The Tale of A.
A. (not his real initial) was a fellow linguistics major, who had two classes with me and Melyngoch one fall semester. The first one was a large, early-morning lecture class with a couple hundred students. The second one was a small afternoon elective, with only half dozen students, plus occasional visitors.
A. was charming and relatively attractive, but he had an odd quirk: He would only talk to the hottest girl in the room. One moment we’d be in a deep, philosophical conversation. The next, he’d have dropped me for a classmate who’d just walked in the room.
In some ways, it was like a perverse exercise in logic. (If A. will talk to B. over C., but D. over B., who’s the least attractive?) In our small afternoon class, the hierarchy was fairly easy to pin down: R. (an intriguing artist) came first, then Melyngoch (with her ever-amazing eye shadow), then me, then E., who was shy and serious. However, none of us could hold a candle to M., the blonde bombshell from our morning lecture class, who really just wanted to drop out of BYU to become a dental hygienist. (If Melyngoch and I saw A. in the mornings when he was chatting up M., he pretended not to know us.)
As much as I appreciate behavior guided by logical consistency, I think I prefer people possessed of a little more kindness and a little less sleaze.
8 Comments:
I really hope A. married(s) a blonde ditz and regrets it for eternity.
Does abject aesthetic bias really constitute sleaze? Shallowness, certainly. Arrogance, perhaps. But sleaze?
sleaze -noun (slang)
1. a contemptible or vulgar person.
2. a shabby or slovenly person.
3. a sleazy quality, character, or atmosphere; shoddiness; vulgarity.
4. sleazy behavior, content, appearance, or the like.
A. sounds foolish, vain, and perhaps even cruel. I just don't know if it qualifies as vulgar. I guess it depends on where his eyes were directed during the conversations.
I second Alea's remark; it has a nice ring of poetic justice.
.
Thanks--I've been looking for pointers on how to improve my sleaze quotient.
peter - Good point. "Shallow" would probably have been a better adjective for the specific behavior.
You'll have to take my word for it that he really was sleazy, based on other qualities.
I'm wondering if this is who I think it is.
Brozy - I'm pretty sure you don't know him, but now I'm curious to know who you think it is. (It's not your Armenian teacher, if that's what you're thinking.)
: ) Wasn't what I was thinking. This story just sounds vaguely familiar.
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