Laugh or ... go mad?

Okay, it's been a busy weekend. The first and foremost adventure is "Topanga Canyon"... this is a great cut through the mountains to the beach (for seaweed collecting naturally) instead of taking the dreaded 405 down to SantaMonica, UNLESS you are stuck behind a car that refuses to go fast. Now when i say fast I mean 1)the speed limit, seriously 2)faster than the speed limit. I have now been stuck twice, in as many weekends behind a WHITE 4 door that refuses to go fast. The first time, I was near road rage. She kept up to 10 cars trailing behind her thru the canyon. I escaped half way thru by racing over a double yellow toward oncoming traffic. I confess- I flipped her off, but I don't even think she saw me. And as I escaped to freedom there was no one behind me for miles. Poor people. Now, my second trip up the canyon, you wouldn't think that this would happen again but maybe the "universe" wanted to see what I would do this time... So almost immediately i find myself in exactly the same position: white car. i, the second car removed. i laugh. My mom gasps- i promise i'll be good, i say. i immediately fill in my friend. Then I start honking. Polite honks, and I laugh I'll the while I'm doing it- enjoying the ride through the canyon and the trailing car train of 6 cars behind this one and wonder, won't anyone else honk? No? Okay. I will. So sporadically I kept honking all the way through the canyon and laughed everytime we had to slow down to 15 miles an hour around a turn. I might've perhaps snapped but I prefer to think I had a good time. People, if you are a slow driver, get the *!$& over to the right! especially if you're in a canyon. There are always turn off lanes.

This is why they're out to get me though: how funny am I going to think this is if it keeps happening? So after escaping the neighbor's mariachi music- damned polka- we go to MOCA and see the Basquiat exhibit and don't get home until quite late. On the way home: I'm on the 5 freeway and I indicate my desire to change lanes: signal: Look, wait, approach. ON the approach a WHITE car starts speeding up. I am already half way in the lane. And as he clearly accelerated, to spite me, I stand my ground and get in the lane anyway. He then cuts over to the right and gets in front of me. Now he's clearly disrespecting me... which I cannot let go unaffronted. So i respond in kind. We do the look over- "yah, asshole, that's right. I see you. and i could give a fuck. you wanna go mary? yah, susie, i do." So I punch it. and so does he- we didn't get past 85mph- bcs I ran up against a truck and he ran up against a car and mine pulled ahead faster than his. I think I won the round. He cut over 3 lanes and took off going 90+. I confess: I thought about his car crashing and laughing, but you know the outcome tempers the reaction.

Let me take you to Sunday: I go to a comedy sketch club. There is an older woman next to me. The show starts. I laugh. I'm a loud, baritone laugher. I see her drilling darts into the side of my face. I think dude, what's her deal. I lean over to a friend, dude, that woman is talking about me to her friends. This is where it gets funny. She keeps doing it. At one point she almost swats my hands down when I clap. Clearly this is all a little too loud for her- the music, the singular laughing styles of me- but then someone else laughs outside the crowd laughter and she glares up behind her. She does this a few times and then the guy says, What's your problem. And she says, You! At this point I start laughing even harder. She starts complaining to her friends about the decibal level. Her head roves around for those errant laughers, those hard fisted clappers. She is not amused. She does not laugh. She grouches, she sticks out her thumb and gestures at me. Everytime I laugh, my friend thinks I'm doing it out of spite, but remember, comedy show. Comedy show funny= me laugh. She says to her friends, "I can't take it." Me neither lady. I'm about to have a talk with your two friends and it's going to involve polite phrases- (I wouldn't cuss at my elders) like, ie. Your friend is totally mental. She needs to go. Cut the chord. Bcs the whole time, God bless them, they were trying to get her to stay. She finally left at intermission, but I kept laughing. I think, when I put this in a movie, no one's going to believe me. On the way out her friends pass by me, looking up, shuffling by. I smile. Hey, no hard feelings smile. I don't know what she told you, but I'm just a loud laugher, seat shifter- and your friend is mental, get her some earplugs!

Quote of the night: from an ex-friend who I ran into by mistake- as I have successfully not seen her for quite a while. I play friendly though, remember, I've been laughing. I smile, I wave- I say, hey how yah been... On the way out she sort of hugs me and says, "It's good to see you again, as usual." I say, "You haven't seen me in 2 years."

Yes, yes I did say it. She was good right up until usual. Our other friends gape and blink and I roll my eyes. She stumbles around that foot in her mouth, says something about oh how time passes, and my isn't she getting old. And then she leaves. I shake my head. We pretend it didn't happen. We go on talking about war of the worlds and march of the penguins- someone refers to me as the Quentin Tarentino of the co-op... I laugh. I shake my head. I think, what kinda crazy weekend was this.

THEN on the way home i get stuck in some f-d up bowl traffic. I'm in the right hand lane, stopped at a light. There is no room between me and the curb. We go. Then a guy cuts into my lane from the right side! I look at him, sort of bewildered and outraged. He backs off, comes up to the left of me- rolls down his window, which I do as well. He starts yelling at me for cutting HIM off. We're stopped again. I say, "What the fuck are you talking about!" There were words. There was him being insane and me being, what the fuck are you talking about! I roll up my window. He speeds off. I speed off. I get ahead of him and continue the internal dialogue of wronged-ness. I shake my head as if my entire life was one bewilderment after another. And I laugh. I think, what the hell.