Basically, anything that involves being in a public place, where your chances of looking like an eejit are greatly increased.
THERE ARE GOOD ideas and there are bad ideas. And if you know me at all, you will know which of the two I am prone to. When given a choice, I will almost always opt for the thing that is most likely to go disastrously wrong. It’s a genetic thing, and there is no cure for it. It’s just the way it is.
Take today, for example.
I had a dentist appointment in the afternoon. The details need not detain us here, except to say that when I left her office I couldn’t feel my face. It was as if everything from my lips to my eyebrows had ceased to exist. You know how it goes.
What I should have done at this point was go straight home and avoid public exposure until my face had returned to what passes for a normal state.
Instead, I decided it would be a great idea altogether to go for a coffee.
The first clue that this in fact was not a great idea at all was when it took half an hour to order, on account of how the young lady behind the counter couldn’t understand what I was saying. Which sounded something like, “A babadedo bibba bebbon a biboba bubbin beed.”
“Sorry?”
“A babadedo bibba bebbon a biboba bubbin beed.”
“I’m really sorry, I don’t understand.”
By the time she deciphered that what I wanted was a cappuccino with a lemon and white chocolate muffin, the queue behind me stretched all the way out the door and one gentleman had dropped dead of old age.
She then asked me if I had the app. What I wanted to say was, “No, but if you can afford to give a discount to the lad with the app, you can afford to give it to me, thanks very much. And I look forward to that free coffee the next time!” But I didn’t want to be there till next Christmas, with perhaps several more deaths on my hands. So I just shook my head in a fashion which I’m sure conveyed the message clearly. At least I think I shook my head. It was still entirely numb, so who knows what it was doing?
But that was only the start of it.
I then sat down and tried to drink this cappuccino, and proceeded to dribble all over myself, which I suppose is what happens when you have no functioning lips. A small child nearby giggled and leaned over to whisper to his Mammy. Probably something like, “Look at that enormous baby over there! His Mammy forgot to put on his bib!”
The mother stole a glance in my direction, just as I was attempting another sip but actually ended up blowing bubbles. And I’m not a professional lip reader but I’m fairly sure that what she said was, “Don’t stare. He could be dangerous.”
But like any normal child, he continued to stare in utter amazement until I fled the premises at high speed, wearing my jacket like an apron to cover the coffee stains on my jeans, so the kid wouldn’t conclude I was rushing home to have my nappy changed. I realised too late that in my haste I had abandoned the poor muffin, still untouched. Probably for the best I hadn’t attempted to eat it, given my debilitating condition.
As I write, the feeling in my face is just beginning to return, and I suspect I may have third-degree burns to my upper lip, from the coffee my mouth didn’t know I was drinking.
I would say, “Never again,” but the history of my life choices says otherwise.
But let it be a warning to the rest of you. When you finish at the dentist, go home for the love of God and don’t make a holy show of yourself.
CURRENT LISTENING: Chuck Prophet and Stephanie Finch – Marathon
Time to get your dancing shoes on.
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