Sometimes I’d swear that I’m trapped in an unaired Seinfeld episode. Or maybe there’s a clinical condition for the common to somewhat regular feeling of “Is there a hidden camera somewhere in here?”. I dunno. Probably actually looking for that camera would send me to a doctor’s office but as of yet, I just chuckle and wonder how funny it would be if I was indeed on some hometown version of Punk’d.

So I told you about my mother meeting up with the son of the man that she’s dating at our party a few weeks ago, right? The son of the guy that she met on E-Harmony just happens to work for my husband. That’s bizarre. I know I say I live in a small town but these people do not live way out here. They live in Northern Virginia - home to 2 million people. What are the chances of sharing a cocktail with the grown child, that just happens to be employed by your son in law, of someone you met on an internet dating service in my freaking backyard in the Ding Dang Woods? Slim, I think. Very slim. Are you grasping the slimness?

Here’s another example of my condition. Earlier this week, we took the kids into town for dinner at one of those chain Japanese steakhouse places where they make the onions into a volcano and throw shrimp at your head. My kids really dig fire. Anyway, we were seated and already looking over the menu when the waitress seated the other half of the table.

The only thing I don’t like about these places is the family style seating. Yeah, it’s cool to sit around the grill and watch the cooking fireworks but I just wish it was a smaller area. We always end up sharing a table with the most undesirable people - burpers, loud chewers and the like. This time was no different except that our tablemates happened to arrive in the form of our next door neighbors.

There are 8 homes on our street that happens to be located 10 minutes from the nearest town whose population is around 10,000 people. 2 of those 8 homes on our road contain people that we would sooner choose to have an raging eye infection than to share a meal with. Are you catching my drift here?

So, the neighbors sat down and we exchanged awkward hellos. Nothing like an unexpected tribal merge to go with your teriyaki chicken, I guess. As the meal progressed, we stayed to our own sides for the most part. However, their conversation could not have been harder to ignore.

National Politics
The War
Local Election
Religion
Cars

They had very strong views on each subject (and mostly opposing our own) but it was the last topic that made me think we were on Candid Camera. My husband is a car nut. Wait, that is really putting it mildly. He is an automotive addict. He knows data about cars like most men know stats about sports. Don’t ever try to tell him something incorrect about a car. He’ll have to correct you. It’s an involuntary compulsion.

When the conversation turned to cars, I’ll have to admit I wasn’t paying attention. I was busy shoveling fried rice by the chopstick full into my piehole. But my husband sure got all prickly ear’d and red faced. He leaned over to me and said something like,“This guy is a jackass” through clenched teeth. I then started paying very close attention in case I needed to grab the kids and jump ship.

You know that old saying, “You can pick on my wife but don’t mess with my dog”? Well, my husband was about to explode from trying to keep mum. They were dogging hybrids when they know damn well (Hello, we live next door!) that we drive one. My husband was convinced that the neighbor was baiting him with every controversial topic known to man and deliberately spewing out incorrect car facts for him to pounce upon. He was honestly about to throw the guy down on the hot grill and take his face apart with a spatula. I was getting mad, too, but more because I asked for the California Roll without roe.

As I dislodged the fish eggs from my back teeth and waved frantically for the check, I wondered, “How does something like this even happen? Let’s do the math here. What are the flippin’ odds of ending up seated next to your loathed neighbor in a town of 10,000 people? And why do they feel it necessary to send our blood pressure sky high discussing hot button issues like we were all on some cable news channel during sweeps week?? Why, Lord, why?”.

It was then that I’ll admit, I did take a good look around. With no camera in sight, I came to the conclusion that God must really want me to blog. Why else do I keep finding myself in these situations? Heck, if all this action keeps up, maybe she’ll even leave a comment sometime.

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