for silly lobster fear.

You know how sometimes people ask you like "What is the most emberassing moment in your life?" Yeah, well...There was this time...

See, it was back when I was dating Zara, right after she got outta the hospital, before things turned bad. I figured...She was gone and at work for the day, so I'd do something nice for her, like make dinner. Problem was, I couldn't cook.

But back on my way home from the library some guys in a pickup were selling fish and stuff. I guess they'd been down at the warf all day. See, I passed a construction site, and that's where they were. For some reason guys like this gravitate towards carpenters.

Anyway, if it's one thing I do know, it's that you can just boil most crabs and that makes em' edable. So I walk up to this guy, and we're both real gentlemanly like, calling eachother 'sir' but at the same time being informal. He's got like half a dozen rock lobsters in the back, inside a bucket that's been cut into a half cylander to form a little pond for them. They're ugly ass motherfuckers but endearing in a sorta way, rock lobsters.

So I buy about three off this guy, and he puts them into a paper bag for me. I head back to Zara's, the whole time these lobsters are throwing a fit in the bag. I guess if I were a bunch of lobsters shoved in a wet dark paper bag, I'd thrash around too. But I'm not, and I'm pretty happy with that fact.

I let myself into Zara's house balancing this bag of lobsters on my knee, using the key she hides behind that little plastic doorway box for Jewish people. One of the lobsters has torn through the paper and is poking its snub face out, so I poke it in the eyestalk and when it pulls back into the bag, I run into the kitchen.

I put them down on the counter, and start looking around, and it's about this time I realize Zara hasn't got a pot. It becomes pretty clear I'm gonna hafta go get one, so I go into the apartment's living room and pull one of the big clunky chairs across the carpet until it's blocking the kitchen. I'm going to be making these things for Zara now, even though I'm laughing at the fact I can't even put these lobsters into a pot yet.

Anyway, by the time I got back with a pot big enough to cook them, Zara was already home. Oops. She wasn't just home, she was shrieking and throwing books into the kitchen and swearing. The lobsters had torn out of the paper bag and were all over the floor, scared out of their wits, and Zara screaming at them probably wasn't helping. When I came in the door she stopped throwing things and came running at me, crying like someone had just shot baby Jesus.

I held her and told her it was okay, but in my mind, all I was really thinking was this.

I had no idea Zara was afraid of lobsters.