Then I get to say
My favorite pick-up line:
“We have so much in common!”
"You like beer?! I like beer! We have so much in common, Marshall!"
This line is hilarious, because you’ve just met this person.
You have no idea if you and this person have anything in common, and you both know this – it’s fake flattery.
Which makes it super effective. :)
The Origin Story
My line, “We have so much in common!”
Was given to me by the comedy gods the summer after my freshman year of college.
I was working as a camp counselor/lake lifeguard/boating instructor at a coed, two month long, summer camp in the Pocono Mountains.
Some poor misguided soul had put me in charge of 12, 14-year-old girls, about to enter high school, whose only interest was boys.
My only interest was is boys!
(my british co counselors :-) )
“We have so much in common!”
All of the counselors were in the middle of the healthiest summer of our lives.
When you’re up at 6 am every morning and never alone until you go to bed at 10 pm, you don’t have idle hands for the devil to play with.
One of the very few times in my life that this has been my situation.
Usually, my hands are free for just about anything…
I was spending my days hiking through the woods to get to the lake. Then I’d paddle around in a rescue kayak, yelling at kids not to rock the boat.
No kid was allowed out on the lake without a life preserver AND a floating device, so a camper would have to go out of their way to drown. This made being a lake lifeguard a lot like meditation.
I’d lead kayaking excursions and, in my free time, I’d try to teach myself how to sail.
It was a nice summer - lots of stars that summer.
It was a nice summer - lots of stars that summer.
I’d made the long distance relationship mistake that summer. :-( Sad face.
“Two months isn’t bad,” I’d thought.
In the normal world, this is very kind of true.
In camp world, in two months, you’ve spent so much time with the same group of people, and been awake for so long that it might as well have been half a year or more of interacting in the normal world.
Coupled with the fact that you’re Never Alone, so there’s never any You Time… if you’re picking up what I’m putting down. ;-)
(I'm talking about masturbation.)
After a month, the gap between the counselors who were getting laid and those of us who were not had grown obvious.
Those getting laid were almost unbearably happy all of the time.
Those of us in solitary confinement were really, fucking irritable.
A couple nights a week, I would get a night out from 10 pm to 12:30 am back at the campsite, and in your cabin by 1 am.
Finally it was my night out!
My boyfriend was driving out to see me and would be there the next day! So I was a little bit Too Excited.
A group of us went to the lake for some drinks.
And.
Oh damn. Again?
I drank a little too much.
Didn’t drive… as far as my memory serves me.
Made it to camp.
Checked in without appearing too drunk.
(This skill later became essential in Sydney Australia, where they will refuse to sell you alcohol for appearing too drunk.)
Stop smiling. Don’t talk more than necessary. Get in. Get out.
I’m a master of deception.
Leah Davis: tiptoeing to the bed, jumping over clothes, sliding under the blankets for the win!
Usually, it’s no problem sneaking in to the little cabin bunk beds to sleep. The girls have lights off at 10 pm.
But, Ah Me!
This night the wretched monsters were awake!
And wanted to hang out with me!
Such super bad influences those girls were on my behavior.
I believe…
What ensued…
Was a mini dance party.
And at one point, a camper, allegedly, asked me what my name was, and I proudly told her that,
“My name is Leah!” Because that is the truth, and I was raised to tell the truth, you see.
I then, being polite I thought, asked her what her name was.
“My name is Leah too!” she lied to me. Some people have no manners.
“That’s great!” I was so happy to meet another Leah, even though I knew her name was Jessica.
“We have so much in common!”
Those Adorable Girls are Evil Monsters!
It was a lesson in futility trying to control them. They knew I had no real power over them.
An Unhappy Home
My co-counselor, Jamie, was the other person in charge of these 12 horny, little brats
My co-counselor, Jamie, was the other person in charge of these 12 horny, little brats
Perpetually irritated, especially with me, Jamie was not pleased about the dance party.
Exactly like the angry priest in the movie Footloose.
Jamie hated happiness and dancing.
Jamie hated happiness and dancing.
OK GO understands me: “You can’t stop these kids from dancing!”
In our summer co-counselor/life partner relationship:
Jamie was the mom that stayed home with the kids all day and took them to activities.
I was the father figure, leaving for the lake during the day. Coming back at night and just wanting to have the kids out of my hair.
Just like on the TV show Modern Family, mom Jamie was the disciplinarian and I was the useless father figure who didn’t see what the big deal was all of the time.
I was camping out in the middle of the beautiful Pocono Mountains all summer, my girls were practically old enough to drive cars, and I was getting paid for it!
Calm down, Jamie! Life is good!
Jamie assured me that I only felt this way because I got a break from the kids, while she had to slave away at home.
Our arranged marriage fell apart until finally, Jamie and I, in front of the children, had a screaming fight where I broke down crying and ran from the room.
Jamie chased after me. By this time, I’d stripped naked and jumped in the shower.
A misguided attempt to hide the fact I’d started crying.
Jamie ended up apologizing to me through a shower curtain.
Always a strong man, I said, “I’ll be fine. I just don’t want to talk about it right now - or ever. Just please, leave me alone until I’ve regained my composure.”
The Telephone Game
Between Jamie already hating me and wanting me fired and my girls having just had the most fun night ever,
By lunch time, I had many male counselors asking me if it was true I’d come home wasted, woke all my girls up, and insisted they strip so we could have an underwear dance party…
Rumors are so vicious!
And at summer camps where many of the counselors are busy not getting laid, the prospect of an underwear dance party with drunk me and jailbait campers might as well have been Girls Gone Wild filming in the woods.
Well, it wasn’t true!
The stripping part, at least, was patently untrue.
I'm positive my girls would have told me about a stripping dance party. And I didn’t hear anything about any of that from anyone who was there on the night in question.
You’re Fired!
There are a number of reasons why this could have been…
but I’m pretty sure it was the whole dance party incident; I wasn’t invited back to be a counselor the next summer.
But I also wasn’t really fired!
And that’s, historically, tied for the best work I’ve done at any job!
Even with "the machine" trying to keep me down, while I raged against it
It was a great summer. :-)
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