Other Great Moments in Time

Recently, an old woman chastised me for pouring tea like a city boy. Too much flair and risk, she said, and not enough consistency. The whole thing reeked of a hackneyed comedian, spitting out lines like "white people do their taxes like this..." Unsure of where I could have picked up such metropolitan habits, living in a town of 4000 people, I pressed the matter and realized that by "city" she meant "the part of town that has more than two stores." You know that saying "In the land of the blind the one eyed man is king?" Well, in a backwards-ass piss ant foothills town, the part where stuff is open past 7:30 is developed.

The other day I revealed my discovery of the mudir's status as "that guy" in a perversely high percentage of photographs. This week, however, a new facet of his unbearably puzzling persona made itself obvious. As ridiculous as it may sound (and it shouldn't really considering all the other weird shit this dude is into), he is also a crazy cat lady. While eating lunch at his place last Sunday, we began to be approached, slowly at first, by the various kinds of animals which call his little enclosed dirt-patch garden home. Cats, chickens and toddlers alike came to investigate the food scenario, and all were shooed away save for the former. At the height of the meal we were engulfed by an small symphony of meows. Since meals at this dude's house typically cruise tohigher degrees of disorder, such a stagnation, however eerie, was bound to dissapate into further chaos. Enter the mudir's youngest son, aged two, wielding flailing kicks and erratic verbal outbursts. Those little pussies were no match for the terrible-two fueled insanity of little Sa3d who capped of his Van Dammesque performance by snatching a box of tea and hurling it at the last straggler. He then grabbed an apple slice out of my hand, licked it whole and placed it back on the table, never to claim its saliva soaked nutrition.

By this point in our lives, most of us are aware of the all too common, not-so-secret pastime of champions and pervs alike, facebook stalking. Well, earlier I spent a good hour listening to a married friend of mine scour the annals of the world wide web ogling a particular girl who, surprise, he has never met and is actually the equivalent of a junior in high school. Interestingly enough, my initial thoughts were nowhere near the expected "wow this just got creepy" or even the acceptable "ok he's got a point this bridget is smokin." Instead, I couldn't help but be stunned at how someone who types with only one index finger figured out the intricacies of proper online creeping. Remarkable what the man can do when he puts his d to it. This interaction was then followed up by the totally sincere plea to go along with him on a nearly 400 Kilometer trip to Agadir and pose as a wealthy tourist so together we could connive his acquaintance into showing us a pair of gold, diamond inlaid binoculars he had found in the sand but wouldn't exhibit just to Moroccans because of their inability to put in a serious bid for such an item. That last sentence may run on, but it is accurate. Such is my life.

On the day of 3id this year I witnessed the greatest holiday tradition in the history of organized celebrations with my very own eyes. No, not the religiously sanctioned, semi-controlled mass sheep genocide. Old dudes playin' soccer. Apparently, this town has a yearly tradition of gathering up a bunch of old bros and having them scrimmage each other in front of a large percentage of the town's male populace. Honestly, it's absolutely spectacular. These peeps are way past their playing days and have become pretty much sedentary in their later years, but on Independence Day (which happened to coincide with 3id this year) they squeeze into some short shorts and throw down on the dirt pitch. The style of play this yields can best be described as frantic hacking accompanied by crude jokes and constant debate. The entire ordeal was a majestic comedic show put on by some of the town's more respected individuals so that all could come and revel in their bygone fitness. Score and basic rules were barely important as showmanship and misguided attempts at bicycle kicks reigned supreme. Imagine watching the Harlem Globetrotters, except just the opposite. It was truly remarkable to witness so much effort being put forth with such little quantitative outcome. As I watched, I figured those dudes had to have been defying the laws of thermodynamics, energy was clearly being destroyed. By the time the game ended, the official score was pretty fuzzy. But, most in attendance felt that witnessing three missed PKs, a slap fight and countless old men falling was enough reward.