Never Argue with a Genius

We were sitting in a restaurant waiting for two other friends, a couple, to arrive.  It was a cozy restaurant with a great wine list, tiny little plates of food, and dim lights.  We were regulars.  I was busy admiring the décor when my companion interrupted my reverie.

“This looks like them.”  He said.  Parking across the street in front of us was a school bus yellow Xterra with two people inside.  I looked up and squinted, trying to recognize the people inside.  I’d never seen their car before.

“It’s got to be them.  How many of those blinding yellow Xterras can there be in this town?”

“Lots, actually.”

“Oh, bah.  There aren’t lots of them here.  I never see them around!”  A couple stepped out of the car and walked away from us.

“It’s not them.” He said.

“Huh.” I sniffed.  “What are the odds?”

“Pretty good, actually.”

“Oh, please.  There can’t be that many of them around here.”  I looked at my friend who didn’t immediately reply.  He just shrugged and blinked.  Arguing un-provable points about the color of grass or the sum of two and two was an exercise in futility.

“Okay.”  He said.

We were sipping our wine and discussing the 2008 campaign when another Xterra snuck into the corner of my eye, driving past the restaurant in a dangerous I’ve-got-a-woman-delivering-a-baby-in-the-back sort of hurry. 

“There they go.”  I said.  “They missed it.  Maybe they can’t find it.  The sign is hard to see.”

“I doubt it was them.”

“It HAD to be!”

“No.  Those cars are everywhere here.  I’m surprised you haven’t noticed.”

“I haven’t noticed because they aren’t that common.”

He said something about Obama in reply.

Another yellow Xterra turned from the main road onto the other side of the corner restaurant.  We peered inside to see two strangers.

“How is that possible?  I’ve never seen any of those eyesores before and now they’re all over the place!”

I barely noticed the shift in the corners of his mouth.  It was so slight, only a person sitting right beside him wearing magnifying glasses could possibly have seen it.  It was like a gnat had pushed up the corner of his mouth and slipped right between his teeth in less time than it took to say “huh?”

He didn’t blink this time.  Instead, he started complaining about Hillary.

We were sitting there for a total of ten minutes when he said, “There they are.” 

As the thirteenth brightly offensive school bus yellow Xterra parked beside the building.