A few months ago I was at a "First Friday" gathering of history department folks where we drink beer and talk almost incessantly about work. I've been trying to not be quite so image conscious and work minded with my fellow grad students and my professors. So I thought I'd reveal a bit more of my personalty, with interesting results.
One of the new grad students told me she was from Parkersburg, and I asked her a bit about her town. She ended up telling a story about working in a department store and being asked out to dinner by a male customer. She accepted, and at the restaurant, told the guy a funny anecdote about how the first time she undressed the manequins, she was taken aback by the size and shape of their nipples. The guy laughed at her story. After a beat, he asked, "How big are your nipples." She told him it was none of his business.
We laughed a bit at her story. I, as usual, had some follow-up questions. Then there was lull. I thought, maybe I should share something about myself. Let's see...nipple story. I flipped through the anecdotes filed under "Nipple--Humorous," and came out with this gem:
"I got an injection in my nipple once when I was five years old."
My opener was met with silence. I followed with, "It was really strange because to this day I have no idea what the injection was about."
Then there were questions. Could you have dreamed it? Maybe it was a testosterone injection? Does it not work anymore? I did say that it responds differently to cold, at which point my friend John said he didn't know whether I was full of shit or serious.
About a month after that I told another group about the experience of telling that story and how it brought conversation to a screeching halt. Ironically, it had the same effect the second time.
Well, let's just say project reveal-more-of-myself-to-coworkers had a rough start.
Thursday, February 21, 2008
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5 comments:
There's a lot that's funny in that story. I like the idea of her gasping in surprise about the mannequins, I like the idea of this guy thinking, "here's my opening!" And it's always good to bring a conversation to a screeching halt. I've been searching my files under nipple humorous and coming up empty, so good job coming up with something. But I do think the correct response after the lull was, "So... how big are they? What? We're all thinking it. I'm just the one with the guts to ask."
Lou, I can feel your pain. I also like to experiment with the boundaries of social conversation. My highlight was while at a wedding reception with my co-workers. I was at a table of 40 and 50 year old couples and worked the word "cunt" into the conversation. Needless to say, I brought the converastion to a screeching halt. Sometime beer cloud my judgement. Sometimes.
Now I'm thinking the appropriate comment would've been: "How big were the mannequin's nipples? I bet they were HUGE." And then stare blankly into the distance.
David, I remembered once you broke a beer bottle (or somebody else did) in Warren, and you went to kick the shards toward the bar or something and ended up kicking them into the shoes of a coworker's wife. I was thinking about that story when I wrote this blog.
Ah, yes, it was a 22 oz draft at Bw3s. I don't think I broke it but I'm sure I kicked the shards all over my boss's wife's feet.
That same night I also remember someone wanting to play pool and asking if I had any quarters. From about 10 feet from the pool table I spun around, thrust my hand in my pocket, and threw an entire fist full of coins at the pool table and everyone around it.
I'm not sure how I didn't either get my ass kicked or thrown out of the bar that night. I guess I looked a bit crazy.
-David
As I recall, a colleague of mine, if you can call underclassmen freshmen "colleagues" at that point had a classification system for the size of the nipple in terms of the cross section of your favorite deli slice. Actually, in hind sight, he simply referred to a girl who had baloney nipples. Obviously, the visualization becomes clear. However, I think I took it upon myself to classify nipples, as such. I didn't look at much porn, or even deli meats, much less warm real nipples at that point in my life, but it went something like this in order of hierarchy:
*Beans & Franks (Hot Dog Nipples) ~1" dia.
* Pepperoni (optimal size)
* Salami (pushing the limits of attractiveness)
* and of course the coup de gras, the boloney nipple, that is, well, big.
I guess you could imagine a fresh baked piece of bread with a piece of pepperoni and a small piece of slim jim on top of that. That's nice.
I hope my wife can view these as objective biological/culinary obsevations should she read your blog.
Bud
...more intelleigent discourse to follow... (yeah, whatever...)
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