Skip to main content

Litmus Test 2

Remember how I have a friend who I have dubbed "The Litmus Test?" The story behind this was amusing enough to write about; basically, every time she's met one of the Mild Ex'es, I've gotten into a big fight with said Mild Ex shortly thereafter. And I hate to say it, but she may now have some company. There is now a second friend who can lay claim to the title of "Litmus Test."

The first time it happened, I just figured it was a random coincidence. I was about to take off on a vacation with a buddy of mine, and I got in to a fight with the now-Mild Ex pretty much the day before I left. The next couple of days were not pleasant, and the fact that I wasn't around to try to work through it all made things even worse. Now, when you're traveling with people, you tend to talk about anything and everything, so this came up at some point. He was a good friend about it all, and he gave some words of encouragement and all that. When I got back, the Mild Ex and I made up, and things were back to normal. All was right in the world.

A couple of years later, an eerily similar scenario popped up. I had made travel plans, and this friend happened to be on the same trip. Sure enough, the day before I left, I found myself in a fight with the Mild Ex. Mind you, this was a different woman, and the circumstances that led to the fight were also far different. Regardless of the differences, though, the same basic principle applied: if I went on a trip with this friend, I ended up in a non-trivial fight with the Mild Ex the day before.

Now, this guy didn't actually meet either of the two women I was dating, so the fact that he was able to channel his powers of discord is all the more impressive. That's some impressive, long distance, somehow-kicks-in-at-just-the-right-moment voodoo. Interestingly enough, both of those relationships did end within a couple of months of said trips and fights. It's not like those trips were the straws that broke the camel's back, but I wouldn't entirely disagree if you said they marked the beginning of the end in both of those cases. Like I said, he's got a definite claim to "Litmus Test."

That's all well and good, but a thought occurred to me that prompted me to write about this: what would happen if the two Litmus Tests met each other? Would they somehow manage to use their powers on each other? Would their powers negate each other? Would they do double the damage? Or would they somehow create the absolute opposite effect? Part of me is really curious about this. I'm going to have to find a way to get those two in the same room, and bring a date. Either way, I suspect I'd end up with one heck of a story.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

New York City Trip (Day 3)

By the third day of the trip, I was tired enough from the previous day's adventures/subway rides that I felt like sleeping in. And sleep in I did. I think I woke up at something like 11:30 or noon. Of course, that meant that a later start to the day, which started the vicious cycle all over again. By the time we rolled into Manhattan, it was about two in the afternoon. I had tentatively set aside Sunday to see something on Broadway, so we headed over to the tkts booth for discount tickets. There were actually various 3PM options, and after mulling our options, we figured it'd be a good idea to catch one of those. We settled on The Toxic Avenger , which was actually an off-Broadway option. However, we hadn't eaten yet, and the show started about 15 minutes after we got our tickets. Enter the food carts. There happened to be one right outside the theater, and the guy charged a little bit of a premium for the convenience. Still, I was hungry, and I had yet to try...

Moment of Truth

I forget where I first heard it (I think it might have been Descartes), but I have long been a fan of the notion that certain things just have a " ring of truth " to them. If you've never heard the idiom before, the basic idea is that some things are super-true. They are not just true, but they are so obviously true, that as soon as you hear them, you recognize the truthiness inherent in them. I usually get excited when I hear one of these, since it means that I am a tiny bit less ignorant from that moment forward. For the first time in memory, though, I experienced the ring of truth. First, let me paint the scene with a little bit of background. I'd made plans to have dinner with my friend, but we'd agreed to play it by ear. The end result was that we ended up settling on a pretty late dinner in a local spot. That worked out just fine, since we weren't shooting for gourmet, we just wanted to grab some food and catch up in the process. So, we headed out to ...

Backlog

I am an information junkie. Always have been. I'm one of those people that cares far more about the storyline in a video game than the actual game play. At work, I will spend time researching things related to solved problems, because I want to know exactly why it failed in the first place. And if someone learns something new, I want to go see what it's about, because I want to know what they know. I know it's not exactly the average outlook on life, but it is what it is. Anyhow, this mentality leads to my habit of tracking various websites, blogs, and other internet web sources to keep my information flow constant. Doing all of this manually is tedious at best, though, so I use Google Reader  to organize all of these feeds. It just makes things simpler to have a single source of RSS feeds, so that I can quickly browse through items related to my interests. Given all of that, it should come as no surprise that I also try to keep up with my feeds on a regular basis. I ...