Manners of the Season

Posted on December 12, 2013

Ralph excels in non-verbal communication. For instance, he silently insists he deal with Kris when he’s home and not Kage. He has very little patience when Kage wants to come out to play. The funny thing is that Kris isn’t afraid of Ralph whereas Kage—who isn’t afraid of anything or anyone else—runs and hides like a little Loganite. There are times, however, when we need to play Good Gay/Bad Gay and Ralph coaxes Kage out to play by dangling a Blu-Ray in front of him. It always works. And the holiday season is the one where Kage gets to come out and play the most!

The one thing my alter ego and I cannot stand during the holiday season is bad manners. This goes beyond someone not using their blinker when weaving in and out of traffic they deem too slow to possibly exist behind for more than a couple of extra seconds. Yes, the asshats are out in droves and now that we’re getting snow, it’s going to get worse. Much worse. This even goes beyond those people who you hold the door open for at the mall and who walk by you as if you should have opened it for them because that’s your sole function in life. There’s a special place in hell for those folks. I know. Ralph’s Hong Kong grandmother and I are designing it.

Although, it’s funny how you just mentioned opening up the door for someone. Well, I technically mentioned it, but you’re along for the conversation, so you’ll have to accept half the blame here. I dropped some things off yesterday morning to one of the local charities—a local battered women’s shelter—and as I was leaving, I saw a woman heading towards the donation door. She was probably a decade and a half older than myself, dressed quite smartly—probably a well-to-do socialite—and carrying a small plastic grocery bag.

Granted, I haven’t had a haircut in two months, but I didn’t look like hell and I was dressed with recognizable brands. She looked over at me and instead of a polite acknowledgement for holding the door open, she goes all Grosse Pointe on my cute, adorable, angelic, epitome-of-sweetness, charming self.

Lady: The rest of the bags are in the car.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen! I’m your announcer, Howard Excel, and welcome to the first bad opening statement of the holiday season. In this corner, we have dual personality mild-mannered husband Kris and flipside evil, snarky, prankster author Kage. In the opposite corner, we have the snobby beyotch who thinks all of mankind is here to serve her. The gauntlet has been thrown down and the first punch delivered, so let’s see what the response is.

Kage: Well, good luck with those.

Kris assesses the situation, then takes a step back, allowing Kage to emerge and respond with a resounding dismissive shrug-off. It doesn’t get any better than this when snob vs. snob!

Lady: Aren’t you going to carry them in for me?

And he’s thrown her completely off balance! She’s wondering if she heard him correctly. Is it humanly possible that one of the little people in life has summoned the courage to talk back to her? If so, she may go crawling back to Grosse Pointe and call an emergency meeting of the Grosse Pointe Anti-Minion Society in order to find out how to deal with this emerging crisis. Will Kage cave in, bow down and run away like a little Loganite or will he stand tall in all his glorious belligerence?

Kage: Lady, I don’t carry bags. They’re carried for me. You’re lucky I figured out how to open the door. Now get your own staff.

Kage fakes one to the left, then comes back with a sucker punch to the right before summoning his Uncanny Gay Catty Energy Punch to the face! It’s a TKO! She can’t handle the pressure of Sarcasm to the 12th Power. No, ladies and gentlemen. This fight is over almost before it began. Kage’s staff of Tea Maker, Toast Maker, Toast Butterer, Tea/Toast Deliverer, Toilet Paper Fluffer and Seat Warmer are all heckling her as the paramedics carry her out of the ring. This was a brutal one.

Suffice to say the woman extended a gesture of her own while I walked away. She must have picked that up outside of Grosse Pointe since she could be fined for doing it within the city.

Ah, tis the season…

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Kristoffer Gair (who formerly wrote under the pseudonym Kage Alan) is the Detroit-based author of Honor Unbound, A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To My Sexual Orientation, Andy Stevenson Vs. The Lord Of The Loins, Gaylias: Operation Thunderspell, several short stories featured in anthologies (to be combined in a forthcoming book), the recently re-published novella Falling Awake, its sequel, Falling Awake II: Revenant and Falling Awake III: Requiem.

6 Responses to “Manners of the Season”

Dorien says:
December 12, 2013 at 10:04 am
Class always tells. So does lack of it. Snark on!

Dorien

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Kris says:
December 12, 2013 at 10:43 am
I should have sent you a box of tissues with the card for Christmas, D. Hope you’re feeling better.

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West says:
December 12, 2013 at 10:04 am
LMAO…oh my God…Me and my alter wish we could pull that off. I needed a good laugh this morning. Thanks, Kris.

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Kris says:
December 12, 2013 at 10:44 am
Glad I could assist this morning. =) Some people are just too annoying and I seem to bump into all of them at one point or another. Am pretty sure she’ll remember me if I ever do see her again.

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Patricia Logan says:
December 12, 2013 at 10:59 am
So rude! Glad to know that Kris has joined the Loganites here on the dark side but sorry to say, there’s no room at the inn, buddy. You’ll just have to find your own mythological group of RP’rs to play with. You need balls to play in my back yard!

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Kiernan Kelly says:
December 12, 2013 at 2:43 pm
Kris, if this was a video game, I would SO play it.