Making Friends Left & Right 'Round Here

So maybe we should reconsider the whole "moving" thing...

So I get into the elevator clutching my The Great Cruising Cookbook written by John C. Payne, the same fellow who wrote such greats as Understanding Boat Wiring, Batteries, and other things NOT cooking, but definitely boat related. Whatever, it was a free book and saved my unskilled cruising butt many times.

In the elevator clutching his case of light beer and groceries is the crusty smoker/older/non-student neighbor I've only ever smelled before--you know he has been in the elevator because you can smell the lingering smoke.

"OH!" says he, "THE GREAT CRUISING COOKBOOK, EH?!?" Yes, he does speak in all caps in that old-man-yelling-but-not-yelling voice.

"Yes."

"'DON'T KNOW WHY YOU NEED A COOKBOOK, I WENT CRUISIN' AND ALL I USED IS CANS!"

This would be where Andy says I got into a pissing contest:

"Oh. I went cruising and I couldn't really afford much in the way of cans, we bought and cooked what the locals ate."

"REALLY? WHERE?"

"I sailed from the San Francisco Delta area area down to Zihuatanejo."

"WELL, I WENT FROM HERE DOWN TO BAJA, AND FROM HAWAII OVER TO HERE."

"REALLY! I sailed from Mexico over to the Big Island in that same trip."

"WELL, I DID IT THE HARD WAY!"

And that's when we got to his floor and he stomped out.

"Have a good evening!" I said to his retreating back...no answer from him.

We've lived here almost a year and seriously that's the first time I've actually conversed with a neighbor...well, if you can call it that, and what do I do? Make him not like me. Good one, Ace. It really reminded me of that Monty Python bit, "Well, we lived IN the lake..."

"LUXURY!"