"you told me life was a risk…"-City and Colour

He's reading my notebook!

There I am in my local coffee establishment that shall remain nameless, but shares a name with my favorite Battlestar Galactica character (new Battlestar. Old battlestar, my favorite character was the robot death-dog thing. It was cute, but you knew at any moment it would turn terminator and eat the crew. Too bad that didn't happen until after they found Earth. I'd much rather have watched Cyber-Cujo puppy-chow the crew than endure the banal Bonanza in space Galactica became. Why couldn't the TV writers go on strike back then? Writers have really bad timing when it comes to self-importance. And what about those writers who use parenthetical notation like it's a chapter break? I hate people like that.), busily holding a conversation with myself. The dialogue is really quite stimulating. I think I'm discussing the underlying themes of Cloverfield

"Don't be a moron!"

"No I'm serious!"

"It's not a play off of 9/11."

"It is! Day to day interrupted by xenophobia, chaos, and devastation. Why can't you see that?"

"You've just described my divorce."

"Well how would you explain the spider things then?"

"insidious critters of venom and bitterness. All part of divorce. You've read my blog."

"Yeah, well to you everything is about your divorce. You even found a way to link it to Jumper."

"Only the title."

"Ok whatever. Maybe it's more about the unpredictability of death, and how we should live our lives to the fullest. That would explain the opening and closing scene."

"Yeah, well those scenes were—Hey!"

I'm distracted. Some guy is reading my notebook. Yeah, thus the opening blog line. My note book is sacred. Gaze upon it, and may your eyes burn from your skull. It holds thoughts that I don't tell myself while I'm fueling my Battlestar Vente with sugar and cream. Normally the fact that I'm talking to myself works like screaming "Bird Flu!", but this guy is either oblivious or immune. He's trampling my personal space and he's reading my notebook!

What can I do? I'm holding a stir stick and a coffee cup. C'mon MacGyver! Damn, if I only had duct tape, a ball-point pen spring, and a tuft of yak fur! Panic! My arm jerks. The Vente opens fire.

Splash!

"My eyes! My eyes!"

Now! While his hands are holding his blistering face, I jab at his heart with the stir stick. It's wet so it kind of folds then breaks (the stick, not his chest). Still I'm sure he'll have a bruised heart. He'll think twice before he looks at another man's notebook again.

OK, I didn't do that. I just put the lid on my coffee and snatched to book in my other hand.

"You write?"

You speak? I'm a mother bear over her cub. "Yeah."

"What do you write?"

Why is it everybody thinks a writer can sum his creative thoughts in one neat, well phrased turn of words? "Fiction," I say.

He tries to snatch another glimpse of my notebook, "What's that about?"

What was on the page that he's so interested. Now I'm feeling a little paranoid. I wasn't logging fantasies again was I? I can't look, it makes me appear unprofessional. "Uhm…It's a think piece."

"Really? How cool…" He doesn't care. He just needed a wedge for conversation. He's going on about his fantasies of becoming a writer now. He's 24 working on his MA. Galactica Coffee is the only place he goes outside of school. He doesn't have a girlfriend. His parents are divorced, Mom lives in Minneapolis, Dad lives in St. Paul. Small world...

I should have thrown the coffee.

Why is it that the lonely repel each other? I mean It's usually a same sex thing. Drop a lonely girl in a room of lonely guys and they're sharks on chum, but same sex folk are same poled magnets. I guess that's a pretty accurate analogy really. Right now, this pole is trying to get away from that pole. He's talking about writing a sci-fi trilogy. Maybe if I dip my face in the Vente Vat. It would numb the pain.

"…had a character dip their face in coffee like that once…"

Feeling the skin peel back, I wonder if this is really the best way out. Maybe I should do what MyUnwife did. I should divorce myself from the situation.

"I love you, I'm just not in love with you, "I say, pulling my head out of my vat.

That's not what she said, but it shut him up for a second. Oh look he's backing away, "Watch out for th—" Ooof! Too late, That chair is gonna leave a mark, luckily the table edge caught his fall.

This is when I make my escape. I can't help but notice the beautiful young girl leaning over him, making sure he's ok. I'm sure if she's still there when he comes to, he'll be just fine.

Me, I'm alone in the parking lot with my own significant other now.

"Cloverfield was not about America's Gumby fixation!"

"It totally was!"