[stylist] Weekly Writing Challenge

[Chris Kuell]

I've enjoyed everyone's contributions to this exercise. And now I'm going to
start my timer...

 
As a writer, I'm always listening in on other people's conversations. Most
of them are fairly meaningless, but occasionally I'll pick up a nice tid bit
or phrase--like the time I was in Atlanta and I heard the expression, "he's
dumb as a box of rocks." To me, that was a keeper.

Anyway, I was in a local coffee shop yesterday, a place called Molten Java,
which I like to support because they give young people a chance to play
music and read poetry on Thursday nights, and I think that's pretty cool.

So yesterday I slid into a booth with my cup of cammomile tea and tuned in
to the guys in the booth behind me, who I'll call Nick and Johnny. I could
tell Nick was a big guy, with a deep, booming voice. Johnny was a little
nasally, like maybe he should have had his adenoids out as a kid. It took a
minute, but I soon figured out they were talking about dating, and in
particular, a dating web site called Tinder.

Johnny: So I was messaging with this girl, Stephanie. I asked who her
favorite president was, and she said Lincoln, then asked me who mine was, so
I said Martin Van Buren."

Nick erupts into laughter. "Martin Van Buren? Holy crap. Why?"

Johnny: "I just wanted to see what she'd do."

Nick: "And...?"

"Johnny: "And she blocked me."

More laughter from Nick, then: "Well, I was chatting with this chick named
Shontelle. Totally hot. I'm talking pure fire. We're vibing, everything is
going smoothly, when she starts telling me about her friend, who used to be
Meghan, but now is Mason. I asked what he did for work, and she said not to
say him, but to say they or them. I said--say what? She then goes into this
gender neutral pronoun mumbo jumbo, saying it's better to use they or them,
even in the singular, because it's not gender specific."

Johnny: "But that's grammatically incorrect!"

Nick: "Dude, that's exactly what I said. I told her that as an English
major, I just couldn't get behind that bullshit."

Johnny: "And...?"

Nick: "And she blocked me."