Fatale Abstraction

OK, I'm just going to tell you right off the bat that this is going to be in poor taste. The place I'm going with this ain't pretty, so no whining - I won't allow it.

A post in which our heroine ponders a prickly etiquette question...

I went to the cinema to see 300 last week. Ticket in hand I walked up to the teenager taking the tickets. I held out the ticket, but I stopped short. He was wearing a polo shirt but from his left sleeve extended no arm. Now, the ticket takers generally tear off the stub, and I was surprised-- didn't mean to be rude. Instead of thrusting the ticket all the way at him, I stalled by asking him where the nearest bathroom was and then which side of the theater housed my movie selection. As I was asking those important questions, I was wondering "do I tear the stub for him? What???"

My uttered questions answered, it was time to see what would happen next. I held the ticket closer to him, and he grasped it (at this point I'm thinking Oh, I'll hold on tightly and let him rip it off) and then he grasped beyond the perforations and took the whole ticket. He deftly stuck the ticket into his armpit, where I suppose a partial arm of some sort was lying in wait. He zipped the ticket in two, handed me my stub back, and then took his end of the paper from his armpit and dropped it in the box.

I wondered if part of his schtick was freaking out ignorant people like myself. It's weird how even a generally unflappable person can be brought up short by something unexpected. Anyway, I wouldn't have offended him for the world, and I hate when I feel like I've acted like an uncool asshole, because it's so common, innit, what with jerks around ever corner? I mean, should it have to be his job to educate every moron he ever comes in contact with? How tiring that must be.

**************
This is not really the same thing, and I know I've mentioned it before, but in Romeo Is Bleeding (a film noir which I loved, and critics soundly panned), Lena Olin is the über-bad-girl and she tangles repeatedly with dirty-dealing cop Gary Oldman. They obviously have some wicked chemistry going on, but she's a lunatic and he could fill a magazine stand with his issues, and it really doesn't seem to work out for them, early on. On, and they are on opposite sides. Then he shoots her in the arm. Next time we see her, she's got a gimboid-looking prosthetic arm.

In one of my hands-down favorite scenes in all of filmdom, Gary awakens on his back, his wrists handcuffed to an old cast-iron bed, and they obviously are about to finally do the deed. She straddles him and says "With the arm, or without?" Gary had already won my heart forever for lots of other roles, but he cemented the deal when he says "Without." The next thing you see is the fake arm flying through the air. Great stuff.

Here's a clip from that film which is of rather poor quality, but still worth a peek. Gary Oldman has just had some toes chopped off by the local big-time crime boss, so he's in a somewhat compromised state. Lena is about to get her shot in the arm, and still she's a force to be reckoned with. I love the way she gets out of the car, and the shoe-toss at the very end is priceless. I told you that bitch crazy!

*warning - not for the fragile. Then again, neither is my blog*