Vincent Truman's Blog, page 5

Expiration Dating: Ruminations on Alli Reed’s Worst OK Cupid Profile

Vincent Truman in 3D.

There has been much discussion about comedy writer Alli Reed’s fake OK Cupid profile (named aaroncarterfan) and how, despite the tone and context of the profile (“I’m really good at convincing people I’m pregnant”, “on a typical Friday night, I’m knockin the cups out of homeless ppls hands, its sooooo funny to watch them pick it all up lollllll”, etc.), it received hundreds of inquiries from men.  The primary reason for this would appear to be the cute self-portraits (2014 translation: “selfies”) of a pretty young woman in her mid-20s.  Here’s a couple of links for those who might like links:

http://www.bustle.com/articles/11886-comedian-alli-reed-proves-theres-no-okcupid-profile-too-terrible-as-long-as-the-woman-is

http://www.buzzfeed.com/alanwhite/this-woman-created-the-most-appalling-dating-profile-ever-an?bftw

Ms. Reed’s own article: http://www.cracked.com/blog/4-things-i-learned-from-worst-online-dating-profile-ever_p1/

The general reaction of this social experiment appears to be “men be stupid.”  A more measured sentiment might be “men primarily think visually, but yes, they be stupid, too.”

As a fellow who has put in my dating site dues, I find it hard to contradict the consensus.  However, being a man on a dating site is like being a homeless man in the city: no matter who you say hello to, or how, it is likely you’re going to be ignored.  And if you don’t make the legendary First Move, the odds are high that you’re going to be ignored even more.  That can lead to the (bad) idea of writing as many women as possible, and hoping the odds land in one’s favor once in a while.

As such, I don’t find it remarkable that men wrote to this faux profile.  I may have even written to her/it myself, as I found most of the profile to be quite dark and funny.

Another reason I don’t find it remarkable that men wrote aaroncarterfan is below.  Here are my top 10 favorite dating site profile bits, compiled exhaustively over the course of twenty minutes this morning.  These are not edited; they are lifted directly from dating site profiles.

* * *

I am looking for someone to fall hopelessly in love with who will also be my best friend. I have simple tastes and believe quality of life is the most important thing. I am looking for someone who can make me laugh and likes to sit and talk. I am extremely loyal and will accept you for who you are and not try to change you. I ask that you respect me and not lie to me. I like to cook and watch TV.

For having six sentences starting with “I”, this profile says virtually nothing – except for the reveals that she’s insecure, has tried to change too many people and too many people have lied to her.  Actually, this profile says plenty, but the thing it says loudest is “look at the next profile.”

 

I hate talking about myself If you want to know something about me feel free to ask.

Here’s a question: “why?”

 

MY HOBBIES INCLUDE BUT NOT LIMITED TO…DANCING, HANGING WITH FAMILY AND FRIENDS, MY GOALS ARE TO BECOME A BETTER PERSON AND FOLLOW MY OWN PATH. I AM A VERY UNIQUE PERSON I SPEAK WHAT IS ON MY MIND, LOVE ALL KINDS OF MUSIC..R&B COUNTRY, POP, ROCK POP AND MORE!

This lady would be a great pen pal if my eyes were hard of hearing.

 

Iam a single woman looken for a serious black man that keeps it 100 Iam very outgoing I like to take walks, bbqs, spending time with my grandbabies, I love to cuddle,

The final comma fills me with uncomfortable anticipation.

 

Looking for someone that what to have fun playing cards bowling skating just having fun

I want to introduce Ms. Too Many Commas to this lady.

 

Hello i’m a single, intelligent 34 years young woman,,, I’m drama free, don’t play games, or don’t do the lies… I’m very down to earth, very outspoken, direct , optermistic, and straight to the poin

At least she’s not pesstermistic.  Amirite?

I DON’T DRIVE AND I DON’T SWAP PICS. I LIVE SOUTHSIDE OF CHICAGO N DA HOOD BECUZ I CAN’T AFFORD TO LIVE WHERE U R

How does she know where I live?

I love scary movies n going to the show im very simple the smallest things makes my day for instance a simple good morning how was yr day .those things tell me u care. I love flowers n roses

Flowers AND roses?  

I consider my self that woman I love to cook clean, I love to watch sports I am a home body I don’t do the club life I will socially my goal is to find that special someone to spend some quality time

This hurts my brain.

It is difficult to take a reductionist approach to capturing my whole personality. From a cursory perspective, I would describe myself as a single black female who loves shoes, the Huffington Post, discussing polarizing issues, gin and tonic, and modest brilliance.



Now that’s lovely!  I felt I should put a stellar one in here because the first nine make me want to weep uncontrollably while hitting puppies with a stick.

* * *



So, in reviewing nine of the ten above, why wouldn’t a guy write to aaroncarterfan?

Also, who is Aaron Carter?

 

 

Single Again For The First Time 19: The Tear In Review

Vincent Truman

For the final podcast in the ‘Single Again’ series for the year, I just decided to switch the camera on and talk of coffee cups and Christmas cards.   For the latter, I was quite happy that I got around to sending out cards for the first time in years, and for the first time utilizing my own design for a card, in this case pulling in some help from my friend Shozzett and a fake baby bundle.

I also ramble on about the last two prior holiday seasons since ye olde divorce and how, by comparison, this year was a delight.  Also, I reflect on some fond memories of the former in-laws and what they espoused – at the time I was a dutiful husband and just nodded, but now it’s just comic fodder.  It is at times, when I remember such instances, that I most likely, in the words of my closest friends, “dodged a bullet.”  Actually, it’s more likely I was struck by the bullet at point blank range but it passed through with minimal damage.

Finally, I drone on about my second first date of the year and the good feeling behind it.  And then I take a picture of whomever is watching this video, which is as silly as it sounds.

Happy New Now, all.

Velma “Throttle” Slackhard’s Christmas Letter 2013

Velma

Dear friends:
Can you believe it has been an entire year since a year ago?  Well it sure have, and on behalves of my husband Willard and our boys Truckstop, Backseat and Noidea – named of course for the locations at which they was conceived – we want to wish you the very best for the new years.

I’m sure you read the papers or at least have them read to you if you ain’t the reading type, but you should know that Truckstop done set a record in the Guinness Book of World Records for most times being held back in fifth grade.  The first few times, we were very angry with him, and Willard would beat that boy senseless, but after a while we thought, what the hell, so we encouraged him.  I reminded him to stay up as late as he wanted and how it was ok to sniff gasoline and Willard taught him how to hit himself with a ballpein hammer just enough to forget things but not to fall asleep.  He got real good at it and showed everybody at his 21st birthday party.  One perfect bonk to the head later, he was all, ‘whose cake is this?’  It was so adorable!

Backseat is turning out to be a really lovely girl with a good head on her shoulders.  She graduated high school four years early, thanks to her tutor, Uncle Tup (the same Uncle Tup of Uncle Tup’s Most Unwanted Massage Parlour on Route 7.2 – we know a celebrity!). You know she got that job at the rest area outside of town.  She still won’t tell us what it is, but says something about being in the service industry for truck drivers.  We still don’t know what that means, but we do know she just bought her first condo.

Noidea is still a bit of a lost soul.  We’ve had doctors and head shrinkers to the house, but they don’t know what’s going on.  Me, I put it down to him being stillborn.  He doesn’t do much all day but float in his jar of formaldehyde  and stare out the window at other kids playing.  Willard says he looks pensive, but I think he looks sad.  We taped my old vibrator to the jar so he can get a little exercise.  But you know, that’s family.  Gotta stick together through thick and thicker.

Anyway, I got to go seal up the cracks in the house with fruitcake.  Let’s keep the ‘mas’ in ‘Christmas’.

Signed,

Velma “Throttle” Slackhard

Rte. 35, Ray Pasheep County, VA

Single Again For The First Time 18: Anniversaries

Vincent Truman

The major difference between death and a divorce is, in the latter case, one is obliged to carry around the tombstone.

It was in November 2011, immediately following my wife and I visiting my family in New Mexico, that I was given the news, all in one conversation, that we were having problems, or maybe should consider a separation, or maybe should consider getting divorced.  There was no indication that things were terribly wrong in New Mexico, other than the missus spent most free moments playing Second Life and engaging in some October scavenger hunt for virtual gifts.  I do remember watching her twaddle away at the keyboard under that magnificent night sky, grey with stars yet richly black as only semi-rural areas are, and thinking, ‘what is wrong with this picture?’  Despite that, I never thought we were in mortal danger.  It was only later, when I learned problems with our marriage were being shared with other players on Second Life and not me, that I realized that marriage mortality was assured.

Now, two years later, I am left with a series of anniversary echoes, which are probably not dissimilar to those who lose a loved one through a drawn-out disease.  I imagine those folks avoid eye contact with their calendars when they reach an anniversary of the first diagnosis, the first treatment, the last good day, the waiting, etc.  As far as I’ve come from the dismal days of 2011 and 2012, certain dates bring with them a dull ache, a silent pain and a vaguely persuasive sorrow.  After all, these anniversary echoes are all I have left of a relationship with the woman I loved more than anyone in my life.

For this installment of Single Again For The First Time, I wanted to juxtapose the occasional depressed me that lives in the present day with the nervous but anxious fellow I was in the days prior to my wedding.  I avoided the easy track of being remorseful – because to this day, I don’t regret my time with my ex-spouse, although some days I miss it – and instead added some humor and encouragement, the two emotional food groups that guided me out of the hell of watching my marriage crash like a Second Life sim.

In A Mirror, Darkly: Reflections on 2013

Vincent Truman

As 2013 draws to a close, I cannot help but wax nostalgic about the journey that brought me from the distant land of 2012 to here. Because such an exercise is so rooted in feelings, I find it best to view the last year at the gut level, without research. As such, I might get some of this wrong, but I’ve found how one remembers is often more telling than the events themselves.

The year erupted full of brilliance and sorrow, as my adopted family – framily, as we call it – was staying with me over the holidays. They probably could have been anywhere, or even just with themselves, but they chose to stay with me. As New Years wandered in, I was touched with their presence, as well as mortified, once again, that my marriage was over. Or still over. This latter feeling had been like a ballpin hammer, each strike to my heart completely expected yet completely debilitating at the same time. The two feelings smashed together like a James Cameron film and an iceberg, and I felt those hot tears that seem to burn their way out of one’s eyes and sizzle down one’s face. And the oldest child of my framily – we’ll call her Katherine, because that’s her name – gave me a wonderful, wholly adult hug. And things were better.

I met a woman a few days later, who was brash, bossy, and beautiful. For the very first time since I met the person who I later married, I was genuinely attracted to someone. I had been attracted to a couple others earlier, but usually that was marred in guilt (the little voice in my head needlessly reminding me that I swore allegiance to one woman and how dare I look at someone else – thus illustrating either the depth of my commitment to my marriage or the depth of my denial at its demise). We texted for months and eventually had a single date in May (she didn’t live in my state, let alone city), but she vanished almost immediately afterwards. I was saddened by this, but it didn’t kill me. It took very little time for me to silently wish her well, though, and things were better.

Somewhere along the way, I dropped out of two gangs to which I had identified myself with: atheism and feminism. Although I am deity-free and pro-equality, I found the louder voices in both to be just a little close to the fundamentalists I had left behind in my earlier religious and traditional life. I’ll be a part of any group I identify with, but when I’m instructed on the parameters of my participation while simultaneously being unable to respect the direction of said group, I bow out. I no longer have a burning need to belong; it’s enough that I have a burning need to do good and be true doing it.

The spring saw me attacking a new script, entitled “Killing Angela”, and seeing that through to production later in the year. Bolstered by the perfect leading actor in the form of my dear friend Kimmy Higginbotham, the show was a wild success in my eyes, and less so in the critics’ eyes. But again, it didn’t kill me. I knew the show was good, and I no longer needed a critic to echo my own sentiments.

As I was writing “Angela”, I did whisk by a few grotesque anniversaries: a year since I last spoke to my ex-wife, a year since I filed the divorce papers, a year since I alone appeared in court to dissolve a marriage I didn’t want dissolved. All of them hurt, but none dropped me to the ground like the original events themselves. So many days in 2012 were spent curled up in a fetal position on my living room floor, crying in such a manner that sounded foreign to me. Insanity was within my grasp in those days, both inspired by my sense of loss and the seeming dispassionate distance felt from many I called friends (in layman’s terms, it was like having a disease and many people didn’t want to say anything, for fear of catching it – there is a lonely abyss there I find hard to convey).

August 2013 saw me direct, write, edit and score a short film for the 48 Hour Guerilla Film Competiton, which I did on my birthday (I’ve always liked to work on my birthday). The crew and cast were upbeat and enthusiastic, and the mood on-set was encouraging and healthy. The film got three nominations, including Most Original Concept; it won none of them, but again, I didn’t mind. It was just good to have the experience and to work with my friends.

In the autumn, I started seeing a woman who was quite lovely and, though opinions differ, far too pretty for me. But when I noticed similar traits to my former life, or former wife, I ended it. No blame, no game. And again, it was mildy painful to end things, but better that than to spend seven or eight years attempting to be approved by someone who wasn’t going to approve. She wrote several emails and sent letters and postcards, enough that a younger me would have quailed, but I made up my mind and that was that.

So what has 2013 been for me, I ask myself? I have not only reclaimed myself, but I have continued the growth that was stunted in 2012. I have gotten love back, and I find that simply thinking of my framilies and friends can inspire a warm smile and really good thoughts. That’s new for me. And things got better.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Your Call May Be Monitored For Quality Assurance

Vincent Truman

A brief snapshot of customer service in the 21st century in two acts.

* * *

Act One.  

I call and spend seven minutes listening to the pleasant female voice telling me what buttons to press, until it becomes exasperated with me and decides to put me in touch with a person.

Act Two.  

“Hi, thank you for calling Macy’s; this is Shandra. May I help you?”

“Hi, Shandra, my name is Vincent Truman. I placed an order with Macy’s and UPS indicated it was delivered yesterday, but I do not have it.”

“Can I have the order number?”

“Certainly. 987987654654.”

“OK, let me look that up. It says that it was delivered.”

“Yes. I noticed that, too. But I do not have it.”

“Can I have the tracking number?”

“Sure. UPS123234345.”

“Thank you. Let me look that up. It says it was delivered.”

“No doubt. But the thing is, I don’t have it.”

“The notation I see here says that it was left on your front porch.”

“Sure. I have to pass my front porch to get into my house, and the package was not there.”

“Maybe it was taken to your local post office.”

“Despite the fact they said they left it on my front porch?”

“Oh. Perhaps they’ll attempt re-delivery today.”

“Despite the fact it was allegedly delivered yesterday?”

“Oh. Please hold.”

— Patsy Cline’s “Walking After Midnight” —

“Hello, sir, thank you for holding. I checked again, and they said it was delivered.”

“I got that. The only missing bit is that I don’t have it. So I figure, you could either send me a replacement or refund my money. Either way seems doable.”

“Oh. Please hold.”

— Elvis Presley’s “Hound Dog” —

“Hello, sir, thank you for holding. Can we re-ship the item to you?”

“Sure, that sounds like a great idea.”

“OK. We apologize for the inconvenience.”

“It happens.”

“Thank you. It should go out in one to two business days.”

“Great.”

“Can I help you with anything else?”

“I hope not. You have a great day over there.”

“Thank you, sir. You, too.”

“Lose My Way”

Vincent Truman and piano.

I was probably eight years old when I learned how to cluck.

My clucking wasn’t chicken-esque, I should point out; instead, it was a rhythmic tool. I found, quite by accident, I could hum a melody and cluck on the beat – more specifically, the snare beat – without pausing. Having no ability to whistle while exhaling, a skill yet to be attained to this day, this was an incredible revelation of self-entertainment.

Gradually, the clucking sound morphed into a short nasally-pushed near-cough, which sounded much more like a snare than the cluck. Imitating a bass drum was simple enough, with a deep back-of-the-throat ‘thud’ sound. And cymbals were equally easy – a light ‘tit’ sound driven through the nose as well without vocalization. Hence, my first forays into songwriting, long before I learned how to play anything, were composed solely using sound effects generated by my face.

Of course, in time, I learned how to play the drums (my first instrument, around age 14) followed by acoustic guitar (age 16) followed by piano and then picking up instruments that were largely derivative from these first three: banjo, bass, dulcimer, etc. Thanks to technology catching up to me as a humble consumer, I’ve managed to record a great number of songs, playing all the instruments much like my heroes Stevie Wonder and Paul McCartney, the latter of which (at least) having no classical musical instruction.

Despite this, when I have written songs in my head, I have reverted back to the face playing that served me so well in my pre-musical days. And for some reason, I felt a bug in 2013 to try and record a song using only my face. This became “Lose My Way.”

I began the recording by taping the bass drum and cymbals, then looping them. This was followed by a nasal snare, also looped. Then, unsure where to go, I recorded a warbly ‘wah-wah-wahhh’ sound, then a doop-da-doop-doop-doop vocal bass, then a higher registered ‘doot doot doot’, followed by a harmony of the same. On tape, I had the basis of a two-minute song featuring four of my voices. So on top of it, I recorded an improvised vocal over three takes (to ensure the proper rhyming), staying in the same key, followed by several tracks of response vocals to the improvisation, singing each at a different pitch in the same key and, on the final take, ascending up the scale for effect. I added some flourishes of added vocal percussion in different speakers, some high-pitched ‘ooh’s and ‘ahh’s.

The end result:

 

Single Again For The First Time 17: Well That Happened

Vincent Truman

A self-assessment of the summer and fall so far, including writing, home improvement (pretty flowers!), dating (and an interesting discussion about men and women v. men v. women) and the occasional nightmare featuring an avatar from Second Life flying above my head.

And an interesting realization of a sixth stage of grief, after one is done with the quintet of loss (anger, denial, negotiation, depression and acceptance).

The Future NOW!

Vincent Truman and friend.

There are unavoidable milestones in life: the first day of school, the first kiss, the first car, the first schtupp. Every one of these events change our internal makeup and exterior perspective and go on to chip away at the blank granite block we’re born as, slowly sculpting us into a future form. As one gets older, the milestones become more sparse but just as life-changing.

In the last week, one of my dearest friends, Tina, came to visit me from the old Mexican settlement called Los Angeles. We had a tremendous time together, visiting with many of her friends, one of which again has inspired me to write the autobiography of Madelyn Writer, the virtual character I inhabited in a game called Second Life (which one should avoid at all costs, because playing it will cost more than you could imagine). And Tina herself came bearing a gift I had been equally dreading and looking forward to: an iPhone.

Of course, I am more than familiar with smartphones, having seen them attached to the majority of my friends and strangers for years now. I have resolutely clung to my hideous 1990s-style flip phone, because, as intriguing as being part of the gang is, it is a gang of miscreants. I cannot count how many times I’ve been talking with someone, only to have them check their phone mid-conversation. As much as I have carried the demon which suggests to me that I’m not good enough (for friendships, relationships, etc.), I do hate to see it reinforced in such a blatant manner. And the last thing I would want would be to become one of the iDiots who are too iNsenstive to not iGnore their iPhone for the duration of social iNteraction.

Less than five days into having my iPhone, I found myself on more than a few occasions walking around with it in my hand. No real reason, no real point. I just carried it. In the back of my head, I rationalized it expertly: I might, at any point, be challenged to a game of Bejeweled Blitz, so I better be ready.  At one point during my internet tooling, I happened to catch an image of my ex-wife.  Her face looked fat.  I wondered if she was pregnant at last.  Then I was distracted by a message from a friend and forgot about my ex-wife’s fat face.  Before I could respond to the message, I decided I had to update my contacts.  And there I was.  In a future I had feared.

But on the way home from work today, I saw the most horrendous future I could imagine. Riding on the bus, reading a copy of the not-yet-released book “Box Girl”, I noticed a post-adolescent zit-packed peach-fuzzed-bearded fellow to the left of me having a chat conversation. I glanced down at his phone. He was breaking up with someone – or someone was breaking up with him. “Nag nigga,” read a text to him. “I don’t wanna hear from you again so fuck off.” He texted back, “Well fuck you bitch. I love you but if you gonna play me like this, you can fuck yourself.” He switched to another chat conversation. “Almost home, want anything from the store?” The second person in the second chat replied with, “Grab some chips ok? Love you hun.” “OK mom.” He went back to the first chat, and was met with, “You neva loved me, nigga. U don’t even know what love is.” He replied, “Fuck you, bitch. I no plenty about love. You don’t deserve mine or anyone’s. You broke my heart.”

Now, what was amazing about watching these conversations take place was not their disparate nature; it was that this kid betrayed zero emotion to both. He didn’t bristle at one and smile at the other.  O no!  He just texted at a rapid speed and glanced out the window, as if he was nonplussed with life itself. “I’m sorry I broke your heart,” came a text. “I never wanted you to find out.” Not even moving an eyebrow, he texted nonchalantly, “But I did bitch and now U gotta live with dat shit, bitch.”

I glanced at my bus companion as he again glanced out the window at the boring universe he observed. And I dove back into my book, terrified at what might await me in the iNterim.

This Is Where I Leave You: The Home Game

Vincent Truman

I tend not to read often – well, as often as I’d like – because, for whatever reason, I spend an inordinate amount of time mentally mirroring the narration in any given tome.

For instance, I just finished a book by Jonathan Tropper entitled “This Is Where I Leave You”, a charmingly funny and tragic story about a man who loses his father and marriage in one foul swoop (even though the acts are unrelated) and deals with both while sitting shiva with his family over the following week. The book reads like a hysterical comedy without any sign of a laugh track, which is a way I would describe my own life over the last year and a half, so the mental mirroring was just a matter of time.

On one level, it’s a great and personal way in which I enjoy a book, having an author grab hold of the reins of my thoughts and lead it down his or her own synapses. On the other hand, when one’s life is indeed a comedy without a soundtrack, it can be troubling, as if I cannot put down the book at all. Rather, it lives on in my head. This is how Tropper writes, and this is how I thought for a good hour after I put the book down at lunch:

There is a girl who in in charge of the cafeteria at work. I call her a girl, because, in the dating world, all men are boys and all women are girls. Everyone retreats to the safety of their youth when contemplating the likely futility of an adult relationship; who wouldn’t? Knowing the odds of establishing a good relationship, indeed even one that is fleetingly pleasant, could only inspire one to hide in one’s basement, not to embrace the unknown. Because we all know how most of them turn out. Anyway, the girl is directly my type: shorter, brunette, a slight determined frown, noticeable nose, unnoticeable breasts. Plus, in her eyes, there’s the look of great adversity in her past, as if she’s overcome some circle of hell that Dante couldn’t have even dreamed of, and has lived to fight another day. She looks primed to be charmed with humor and stolen glances. Yes, she is directly my type. And then I recall the same features that framed my ex-wife. So I look at the girl in the cafeteria. And avoid her at all costs.

I have to be careful of the books I read because of such a phenomenon. I daren’t go near any Greek tragedies, as I still want to cultivate a healthy relationship with my mother. Shakespeare is also a no-no, as it inspires me to imagine in which way my closest friends and colleagues will die horribly. I steered well clear of ’50 Shades of Gray’ because – well, it sounded ridiculous and far too proudly and gleefully in-the-shadows to constitute actual literotica.

My mind only comes to rest on the most trivial and fact-based material. The books that line my bedroom and bathroom are: The Complete David Bowie, The Pythons: An Autobiography by the Pythons, The Beatles Anthology, and various Doctor Who novellas. With these, my mind doesn’t want to assume the role of narrator or protagonist. They are my safe zones. Same with my choice for sleeping music, for lack of a better phrase: any concert by George Carlin or Bill Burr or Louis CK, the Mighty Boosh radio series, the audiobook of Christopher Hitchens’ “God Is Not Great.” All of these lull me to sleep due to the beautiful rhythm I can hear these days only in comedy or the British tongue.

There is so little left of me, I often think to myself. I have grown up a great deal in the last eighteen months, and as a result, my inner Peter Pan, who would see beauty and challenge and opportunity at each sunrise or low flying plane or oncoming thunderstorm, is dormant and unable to be easily moved. I am far more mature, but I find within that maturity, a protective yet isolating wall, the type of which my family and former spouse so excelled at. Is this it? Is this all that’s left of me? Am I indeed going to be like every other emotionally crippled person I know?

I don’t know.

In the meantime, even after “This Is Where I Left You” has been finished and put aside, I try my best to enjoy the ride of an author whom I’ve never met.

I entered my building using my keycard this morning and the fellow behind me had to leap for the closing door. Jagoff, I heard him say under his breath. Instead of ignoring it, I stopped. “Was that for me?” I asked him. “What?” he asked, with a belligerent tone that suggested he knew damn well what I was talking about. “Did you say something to me?” I asked. “Why would I say anything to you?” he snapped back. “You’re going to be thinking about what you could have said for the rest of the day,” I said, “and you’re not going to like it.” I turned and walked away, through another door. He stood still. Just as the door was closing, I said, under my breath but loud enough for him to hear, jagoff. He said nothing.