Shut Your Seed-Cracking Beak

Sometimes life is just a bit too ethereal for even me. After the drive-thru house closing that Brian and I attended today, we opted to dine at the house of Regina vinegar and pepper, since it is close to work. I was working over my starter salad with my fork, enhancing each bit with equal parts of lettuce, croutons, tomatoes, and cheese, when he quipped this little thoughtpiece.

"I bet you wouldn't have married me if I had a seed-cracking beak."

What the hell?

I think I snorted and asked him to repeat. He did, and I had heard correctly the first time.

I'm sure I crinkled up my nose and conveyed the proper quizzical countenance and continued eating.

At some point, I realized, this makes a perfect insult. When someone's jaws are too freely flowing, you can always say "just shut your seed-cracking beak." But you must do this with a straight face, of course.

Seed-cracking beak face isn't too bad either. Remember that one for the drivers yapping on their cell phones.

Addendum
And so the esteemed spouse days to me after reading this, "You're making life with me to be a bit more surreal than it needs to be." And his justification for this comment is this: "I was probably talking about my flesh rending teeth." And then, "I was eating a salad, and we were talking about becoming Vegan!" And then, the pinnacle: "Honest, I can connect this all up to sanity!" I love instant messenger.

The rest of the story: so, okay, there probably was some context of teeth and their uses, but that beak thing is a pretty good stretch - almost the splits. The Vegan thing? He couldn't do it - he'd have to give up butter, and that would be torture.

DOUBLE Addendum
Oh, and robins do not have seed-cracking beaks, they have worm-stabbing beaks; I learned this today.

hln

Posted by hln at April 23, 2003 08:46 PM | Anecdote