Awkward List

Awkward moments and more weird stuff

dating

Will you be paying together or separately? (Part 2 of 2)

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Continued from Part 1:

——

“Weird,” Megan said to me, as we walked back to a seat near the door to wait for our coffee, “what was her deal?”

“I think she knows you.” I responded to Megan.

“Edwin, how could she know me? I’ve never seen her before.”

“You suggested this place, right? How’d you know about it?”

“I came in here once for like five minutes, my coworker was picking up some coffee. But whats-her-name wasn’t here, I’m pretty good with faces. Wait, why would you think that she knows me?”

“Megan?” We heard the barista yell out. There was no expression on Megan’s face for about two seconds.

“Megan, here’s your latte,” Kelly said. Megan smiled, and stood up to get brown paper coffee cup.

I had ordered regular coffee, and had ordered first, while Megan had ordered some super specialized latte. Baristas have their own priority lists when it comes to preparing coffee, I guess.

I picked up my coffee soon after that and we were on our way out, when Megan suggested to ask her why Kelly wanted her to pay for her own coffee. I thought Megan was joking, so I smiled. I looked at her face for some reassurance that she had made a joke, but Megan was not smiling. Then she stopped walking.

“Excuse me, Kelly?” Megan asked.

“Yeah?” Kelly answered, holding her cell phone with both hands and elbows on the counter.

Megan was not going to go through with it. It would be too awkward.

“Why did you, um, I’m sorry, did you think that…?” Megan started.

“Did you think it was weird for me to offer to pay for Megan?” I blurted out.

It was odd, but Kelly answered.

It turns out that she had witnessed Megan come in once, with a guy who had frequented the place often and happened to be quite rude.

“If a woman wants to pay for her own coffee, she should be allowed to.” Kelly stated.

It bothered her that women did not get a choice, and went on about women in the workplace, rape cases in Africa, and abortion issues. We couldn’t say much without risking upsetting Kelly, so we just listened, awkwardly sipping from our hot drinks in unison for a good ten minutes. She was quite a character, and spoke with uneven flow, and I’m pretty sure she was making up stuff.

“Then she feels obligated to return a favor,” she went on.

Oh no. Things were about to get weird. We had to get out of there. I reacted the only way I knew how: I took out my cell phone and acted surprised when I looked at the time. Kelly caught on, and her tone changed to apologetic while her current sentence faded while she thought of something else to say. The talk she was giving to us, two friends who had just met earlier that day, was about to get a lot more awkward, and I was glad to finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. And glad we got an answer.

“I didn’t mean to make you guys feel weird,” Kelly mentioned, “You guys look cute together. Tell me, how long have you guys been dating?”

“Oh no, we just met actually.” I said, after a short pause.

That was awkward, too.

“What?” Kelly looked smiled and sighed, “Well that makes sense. Wow.”

Megan and I were confused. What the heck was she talking about?

“So you and that, um, other guy a few weeks ago, you–”

“Friends,” Megan interrupted, “we’re coworkers actually.”

“Oh, ha ha! Thank god.”

Kelly and Megan exchanged some telepathic dialogue or something. They both smiled.

“I am so sorry. I was just like, ‘poor guy, this girl is obviously taking advantage,’ and the guy, um, your coworker comes here a lot, and he’s a real jerk, so I could totally see you ditching him” Kelly said.

So she wanted Megan to pay for her own coffee because she thought Megan was cheating on a jerk, but could totally rationalize it? But first gave a speech on me not giving women an option to decide? We slowly started inching toward the door.

“Thank you guys!” Kelly yelled out, as we opened the door. It got dark pretty fast outside.

So we didn’t really find out what you guys had mentioned in the comments. I guess it could be a lesbian coffee shop, or she could be a feminist. It was such a strange situation, that it still puzzles me, even though it happened a few months ago. Obviously I had to blog about it.

Once we were outside, Megan and I looked at each other. We didn’t have to say much about it, we were both thinking the same thing.

Or not.

Actually we had no idea what had just happened.

Megan finally said what I wanted to ask. I think. Remember, I was quite confused. I could sense her mind working hard to get out this question:

“So, whose side was she on?”

Will you be paying together or separately? (Part 1 of 2)

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Talk about putting you on the spot.

I was out with a couple of new friends I had met at a bookstore, and eventually the group of five people turned into two: me and a brown-eyed girl with long dark hair. We talked about coffee and shared our views on unconscious cues that people give off. Both of us being deeply interested in human behavior, we had lots to talk about. It was around six o’clock in the evening, and the sidewalk was getting a bit crowded, so we stopped by a coffee shop that either sold really bad coffee, or was operating illegally because it was empty from what we could see from the outside. We walked in.

Sometimes you don’t know how to order at a new place, you know? Some people let you pay once you get your drink, others you pay up front, you can open up a tab, you can stuff your face and then pay later.. it can get quite confusing. The barista was cleaning something in the sink and asked what she could get for us, so I ordered a house coffee, and Megan ordered a latte with some other italian sounding words.

“It’ll be ready in a minute, guys! For here, or to go?”

I looked over to signal that we’re going to be heading out, and she looked directly at me and walks over to the cash register, wiping her hands on a towel. I walked over, and took out my wallet.

“Where are you guys coming from?”

“A bookstore,” I reply, “the one two blocks down, on Fourth.”

I handed her a ten dollar bill, and she held it without doing anything else. She looked at me and then at Megan. Then she asked, “Will you be paying together, or separately?”

Megan looked over, and stood up. I turned toward Megan.

“It’s OK, this one’s on me.”

“No, no. It’s OK.”

I looked at the barista, Kelly, her name tag read, and motioned her to accept it. Looking over my shoulder, Kelly opens her eyes widely toward Megan and says “Would you like to pay separately, honey?”

Megan froze. She looked at me, and then at Kelly.

Awkward.

I turned around toward Kelly and said, “It’s fine, just take my money,” trying to sound as casual as possible even the though I was awkwarded out.

Kelly waited for Megan to say something.

What was happening? Why was this such a big deal? I made an obviously confused facial expression for Megan, out of sight from Kelly.

Megan laughed.

“Yes, that’s fine. I’ll get you next time.”

Thank you, Megan. You just got us out of this strange situation. Pheew. Awkwardness averted.

Oh, wait.

There were no sounds coming from the cash register. Kelly was still looking at Megan, trying to communicate telepathically or something.

Silence.

I wanted to laugh.

Still silent.

“Are you sure?” she asked.

Silence again.

Megan didn’t know how to respond, and the whole situation was so awkward that we ended up paying separately.

…

What.

?

Why was this barista being so weird? We asked her. Her response may surprise you. Or not. Yeah, it probably won’t.

Any theories?

Part 2 of this story is coming up on Wednesday. 

When you really want someone to shut up but have to be polite

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There are some people who really like to talk.

And I mean REALLY talk. Some do it because they are nervous, and others are just plain talkers.

I run into a few of these people about once a day. They tell you about their day, and about their life.. then make a comment about how they’re taking up your time, they apologize, and then keep talking.

y-u-keep-talking

For women in the dating world:

Imagine yourself sitting at a bar, with a couple of your girlfriends.. trying to act all cool. Suddenly someone takes the bait and he begins to approach you. Uh oh. Here he comes.

“Hello, I’m Jeff.”

“Melissa. Nice to meet you.”

“How is your evening going?”

“It’s going well, thank you.”

“Same for me, a couple of my friends had a blah blah blah…” and he goes on and on about people you don’t know doing things you don’t care about.

So he keeps talking and talking and you just sit there,  smiling, looking away every once in a while hoping that he gets the message –but no luck. What do you do? Pretend to get a phone call? Say you need to go to the restroom? …yawn?

For men in the dating world:

Well, let us be honest here.. you probably think the date is going well if she keeps talking.

Haha.

I don’t know. Sometimes I just wish I could leave the person talking by themselves. How many times have you been on a phone call and literally put the phone down, go pee or make yourself a sandwich, and then pick up the phone again only to discover that the person still hasn’t stopped talking?

How do you let them know?

109. Unintentionally sexual stuff

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It is not that immature..

During lecture, our professor was explaining an engineering problem:

“So the tube can slide freely along the rod, therefore there is no force exerted on the z-axis.. do you guys understand? It’s like..”

*This is the part when he made a circle with his thumb and index finger, and started sticking the dry-erase marker in and out of it.*

   “It can flow freely because there is no friction. Can you guys see this in the back?”

*In and out.. in and out, over and over again.*

We were all thinking it.. so we did what we had to do: we avoided making eye contact with each other in order to keep ourselves from laughing.

There are so many things out there that sound and look extremely sexual, but in order to act all grown up and mature, we avoid mentioning them. How many times has your teacher drawn out something that looks a lot like a penis? Or have you ever let out a moan or a grunt that sounds a bit sexual? I was reading an article on Huffington Post about the “Funniest Unintentionally-Sexual Books of All Time”, which shows pictures of book covers with some titles that one can easily question if they were meant to sound that way, and it shows what I’m talking about.

Some words have a different meaning now than they did a while back, I’m sure you can think of some (like the word “gay”), but there is one name that has  become both a proper noun and a common noun.. and a weird one at that –the name “Dick”.

I want to research HOW that name could have become another word for penis (along with the other word for rooster), but I’m afraid of what I’ll find if I Google such a thing. The book Moby Dick STILL gets some giggles! How come? I’m a little ashamed of the following, but I’ll say it anyway.. a couple of friends and I were introduced to a man named Dick a while ago, and here’s how the conversation went:

“Hello, nice to meet you. My name is Dick,” he said.

*We looked at each other. Followed by an awkward pause*

  • “Um, hi Dick.. I’m Richard, this is Edwin and that’s Mark,” Richard replied.

“Hey! You’re a Dick too, that is great!” Dick replied, referring to the fact that his own name was also Richard, but he went by Dick.

“Heyy.. you ARE a Dick!” Mark said to Richard, referring to something completely different (another word for jerk).

..and it just got more uncomfortable..

In the end, Dick did not catch any of those other meanings to the word/name, and I felt a little bad for not explaining it to him.. but maybe I would’ve just made things worse.

Super awkward.


More Awkward:

108. Awkward Moments in Middle School

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..Middle school has its awkward moments.

The bell buzzed.

I guess it can no longer be called a bell if it doesn’t ring, but I’m so used to the bell at Glazier Elementary that it still feels strange to call that thing a buzzer. Instead of ringing for recess, it will buzz for “nutrition”. It even sounds boring that way. Middle school will be different. We no longer have just one principal and support staff, but a principal and two assistant principals plus a staff that all look equally scary.

“That bell isn’t for us,” some tall kid said, who apparently still had the whole buzzer and bell thing confused, “our classes start at 8:20 A.M.”

“Thanks man,” I responded, “but I still have to find the HR, what ever that is.”

“I think it stands for home room, my older brother says that we will have more than one teacher so I guess that’s where we will meet first,” he said, “I got room 196, you?”

“196, I guess we’re in the same room.”

And so my first day in middle school started. We found the home room, had our dumb introductions (name, what school you come from and an interesting fact about yourself), broke in our brand new notebooks and pencils, and went through the usual uncomfortable first day stuff. I had absolutely no idea about the awkward moments waiting to happen in the next three years of middle school.

It didn’t take long for me to realize that I was not in elementary school anymore. A question many of us had but did not dare to ask was “where the heck is the playground?” all we saw was a bunch of benches and other areas to sit. Were they expecting us to sit around and actually talk to each other? It reminded me of how strange it was to think that older people sat around just listening to music. At least we weren’t being pressured into eating the horrible cafeteria lunches anymore. All the cool kids didn’t eat cafeteria lunch. There were many other differences, such as the introduction of school security, increased seriousness in the word detention, and the creation of cliques. I remember asking for cooler-looking underwear since I would be changing in and out of gym clothes in front of other kids. And it all went crazy from there.

You see, middle school is supposed to be filled with awkward moments. There are kids that still haven’t hit their growth spurt, so you end up with a random assortment of short and tall kids. You cannot tell the difference between a sixth grader and an eighth grader just by looking at their height. Some kids are freaking out because of the first signs of pimples. Some girls actually have boobs now and some are flat out ..well, flat. Some guys have the whole deep voice thing going, some sound comically feminine, and others are still experiencing heavy voice cracking. Everyone goes through a bunch of changes in their bodies, some more embarrassing and more noticeable than others.

Suddenly the opposite sex doesn’t seem that bad, but the thought of a boyfriend or girlfriend seems way too serious for your age. Of course, there are those exceptions out there that claim to already have had 4 girlfriends and are not afraid to write love letters and ask someone out to the dances where girls stand near one wall, and the guys stand by the opposite one.  For the first time ever, you experience what its like to blush at the sound of someone’s name and have those perfectly planned conversations in your head completely fail after the first word. And then you figure out what it feels like when she starts liking some other guy who probably plays basketball and sort of has facial hair and all you have going for yourself is the top score in your pre-algebra test and band trophies and it leaves you bummed for a whole two days! Ahem. Uh, anyways..

Middle school is a planned chaos. It appears as though the school system thought to itself:

Hmm.. kids are usually going through a lot of things between the ages of 11-13, lets put them in a school together, yes this is a great idea!

But it didn’t kill us, so I’ll trust the guy that came up with the quote and assume it made us stronger. No more unoriginal yearbook signings that say “Hope you have a great summer! See you next year! K.I.T.” or the need to take food out of your braces. It must be safe now to say congratulations, you made it through some of the most awkward years of your life!

What awkward moments do you remember about your middle school/junior high life?

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33. Getting hit on

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First of all, I would like to apologize to the guy from Starbucks, I will tell the internet about his awkward moment. He is the main character of today’s story:

After spending 6 hours in the university library, I decided to take a break and head out into the real world to get a cup of coffee at another Starbucks (we have one on our campus). It was finals week, and I was bored to death by the American government studies, I just needed to see things other than the black Times New Roman letters in my American Government textbook and my unreadable notes.

I arrived with a big bag filled with notes, a laptop, charger, pens, highlighters.. you know, the student essentials. After putting my things on a chair next to a man (who was talking on the phone), I noticed a very attractive woman standing by the teas and other stuff that Starbucks sells. She must have been in her mid-twenties, tall with long dark hair, and wearing a black dress. I asked her if was waiting in line. She said no, and I proceeded onto ordering coffee from the tall barista guy.

Since ordering plain coffee takes around 10 seconds, I stepped back and waited for it before heading back to my chair. Then I saw the cell phone man approaching the woman. Was he doing it? Yes he was! He was going to go up to her and talk to her. Big move. [Whenever I tell this story, I like to imagine that everybody put their coffee down, the music stopped playing, and all eyes focused on the man about to do what no other man in the shop was willing to do: talk to “her”.] I must have been around 3 feet away from all of the action.

“Hey” said the man.

“Hi.” the woman politely replied, with a smile.

“Ordering some coffee, huh?”

“No, I’m just waiting” said the woman

“Oh,” said the man, “Do you come here often?”

Do you come here often? DO YOU COME HERE OFTEN?!? He asked her one of those questions that just give it away! It’s like saying “How YOU doin’ . . .” At this point, I gave up all hope on the man. He pretty much flipped a coin and was either about to face rejection or success.

“Sorry. I’m actually waiting for my boyfriend.” the woman said, with an “I feel sorry for you” look on her face.

“Oh, cool. Your boyfriend.” –awkward.

“Yeah,” she said, pointing at the guy taking orders at Starbucks “that’s him.”

At this moment, I looked at the barista guy, and he just smiled at the man and started to shake his head a little. I felt embarrassed for the man. He just walked back to his chair without saying another word. I didn’t know how to pretend that I hadn’t just witnessed something like that. I was hoping for the moment to end when, suddenly..

“Edwin!”

I heard my name from the other side of the shop.

“Edwin! A tall coffee?”

Oh, right. My coffee. Those 10 seconds seemed way too long.

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