Was because some young punk wanted to get into a testosterone charged pissing contest (please forgive my vulgarity).

Let me paint the tapestry for you.

I was twenty and working for a software retail store in the local mall, and I had made friends with a young lady who was working at Wickes 'N' Sticks. She was dating a very cool guy who worked at one of the local television stations.

***Sidetrack alert***
A bunch of my friends and I were up late generally hanging out and probably rolling up new characters, working on costumes and all kinds of gamer geek stuff like that one night and were watching "Flesh and Blood" with a young Rutger Hauer being shown on one of our local TV stations. During the commercial breaks there would be short segments of a couple guys out in a field attacking each other with swords and generally acting very medieval and geeky. We positively ate up the little vignettes and enjoyed seeing where the (admittedly small) plot was going in and around enjoying the primary movie.

The last vignette either had a message or a phone number with a recording that invited everyone who enjoyed watching the series of vignettes to meet the guys down at the local IHOP at some ridiculously late hour of the morning (which was only about 30 min to an hour from the point where we received the message anyways *grin*)

So we loaded up vehicles and headed out in mass geek force to take over a table at the IHOP and waited for the stars to arrive. The guys who worked at the TV station showed up a bit later than they said they would, but for some reason none of us had the courage to go up and talk to these guys at that time. We finished eating and went back to whatever it was that we had going on that evening.

The reason for this sidetrack is I finally met one of these guys several months later when I became friends with his girlfriend and told him about the time that a whole gang of us geek boys and girls had showed up but didn't have the courage to go over to their table. He told me how he and his partners had been disappointed that night because no one had shown up.

*sigh* I wonder if the Wizard can give me some more courage *grin*

***end of sidetrack***

Anyways, for various reasons, one of which I was a lonely male geekboy, I ended up being this young lady's ride to and from work depending on when our schedules coincided properly.

This particular evening after I finish up my store closing procedures, walked the deposit to the bank, etc. and show up at my friend's store to walk her to my vehicle or help finish her store cleanup if it wasn't done yet, I find out she has made a new friend from the shoe store across the the way from hers and she has invited him to go out to eat with us.

*shrug* not really an issue for me. He comes across kind of like a little yip dog though, but I give him some slack since he's younger than me and probably think he needs to talk big... I've dealt with worse... after all I was working geek retail, who was I to judge.

We go to Hooter's (really it was for the food, not the scenery! well the scenery helps, but if it wasn't the food then I probably wouldn't be taking a young lady there... shame on you!) and I of course order my usual crab legs and start eating them the way I had been taught without using the crab plier thingys.

More self glorifying conversation ensues as little punk boy tries really hard to make himself look good for my friend (and I'm fairly certain that he's not her type... Remember, I know her boyfriend).

All of a sudden punk boy decides to order a plate of raw oysters and offers to share them with me and I shrug and say sure.

Now if you don't know what raw oysters look like, basically take a look at your kleenex next time you blow your nose. On top of that I am an avid reader with a very vivid imagination and I have read descriptions of what it is like to try and eat these things in something or other that I have read before. This was basically a situation that I could have happily gone the rest of my life without ever being in.

But... I was really getting tired of punk boy and his constant talking up of himself. I was getting really tired of his oh so subtle one upmanship that he was trying to do to me and I'm not even competition for this lady's affection. Not only do I respect and admire her boyfriend, he's a bit bigger than me and I was still the 130 pound stick figure with limited amounts of courage when it comes to physical confrontations.

So I had no real stake in this pissing contest... I wasn't after the girl... I had no real interest in being respected by this little putz...

I externalized none of this beyond maybe a small amount of tension in my shoulders. Outwardly I was still in "just hanging out" mode.

The oysters arrive and we both grab our first offering and nodded to the young lady and then to each other.

Now I had decided that in order to make it through this ordeal I was going to just knock back the oyster as quickly as possible down my throat and not take the time to savor the taste, trying to avoid as much of my tongue as possible. I figured that it was only fair since Putzboy came across as having experience with eating oysters and I was fairly certain in the back of my mind that the whole thing was a macho contest and that the young twit was trying to show me up.

So I ate the first one with no physical reaction or verbal exclamation of any kind and just reached for the next one without even bothering to look over at Putzboy.

Putzboy barely finished his second one. Without gloating or commenting of any kind, I finished his remaining oysters also.

The rest of the evening was much more pleasant.