Friday, January 16, 2009

Do I know you?

So I was getting some lunch yesterday, and while I was standing in line to place my order I noticed a woman sitting at a table looking at me...

I thought it was a little odd, but I just passed it off as someone sitting alone at lunch watching other people on their lunches. So I placed my order and glanced around the shop and noticed that she was still looking at me...

The place wasn't exactly empty, so now I'm starting to get a little more curious...

I finally get my food and eat my lunch at a table looking out a window...

When I'm done I go to throw my garbage out and she is still sitting in the same spot and looking at me like she either knows me or likes me...

Now I'm not going to complain or anything, as she was around my age and was fairly attractive...

The backstory here is that I have a brother who looks damn near identical to me, so when this sort of thing happens, I usually just brush it off as the other person thinking I'm my brother...

But usually they will say something in that regard, like saying my brother's name...

You have no idea how many small world moments I get, half of which are because of my brother...

But she said nothing, so I left and went back to work...

Can't help but feel that I should have said something...

Of course, it was right by my work, which is right near my house, so there may be other chances...

Thursday, January 15, 2009

Getting Creative...

Ever have one of those days when you are just sitting there at work when something sparks your creative side (no matter how developed that might be)...

It could be a song on the radio, something you read on the internet, something somebody in the office says, or whatever... but you suddenly have this creative urge and it nags at you for the rest of the work day...

I guess I should preface this a little bit...

I'm not what one would consider an artsy person. I tend to think very logically and in straight lines. So if somebody asked me to create something abstract or to write something profound, I would have a lot of trouble. My mind has trouble creating something from nothing. But if you give me an idea, I can usually visualize something...

My problem is that I can't really recreate it. My medium of choice is photography, so unless I can easily recreate it, I can't get it out of my head. I've been told I have an eye for photography, since I can recognize something as being more than it originally looks. I can see something and can instantly know how to best capture it in two dimensions. Which is useful at times, but also extremely frustrating at others. I can have the ultimate image in my head, but no way to get it out...

I have never been good at painting or sketching, which would be the most obvious media for translating an image from mind to paper. I can try all I want to draw something, but it never comes out anywhere near what I have in my head...

At various points in my life I have lived with artistic people, the kind that can paint or sketch. My sister is the main one that comes to mind, as she is about as opposite to me as you can get in many ways. And my college roommate was similarly skilled, and similarly different...

I've often thought 'if only I could draw or paint like that', I could let others see what I can see...

But its all for naught...

Which leads me back to my current conundrom...

I was listening to the song 'Closer' by Kings of Leon a couple of days ago, and I got this dramatic image in my head that I want to get out, but can't...

I can try to sketch it on scrap pieces of paper at work as much as I want, but its never the same...

Which I guess is life for those of us that have trouble putting pencil to paper...

Wednesday, January 14, 2009

So you're probably wondering...

Who is Harry, and why should I care about his clothes?

First off, I'm not Harry...

And I'm not talking about his clothing...

Cue the backstory...

When I was in university, I was in a fraternity (actually, I'm technically still in it)...

When you get initiated into a fraternity, you are given a nickname that will be attached to you forever, unless you do something before you graduate that necessitates a nickname change...

If you don't know what I'm talking about, stop reading and go rent Animal House, then come back after you've watched it...

When I first got in, my nickname was 'GI Joe', because I was volunteering with army cadets once a week and the occasional weekend, so it seemed rather apropos. Other guys received various names that seemed, and in most cases were, completely arbitrary. We had a guy nicknamed 'Cabbage' for no particular reason whatsoever...

Another guy was given the moniker 'Jabroni', just because they wanted to give it to somebody (the WWF was very popular at the time, especially in my fraternity), and he happened to be the one sitting there when the name came up. Over the years he has proven that this was destiny, with one bone-headed action or comment after another. He actually once had a sorority girl refer to him by his first name, followed by 'Jabroni', as she thought that was his actual last name, since we called him by his nickname so often...

There are a few reasons that a nickname could get changed (and this isn't just something guys keep in their memory, the nickname goes down in a big book). You could do something rather profound, like when one of my brothers ran around a neighbourhood waking people up after a house caught fire and got branded 'Mighty Mouse'. You could do something really stupid or humiliating, which I will address in regards to myself shortly (I pulled off one of each). Or people could just get bored with the nickname you have and feel that it needs to be changed, which is where Harry's Clothes comes in...

My first year in the fraternity, which was located right across the street from the university, I lived about 20 minutes from campus. So when I was between classes I'd go over to the fraternity house and sit and watch television and hang out with the guys that were there. At which point I garnered a bit of a reputation. Somebody would come in and ask where somebody else was, and I'd always know (due at least in part to my photographic memory, I suppose). So the joke in the house was that if you were looking for somebody, just find me, as I'd be somewhere in the house...

At the same time, one of the guy's living in the house (Harry), seemed to have a tendency to leave his wardrobe all over the place. He'd do laundry and would leave his stuff in the dryer, so the next person would take it out and put it on top. He'd come in from class and throw his jacket or sweater on the couch in the living room. He'd have a shower and leave his dirty clothes in the bathroom...

At a meeting one week, the fraternity vice president decided that I needed a new nickname and he was looking around the room for an idea when he spotted a pile of Harry's clothes on top of the dryer through the laundry room doorway. And then it dawned on him...

I was Harry's Clothes... You could always find me all over the house...

Of course, that nickname didn't last forever. The following year I pulled a bit of a bonehead move and congratulated a brother on becoming engaged in front of the entire chapter... before he had a chance to tell everyone...

Sometime in the next month or so, I also spilled the beans to the entire chapter about an alumni brother's wife having a baby, while he was also in the room...

Which led to 'Stealing Thunder'...

If only it had stayed that way...

Two meetings before graduating (at which point your official nickname can no longer be changed), a couple of my pledge class brothers decided that I had become a little too attached to my nickname, and I needed something more humiliating...

Now, at the time, I was not exactly known as a graceful dancer... So they decided that I would become... 'Elaine Benis'...

The following week, at my final meeting, one brother stood up and proposed to change my name, the mere notion of which recieved a resounding chorus of boos, and a bit of a hopeful grin on my face...

"I propose a name change from 'Elaine Benis' to..." (more boos)... "'Elaine Benis'" (outrageous cheering and laughter)...

Which is what I'm now stuck with for life...

But at least my nickname's not 'Jabroni'...