his form was bad or whatever. I figured that I was going to get a tip of some sort. I do drop my wrists back on bench if I’m not watching and I thought maybe he was going to tell me that.

It turns out that he wanted to tell me I wasn’t supposed to work out in khakis. He said that it was bad for the gym if I was wearing khakis. I was a bit confused by this. I can understand why it is a bad idea for me to dirty my nice pants on grubby gym equipment, but as to why the gym should care I couldn’t figure. Well, I hadn’t taken into account my weight as a trend setter. He told me that if I woke my pants to work out in pretty soon everyone would be.

I must admit, I like myself in a tank top and khakis. It is actually my club outfit sometimes. Perhaps I should be more cautious with my sexiness. ☺ At the very least, I, as an American, do carry a certain weight. Cool comes from America for Mauritania because that’s where the music and movies come from. I don’t really believe that anyone would start wearing khakis because of me, but it did convey a certain sense of efficacy to have someone caution me about leading others astray with my coolness.

Not that I didn’t argue with the guy. I have become quite obnoxious. Back in the States I was obnoxious, but I wasn’t confrontational. If someone said something to me I thought was dumb I’d do it and then sulk to my friends. Now, I just bicker with them. Unfortunately, my sarcastic and questioning tones are pretty much identical in French. So when I come out with “you think that if I wear pants everyone is going to do the same thing?” instead of the intended “what is your malfunction?” I convey “huh? I don’t understand the words coming out of your mouth.” It is probably better that way since I think people would be pissed if they realized how rude I am trying to be.

I am most frequently a computer geek, but unfortunately my geekery is not bounded there. Developmental psychology and analyzing the fuck out of things is also a habit of mine. I try and keep it contained, but sometimes after big events, like this last week, I just get me too worked up and it comes busting out.

I’m sorry. I try and be cool and disaffected. I’ve just got a thinking problem. I’m stepping up my already heavy regiment of intoxicants in hope of taking care of it. There’s still a few persnickety brain cells holding out, so until I finish them off, just ignore these lapses.

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