Running Commentary

The other day I was behind a guy in line at one of those new vending machines which has a device on the front of it where you can slide your credit card and pay for your drink that way (because who doesn't want to finance their $2 soda at 8% interest?). Anyway, despite being young enough that technology shouldn't be blowing his mind, the guy in front of me was very impressed by this feature. I know this because he was giving his own minute-by-minute recap as the transaction was going down, out loud and to no one in particular. It went a little something like this:

"Let's see here. Slide card." (Oh, did I mention he was an out-loud reader as well? Awesome.) So he slides his card.
"Make selection. Oh, what do I want? I guess Pepsi will be good." (Good thing since we were standing at a Pepsi machine. If he wanted a Diet Coke he would have been shit out of luck.) He hits the giant Pepsi logo, the screen says 'vend' (which he reads) and out comes the bottle of Pepsi.
"Nice! That's cool." (Yes, you paid your money and got what you selected. It's a miracle.)

Meanwhile, I'm standing behind the guy with my exact change, just trying to buy my drink and get on with my day, desperately hoping no one else in the area makes a comment, because that would only encourage him. I'm very familiar with these kind of people, who want nothing more than for you to acknowledge their comments, because it opens the door for a conversation and the next thing you know they are telling you their entire life story (trust me, this happens to me all the time).

Now, I'm not one to make fun of a guy just because he's got some kind of running dialog going down in his brain. Some of my best conversations of the day are the ones that take place inside my head and almost nothing happens to me where I don't have some sort of remark at the ready. The difference is I keep them to myself in social situations. No one wants to hear your thoughts on every thing that happens to you, while it's going on. Frankly, it's kind of annoying. Dude, have some self-respect and start a blog like the rest of us.