every insecurity I have about foreign languages

2/14/2006

Occam's Razor was postering in Compton house, which looked more like HEP or Pierce or a Kaufmann's department store.
I left to get food at Maravillas, which had an orange interior and a counter.
The man at the counter looked like a thin, Mexican Vin Diesel.
I decided on a whim as I got to the front of the line that I hadn't been speaking Spanish enough lately and I should make an exception to my usual refusal to order in Spanish at Mexican restaurants (a mechanism for avoiding accidentally sounding like a condescending ass).
Fortunately I had already written down what I wanted to order in Spanish, in pencil, on the back of my SOSC essay prompt, and nervously I read it to the guy.
He looked at me with pity and asked me to repeat everything.
I did, and apparently my pronunciation still sucked, so I re-ordered in English.
"It's just that I haven't spoken Spanish in a while because I'm not taking classes anymore and I wanted to practice a little before it all went away completely," I said apologetically.
He offered to give me Spanish lessons once a week in exchange for borrowing my green bass guitar once a week.
I agreed and went back to postering Compton house.