taxi1010 - Ingenious Codewords inside Everyday Verbal Violence

[A baby takes one look at you and starts screaming] • [A bully punching you on the shoulder as his posse stands around] Do you have a problem with that? • [A child alone on a grocery shopping cart drops a stuffed toy and points at it; you pick it up and hand it to the child, who cheerfully says, "Thank you!" Then the father races over and asks the child ...] Did he knock that out of your hand? • [A child copying everything you say] • [A child persistently copying everything you say] • [A child who is getting too physical with you] • [A completely lackadaisical person gesturing for you to come on over to chat, and if you do, they say, "Do you have change for a twenty?"] • [A dismissive wave of the hand] • [A face all full of mistrust and reason] • [A "friend" blasting their car horn at you] • [A gangster or thug coming after you] • [A group of people standing behind your chair in a bar or restaurant, occasionally bumping into you, or kicking your chair] • [A hard handshake] • [A homeless man peeing on you in a city bus] • [A little girl turning around and pointing at a three-hundred-pound woman, making everybody laugh] • [A long-winded joke] • [A parking lot attendant using bureaucratic double talk to cheat you out of fifty cents] • [A pedestrian pounding the side of your car] • [A physician giving you a long-winded explanation about your medical condition] • [A piece of apple strudel shoots from the tip of your tongue across the dining room table into the Chancellor's peach aperitif] • [A pretty girl purposefully crossing your path] • [A process server outside your door; don't open the door! It's like a Laurel and Hardy movie; you're just patient, and sooner or later they'll leave you alone] This is Tim Hutton from the Berkeley Heritage ... I'm writing a story about local writers, poets, and artists ... Are you saying there's no one here who's a writer, poet, or artist? Cheeze! [Berkeley Heritage doesn't exist; sooner or later liars always trip themselves up] • [A recording from a parking lot ticket machine blasting away in your ear] • [A stranger continuing to get physical with your child] • [A vicious aside to a friend] • ["A wind chime!"] I wish I could change it. [Cell phone chime] • [Aaaaa-CHOO!] • ["Aaaaa-CHOO!" "Oh, you've got a cold?"] Just a little dandruff flying by. • [Ac-c-c-h-t! spit!] • [Aggressive hazing rituals, including locker room towel snapping, "bagging" (grabbing men's testicles), goosing, mooning, pugnacious horseplay, or similar boorish behavior] • [An impostor asking you a question when they already know the answer (It's just an expression of hatred)] • ["And Japan Center is further down Fillmore."] We're Asian. [They are Chinese, misinterpreting the situation] • [Any incomprehensible or inexplicable question] • [Any off-color joke] • [Any off-the-wall response] • [Anything in a foreign language] • ["Are you an industrialist?"] No – Insurance asshole. • ["Are you Canadian?"] Do we exude Canadian? • ["Are you from Columbia?"] Do I look like someone from Columbia? [It turns out they're from Poland] • ["Are you from the European continent?"] No, I'm from Italy. • ["Are you from Vietnam?"] Do I look Vietnamese? • ["Are you in love with someone else?"] Yes. • [As the credits begin to roll, a high-maintenance Brahmin, not too bright, in the row behind you, flipping on her cell phone & critiquing the movie you just saw.] • [Beep!] • [Being told to do something unethical by a boss – They're trying to take you into a place you don't want to go ... "... like fabricating or destroying documents, lying to clients, or anything well outside the normal course of business." (–Eilene Zimmerman, "Does That Request Pass The Smell Test?" The New York Times, October 24, 2010) – She's not a pushover! ... Never sign anyone else's loan!] • [Belch!] • [Belch chorus] • [Belch finale] • [Belch, spit, fart, hawwwwkkkk, redux, redux] • [Belch symphony] • [Blowing a police whistle at you] Very good! Very good! • [Body press – someone crowding in on you, almost pushing you aside] • ["Boys make passes at girls who where glasses."] What about girls who don't wear glasses? – They get lonely, too. • [Bully in the Hallway] • [Bureaucrats haphazardly flouting their own rules] • ["Can I help you?" (Cornelia Dean, science editor of The New York Times, answering the phone)] No, no, no, I don't want to talk to you, I want to talk to someone important. • ["Can I see that ring?"] You wouldn't be able to afford it. • ["Can I use your restroom?"] No, they mop it. • ["Can you tell me what row it's in?" (Your taxi)] Sure I can tell you. [Turning their back on you] • [Car horn / finger / drive-by combo] • [Car horn just so they can show you the finger] • [Car horn right in your ear, stuck in traffic] • ["Chris, do you have a website now?"] No. • ["Click, click, click, click, ..." (Imitating the dog)] • [Close quizzing about your activities] • [Complaining] • [Contents for a suicide kit] • [Credit card declined] • [critical hints] • ["Did not!" "Did, too!" "Did not!"] Did, too! • ["Did you add vermouth to that?"] I was making two drinks at the same time, so you probably don't know what you saw. [He's an asshole] • ["Did you ever live in Tokyo?"] No. • ["Did you make a date with the millionaire? ... with the big fish?"] Oh, yeah! • ["Did you see The Evolutionary Throwback?"] Those are the things I do. • [Disapproving looks] • [Distraught woman whose dog has been bitten at the dog park] • ["Do you live far away?"] I don't live here. • ["Do you want to know how WASPs do it?"] No! No, I don't. • ["Don't you grow more fond of this city every day?" (San Francisco, on a beautiful sunny afternoon)] I can't tell if that's sarcastic. • [Dramatic laughter] • [Energetic throat clearing, to silence the whole room] • ["Everybody in the East thinks everybody in California is weird."] And they're right! • [Everyone mischievously laughing when you enter the room] • ["Excuse me, this is my classroom, and I have sixty students here."] Get out of MY classroom. [A woman's voice from the darkened room, currently being used as a video gallery] • [Eye-rolling] • [Fart!] • [Feeling off kilter & totally out-of-synch with everyone, you hear something that makes so little sense, you can hardly describe it] • [Finding your wife being nailed against a wall by another guy] • [Finding your wife half under a blanket with someone else] • [Finger wagging] • ["Fitzgerald Avenue ... at Cameron Way."] I can't take you there. I don't go there. Get out. [Cab driver to a Black woman he picked up at the bus station at 10 PM] • ["For any particular attack, someone on the planet knows what to say back."] Have you found that person? • ["Freud said, 'What does marriage have to do with sex?'"] That's what I say! • [From out of the blue, someone going off on a tangent] • [General hilarity from your friends] • [Gesture for a "hand-job"] • ["Going out?" "No."] Oh, racial profiling ... Asshole! [You're through for the day, putting your cab away, and they find that hard to accept] • [Good comebacks when someone is angry with you] • ["Good morning."] What does that mean? • ["Good night."] Good-bye. • ["Google has given up on the size wars – They no longer list how many pages they've indexed."] Well, maybe they believe what women pretend to believe – that size doesn't matter. • [Half-baked and ill-formed questions] • ["Have you ever been there before?"] What do you mean? • [Heckling] • ["Hello!"] [The cold shoulder] • [Helpful things to scream back at a driver who's screaming out his window at you] • ["Hey, it's Labor Day!"] And? • ["Hey, Pat, it's Chris!"] (calling Pat on the telephone) Yeah. • ["Hi!"] [The cold shoulder] • ["Hi."] You have some nerve! You've lived here twelve years and you've never talked to me. • [Honest way to renege on a party] • [Hooligans trespassing at a girls' summer camp] • ["Hope to see you again soon!"] Socially or professionally? • ["HOW ARE YOU DOING?" "All right."] GOOD! • ["How are you doing?" "All right."] If you're just all right, I don't know if you're ready to go on the radio. • ["How are you doing?" "Fine."] Fine? Are you sure? • ["How are you doing?" "Okay."] Just okay? • ["How do you write women so well?"] I think of a man, and I take away reason and accountability. • [How to extricate yourself from something] • ["I am so poor you wouldn't believe it."] I thought the taxi business was getting better. • ["I do research on bullies."] WHY THE HELL ARE YOU DOING THAT? [facetiously] • ["I do research on mean people, rude people, stupid people, phony people and bullies."] Any tips? • ["I don't watch the news."] [General hilarity from your friends] • ["I don't worry about that."] Well, you should. • ["I dreamt about you and your father two nights ago."] Poor thing. • ["I forgot you're not supposed to talk to people about religion."] Why would you? • ["I found out after work my mother had died at the moment I pulled off the highway and dreamt she was behind me, digging a hole in the sand ... over in North Carolina."] Where in North Carolina? • ["I go to Stanford."] Oh, the anti-intellectual school. • ["I had a hunch you weren't going to be long."] You know me. • ["I have to leave right now for a ten o'clock meeting."] Just one more minute! [You're in your boss's office at five-minutes-to-ten; your girlfriend is outside the office building waiting with packed bags for you both to catch a cab to the airport; and your boss intends to keep you wrapped up in a rambling business strategy conference half an hour – if you let him] • ["I heard your laugh from around the corner."] My cackle? • ["I just want to make sure you have my forms."] Oh, I don't recall; I don't recall ... Did you make a copy? ... Make sure you make copies! [Required paperwork you turned in the first day of class, which they somehow lost] • ["I lied."] You do that a lot, don't you? • ["I like the tracks."] Do you? • ["I love San Francisco!"] Because? • ["I love this kind of weather."] All the time? • ["I love you."] How embarrassing. • ["I love you."] You can't! • ["I love your coat!"] Oh, everybody has this. • ["I owe you a buck."] Oh, you can give me a blowjob later, B.J. [Banter between two straight guys] • ["I really like wild rice."] Wild rice is hard to digest. • ["I speak Japanese."] What good does that do you? • ["I used to be a systems programmer at IBM."] You don't like that? • ["I used to work at IBM."] What happened? • ["I was a year too young for my class in first grade, and beyond that, immature for my age."] It's good you can admit that. • ["I was molested as a child."] I'M SO SORRY! • ["I went to Dartmouth."] I applied there, but I didn't get in. • ["I won't be in tomorrow."] Bitch! • ["I'm a taxi driver – Can I use your restroom?"] It's for customer only. • ["I'm a throwback."] It's good to know yourself. [Condescendingly] • ["I'm curious ... what's that bell?"] It's not as if we're not working on it! • ["I'm from Dodge City, Kansas."] We're from Narnia. • ["I'm from New Jersey."] Well, when I was in New Jersey, I fucked your mother. • ["I'm going back to visit Boston." "It should be beautiful!"] When I'm there, I tend to focus on the cold. • ["I'm going to call the city."] I am the city. • ["I'm going to make movies."] It's not going to happen. • ["I'm going to Moscone." "Which one?" "Moscone West." "Much better!"] Oh, that's not good? • ["I'm not a nightmare, am I?"] Just a bad dream. • ["I'm not coming in tomorrow."] Why not? • ["I'm not going to the Prom."] Sure you are, honey! • ["I'm proud of you."] Nobody cares what you think. • ["I'm the king of late charges!"] You wish! • ["I'm using it right now."] Can I use it after? • ["I'm waiting for life to help me."] "An opening. • ["I've been waiting like half an hour."] Really? That's too bad. [Crisp, cruel] • ["I've lived in fourteen different states."] Is your father in the military? • ["I've never been to Phoenix."] You've never been to Phoenix? • ["If you move in with me, you can't bring the cat."] Why would I move in with you? • ["In two years, my TV won't be able to receive any more broadcasts, because all the TV stations will be broadcasting digitally."] Then you'll have fun watching TV! • [Instant Message with nothing but Smiley faces] • ["Is it okay to call you Arthur?"] No, it isn't. • ["Is that a good time to schedule your next appointment?"] Maybe. • ["Is this an Italian sword or a Japanese sword?"] Neither. • ["Is today the twenty-fourth?"] All day. • ["Is your name Christie?"] No, it isn't. • ["Isn't Amoret's dog great?"] "Well, I think she looks like a germ." • ["It was so scary! I almost fell in front of the cable car!"] I almost pushed you. • ["It would have happened even without Facebook."] I disagree. • ["It's going to be a cold, frosty night."] How do you know that? Are you a meteorologist? • ["It's going to be cold the rest of the week."] Why is that? • ["It's going to be hot today!"] Sexy weather. • ["It's how to change the mood if someone is mean or difficult."] How do you do that? • ["It's really a question of family influence: for instance, my son read six books over Christmas vacation."] Well, now you're putting ME down — and my cousin. • ["It's research on how to defend yourself with words."] Well, screw you! • [Jabs, pokes, prods, bumps, pushes, leans, assists, hot breath on your neck, lightly touching] • ["Jessica says hello."] You talked to Jessica? • ["Joe Lieberman was our high school class president."] Did you check your wallet after that? • [Just when you discover people have been lying to you, tricking you onto the wrong train, sideswiping your van, pointing fingers of blame all over the place, making you feel hotheaded, you simply realize] • ["Keep the change."] All of it? • ["Let's go away for the weekend."] I can't ... You can take Kitty! [Her imaginary friend] • [Long-winded bullshit] • [Looking at each other for cues, they finally ordered water at the bar – "Are you guys with Alcoholics Anonymous?"] Not this week. • [Loudmouth at a movie theater yakking away like there's no tomorrow] • [Malevolent laughter just the moment you stop to adjust your belt] • [Masticating, slurping, smacking, or chewing with mouth open] • ["Maybe I should go."] I think that's best. • ["Maybe you better check."] What do you think I was going to do? • [Mean-mugging] • ["Melissa hates me."] I can see why she'd hate you. • [Mumbling] • ["My favorite is PayMyBills.com — Do you have a favorite service on the Internet?"] Not really. • ["My first phone number was 2540, and my best friend's phone number was 2260."] Four digits? This is a put-on. • [Name dropping] • ["New friends keep joining you in line in front of me Can I just get a small cup of coffee? I have a taxi waiting outside with the meter running."] No. I'm waiting to go to class, too. • ["No one is doing any research on deep-sea living."] Why don't you get to work on it? • [Noticeably greasy door knobs & dishes, different from sweaty hands and feet, or "palmer hyperhidrosis," a mild symptom of diabetes] • [Oaths and curses] • [Obscene phone call] • ["Oh! A cat."] It's okay ... He's all zipped up. • ["Oh! He didn't tell me he was going on vacation!"] There's no need for him to check with you. • ["Oh, you bought dirty clothes."] No, not dirty. • ["Okay! I made it on one hour's sleep!"] Okay! Congratulations! • [Outrageous flirting, pushing all your buttons, remaining clearly unobtainable] • [Overhearing something, which may or may not apply to you] • [Parting shots] • [People screaming in a foreign language] • [People talking to each other during a movie – These people are like intuitive – They can tell who they're going to upset – When certain things happen, they trigger a response – Everyone has something] • [Persistent heckling, disturbances, catcalls, and throwing things] • [Personal attacks, hate mail, vitriolic e-mail or other written invective, from "e-holes."] • [Physical comedy, boorish pratfalls, or weird mocking behavior] • [Platitudes and "moronic comments" friends say after you've been laid off, extracted from "Navigating a Delicate Subject: The Layoff of a Friend," by Alina Tugend, The New York Times, April 25, 2009] • [Prank phone call] • [Putting your foot in your mouth] • [Reverent prayer] • ["Sam and I are going to look at the Savannah College of Art and Design."] Isn't that a private institution? – Well, is it accredited? • [Satanic phone call] • [Scoffing out loud, with an incredulous tone of voice expressing total disbelief] • ["See how she walks across the street without looking? ... a Californian."] We're not stereotyping or anything, are we? • ["See you tomorrow!"] Not if I see you first! [They'll disappear or make a getaway] • ["She's our stealth neighbor."] Oh, she just likes to take care of her kids and mind her own business — That's pretty nice if you ask me. • [Silly or simple-minded jokes, such as ... (1.) "Does your face hurt?" "No." "Well, it's killing me!" ... (2.) "How do you get a nun pregnant? ... Dress up like a choirboy." – They're all the same formula] • ["Sir, can I help you?" "Can I just stand here a second?"] No, you can't. [Seeking momentary shelter from the cold inside the reception area of Williams-Sonoma Corporate Headquarters] • ["So what are we?"] Not to give us a title yet, but he is mine and I am his. • [Some angry hombre staring at you] :: WildCard-0 • [Somebody saying too many words] • [Someone about to mug you near an alleyway] • [Someone actually getting your goat, because they know you all too well] • [Someone at a lunch counter whacking you with their elbow while they eat] • [Someone at the movies putting their feet up next to you] • [Someone being mean, stupid, vicious & phony – all at the same time] • [Someone betraying they didn't hear a word you said – They're too busy formulating their own preconceptions] • [Someone blocking the aisle with their chair] • [Someone blocking you from opening your car door] • [Someone booting you out of a blues club, essentially because you're by yourself] • [Someone boring you to death at a party] • [Someone bugging you] • [Someone butt-fucking you when you're two years old, leaving you curled up on the bathroom floor, with whatever oozing from your bottom] • [Someone channel surfing ... just when you're absorbed in a particular show] • [Someone chucking apples at you, pushing you down] • [Someone coming into your classroom with a gun] • [Someone coming over and sitting on you while they're talking on a cell phone] • [Someone coming up from behind and pulling your hair] • [Someone cutting in line ahead of you] • [Someone destroying and stomping on your sand castle, right in front of your eyes (–A kid stomping a four-year-old girl's sand castle)] • [Someone disparaging gays when you're gay] • [Someone disparaging you on a conference call, unaware of your presence] • [Someone distracting you with random fragments from television, or things you once said, or some cartoon character] • [Someone dropping the ball, trailing off into a pretentiously absorbed silence] • [Someone dropping your business card into the trash can] • [Someone dumping your change on the counter] • [Someone erasing comments to say, "Hi and I am always thinking of you," from their website, and not returning your phone calls, calling you, "that girl nicole" blah blah "she's my friend" and what not] • [Someone feeling suicidal] (Urethral sadism -- Feeling angry and powerless, unable to cope with the pain and humiliation of wetting the bed, and believing (1.) the warmth will never return, and (2.) the pain will never stop, they've decided to piss their life away; this intense pain resurfaces in early adolescence, under various inexplicable circumstances having to do with sexuality (outer-directed love towards people who don't even know how to like you, where you came from, or even where they came from; they could care less; if you even try to talk to them about all this, they lie; they'd rather distract themselves with shopping, travel, movies, vacations, politics and cruelty. Oops! That's urethral sadism, too!)) • [Someone feigning "being startled" when they see you, making you out to be a monster] • [Someone flipping you the bird] • [Someone giving you a check that bounces] • [Someone giving you a counterfeit bill, which you can't legally accept] • [Someone giving you a partial view down their blouse] • [Someone going off on a tiresome tangent, as if they're telling their mother something they did to kiss a school teacher's ass] • [Someone going on and on about the prices of things] • [Someone hanging up on you] • [Someone having a Friday night tantrum] • [Someone having psychological issues, trying to provoke you or start something] • [Someone humming, whistling, crumpling bags, slamming doors, and carrying on while you're concentrating on your work] • [Someone ignoring your e-mail] • [Someone in a blue blazer breaking in front of you in an airport security line] • [Someone intentionally bumping you] • [Someone leaving you suspended mid-conversation] • [Someone leering at your wife or daughter in your presence] • [Someone making bedroom eyes at your girlfriend] • [Someone merely looking away without a thank you] • [Someone mimicking random people on TV] • [Someone mimicking you blinking your eyes] • [Someone mimicking you scratching your chin] • [Someone mocking or pointing at your spouse, who's overweight] • [Someone noisily picking their teeth] • [Someone not having the courtesy to get off the phone and talk to you after you've done something to help them out a lot] • [Someone not quite betraying a confidence, rather, simply "playing with you," flirting around with betraying your confidentiality] • [Someone not taking your offered handshake] • [Someone offering you a handshake after you discover they were cheating you] • [Someone on the cell phone, looking at you, though not talking to you after all] • [Someone overreacting a little because you bumped into their car; if they just got out of prison, they could pull a knife on you] • [Someone parroting you] • [Someone patting your belly] • [Someone piling it on, telling you details and factoids you could do without] • [Someone pissing on the garage floor] • [Someone playing favorites and not playing fair] • [Someone playing possum on the living room sofa] • [Someone plunking down at your table uninvited] • [Someone poking you, provoking you, trying to start a fight] • [Someone pouring it on thick, punishing you for something you said] • [Someone punching the lid on the bathroom trash receptacle (when they see you) to deposit a soiled paper towel] • [Someone reading exam aloud] • [Someone reciting poetry in your face. (You can see this as one of the compulsive utterances of Tourette's syndrome) What they really want is attention; it's up to you which way you pay attention to them] • [Someone refusing your business card] • [Someone repeating what you just said, word for word, in an incredulous tone of voice] • [Someone "reserving" the last table for themselves even before they've gone through the cafeteria line] • [Someone rudely interrupting you] • [Someone rummaging through your private things when you're gone, leaving one item menacingly upside-down] • [Someone screaming at you, and you don't even know what they're saying] • [Someone "secretly" pulling back so you have to reach a little too far to take what they're handing you ... because they're dwelling inside a Betty and Veronica comic book grudge or are trying, somehow, to "even the score."] • [Someone showing you the Yiddish way of enumerating Christians, finger by finger, folding down their fingers in such a way they end up giving you the bird] • [Someone sinking into a silence in the middle of a conversation] • [Someone sitting on your car while you're taking a nap] • [Someone spam-blocking your e-mail] • [Someone speaking in parables] • [Someone spitting on your shirt] • [Someone spraying your dog with a garden hose] • [Someone staring and glaring at you as you drop the mail off] • [Someone staring at you when you're having fun in class] • [Someone stealing your graduation present, a bright red fire truck, on the last day of kindergarten] • [Someone studiously ignoring you] • [Someone suddenly getting serious on you] • [Someone switching to another doorway when they see you coming] • [Someone systematically removing references to taxi1010.com from Wikipedia.org] • [Someone tailgating you at a high speed] • [Someone talking about you like you aren't even there] • [Someone talking past you] • [Someone talking directly to your breasts] • [Someone talking to you from the other side of a glass window] • [Someone talking to you with their back turned] • [Someone telling you the score of the game before you've seen your videotape] • [Someone telling you things you wish you didn't know about their distant relatives] • [Someone throwing half-full soda cans at the back of your head, and teasing you, year after year] • [Someone treating you like a pariah for asking a simple question about a dog's injured ligament: "Did the doctor say anything about its source?"] • [Someone truly upset with you] • [Someone trying to grab a free newspaper after you've opened the box] • [Someone trying to make you a laughingstock] • [Someone trying to make you the butt of their joke] • [Someone trying to speak for you] • [Someone turning their back to you on a barstool] • [Someone unmercifully beating a child] • [Someone viciously condemning a movie they haven't even seen] • [Someone whacking themselves on the forehead] • [Someone with bad breath] • [Something to say to your ex-wife] • [Something to tell yourself, having not been invited to the party next door] • ["Sometimes I think attacks are the coin of the realm."] And betrayals. • [Spit!] • [Spit over and beyond the call of duty] • [Spit redux] • [Spurious explanations for deliberate and persistent self-injury. "Common self-injuries include carving or cutting the skin, scratching, burning, ripping or pulling skin or hair, pinching, biting, swallowing sublethal doses of toxic substances, head banging, needle sticking and breaking bones. The usual targets are the arms, legs and torso, areas within easy reach and easily hidden by clothing. (–Jane E. Brody) "Self-injury can be manipulative, an effort to make others care or feel guilty or to drive them away. More often, though, it is secretive. Self-injurers may try to hide wounds under long pants and long sleeves even in hot weather, and may avoid activities like swimming." (–Ibid.)] • [Stony silence, because it's just your luck to have asked a stranger a question in the most unfriendly town west of the Mississippi] • [Street toughs looking for a rabbit to come along] • [Strip-o-gram at the office] • [Stuttering] • [Tattletale not seeing you're performing a service (such as returning a lost cell phone) for someone else ... who isn't defending you! The one you're helping out should be saying, "You fool! Can't you see he's doing this for me?" Both the one who's attacking you and the one who isn't defending you are total idiots, and you're caught inside an idiot sandwich!] • [Teenager leaving his socks strewn about the living room] • ["Thank you."] Uh-huh. • ["Thank you for the help."] Was that a sarcastic remark? • ["Thanks!"] Yep. • ["That is your ex-girlfriend?"] She never had a boyfriend. Seriously, Icarus, you should consider asking her out sometime. • ["That's a beautiful color on you."] Thank you ... You won't be seeing it for a while, though, because it needs ironing. • ["That's a Boston accent."] That's extremely unlikely. • ["That's MINE!"] No, the fire truck does not belong to you. • ["That's the news!"] I feel so much smarter. • ["The bus went that way!"] That's for MUNI only! [From an angry police officer making everyone, except the bus, turn right] • [The cold shoulder] • [The cold shoulder] • [The finger] • [The finger from a passing car] • ["The freight trains headed north are all empty and the freight trains headed south are all full."] Makes sense. • [The hand of your mortal enemy reaching out, extending itself, holding itself stiffly out ...] • ["The people from Japan are the nicest people in the world."] Maybe I'm the exception! • ["The population seems to have doubled."] It's all the students. • [The secret finger every time they pass you "away from the office," in the form of a Hitler's mustache] • ["The service around here sucks!"] How would you know? You haven't had any yet. • [The silent treatment] • [The Sufi character Nasrudin pouring yogurt into a lake: "What are you doing?" "I'm trying to turn the whole lake into yogurt."] That's not gonna work! • [The two-fingered "eyes on you!" gesture] • [Theme from The Twilight Zone] • ["There are some nice places you can go."] I'm not going anywhere. • ["There're way more people from Dartmouth out here than people from Princeton."] Is that so? • ["There was a six-foot tsunami in Indonesia twenty-eight minutes ago."] End of the world. • ["There's a lot of joy in it."] [Trying to figure out what to say to mean people] Seems terrible. • ["These aren't Frisbees."] Oh, you mean, like, Frisbee brand? [Derisively, scornfully, viciously, from a store clerk attempting to sell expensive knockoffs] • ["They don't cheat at places like Harvard and Yale – They have an honor code." "I know they cheated at Yale, because when I went to college, there were three hundred people in a class – they didn't even know who you were." "Yeah, and at my college, I used to write papers for other people."] See that, Richard? • ["They have spumoni ice-cream!"] Is it homemade, or do they get it from Italy? • [They probe to see if you're scared by their shit] • ["They sent me back to put air in the tire, can you believe it?"] Put air in your head? – I thought you had plenty. • ["They turned on the tower clock!"] Now everyone knows what time it is. • [They won't let you go] • ["They're not very friendly."] How many times did you go there? [To Chez Panisse Restaurant] • ["They're totally addicted to them." (Their dog treats)] So, you are feeding an addiction. • [Thievery confessions or admissions you wish you hadn't heard] • ["This is not an asthma symphony!" After asking you one question about your asthma, your mother thinks she can proceed with an unrelenting barrage of intimate questions about your asthma in front of your girlfriend] • ["This is Richard."] Richard ... Hart? Is this Richard ... Hart? [An anonymous bill collector] • ["Those are pictures of Virginia stabbing me in the heart."] Virginia doesn't have a heart. • ["Those are stratocumulus clouds."] No! • ["Those were scary times."] These are scary times, too. • ["Three weeks after I got married, I knew it was a mistake."] Was that in San Francisco? [Codeword for "Are you gay?"] • [Tongue stuck out] • [Tribal (and frightening) scream from a passing car] • [u'll say something, then another guy will say ..."ohh ur mom is (whatever u just said)"] • [Unintelligible mumbling] • [Uproarious cackling] • [Uproarious laughter] • [Utter nonsense] • [Verbal defense against crowbar attack] • «Verbal defense to use when called a bad nickname» • [Vicious mock laughter] • [Vicious or morbid displacement onto a third person or outside possession] • [Vigorous chicken noises from your roommate, at suitably random moments] • ["Wait!" (Telling someone not to feel you up)] For what? Luann, the more you are waiting, the less you are living. • ["We are the forefathers of the Internet, and if we're not doing things on the Web worthy of our times and culture, people will look back on us as complete dolts."] I have two things to say about that: There's a statement A, and there's a statement B, which is NOT A. There is no way to prove the truth of either one. • ["We got listed in The Rough Guide to the Internet!"] What does that mean? • ["We have seventeen websites."] Kind of compulsive. • ["We have to build up America again!" "You mean, by breeding with beautiful women?"] I think your generation can take care of that. • ["Welcome back to the United States!"] No problem. • ["We're doing the same thing!"] No we're not! You have to come to our workshops! We teach people centering. • ["Well, young lady, I hope we didn't hold you up."] Well, old man, that's okay. • ["What a money drain this is!"] Yeah, and what isn't? • ["What a nice car!"] You want it? • ["What country are you from?"] We're from overseas. • ["What culture are you from?"] I'm Japanese. [Many Asians will say, "I'm Japanese," because they're ashamed they grew up in a slum in another country; sometimes you just have to assume the opposite of what they said, without interpreting, using a light touch, with care, reserve, and no undue familiarity; over time, the truth comes out] • ["What do you do for a living?] It's not interesting. • ["What do you have?" "Two cereals."] I cannot see. [Inside the paper bag] • ["What do you think they're doing outside over there?"] [Stony silence, because it's just your luck to have asked a stranger a question in the most unfriendly town west of the Mississippi] • ["What else can you do?"] You can give blowjobs. • ["What is a nightclub?"] Oh my god, you don't know what a nightclub is? You must be a virgin. • ["What line of work are you in?"] Who, me? • ["What should I wear?"] Nothing outlandish. • [What to do when a girl insults you] • ["What's happening, brother?"] I ain't yo' brother! [White guy to a black guy] • ["What's your profession?"] 'Bye! • ["What's your profession?"] I don't work. • ["What's your profession?"] I work for UCSF. • ["What's your profession?"] I work in a bank. • ["When is Ramadan?"] It's in the spring. [They'd rather make up an answer to appear knowledgeable than tell you they have no idea when it is – It's a form of lying, or misleading at best – it turns out the fast of Ramadan is sometime in September or October] • [When you pick up the phone, the caller says,] Who's this? • ["When is your baby due?"] I'm not pregnant. • ["Where are you from?"] You sound like Immigration. • ["Where are you from?" "Detroit."] That's right ... You said that. • ["Where are you from?" "I'm from a country." "Which one?"] That's of no importance to you. • ["Where were you born?"] In the USA. • ["Where were you born?" "Dodge City."] I don't believe it. • ["Which do you like better, stick-shift or automatic?"] I like both – I like what I have now – I'm more grown-up. • ["Who's spending the night with you?"] My friend. • ["Why did you ask me to move?"] I wanted to make a U-turn. [They honk, and even when you move to a nearby parking space away from the driveway you thought you were blocking, they honk again, because all they wanted to do was make a U-turn to grab the parking space – Essentially, no matter what you do, you're in their way] • ["Why doesn't this taxi have a meter?"] You are very rude. • ["Why have you been so reluctant to appear on my show?"] Because I think you're an asshole. • ["Would you like a card for my website?"] No thanks! – You've got a blog? • ["Wow! That's the first cola I've had in about five years!"] You don't like them? ... or you just were drinking water? • [Yawn!] • ["You came in here the other day in an orange jacket." "That wasn't me."] You look different. • ["You can hint all day long, I'm not cheating you."] I'm not hinting. • ["You can tell a man's from New York, but you can't tell him much."] I think that would be good for an asshole: 'You can tell a man's an asshole, but you can't tell him much.' • ["You can't drink four martinis! You only weigh a hundred and twenty pounds!"] [Inadvertently spoken within the earshot of her boss, who could drink four martinis] • ["You just don't know what I like to do when I'm alone."] I don't want to go there. • ["You know what's really good? — McDonald's coffee!"] I've never had any. • ["You must be a Californian." "No, I'm not."] I am. [Menacingly, from a third party] • ["You're so beautiful!"] Oh, so you don't think I was pretty yesterday? • [Your head's shoved into a wall locker] • [Your own mind giving you shit] • [Your roommate cheating you] • [Your roommate not turning off his alarm clock] • ["Your warning sign is not where anyone would see it."] That's not my problem. • [Your wife getting stoned and going to a B. B. King concert with some of your friends, pointedly without you]