Happy Freakin' Birthday part 2

Along with a coworker quitting both his job and his gender in extraordinary fashion I also almost got in a fistfight for the first time since Jr. High. What's scary and troubling to me, other than the stupidity of the circumstances surrounding the almost fight (which I'll delve into in a moment), is that I really, really wanted to get into the fight. I really wanted to hurt this guy. Even writing this my gut is tensing up and I can feel my primitive brain lambasting me for not getting into the fight. There is a significant part of me that regrets not hitting this guy. 

Now, there is also an equally significant part of me that is wondering whether my back could have even handled a row and cheering the fact that I didn't break my glasses that night. The fact that I'm having these thoughts, though very sound and rational, and the fact that this whole incident happened the night before my 34th birthday just make me feel old.

So, here is the story.

My father-in-law gave me the best gift. One night away from my kid. My father-in-law took Qball for the night and let my wife and I have the evening and morning off. This was great. If you ever need a gift for me (and really you should all be thinking about gifts for me) this is at the top of the list. My wife and I decide to do dinner and a movie.

For whatever reason I'm already annoyed by the time we get to the theater. I don't remember exactly why. You can ask my wife because she probably remembers why. It is Saturday around 7 or 8, prime movie time. It is packed with a long line to get a ticket, no surprise there. We're seeing Sisters because that's the only movie we could agree on. 

This theater has the standard box office but also has a couple self service kiosks where you can buy tickets as well. They are around a corner and behind a big support pillar. Both have a line but the kiosk one is usually shorter. Being efficiency prats, I stand in the kiosk line while my wife stands in the standard line. There are two separate kiosks but only one line in the middle of them. This doesn't strike me as odd and seems like a perfectly reasonable thing to do, maybe even the best way to line up for this sort of thing. This way no one gets stuck behind someone being extraordinarily slow.

People tend to forget or not want to bother with the kiosks so by the time I'm next in line there is only one guy behind me. I didn't pay him much mind but he seemed to have no problem figuring out the two kiosks, one line thing, but a woman walks up shortly after and she does have trouble with this concept or chooses not to abide by it. Either way unbeknownst to me this woman happens to be the guy behind me's wife. She is probably about my age give or take a few years.

I see her walk up out of the corner. She stands off the side looks at the kiosks. Looks at me. Then back to kiosks. Then back to me. She is trying to figure out why there are two stations but only one line for them. I see her puzzle it out for a few moments. She apparently decided that there should be two lines so she steps in front of me and directly behind the people buying their tickets. This annoys me as it should anyone else. I debate calling her out for about half a second but saying, "Excuse me. You just cut me."

She looks at me as if I just slapped her. Affronted, she responds, "There are two lines."

I ponder for a second whether she's being an ass or being an idiot. I decide it's the former which makes me even more annoyed. I'm pretty certain she knew there was only one line. Her husband is behind me for god sake! He just about interrupts me as I say, "No there is just one." She turns away trying to ignore me. Her husband says something to the effect of "Hey, she's with me." I got the sense that he was going to apologize and say something like "Hey, babe come stand by me and let this nice, observant man go about his merry way." He doesn't get a chance to say that because she turns back to me and repeats with a who-the-fuck-do-you-think-you-are? look, "There are two lines!"

I'm getting mad now, "No, you cut. There is just one line."

"Who would know that?!" She starts to yell a little.

I'm a little dumbfounded by this statement. I raise my arms up to indicate everyone standing in front of the movie theater, "Everyone but you!" I say loudly.

By this time both kiosks open up. She and her husband go to one and I start heading to the other one. I'm just about to shake my head and dismiss the whole thing. We're both getting tickets at the same time anyway. But she says something else which I don't actually recall. I respond with "You cut. Just admit it and quit being a dick about it." In a bit of raised voice. 

I admit it's not the best or most classy thing to call someone a dick, but in my defense she was being a dick and I tend to call things as I see them. I'm not even sure why I said dick. Maybe I thought bitch was too gender bias.

At this point I'm about to get my wallet out and buy two tickets for Sisters (which is a slightly above average comedy, by the way). I can't buy the tickets though. The husband, who at this point I had thought was the sane one of the relationship or at least the less dickish one, charges me. He's about half a foot shorter than me, but a little younger and probably fitter. Which isn't hard as I'm on the doughy side of fit right now. He bumps chests, tries to push me, and is yelling something about how no one calls his wife a dick and he's going to make me apologize. Meanwhile, his wife is calmly buying tickets and says "Don't bother with him. He's psycho." I apply this to her husband but I'm pretty sure it was directed at me.

It's at this time that I'm flooded with a near overwhelming desire to fight this guy. Not just fight him but really hurt. Like curb stomp hurt him. It's also at this time that I think about how I haven't been in a real fight since Jr. High and even then it wasn't a full on fight. I also think about how I've been having back problems and I don't want to pay for new glasses. I then think about how much of a wuss that makes me sound which makes me want to hurt this guy even more.

Instead, I just get back in his face and say, "Calm the fuck down." It was the first thing to come to mind. He tries to push me again and says I'm the one not being calm (which is, for the record, demonstrably false) and demands I apologize. I say calm down again, hopefully in something of a menacing way. This repeats a few more times and then it just ends. His wife got the tickets. The guy calms down a little and walks away. He might have said something else before he left but I didn't catch it.

Like some stupid Neanderthal I stand there a second and start debating whether I "lost" the little fight because I didn't push him back or whether I "won" because he did calm down and I didn't apologize. So in the end, he did what I told him to do and I didn't do what he wanted me to do. 

At this point my wife comes up to me and tells me the movie is sold out and we should get something to eat and come back for a later showing. She didn't see what had happened. So, we went and got some burgers then saw the movie. 

The next day was my birthday. It was one I probably won't forget soon.