Like a scene from Clerks 2

A few weeks back I took a sanity date with me, myself, and I.

My wife calls them "Artist Way dates." I call them "ditching my family for a few hours of sophomoric alone time outings."

Regardless, the three of us went to see a late showing of Clerks 2.

I'm a Kevin Smith fan from way back and was jonezing to see what the twisted-dialogue-heavy mind of the creator of Jay and Silent Bob had in store for Dante and Randall's future. The film felt like a reunion of sorts, had a good payoff, and I actually teared up when Randall professes his love ("in a totally non-homosextual way") for Dante when pleading for his lifelong friend to stick around.

K. Smith is a professed net junkie of crack addict proportions and proved so by including a list of ALL of his myspace pals in the closing credits.

There were thousands of names. Thousands.

The only other popcorn guzzling patrons who stayed glued to their stadium seating for the entire end scroll were, I'm assuming, those whose names were included in the myspace credits.

No, I was not one of those zillions of people listed. But I did sit through it all, cuz that's what I do.

Afterwards, I ducked into a nearby Denny's (alas, the only 24-hour well lit eatery within 40 miles of my small town) for a post-movie coffee and fruit compote dessert of some variety.

I chose a booth within earshot of one populated by a micro-herd of young Okie counter-urban turks who by my accounts, were looking for some nourishment before heading home for a late night snack. Their conversation was rude, crude, lewd, and completely adolescent male in tonality and texture.

I was all ears.

They talked of girls and cars and girls and trucks and classes and homework and girls and money.

Finally the conversation took an interesting turn when the topic of where a particular individual was getting all the money he was spending. My back was to them, so I couldn't tell who was saying what, but here's the gist of what I heard...I have a settlement.
Oh yeah, me too.
I was in an accident when I was about 5.
You know Brandon had a farm accident when he was about 10 and he's gone through most of it now.
What'd he do, blow it on a bunch of shit?
Yeah, he bought a new truck, then wrecked it, got a new house for his Mom, got his sister a Trans-Am, and a bunch of furniture for his place.
What's your settlement for?
Tractor wreck.
Structured or you get it all in one big wad?
Structured. Got another 4-years left on it.
That's why he always pays.
Bunch of moochers.The average age of these young kids was about 19, give or take a few years. I felt like handing my bill over the booth and offering to let one of the settlement kids cover it.