Sounding Off

I know it's kind of a wimpy tactic to qualify a blog before writing it, but I'm doing it anyway. I'm going to write about someone in my program at school who pulled a stunt today during a screening that I find inexcusable. Should he, this fellow American who sports a tweedy plaid cap of the ilk a kindly grandfather (or bookie) might wear and occasionally smokes a Sherlock Holmsian pipe (for effect I'm assuming and not so much for actual pleasure), at some point in the future, stumble across these ramblings, let him know that I am merely hating the sin, not the sinner. Although, come to think of it, the guy is kind of a douchebag, so forget everything I just said.

We all marched into the Observatory an hour earlier than usual to be visually assaulted by the four hour silent epic, Napoleon (1927). (Which leads me to comment, I might as well admit it, I'm a philistine. The bulk of these "great" films we have watched have seemed more like tests of endurance as opposed to a visually engaging experience. There I said it, deal.) Our professor was futzing around with the equipment and informed us soon enough that the sound had gone out. Now, you might think, well it's a silent film anyway, so does that really matter? Well, yes, smart guy, because there is a soundtrack on these things. So, we would be sitting in stone silence for four hours with only our throat clearing and general nasal snurluffurings as accompaniment.

Right, hit "play".

About twenty minutes in, someone about two rows back begins to make a hearty meal out of a can of Pringles.

Crunch.
Crunch.
Crunch.

Now, I have little enough tolerance for loud foods in theatres when I'm seeing a general release. However, people have paid their money, they want their rank smelling hot dogs or their crinkly bags of crunch-tastic potato chips that they can't seem to chew with their mouth closed, fine, they can have it. But in a film class? A film class that I have paid freaking thousands upon thousands of worthless-when-compared-to-the-euro dollars for the pleasure and privilege of sitting in? You want to eat Pringles? No, I'm terribly sorry, but just no.

Here's how it went down:

ME: (after 5 minutes of thrashing about in my chair) Hey, asshole*, I'm terribly sorry, but could you save the eating until the intermission? It's kind of distracting, thanks.

HIM: tsk tsk

Uh, yeah, he tsk'd me. It took every bit of will power I could muster not to get up, go over to him, grab the Pringles and ram them down his selfish goddamn throat, can and all, while screaming, "You freaking bourgeois Yank! You're everything I wanted to get away from in America! How do the Pringles taste now (cram cram)?"

But it gets better.

So I decide to let it go, his rudeness to my request that is. About 2 minutes go by. HE STARTS EATING THE PRINGLES AGAIN! Now, I'm not generally an angry person. Due to a childhood fraught with maternal discord, I tend to walk away from loaded situations, even if it would serve me to get in there and do a little scrapping. Accrued anger tends to dissipate fairly quickly for me. But today I was, in the parlance of my grandparents, pretty hot under the collar. I flailed about in my chair and waited for someone, anyone, to get my back. They all just sat there, perfectly happy to let this buffoon munch his way through our super-silent film.

Right, he stops. Maybe 45 minutes go by. He gets a little peckish, he hits the Pringles, yet again. This time, I can't sit still.

ME: Asshole*, I'm so terribly sorry but again, I'm asking you, could you please wait until the intermission to eat? I can't begin to tell you how distracting your munching is.

HIM: (removing earbuds) Huh? What's that?

ME: The chips, please, stop.

HIM: Oh, yeah, sure.

He couldn't hear me because he was listening to his little plaything, his little iPod. Somehow, that just infuriated me even more.

At the merciful intermission most everyone went outside for a break. A couple of the guys hung back and joked on me for sounding off, but in a "I-totally-supported-you" kind of way. I then went outside to get some air. The aural offender had walked off to get some coffee. It was then relayed to me what he (the offender) had said outside.

HIM: God, some Irish people need to relax.

RANDOM IRISH GUY STANDING THERE: Uh, Jenna's American.

Awesome. And by the way, I've had previous discussions with him concerning the fact that we both moved from Virginia.

How much does he suck? Don't answer, he sucks a lot.

*name changed to protect identity