I had a Splenda moment!

Ever had one of those moments where you just want to kick yourself for saying the stupidest things at the wrongest times?

Well here's one.

My roommate Sam and I were at the library one night, studying away. I was toiling away at my grammar homework and Sam decides that it's coffee time. We go downstairs to Java City and I order a small Hazelnut Latte while Sam gets an large Iced Coffee. While waiting for our coffee the barista yells "aoehf iehazelnutag osfh"

Well, that's what it sounded like to me anyway. It was a large but I picked it up anyway. Two seconds later the barista yells "Small hazelnut latte!" I looked at my untouched cup o' joe in my hands and sheepishly put it down. The girl behind me picks it up as I grab my coffee. I mutter an apology..

Sam gets her large iced coffee and tastes it.. Sam is not a frequent coffee drinker; therefore, preferring a sweeter taste for her coffee.. As she pours sugar into her drink, she tells me that

"The whole point of me ordering an iced coffee was so I didn't have to consume so many calories."

"Well if you're so worried about the calories, you could always use Splenda"

"Bleargh!" we both say at the same time.

2 seconds later I notice that the girl whose coffee I had grabbed was putting Splenda into HER coffee, packet after packet.

Shit.

I turned around and tried my best to keep from laughing but to no avail. Sam and I were doubled up, laughing without making any noise so as not to make fools out of ourselves anymore. Needless to say, it wasn't successful

As we were walking back to the "quiet" floor, Sam says to me

"geez Elena, first you take her coffee then you insult her"

Next time I pledge to be more mindful of my surroundings.

Foot in mouth moment... Splenda moment.

NanaBanana

PS: To the girl whose coffee I grabbed, I am sorry! I meant no harm!

Creative Writing

So I had to write a piece for Creative Writing about my neighbourhood. this particular assignment was about scene building and pulling from memory. I got a 98% on this.

so here goes :

Operation Junk Food

The rumbling engine of my mother’s Toyota Unser faded away as she drove off. The plan was in motion. I bellowed to my sister Hillary, partner in crime and faithful follower. Hearing my yells, she tottered down the stairs, having just woken up from her nap. It was time to execute the mission. It had been a while since our last fix, and now with my mother out, it was time to satisfy that itch.

We waited ten minutes just to make sure my mother did not forget anything and had to return home. There was no room for error. We spent those ten minutes counting our money, making sure we had enough to get exactly what we wanted. Precisely ten minutes later, we both consented that Mom was well on her way to wherever she needed to be. Making sure our money was safely tucked away in our pockets, I locked the front door and we started our walk. Not even two minutes outside, we were both already drenched in sweat. We walked past Uncle Sulaiman’s masterpiece, a house lavished in intricate wood carvings and design. It seemed like there was always someone filming a movie there every other day. His stoic gardener was out hosing the foliage to keep them from drying up. We said hi as he nodded his silent greeting to us.

At the end of our street, we took a left and then a right into an alleyway. My mother had always warned us about that alley. One of my older sister’s friends had been mugged there before, in broad daylight too. I grabbed Hillary’s hand and we hurried through that narrow space. She understood. It gave her the creeps too. Once out of the alley, I breathed a sigh of relief. We then crossed the cement bridge above the monsoon drain, smelling the foul, pungent stench of water emanating from below. I couldn’t be distracted by the low levels of water that gushed beneath us; we were so close to our destination— the sundry shop.

The coolness of the sundry shop abated the devilish heat as soon as we walked in. It was filled with all sorts of miscellaneous items, from junk food to bananas and coconuts, basically everything. Hillary and I knew exactly what we wanted. We went straight to the counter, lined with countless jars of our favourite sweets. We scooped heaps out of the jar and counted out ten of each kind. They were so cheap too! I could get twenty pieces of my favourite candies for only a dollar. After we stocked up on our favourite goodies, we trekked over to the Shell station, right around the corner from where we were. This made me a little nervous as it was where my mother usually got gas. A run-in with her here would not be good. We went into the busy gas station and bought goodies the sundry shop didn’t have. Chips, ice-cream, soft drinks and more candy were added to our stash. As we paid, the dark-skinned Pakistani-looking cashier attempted to flirt with us. “What a creep,” I thought, “we’re like, twenty years younger than you.”

But all was forgotten when we walked the seven minutes back home, devouring our ice-creams while quenching our thirsts with soft drinks. Junk food was scarce in our house, unless we went shopping with Dad. Even then it was hard to come by. As a result, on the occasion that my mother had some errands to run, Hillary and I would pay a covert visit to the sundry shop and Shell for our decadent treats.

We retraced our steps, walking quickly. Left out the alleyway, a right onto our street, walked past the architectural masterpiece and straight into the coolness of our home. As we lapped up the last of our ice-creams, I tucked away the rest of our haul. Some went behind my study table; the others went behind the clothes in my closet. As for the wrappers, I collected them. You see, there was no way we could throw them in our garbage without getting caught. As such, I took the wrappers and threw them away in our neighbour’s trash. It was absolutely essential that we covered all grounds. Getting caught meant big trouble. I couldn’t tell you exactly what punishment we would have received as we had never been caught.

As I shut the garbage bin, I saw my mother’s red Unser pulling into our street. She pulled into our driveway and asked me what the heck I was doing in the heat. I told her nonchalantly that I was just chasing a stray cat out of our yard. She bought it. As I lugged the grocery bags into the house, I rationed out the junk food in my head. Who knows when the next time we would get to carry out Operation Junk Food again?