skimming reality - listening to counting crows 'sullivan street' & remy zero 'fair' and outkast 'hey ya'

rode the bike yesterday to pick up my car from dave's house - i realized that when i posted last night, i didn't specify that i didn't drive once i started to party. you know.

when i got within a mile of dave's apartment, i there was a hill that probably goes for .25 miles. on hills, especially steep ones or long ones, i average between 6-8 miles an hour, which people can jog easily, i know, but hills on bikes are hard! anyway, going that speed, i was able to get a good long look at a smooshed snake in the middle of the road. looked pretty fresh. it was probably 1.5 inches in diameter! nice pattern too, i could have used it for a belt.

so when i have read books written by writers, for writers, they advise listening to real conversations to pick up phrases and thoughts expressed in reality. the thing about that is, everyone, myself included, thinks what they say aloud is pretty coherent. i know that listening to myself at a later time having been recorded, i wish i had a built in editing machine. i wish i spoke as well as i think i write. but i don't. although i think my meanings are usually conveyed well enough, i sound like a buffoon sometimes: i seem to abandon thoughts mid-sentence - though what i actually do is enter the silent inner monologue for some reason. i get frustrated speaking cuz i know that there will never ever be enough time to convey what i want to, and even if i do, other people may decode my spoken message differently from the way i meant it.

anyway, i am yet again at panera. and when i sat down i started overhearing someone who was not really trying to hide what he was saying. he was coherent enough, and i don't think he was shy about talking. he did most of the talking in the group he was in. he sat with a married couple (i assumed at first and it was confirmed later).

"... so people kept telling me about this place. everyone i talked to said the same thing, 'you meet someone at lunch, have sex with them, then meet another guy at dinner and have sex, and it doesn't matter.' and whenever someone said that i just thought, 'i, i don't know. i don't know if that appeals to me, really.'

i didn't assume his sexuality then, i wondered if maybe he was quoting women who were talking about a cruise ship or something, where there is just tons of sex going on.

then it got pitiful for a minute. and a morpheme of the conversation kept getting muffled, maybe cuz i was listening extra hard for it, maybe it was cuz he didn't want to be that obviously flaming.

"and i want a ___friend, but i don't have one. if i want a ___friend, why don't i have one? i am involved in a group of writers up in chicago. there's six of us, and two of them are couple, and the other ones are not my type."

then he was inaudible for a minute...

"one guy was really not my type, you know he was large, grossly obese. and he asked me if i knew anyone he could date. i don't know this guy at all, but 'do you know anyone i could date?'

back to my thoughts: i was not offended at this guy's speech, but i wondered how the family sitting nearby felt about their small children hearing this. they either didn't hear, weren't listening, were resolved not to react, like me, or wanted to eat quickly and get out. i'm just being honest right now, a conversation with heterosexual content would be equally offensive to adults with small children in earshot.

and as for not wanting to react, i'm just saying that you don't get a chance to be around people having frank conversations about their dating/sex life, especially homosexual people. i won't pretend that i am totally comfortable around all gay people, nor that their conversations are not intriguing at times. it's more of that 'collecting people's speech' concept.