Plastic, please.

Last night I got another glimpse into the life of a citizen of Los Angeles coping with the rain. It’s not a pretty picture, my friends - not pretty at all.

Let’s take for example, the lady at Ralphs. It was pouring down rain, I will admit. Okay, her hair was nice and dry – this is also true. But even when I put these two things together I can't find a reason for her to do what she did. Standing inside of the store, the woman grabbed a plastic shopping bag and put it over her head. My first instinct was that she might be attempting to suffocate herself. Not the case. She spent a little too much time completely covered for my liking, but eventually she pulled her face out of the bag and used the handles to secure the plastic over her hair. I have two questions for this woman:

1) It’s 8pm. Where the hell are you going that is so important that you cannot get your hair wet?
2) Was it really that well styled to begin with?

Her poor children looked on with expressions somewhere between bewildered and embarrassed. I couldn’t blame them. The younger one asked her mom to wait a second while she gathered the bags from the cart. Her retreating figure informed them that she was not to be slowed. The two girls watched as their mother shuffled the 30 feet to her car, then they grabbed the groceries and doddled after her – unbagged, of course.

I was talking to my online friend (oh, come on – all the cool people have them) about “real” friends. I have decided that they are incredibly hard to come by at this point in life. Where does one go to meet a new friend? I can’t meet them in class or on campus, and I’m certainly not going to meet them in this foreign land people call “the workplace.” Should I go to a bar to pick up a friend, like trashy men pick up trashy women? But then wouldn’t I just end up with a trashy friend? Other suggestions include taking a yoga class, or a play on a sports team, even joining a gym. I find these ideas problematic considering my distaste for physical exertion. Perhaps I could join a chess club? I don’t know how to play. Rotary? Do I look like an old man to you? I find that I have no friend-making hobbies. Except of course, Alias… but then again I acquire friends that could not be placed in the “real” category. Maybe I’ll just hang out with Clio. She’s real, right?