We Think We Think

A Whore by Any Other Name Last night I knew I was in for a long one at work, and so hit the local pub for happy hour before returning to work. I was so caught up in work, however, that after scarfing down a few quesadillas I ran back up to the office and left half a pint of lager on the counter. At about 11 PM I finished up and drove home, with a fresh print of my latest literary effort under my arm (for needless to say, while I do not partake of my literary pastimes in the office, I don't hesitate to partake of the office laser printer for my literary pastimes). I figured I'd run through a quick edit at my favorite watering hole for an hour or two, as it was the end of the week and who needs sleep. But my watering hole was closed when I got there, and so were all the others in town, it being a small town and if there's no one around at midnite the bartender doesn't stick around to buff the lacquer. So I headed across the river to the next town, a pretty well-to-do place that I like avoiding, and went to a fancy old hotel bar that I thought might be on last call. To my surprise there were over a dozen people in there, not the regular town tavern type, mind you, but storekeepers and some college matronly older maids around a table. No jukebox on, Howard Stern was on, but the sound was turned off. There was just good chatter allaround. I found me a big empty spot in the middle of the bar, ordered my pint, and started editing. That's when I noticed this elderly gentleman two seats to my left. I call him elderly because he was about ten years older than me and looked 61 or thereabouts, as opposed to me who looks 35 and not a day younger. He was getting very tipsy and was busy fondling a blond immediately to his right, which is to say immediately to my left, which is perhaps the reason I had chosen my seat. As I said, it took me a while to notice the gentleman on her left. She, in the meantime was chattering on, and letting him fondle her. Did I say that I find it hard to believe that I had failed to notice her when I took my seat? On walking in and glancing around, I had made some quick assumptions about the drinking inhabitants of rich little commercial towns, and that was that. Retired accountants, rich widows, some posh people talking theatre, that was that. It seemed a very upscale drinking establishment that I probably didn’t belong in. The blond had seemed the youngest person in the place. However, I took a second look at her and noticed that she had on a very large men’s white cotton dress shirt, hanging out, and black fishnet stockings up to her thighs. But when she leaned over to the older man it became very clear that she had nothing else on. There was an otherwise naked bottom sitting on the barstool. As I checked this out rather unbelieving she happened to turn around and make eye contact. I turned to my beer. A few moments later I looked back over to check out the situation again. But she again happened to look over, smile, and extricate herself from the elderly arms. Then she reached over to my ashtray to flick an ash. "What's your name?" she asked. "Sparky" "HOW did you get that name?" Many people ask me this, so I am not surprised by the question. However, she immediately followed the question with this—--- "That's MY name!!! Do you want to hear how I got it?" To which I naturally said, "Yes, I would, thank you." This provided her a reason to slide her seat over to mine and begin leaning into me and rubbing her stockings against my thighs, as she had previously been engaged with the elderly gentleman. Her shirt was very long, so when she stood up to move, it discreetly came down to her knees. However it turned out she really had a story of how she became known as Sparky… and it's not just that she told every guy she met that her name was Jim, Marvin, Harold, or Sancho. She got it when she was twelve and got nearly electrocuted during a rainstorm while trying to save her spaniel named … I don’t remember the name. Anyway I believed her, and suddenly the elderly gentleman woke up and realized he was missing his fondling and pulled her back. It wasn't long after that I came on a great line in my manuscript to reintroduce myself with. I had made a thoroughly rash and un-researched statement about the bipolar, scalar nature of pleasure in climaxes. I hadn't exactly made the point that way, but that was the essence of the point, and so I leaned over and said, "You know, I just wanted to ask you both whether you have very different kinds of orgasms at different times?" She was very quick to speak up. "That's JUST what we were talking about, wasn't it Mike?" "What?" said Mike. "That you have big orgasms and little orgasms." "Oh" said Mike. "So it's true then? I'd never bothered asking anyone, but figured it had to be, since mine are." She threw her arms on my shoulder, and pulled me towards her. "We've can't let this one get away, can we Mike?!" she said as she planted a long luscious french kiss into my upward orifice. "Well, I guess you shouldn't" said I, nonplussed. Why are you writing this?" and she grabbed the manuscript from me. I tried vainly to explain, but didn't get far when Mike pulled her away from me. Several minutes later she was back, apologizing for her friend's behavior. "Oh, that's hardly necessary," I said in a most genteel way. "Tell me," she asked again, "Why are you writing this? What is it really ABOUT?" I tried vainly to explain, but didn't get far when Mike pulled her away from me. Several minutes later she was back, again apologizing for her friend's behavior. "Oh, that's hardly necessary," I said in a most genteel way. "Tell me," she asked again, "Why are you writing this? What is it really ABOUT?" People tend to repeat themselves in bars, and you can find yourself having the exact same conversation eight or nine times if you are not on your toes. I didn't really want to be on my toes, since a few repeats of the line "We can't let this one get away" followed by that luscious french kiss could have been considered appropriate many times during the night. Unfortunately, the auto-repeat function seemed to skip and she went on. "What do you DO for a living, that makes you want to write this?" "I'm a technical writer," I answered. "What do YOU do that makes you so curious?" "I'm an MSNE." "A WHAT?" I asked. "An MSNE. Microsoft Network Engineer." "Oh," I said. "That explains it all." And despite her association with Microsoft I found her to be a very interesting person, and we swapped email addresses and she convinced me to give her the hardcopy of the manuscript to read. Her feedback will be greatly appreciated.