Last night checking into the hotel:
"Yes, I'm here checking in with the speedway
group"
"Okay, y'all have four rooms. One under Smith, one
under Spence, one under Forrester, and one under -- (long, awkward pause) --
something with a Q."
That's how I'm going to introduce myself at parties from now
on.
I must say, that was a rather graceful escape for that hotel
clerk from that long, awkward pause. I give him credit. Almost always, that
long awkward pause ends one of two ways:
1 - They attempt to pronounce my last name.
Well, no, you put more syllables there than there are
letters. But I'll be nice and laugh and say "Not quite, but close",
the word 'quite' itself being closer than whatever they just said.
2 - They trail off and look away into the distance
> They hope I'll get the hint and save them. Usually I
do, asking playfully "Is it a crazy last name starting with a Q?" And
they laugh, relieved, thinking that if I didn't say something they may have had
to join that monastery high in the Alps and learn how to communicate through
sock puppets.
Of course sometimes I don't give them a lifeline (I don't
know for sure - maybe that name they're scared to pronounce is 'Hitler'. Or
'Stalin'. Or 'Buttmuncher').
And they trail off, the same way people do when they're like "Oh, my brother had a shirt like that..", finishing in their own minds the thoughts of "it was the one he was wearing the day he got eaten by that water buffalo", or
