I spent a day in Hico over the weekend – did some farmwork, slept in a screened-in porch, and took the dog for a midnight walk under a full moon. I would have had to parachute in beer to make it better.
Some things I noticed on the trip:
- The mosquitos this year are big, proud and aggressive. Seriously, these mosquitos deserve to be a little league team’s mascot. They looked like trophies, flattened against my windshield as they were.
- The closest a civilian can get to driving a tank is driving a tractor. You get to plow over rough terrain and knock over just about anything you want. (Or mow over it, whatever.) I realize that some will disagree, saying that the monster truck is also similar. But the thing about driving the monster truck, as opposed to the tractor or tank, is that monster truck driving requires a certain amount of stupidity. Oh, I’m sure it’s fun, but you can’t get away from the celebration of the "Yee-haw Yee-haw (banjo interlude) h-yuck" that is monster truck society. Tank and tractor driving – that’s all practicality. Good old American practicality.
- The wildflowers this year are better than ever. We have entire fields covered in yellows, reds, whites and purples. And I couldn’t help but think that we created this environmental wonderland by poisoning hundreds of mesquite trees, with gallons of kerosene per tree, to clear the aforementioned fields.
Thanks to some movie selections recently made by my wife, we just watched "Forgetting Sarah Marshall" and the not-nearly-as-good "Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist."
I was thinking about how both plots followed the formula of
- Girlfriend dumps boyfriend for new guy.
- Ex-boyfriend finds another, more awesome, girl.
- Old girlfriend goes freakin’ nuts and tries to win back ex-boyfriend.
- After some hemming and hawing, boy gives old girlfriend back of hand.
- Ecstatic happiness.
This is the only subgenre of the RomCom that I think is aimed at men. God knows how many of us have had this fantasy while we were licking our wounds after our most recent dumping, listening to Pearl Jam’s Black over and over and over.
But it’s a fantasy. I know so because it’s never happened to me nor any other guy that I know. And I know like 10 or 15 guys.
Really, the closest I ever came to living this was getting drunken phone calls at 3 a.m. from ex-girlfriends who wanted to tell me about how I was always so sweet ... and not like their new guy ... who was totally flirting with that ho Cindy at the club but that doesn’t matter because he's probably gay.
7 comments:
You neglected to mention your little male romcom fantasy came true when you met your awesome and very patient wife. Ahem.
Actually, my wife didn't follow the aforementioned formula. That was more of a stand-by-your-man situation that showed her awesomeness and patience. I don't know if they've done a movie on that.
(If you're not saying "awwww", I'm not doing this right).
Awwwww!
ditto awwwwwwww!
just out of curiosity - how do you kill a mesquite tree with kerosene? (oh and awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww)
If memory serves, we soaked the tree in a complete circle where the stump met the ground. But it's been awhile. The easy way: Hire somebody.
Re removal of mesquite trees: I would recommend dynamite. I don't know if it works, but it'd be fun trying.
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