Living with the Hannibal Lecter's Old Lady

[OCmike]

This may very well be my last post here. If it is, it's been a fun ride fellas and I wish all of you well...even BSmack.

A lot of you don't know/care that I got a new nerdy tech job in the Bay Area and moved back to Calif about two weeks ago. After doing a room search for several weeks, getting several rude asshats and mostly non-returned phone calls, I get a call back from a nice-sounding older white lady, named Valerie, who is renting out a room that is 1 1/2 miles from my job. Score!

I drive down to meet her and check the place out. It's fine, relatively clean except for her school studies (papers, books, etc, scattered about) and the room even came with a queen-sized bed and she had wireless internet. Not too shabby. She's a bit shy and timid, but I'm a big dude and she probably weighed a buck-o-five, so I figured she was just worried that I'd try to hold her down and go yard on her crapper or something.

She then gets extremely assertive and says, "If you want the room, I'm going to need some kind of deposit and you're going to have to sign a contract."

Wow, nice personality shift there, Cybil. Whatever, I just figured that she was just one of those types who overcompensated for her shyness by being rude and pushy at times.

So I pay my first month's rent and agree to move in this past Sunday. Thankfully, Bizarro-chick wasn't around when I was moving my stuff in. Sunday, Monday and Tuesday, I see her maybe twice and when I do hear/see her, I say "Hello" and she says nothing in response. Okaaaay...

Then Wednesday night I come in the door at about 7:00PM. Valerie is sitting on the couch and immediately says, "Hello!", which is the first thing she's said to me since the day I moved in. She then proceded to ramble on and on in Kathy Bates-style lunacy for almost two fu*cking hours.

Why did I stand there nodding my head for two hours you ask? I learned a long time ago that you never interrupt people that aren't right in the head. Wait until they take a breath and then do the ole' "Look at the time…gotta run." Unfortunately, it took that long for her to stop yammering and inhale.

She began by pointing at the TV, which was tuned to C-Span, and telling me what a saint Barney Frank was for taking Exxon executives to task. She went on to say how she doesn't understand how anyone with a conscience can vote any Republican candidate into office since they're all about big business and all on the take. From hearing her talk, I'm surprised she didn't go down to Capitol Hill and throw rose petals in front of anyone with a "-D" after their name as they walked down the corridor.

Without hesitating, she shifted gears to her former Mexican neighbors and why you have to stand up for yourself. They used to "abuse alcohol and drugs and play loud music until all hours of the night and basically acted like animals." She complained to the landlord, but he didn't do anything, so she did what any good citizen would do. She called the Dept of Justice, the FTC and the FBI. No, not kidding…the FBI and the Dept of Justice...because some Mexicans were acting, well, like Mexicans. I'm sure they LOVE getting those calls.

I never did get a good explanation as to why the FTC was involved, but supposedly she called them to pressure the landlord to boot out the turdskins. I wasn't aware that suburban condos were under their jurisdiction, as I'm sure they weren't as well.

But whenever she'd talk about her neighbors, she'd narrow her eyes and they'd get almost black as she said, "...those Mexicans...". She'd immediately follow that up by laughing hysterically and saying, "Well, I don't have a problem with Mexicans, per se, just with those particular fellows."

"It's probably because they don't value education in the latino community in this state, so they're more likely to turn to alcohol and drugs," I offer, testing the waters a bit.

"Oh my, you do understand. Oh, how refreshing. HAHAHAHAHAHA."

At this point I'm convinced that this chick not only isn't just timid and overcompensating at times, she's completely 100% certifiably in-fucking-sane and potentially violent. It was basically like the moment in "Jaws" when Chief Brodie says, "We're going to need a bigger boat...".

She looks towards the TV again and Dubya is speaking. She doesn't even try to hide her contempt for the man.

"They should do to him what they did to...that guy who...you know...the leader of..."

"Saddam Hussein?"

"Yeah, him. Bush should be hanged for what he did to this country. In fact, there's only one candidate left who can truly save us." She turns slowly and glances at me, waiting to see what I'm going to say.

Hmmmm.... Let's see, I've got a 33% chance of getting this right, since Huckabee has been done for months. She clearly hates Republicans and McCain is damn near a Bush clone, so it's down to the two Democrats. Okay, she's completely fucking off-her-rocker insane, which means she must be in love with...

"Hillary?"

"Oh, thank God...you are truly enlightened!"

Yes! I may have just saved my life right there.

Her eyes turned into that narrowed, black look again and she said, "You know what the problem with the world is?"

She waited for an answer.

Crap...Uh...I felt like I just bet all my cash on Final Jeopardy and the category was "Famous Polish Sculptors."

"Uh, war?"

"Well, indirectly, yes. But specifically, the problem with the world is corporations and white men...but not you, you seem nice. You see, were it not for corporations and white men, we wouldn't have wars, recessions and Enron scandals, would we. Did I mention that I used to work for Enron? Yes, I was an accountant there. Oh, nothing where I could have seen any of the higher-level hijinks that was going on, but just long enough to get completely screwed out of my job because of their Affirmative Action program. You see, they had too many white people on their staff, so some of us had to go... Some of us, just happened to include me, which you'll find is a recurring theme in my life.

Some would look at me and mock me as crazy or insane and think that I've always been this way...but I haven't! I was (eyes narrowing to blackness) made this way."

...Gulp...

"I then moved on to work at Union Bank until the day that I noticed a man walk in intending to rob the bank. I was looking around waiting for someone else to notice...no one did. But *I* did. I knew he was there to rob the place and he did. And do you know what they did to us? All of us who worked that shift when the bank was robbed? THEY FIRED US! ALL OF US! They looked us right in the eyes and said, "GET OUT!" Every time I've tried to get a leg up in life, there's been a white man standing there to push...me...back...down. Some people think that a person on SSI must have quit on life, but I haven't. I've been trying for 47 years and what has it gotten me? What... I've either been fired, laid off, forced to resigned, denied promotions...YOU NAME IT! And ALL by white men."

"You know, I have a compressed nerve in my foot that gets really painful if I stand for too long."

"Oh, why didn't you say so! I feel simply awful... Which reminds me-"

Aw, crap...here we go again.

"I have to do special exercises to straighten out the 'S' curve in my spine. I used to have a normal back just like you or anyone else, until I went to a Chiropractor's office one day when I was having a bit of pain. He said he wanted to do an adjustment and I told him I didn't think that was a good idea. He said that it would stretch out the muscles that were pulling my back out of alignment, but I didn't believe him. He said that I should trust him so I did, and do you know what that got me? Do you know what I got in return for my trust? Pain. ...a lifetime of pain. Your foot hurts when you stand? Well my back hurts when I breathe, when I sleep, when I walk, when I live!"

Okay, now it's getting a bit melodramatic.

"And I'll bet you'll never guess what ethnicity he was... That's right, a white man. Now a casual listener might think that I hate certian ethnicities or people in general, but I don't. I've just learned that you have to think like the enemy. If people are going to affect your life with evil, then you must think as they do. You must learn to think with an evil mind."

"Well if you think with an evil mind all the time, won't that eventually make you jaded and evil as well? Can't you just be aware of the fact that they think that way and act with that in mind, rather than actually thinking like an evil person?"

"If only it were that simple, Michael. Why do you think that some tribal peoples would eat the flesh of their slain adversaries? Because only then would they truly capture their spirit and know...thy...enemy. When you know your enemy so well, you almost know what he's going to do before he does, and I'll give you a perfect example:

I was sitting there before one of my lectures at the university and this abhorrent Latino man walks in wearing a hooded sweatshirt. He's trying to cover it with his sleeves, but just peeking out if one looks closely enough, a tattoo is visible on his right hand. I had this overwhelming feeling rush through my body. Something was WRONG there…something was WRONG WITH HIM! He wasn't supposed to be there. Well I was the only one that saw something wrong with him, not because he was Hispanic, but because it was obvious, but no one else picked up on the signs which were just screaming to be heard and I suppose you're wondering why that is..."

"Why."

"It's because they weren't as intelligent as I was. It's as simple as that. I went up to the instructor and told him that he needed to ask the tattooed man to leave immediately. Of course he also wasn't as brilliant as I, so he, of course, asked me why he should. When I attempted to explain, he said that I was overreacting and had no reason to question this man's presence, and I'm thinking, 'Has everyone gone completely mad?!' As if it weren't enough of an injustice that they were going to let him stay in the class and expected me to leave, but to top it all off, they were looking at ME like *I* was the crazy one. Well, naturally I wasn't just going to stay there with that tattooed man right there in the class, so I left immediately.

They ended up sending me to a campus psychologist, who was this (with disgust) Russian woman. She asked me why I thought this man in the class was a threat, and I thought, "I'm supposed to explain myself to YOU? A Russian?! For all I know you could be a complete facist!"

She asked me again why I thought he was a threat and I explained that the Dean of the Sociology Department told me so.

"Why on earth would he tell you that?" She demanded, incredulously.

"Well, how should I know what his motives are? Wouldn't that be a question that would be better directed to him?

At that point, I had had enough and simply walked out of her office. She told me that I'd need a doctor's approval to return to the school.

So you see how they treat me? You see? I'm the one that notifies them of a legitimate threat, in one of their classes, yet *I'm* the crazy one? I'm the one who gets expelled because I'm "unstable"?

"So am I 'jaded'," you ask? Yes, I guess you could say I am a bit jaded. But I'd like to think that just about anyone would get soured on life in general if they'd been treated as I have been for 47 years."

"Uh huh."

"Oh, you DO understand, don't you. It's so refreshing to speak with someone who gets it. Without boundaries placed in my path by white men, who can all go to HELL as far as I'm concerned…well, present company excepted of course…you seem nice, I could have led a happy life. But I guess they felt like they needed to crack a few skulls on their way to the top. But it's not like that path is anything new. White men and corporations have ruined this country for decades...ever since deregulation. And the only way to fix that problem is to form a grass-roots revolution! But how can you fight back when you're only 5'1" and seen as this frail woman, rather than the genius that I am. ...And make no mistake…I *am* a genius... It's much easier for someone like yourself who is 5'10" or so and 210, 220 or 300 lbs. (Hey!) Those men who passed me up for promotions, disallowed my requests to transfer to another department where I could better my career, or let me go because of Affirmative Action…those men…"


"...should be held accountable..."


"Riiiiiiiiiiight… They should be held accountable. They should all be thrown in jail or they should be- You see, this is where I hesitate a bit, because I'm getting close to using the "k" word and we wouldn't want to do that, now would we."


Gulp.

"So what should we do with them? What should we do with those that destroy lives in order to better their own? I'll tell you what? They should all be thrown in jail or they should LOSE THEIR LIVES. It's that clear. That's how you deal with evil. You fight it right back with the same intensity with which it was thrown at you. I hate to lower myself to that level, but that's the only way to deal with these white men that society protects.

The TV then clicked off and the entire room went dark.

"I guess I need to have that breaker replaced. But you don't mind talking in the dark, do you? It's no problem for me, because I've got the eyes of a cat…mwahahahahahaaha."

"You know, I haven't exactly had the easiest of paths to get to where I'm at either. I've lost everything, including my job, my house and many of my possessions and had to start from scratch living in rural Texas."

Bad...Move...

"You have no idea what it's like to live the way I've lived…", she seethed. "To be so paranoid that you have to constantly reassess yourself to determine if your fears are legitimate or not. Unable to get out of bed for two or three days at a time. Living like a complete zombie for twelve years. You walk down the street and people think, 'Oh, what a nice man.' I walk down the street and people mock me and laugh at me and SPIT AT ME. Oh, I've tried to live a normal life. I've tried to extend my boundaries hoping that doing so would repair the damage that was done. Oh, they said that there was nothing physically wrong with me, but if they had felt the burn in the dendrites in my brain, day after day and night after night, I think they would have felt differently.

You think I'm like this because I'm a shut in? I thought maybe that was the case too. So I went to a poetry reading at Starbucks a few months ago and the people there were animals! All during the readings they were carrying on, laughing and punching each other in the shoulders and no one else could see it, but it was plain as day! THEY WERE ALL ON DRUGS. And the worst part was, no one else had any problem with it! Can't they see? Can't they see what's right in front of them? So I called the dept of justice, the FTC and the FBI and told them about what type of element attends these so called "innocent" poetry readings.

"Huh."

"So I've tried to get out. Don't you judge me. I've gone out. I've left. I've gone to the grocery store and to Wal-Mart, but they look down on me and spit right in my face. And do you know why?

"Why?"

"Because if a woman is 47, childless and single, there's something WRONG with her. If you're a man at that age, you're just 'taking your time' or playing the field or whatever, but if a woman is single and doesn't have a family, she's not normal. And then you see these women at the stores who parade around with their babies and flaunt them in front of your face... 'Look at me and my baby, aren't we cute together?' ...as if you're beneath them because you don't have a family and a husband and I just want to tell them, "Do you know how arrogant people were dealt with in the 1940's? Do you know what Hitler would do with someone like you? He'd throw you RIGHT IN THE GAS CHAMBER!"

*pause*
*pause*
*pause*
*pause*
*pause*

Ooh...ooh...five seconds of silence!

"You know, Valerie, I really need to go sit down. My foot's killing me."

"Yeah, you do that... You go run off to your room and play your games. But at least you're going knowing what it's like to be me for a day."

[Mister Bushice]

OK. I'll admit, I only got thru half of that before several shiny objects diverted my attention so I ain't 100% sure of the fact checking, but it appears...

OC MIKE IS ROOMING WITH RISA!!!

[Rootbeer]

I read every word, Mike. Very well written.

Sorry to hear you're living with a member of the Hilary express who wants to peel your flesh with a curling iron and a potato peeler. Good luck with that.

[RadioFan]

Good read, Mike.

Here's an idea: Order a dildo online (maybe a big black one, since she hates white guys so much) and use the name Mike Hunt as the recipient with her address. Couldn't hurt.

Oh, and Rack Rootbeer.

[The Seer]

Pic?

[poptart]

OCmike -- R.I.P.


That post spooked me deeply.
Not since Moorese posted about remote-control model airplanes dropping piss-filled water balloons into crowds of folks, has a post planted a more disturbing series of images and ideas in my brain.

[PSUFAN]

Mike was a hell of a good moderator. Excellent storyteller. It's not gonna be the same without him.

"You can't go. All of the Emus will die!!"

[Dinsdale]

Good read.

Good luck.

[Mr. Schwump]

Good gracious.

[Jeff in SD]

You might get lucky and she just kills herself when Obama wins, cause deep down it sounds like she hates the blacks as well...

[Mister Bushice]

Maybe you could introduce her to pickle. Sounds like they'd make a perfect couple.

[Goober McTuber]

Maybe you could introduce her to pickle. Sounds like they'd make a perfect couple.

Assuming she has a big enough dick.

[KC Scott]

Damn Mikey, what the hell bro?

Last I caught up with you, life was going well and you and wifey were moving to Texas?

Wild ass story Bro

[Diogenes]

Maybe you could introduce her to pickle. Sounds like they'd make a perfect couple.

White men are The Devil. She and Annie could be soul mates though.

[Ana Ng]

Sounds like my mom.


She doesn't happen to think that the street lights outside your home have video cameras in them too, does she?

[OCmike]

*scroll*
*scroll*
*scroll*

geez, man. sorry to hear about your dad/job/house/marriage/kids/prostate/whatever.

i'm sure it will all work out.

t&p

Oh come on. We both know it'd take at least seven spins of the scroll wheel to get through my long-winded tripe, so I know you read at least half of it. Bode me. And no, you can't have those ten minutes back. :D

I just emailed Valerie and dropped her a link to this thread.

Ass :D. That's just the type of shit that'll have her eating some OC sweetbreads with some fava beans and a nice Chiani F-F-F-F-F-F-F-F-F.

Me: Anyway, I'm not dead.
Valerie Palance: Day ain't over yet...

I jetted up to my parents' house in NoCal Saturday AM, while Valerie was still asleep. I figured if nothing else that would buy me a couple of extra days on the planet.

She doesn't happen to think that the street lights outside your home have video cameras in them too, does she?

No, but she doesn't receive mail at her condo because she's afraid if anyone knows where she lives they'll come there and kill her.

Oh, and she thinks that "Ray", her only friend in the world (some black dude), is only interested in her because he has a fetish for older white women...and no, I'm not kidding.

Damn Mikey, what the hell bro?

Last I caught up with you, life was going well and you and wifey were moving to Texas?

Wild ass story Bro

You must have been thinking about someone else, because the only reason we moved to Texas in the first place is because life threw me a slider and dropped a reverse "K" on me, and then froze the OL with a 3-2 changeup a few months later.

After limping off to Tejas, and working on Gulf of Mexico oil platforms for six months out of Louisiana, I finally scored an IT job in the healthcare industry in Austin, just a few miles from the crib. It was a decent paying gig, but it's no fun working for the IT gestapo. Not only did you have to forward every company e-mail to every company officer, but they had every incoming e-mail auto-forwarded to them as well. Not to mention that they tracked internet usage and ran a word filter on every e-mail you received and sent and every website you visited.

Freaks, some?

They did everything but make us stitch yellow stars on our clothes and stuff us all in a railroad car.

About 8 months later I got a cold call from a headhunter, who mistakenly called me thinking that I still lived in CA, about a high-paying job in the Bay Area.

I ended up being flown out for an interview, kicked ass and scored the gig and even got OL an upcoming interview with the company.

But unfortunately, for right now both she and Lil' OC are still in Tejas, which completely blows.

I've only been at the new gig for a week, but totally love it. Not only is there tons of new shit for me to learn (which in IT means more $$), but my boss is very "hands off", which is the only way I'm really comfortable working. Oh, and war the other person who has the same analyst position that I do being a filipino chick who's a solid "9". According to the boss, we'll be working very closely with each other. :D

[LTS TRN 2]

Sounds to me like YOU'RE the weird loner/seething malcontent in this situation. There's nothing that sounds odd or wrong with the woman's actions or attitudes. How old are you? And you're living with some stranger?...a lodger who keeps to himself while muttering racist asides? Perhaps you could work out an amusing "Odd Couple" situation with babs (aka "mscval")....sure, and you could trade barbs against Mexicans and Arabs while conducting a mutual reach around, etc.

[OCmike]

Sounds to me like YOU'RE the weird loner/seething malcontent in this situation. There's nothing that sounds odd or wrong with the woman's actions or attitudes. How old are you? And you're living with some stranger?...a lodger who keeps to himself while muttering racist asides? Perhaps you could work out an amusing "Odd Couple" situation with babs (aka "mscval")....sure, and you could trade barbs against Mexicans and Arabs while conducting a mutual reach around, etc.

You're dreaming about me and mvscal in a homoerotic racist fantasy and *I'm* the weird one? Uh...okay.

If you don't know why I'm renting a room by myself in the Bay Area, then you need to either read more of my threads or stay out of them completely. Personally, considering the disturbing nature of your above post , I'd prefer the latter.

Oh, and thankkks, Pickkkle.

[Charles De Mar]

This may very well be my last post here. If it is, it's been a fun ride fellas and I wish all of you well...even BSmack.

A lot of you don't know/care that I got a new nerdy tech job in the Bay Area and moved back to Calif about two weeks ago. After doing a room search for several weeks, getting several rude asshats and mostly non-returned phone calls, I get a call back from a nice-sounding older white lady, named Valerie, who is renting out a room that is 1 1/2 miles from my job. Score!

I drive down to meet her and check the place out. It's fine, relatively clean except for her school studies (papers, books, etc, scattered about) and the room even came with a queen-sized bed and she had wireless internet. Not too shabby. She's a bit shy and timid, but I'm a big dude and she probably weighed a buck-o-five, so I figured she was just worried that I'd try to hold her down and go yard on her crapper or something.

So you bugger raped some old broad in San Fran? I assuming you did since this lame asssed shit started out as such and ....

Firstly, I didn't read the rest of it as it was dull and insipid.

B, I can't imagine a person writing such nonsense.

Three, WTF is wrong with you?

[OCmike]

Firstly, I didn't read the rest of it as it was dull and insipid.

B, I can't imagine a person writing such nonsense.

If it's dull and insipid that piques your interest, click here.

Three, WTF is wrong with you?

I'm leaving work, so I'm not going to even bother with any sort of legitimate answer.

Here's the quick version: Do a search for all posts by "OCmike" with the word "crazy" in it.

[Charles De Mar]

.

Here's the quick version: Do a search for all posts by "OCmike" with the word "crazy" in it.

Why would I want to do that? Why dont' you finish the job nature has started and suck on the wrong end of a 12 gauge till the pain stops.

[Mikey]

47 is "older"?

GFY

[OCmike]

Why would I want to do that? Why dont' you finish the job nature has started and suck on the wrong end of a 12 gauge till the pain stops.

Who said I'm in pain? Now, I'm might be crazy and have three distinct personalities, but I'm what's considered a "high-functioning" looney toon. That means all I have to do is chew a couple of pills a day and I can still do the same job I'd be able to otherwise.

Now run along before I shift personalities and bust out BadOC on your ass.

[MuchoBulls]

Very good read. I wonder how long it took Mike to write that.

[Terry in Crapchester]

Mike,

Good luck with that.

[OCmike]

Thanks, fellas. I should be outta there by the end of March.

[Diogenes]

47 is "older"?

GFY

What he said.

[LTS TRN 2]

What's Bill say to Hillary after sex?....

"I'll be home in twenty minutes".....

(Now what this joke really reveals is that he's been banned for twenty minutes while Hillary's powering up the double-D's with Maggie. A lot of stress..)

[LTS TRN 2]

My bad, I admit I didn't read past the first five tedious paragraphs. Yer doin' a funny! Need a job? These guys are hiring
http://youtube.com/watch?v=AuI1srcBoiQ" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[OCmike]

RACK Spray!

I'd been sleeping with a chair under the knob (redneck home security system) and finally got sick of it and bought a locking door knob at Lowe's on Tuesday night. Yesterday she calls me at work and I just let it go to voicemail.

Her message said: "I noticed that you put a lock on the door. Um, I'm not really sure what to think about that. I don't know what type of person that you think I am, but your belongings are safe with me here. You need to remember that that room is MY space and you are renting a place in MY apartment (followed by more insane paranoid ramblings)."

So I had a choice, I could either go home and say, "Look, Cybil, you rented me the room, so it's MY space until I move out. And, the reason I put a lock on the door is that I keep waiting for you to charge me while I'm sleeping with a butcher knife like Glenn Close in 'Fatal Attraction'." You're unstable, untrustworthy, psychotic, intensely paranoid and I can't trust that you won't try to kill me at any time and especially when I'm sleeping."

Using that method probably would have resulted in my water glasses being laced with ricin.

So on my way home, I decided to go with 'Sprays idea. Besides, one of the OC rules of life is never piss off crazy people...it just gets you put on their "List of People to Kill".

So right when I get in the door, she starts being all passive aggressive/psycho. I respond by wringing my hands and in a wavering voice tell her how difficult it is for me to not feel "secure", that I hate being at work and not knowing that my belongings are locked away and "secure", and that it's been difficult to sleep knowing I didn't have a second layer of protection at night beyond the front door.

She bought it hook line and sinker and said that she totally understood how I feel, since she always locks all of her doors as well

Screw that French chick that believes in the 9/11 conspiracies...I'm telling you, *I* deserved an oscar for that performance. Hopefully it wouldn't be for Best Actress though...

[Charles De Mar]

'47 year old Cybil' is your code word for the gimpballed guy using your anus as a hand puppet with his meatwhistle isnt it?

[OCmike]

Hey, gettin' off is gettin' off.

[Charles De Mar]

Hey, gettin' off is gettin' off.

Aight then, can't argue that point.