2005-03-01 - 10:25 a.m.
This weekend I had the …um, err, “unusual” experience of *almost* having dinner with my brother in law, or as I prefer to call him; “The King of Dicks.”
All hail the King of Dicks.
We made plans to meet on Saturday, at 4:00 at a local restaurant for dinner.
Yes, Four-fucking-O’clock for fucking dinner.
Blow me Kimosabe. I don’t eat dinner before 7:00.
For some unknown reason, the King of Dicks insists on being done eating no later than 5:00 p.m. Perhaps, in the Kingdom of Dicks, this is a fine tradition, but in my self centered, booze filled existence, 4:00 on a Saturday barely qualifies as lunch.
But there I was, dressed, ready for dinner and driving to the most craptacular pub in town. Damn it. It seems it was only a few, short, hung over hours ago that I was lazily rolling out of bed, wondering how I would waste the day away, and now I find myself fighting the elderly flocks of early birds for a damn parking space just to have dinner with the most self centered, son of a bitches I have ever had the unfortunate pleasure of knowing.
This is no way to spend a Saturday afternoon. No sir, it is not.
I should be at home, naked on the sofa watching some cheesy martial arts flick, as my super model wife peels grapes and gingerly pops them into my mouth.
But I am not at home.
My wife is not popping grapes into my mouth.
I am in midst of a geriatric parking frenzy.
At 4:00 in the afternoon, the restaurant parking lot is a foaming sea of Oldsmobiles and Buicks circling the lot like so many geriatric sharks. Their horns blast erratically and without reason. Their directionals randomly blink away, signaling some bizarre parking maneuver that no one but the driver and perhaps space aliens can comprehend.
We watched as these behemoths, piloted mysteriously by disembodied billows of blue hair mated with two frail hands stretching up to a seemingly oversized steering wheel navigated the parking lot
I felt as if I was on some bizarre safari watching theses elusive early birds as they
fought for their parking spaces with a ferocity that was truly awe inspiring and at the same time, quite frightening. Occasionally, I spotted a fedora timidly peeking over a dashboard.
My lovely wife snapped me out of my safari daydream when we were almost sideswiped by a black Buick driven by a blue haired grandmother. I swear the Buick had a “Kiss Me Where I Pee” bumper sticker and the sweet old lady flipped me the bird. How lovely.
Finally, after 20 minutes of AARP parking lot rodeo, and reassuring my lovely wife that electric scooter scuff marks will indeed buff out, we joined her loving brother and his drug addled girlfriend for a four-fucking O’clock dinner and an exchange of Chanukah gifts.
Yes, Chanukah gifts.
I know, I know, and unless you are some godless ignorant heathen you also know that Chanukah was 2 and half months ago.
However, coordinating dinner with the King of Dicks is more difficult than appointing a Supreme Court Justice.
It took several fights and twice as many phone calls to arrange this dinner, and my wife, who has a family loyalty that can only be described as a Shakespearian fault, was determined to meet her dickheaded brother come hell or high water and exchange Chanukah gifts, actual calendar date be damned.
“Happy Chanukah!” My wife announced as we sat down at their table. They had been their since 3:00. The waitress was clearing away their empty dishes.
Yes, they had already eaten. Evidently in the Kingdom of Dicks, “meeting for dinner” does not necessarily mean “Having dinner together”. Silly us. We should have been more specific when making arrangements.
The King of Dicks grumbled and motioned to his pie eyed girlfriend for a wrinkled brown paper bag. “Here. This is for you. Happy Chanukah.” His girlfriend embarrassedly handed my wife a worn bag. Inside my wife found an odd set of NASCAR coffee mugs. One was missing.
Yea, I was just as confused as you are. Who fucking knows what goes on in his thick, dickheaded skull? NASCAR Coffee mugs from the thrift store? What ever.
My wife handled them the leaded glass Champaign bucket she had purchased.
“Hey. Cool. You know that’s all we drink: Champaign. I won’t drink anything but Champaign." The King announced as if that statement adorned him with some special status.
Yes. We know Dickhead. I thought to myself as I sat there seething that after all that trouble, this dickhead didn’t wait for us to eat dinner. I fingered a salad fork in my hand and calculated to myself the appropriate force and trajectory needed to pierce the King of Dicks sternum.
And then it happened.
Divine providence shown down upon us in that dingy crappy pub in the form of a blue haired early bird diner who suspisously looked like the elderly lady who flipped me the bird in the parking lot just a few minutes ago.
She slowly navigated the dinning room, meandering between the tables. And ever so slowly, as she passed our table, her frail, calcium deprived , Depends covered hip nudged our table and I watched as the very exspensive, leaded glass Champaign bucket slipped from the table and smashed upon the ceramic pub floor.
King of Dinks was flabbergasted. The sweet old lady continued along her path, completely oblivious to the King of Dicks hysterical rants and the destruction she just caused.
I couldn’t help but not to chuckle. My wife and the pie eyed drug addled girlfriend wondered if the shattered crystal could be glued back together. Good luck.
The King of Dicks looked at me, waiting for me to offer to replace it. No way Dickhead. Too bad.
I sat there smiling, knowing that this dinner was over, and that in a few minutes we all would be heading out on our separate ways. Us with our shitty mugs, and the King of Dicks with a bag full of broken glass.
I wondered to myself if I could convince my lovely wife that we should pick up a video and perhaps some grapes on the way home?
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