Meat Out

Things that make me go hrrrrmmmmm!

I’m normally a peaceful soul. If I were a lake in upstate New York, I’d be Lake Placid. If I were one of the Three Tenors, I’d be Placido Domingo. If I were weather, I’d be partly sunny. But certain external influences cause me to lose my usual studied, sexy air and turn into a giant raging meathead like a werewolf under a full moon. It’s a phenomenon called “meating out,” or simply, “meating.” They say you can’t solve your problems until you admit them, so I’m admitting right here that I’m a serial meat-out waiting to happen.

Participatory games are probably my biggest weakness. I’m a sore loser. I’m not happy unless I win, which is problematic because I’m also not very good at anything. Once, in a poker game in the far reaches of Brookline, Roommate Scott beat me by drawing the one card he needed. I didn’t react well. Scott, who had ridden his bike to the game, was supposed to get a ride home with me. Suffice it to say, he put a few more miles on his bike that night.

Scott foiled me again last weekend, when we were playing some low-stakes skins golf. It looked like I had one hole locked up. I had a stroke lead on Scott as he lined up a 25-foot putt over the cratered moonscape of a Saugus public-course green. Since I’m as bad at golf as American Idol winners are at being American idols (the only thing idol-like about Kelly Clarkson is her fat Buddah arms), I was already exalting in my golfing glory when Scott sunk his putt. I then had to actively remind myself that I was outside, playing a game with friends on a beautiful day, to drive away the dark fantasies of Scott being attacked by turkey vultures. I managed an outward congratulations, but I think stifling my meat-out only made it worse, like holding in a fart.

From these two examples, you might think I could solve my problems by simply not hanging out with Scott anymore, and believe me, I wish it were that simple. But lighthearted, fun games aren’t the only things that send me on a one-way trip to the butcher shop to pick up a few pounds of meat.

Getting in the wrong toll booth line makes me meaty. Given two toll booth lines of equal length, I will pick the one that contains: a car that’s going to break down; someone who doesn’t have any money but will manage to negotiate a complex I.O.U. with the cashier that involves a credit application, a federal background check and a notary public’s seal; someone who, despite being headed east at the Newton tolls, is trying to get to Idaho and will need completely new directions (fortunately, the toll-taker will hail from Boise and know the route by heart); someone who will drop their money on the ground; and someone whose power windows are broken, so they need to open their door and reach around it like they’re afraid the toll-taker has SARS (I’m trying to win a Pulitzer in the Outdated Reference category this year). As I glance over at the adjacent lane to see the Yugo driving on four space-saver spares that I passed back in New York, I can’t help but wonder why monster trucks are illegal, while I punch my dashboard over and over and over again.

Once you get past the toll, you’ll eventually have to park. I hate parking in Boston so much that I rented a spot purely to lower my blood pressure and lessen incidences of meating out (or being meated-upon, as I’ve written about before). So imagine my meatiness when I went to pull into my lot recently and found a car parked in front of the gate. Hoping this was a temporary mistake, I found a meter spot and returned two hours later. The offending vehicle was still there. Not only was it still there, but now I couldn’t find a meter, either, and after driving around for half an hour becoming increasingly frustrated, I gave in and called 911. I felt nervous dialing those three famous digits, but that’s actually what you’re supposed to do to get a car towed in Boston. “What’s your emergency?” asked the operator. I told her I needed to get a car towed. She said she’d take care of it. I drove by later and the car was gone. Problem solved.

I had no idea it was so easy to take care of life’s little annoyances. Thanks, 911. You’re gonna come in handy next time someone in Souper Salad tries to sneak in front of me from the wrap line to the sandwich line. ∂