How to Be a Weirdness Magnet

It doesn't take much. I'm living proof.

If you want to be a Weirdness Magnet when you grow up, the first mistake you should make is talk to people. Talking to people is usually a bad idea on several levels. First of all, you have to make verbal contact with another person. This is bad because, in response, they talk back to you. They fill the air with noise, and the air is pretty noise-filled without someone's endless blathering about which interstates they took to get to your house and how the barrels through the construction zones looked particularly orange today. But attracting people, and their weirdness, is essential to becoming a WM, and if you want to get someone's attention talking to them is a good start.

The next step to attracting weirdness is listening. And I don't mean “pretend to listen while making a mental shopping list" like your mother did when you were six and described that afternoon's episode of "Batman" to her in aching detail. I mean listen to people when they speak. They tell you about their lives and it's then when the Weirdness That Is Average Life is revealed.

Like the many times I've sat in a strip club, admiring the skill, flexibility, implants and stamina of the women who work there. I always offer them a seat after a table dance (I own a pair of 4" platform heels and I know how much my feet hurt after 10 minutes), and dancers always wind up telling me their life stories, or at least a good chunk of them. I wonder if they make up lives to tell to the people who take the time to ask, offering a customer a tiny, if imaginary, glimpse into their lives. Playing Scheherazade for their own pleasure as much as mine. There was Michelle, who I met at a DollHouse, with DD implants, a husband, and student loans from going to nursing school during daylight hours. She shyly cast a glance around the club as she complained about having to check the club in fear one of her professors from school might show up.

Prime example: my husband and I took a trip to Washington state this summer. We are computer geeks, and as such we took along our laptops. Three days into the trip, both our laptops died for mysterious (and ultimately completely different) reasons. So we did what any self-sufficient computer geeks do: find the nearest CompUSA. A CompUSA was within walking distance of our hotel, which we chalked up to my superior trip-planning skills but I put firmly in the "dumb fucking luck" category.

Remember folks: Spouse and I are on the other side of the continent in an unfamiliar store with 2 dead laptop computers. Far away from friends, neighbors, Romans, countrymen, and anyone else who might know us.

We got the assistance of a fellow named Steve. We explained our situation, chatted a little about how we liked the city and the tourist spots we'd hit so far. Further conversation revealed that Steve was a member of the SCA, and had "purchased" his now ex-wife for a shirt of handcrafted chain mail. He lived with his mother. I didn't ask if his room was in the basement. He proceeded to bad-mouth his ex-wife and ask my husband how many chain mail shirts it would take for an evening of my company, if you know what I mean. Spouse took it well, and no deaths or severe injuries were inflicted on this poor hapless soul.

Ultimately, there was nothing to be done for the laptops until we got home. We walked back to the hotel when my husband blurted, "EVERYWHERE WE GO. You find one. EVERYWHERE."

It's a skill. One I didn't particularly want and let's face it, "attracting weird people" does not look promising on a resume. But it makes for a fairly lively life. More of which you shall invariably read about here.

14-Jan-2003