Saturday, March 15, 2014

Forty Days of Lent: Day Eleven

Some things overheard / seen while in Manhattan this afternoon.

1) Woman at movie theater: "I told her 'Get out of here with your volunteer service!' "

2) Couple at a bar: "Can we split a shot?"

3) Book seen at used bookstore: The Idiot's Guide to the Gnostic Gospels

4) "Is Bass Canadian?" (Bass is in fact one of the best known and most popular beers imported from Britain).  "Oh, I'm thinking of Yuengling" (which is from Pennsylvania).

5) Person mentions that a radio station has been taken over by a conglomerate: "But they're going out in style.  They've been playing Nelly's 'It's Getting Hot In Here' nonstop since Friday afternoon at 3:00pm."

"Yes! That is the best story I ever heard!"

Now, I understand hyperbole since I'm better at it than anyone else on Earth, but the fact that someone thought that was the best story they ever heard should be addressed.  First of all, what school did they go to?  Have they never read Tolstoy's How Much Land Does A Man Need, Joyce's The Dead or even Clive Barker's In The Hills, The Cities?  Secondly, I don't think the disgruntled employees playing a Nelly song over and over really qualifies as a "story."  An anecdote, maybe; unfortunate, definitely.  It's a shame there's no book called The Idiot's Guide to What Constitutes a Story.  

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