I <3 potatohead.

An old man came into the cafe a few days ago, and as the ever-friendly barista that I am, I started up a conversation with him. After exchanging a few pleasantries with him he asked me in his slight spanish accent, "How old are you?"

A little red flag went up at this, and I cleverly answered his question with another question. "How old do you think I am?" His answer: fifteen.

:(

I immediately sank into a deep depression tinged with bitterness and rage. Do I look like a fifteen-year old? I'm going to try to make myself feel better and just assume that he is a crazy old man. After all, fifteen-year olds can't even legally work! He must have been off his rocker. ...right? Anyway, I ended the conversation rather coldly after his brutal attack on my ego, and he sat down. After a few minutes of trying to look busy by wiping down clean counters, I realized that his wife was now at the counter! I quickly dismissed any sudden urges to refuse her and any of her relatives service and went to take her order. And, would you believe it, during her speech over what she 'needs' me to make her a huge glob of spit flies from her mouth right onto my lip! What is it with this family?! My first impulse was to squeal and boil my lip, but I resisted, not wanting to create a scene. As soon as I finished her order and made her drink I scampered into the stockroom and actually poured disinfectant on my lips. What a day! One man basically calls me a pubescent guttersnipe and his wretched wife sprays spit all over me.

A few days later I had the pleasure of attending stake conference with Sunny and a few other people. Sunny wanted to be extra-righteous and sit in the front row, so thats what we did. We sat in the very front row, in the very middle of the row. I believe Sunny wanted these seats in order be baptized in the holy spit of the speakers, something I had already experienced. At the end of the meeting I was immediately approached by a rather portly fellow, possibly my age and my height and covered in large black moles that stuck out about three inches. He looked exactly like a potato when they start sprouting all those little knobs. I'm hardly exaggerating.

He asked me all the lead-in questions that come before asking for one's phone number, and I was frightened. I considered telling him that I had a terminal illness and would likely not be alive long enough to go out with him, but luckily enough he seemed to lose his nerve and walked off without so much as a goodbye. I said a quick prayer, pleading that other men might find me attractive, and not just Mr. Potatohead.

It seems like I'm always talking about work, but thats when all the interesting things happen. Yesterday I worked with 'nice Michael', not to be confused with 'stupid Mike' who also works at the cafe. We ended up having a very deep conversation, something that happens quite frequently as there is often nothing else to do. Michael explained to me his views on our society and government, saying that he is an anarchist and that the world today is basically corrupt beyond repair and not even worth trying to fix. He believes that we should all rebel against and overthrow the current governments and revert to living in tribes and small communities. He also said that he is going to drop out of school and move to California with nine of his friends, where he will make a living by growing and selling weed.

Though I didn't agree with a lot of what he believes, he had one idea that I thought was pretty cool. He said that he wants to go up to Canada or Alaska and establish his own little gated community that is hidden from the rest of the world. He would only let in people that he liked (which included me pleasantly enough), and live apart from the world and all its horrible policies and degradation. When I asked him how he would eat he said he'd grow corn and hunt deer with a bow and arrows. It seemed like a pretty solid idea to me. I would like to have my own community, I wonder what I would call it. Arielstown sounds silly, so does Arielsville. Maybe Arielopollis. I'll get back to you.