ladies[heart]tk

Sometimes Laura and I like to use Apple’s iChat to keep in touch. It’s a good way to stay connected when we’re traveling apart. However, I have concluded that iChat is not all it’s cracked up to be. Try as I might, I just…can’t…smooch. I think I herniated my smoocher on this attempt…

Lately I’ve been striving for an economy of words. This all came about from a Bible verse my mom sent me from Chapter 15 Verse 2 of Proverbs.

When wise people speak, they make knowledge attractive, but stupid people spout nonsense.

The fact of the matter is, I don’t know if I’m wise or stupid. So I’ve decided to get around the issue by saying nothing - or at least economizing words so that I don’t spout nonsense.

Laura hates my new economy of words. I guess I’m supposed to work on my communication or something. But I think the situation can be remedied with another spousal translator, much like the one I discussed last year.

See? Communication is fun and easy. TK talk good.

The other night Laura and I were sitting around watching a Law & Order rerun when suddenly Laura turned to me and asked, “Do you think I’m at all like Celine Dion?” I bought time by staring off into the distance as though deep in thought, but what was going through my mind was, “Oh $h1t! It’s a trap! Dear God, what’s the right answer?” Laura has a scary pokerface. It’s a frickin mask of inscrutability, which is sort of ironic because I thought Asians were supposed to be the inscrutable ones. Anyway, with the pressure mounting I caved in and decided to walk through Door Number 2. I was all, “Uhhhh. No?” Luckily, I think that was the right answer because Laura just turned back to the TV as though nothing had happened while I did my breathing exercises to calm myself down.

I was reading a fascinatingly dorky article in Time about the tiger attack at the San Francisco zoo. The article posits all kinds of theories about “animal sentience”…

Perhaps behaving like a tiger is not so psychologically distinct from behaving like a human.

Yes. This the just the sort of hard-hitting journalism I expect from Time magazine.

But as fascinating as it may be to peer into the secret inner life of a tiger, what I really want to know is…how can I escape with my life when I get attacked by a tiger. I have some ideas that I’ve decided to share with you. But I must add that I haven’t actually field-tested any of these techniques yet. Laura is taking me to the Minnesota Zoo later this afternoon and when (if) I get back, I’ll let you know which one worked best.

1) Smear yourself with nacho cheese. I think a tiger would be so confused and revolted by a human smeared all over with nacho cheese that it would immediately run the other way. Unless it’s a Mexican tiger in which case you’re screwed.

2) Hide behind an old person. It’s a well known fact that tigers are lazy. That’s why they try to kill the weak and sick animals first. If you hide behind an old coot, the tiger will probably choose them over you. The downside of this approach is that you’ll be tortured by a guilty conscience for as long as you live. But at least you’ll live.

3) Spray it with water. This is a good way to train house cats not to smother sleeping infants. Basically you keep a spray bottle handy and when the infant starts to twitch you simply squirt the cat until it runs off. I don’t think it’s practical to keep a spray bottle on one’s person at all times, so in a pinch you could probably just drop trou and take a whizz at an attacking tiger. Unfortunately I have shy bladder, so this won’t work for me. I’m just going to start carrying a spray bottle in my fanny pack.

4) Kick it in the crotch. This is a staple of America’s Funniest Home Videos. I haven’t fully figured out the biomechanics of this. Since tigers walk on four legs don’t they technically have two crotches? Quite obviously you’d want to kick the rear crotch. I’m guessing that this wouldn’t work on a female tiger.

I hope I get a chance to field-test all of these techniques at the zoo this afternoon. Laura will be rolling video so I might even have something up on YouTube later.

When I was a kid I played little league soccer. Being an immigrant, my dad wasn’t familiar with the game but he would drive me to practice and watch bemusedly. One day, he took me aside and told me not to head the ball lest I get brain damage. Obviously brain damage would hurt my performance on the SAT’s.

I didn’t care for soccer anyway. Sometimes in the middle of a match I would be gripped with a sense of deep futility and I would slow to a walk in the middle of the pitch deaf to the shrieks of my coach and teammates. Thus it was quite easy for me to avoid heading the ball, in the same manner that I avoided kicking it or running after it.

Nevertheless I still got brain damage, but not from soccer. Here’s what happened: I was riding my bike down the steepest hill in the neighborhood when the front tire started to wobble. I couldn’t maintain my seat and I flew over the handlebars and smashed my head on the curb. I don’t know how long I was out but I woke up in a pool of blood in the gutter. When I staggered home my mom prodded the egg on my head and was all, “Does that hurt?” Eventually the egg went away, but I still have a big bony protrusion on the side of my skull.

Before my bike accident I was the typical Asian overachiever. I would sit around doing factorials in my head while dusting off my trophy case. I had a freakishly good memory and I had lucid dreams almost every night. I sure was a deep thinker….

After my bike accident I became a total dumb ass. I had trouble concentrating and when I tried to read I would find the words swimming around on the page like happy little fish. In class I would drift off and my grades took a nose dive. My memory went down the toilet. Goodbye MacArthur genius grant. Here’s what life is like now….

Hunh? Doh!