by Wahoo » Mon Apr 05, 2010 7:44 pm
It annoys me that I always think of the clever comebacks later, not at the moment I need them. Was driving back from central Va Friday afternoon and stopped at a red light outside Gainesville. On my left were 4 college-aged kids (2 guys, 2 girls) in a jeep who obviously had spent the day drinking and were having a good time being loud and obnoxious. The car to my right was driven by another college-aged kid. I didn't get the impression they knew each, but they were bantering back and forth -- "What you doing?" "I'm chillin!" that sort of thing. Then the inebriated yahoo in the passenger seat of the jeep yelled to the guy on the other side of me, "I'm trying to talk to you, but the fat guy [meaning me!] is in the way!" Then the joker yelled to me, "Where do you work out?" to the giggles of the two bimbos in the back seat. At a loss for words for the unprovoked insults, all I could do was glare at him. "I'm just joking!" he offered as an apology as the light changed and everyone peeled away in different directions.
Only later, when I was miles down the road, did the clever comebacks start coming to me, like chuckling and telling him "Yeah, I was young and stupid once myself" or "Congratulations on getting into your 'safety' school" or "Thank you for not serving in uniform and procreating" or "Your momma wasn't complaining about me being too fat when I rolled off her last night."
That loudmouth probably doesn't realize how lucky he was to insult someone with more maturity and self-restraint rather than one of the local rednecks who probably would have chased him down and gutted him like a deer just for the fun of it.