Well what do ya know, you guys showed up again this morning! I like it when that happens. I feel like it build some sort of camaraderie that...hey, do you think "comrad" and "camaraderie" are related? If so, does that make us Communists? Wow, maybe I should rethink this whole thing.
In any case, a long time ago in UOPTA-speak (so, like, a month or two ago), I wrote about when my lovely wife and I went to Amsterdam. I failed to mention one thing of interest that happened. We were sitting in a restaurant, minding our own business, when I suddenly heard my name. I looked up, and it was our good friend Melissa, who was Amber's roommate at the time. We knew she'd be somewhere in Europe while we were there, but we weren't sure when her holiday of Holland days would be. The thing is, we weren't surprised to see her. We see people almost no matter where we go, so this was no exception.
A couple of years before that, we took a trip to France and Spain as a graduation gift to ourselves. While in the Paris subway system, I allowed someone to exit before me. "Hey," I said, "I know you." Sure enough, I did. It was a young lady with whom I had just shared an English seminar one week prior. The next day, we were on a train and someone caught Amber's eye. It was an old high school acquaintance, and they chatted for a while. When we went to the Louvre for all of the Louvrely things it houses, I saw a student who I had recently advised at UCSB walking around with her parents. Each time, we got less and less surprised.
A few days later, we had made it to Spain and seen a few of the wonderful cities there. We were almost done with our trip when I saw yet another person we knew. Walking out of El Museo del Prado, my friend Anna was there taking a picture. We chatted for a few, and I said that at this point I was shocked that I hadn't see our former boss Carolyn, who was somewhere in Spain with her family. "Oh, I saw them yesterday," she said. "They're having a great time." Naturally.
For years and years, my parents had one person who they would always run into: my pediatrician named Dr. Keer. Those kinds of things have a natural progression. The first couple of run-ins have the whole "Hey, funny meeting you here" vibe to it all. The next few have more of the "This is getting a little absurd; you're sure you're not stalking me, right?" feel. After that, it's generally just a lot of palms-up head-shaking that goes on, indicating the strange feeling of accepted disbelief. This is different than a "willing suspension of disbelief," in which I let it slide when the hot girl falls for the unpopular guy because his soul is beautiful and that's what really matters.
Sorry to get off on a tangent, but I can immediately think of a few times in tv or movie history when I just couldn't suspend my disbelief enough. First, there is no way in hell I can accept Denise Richards as a rocket scientist. I know it was a James Bond movie, and I'm practically agreeing to believe everything when I sit down for one of those, but that's too much. The same thing goes with Jeff Goldblum in "Independence Day" saving our entire civilization by uploading a computer virus to the aliens' ship. Ta-dah! There are more, and I implore you to email
ptklein@gmail.com with the ones you think of so I can turn all of them into a post of their own. Great topic, but I need your help. Back to my story!
While in Spain, I thought I saw Dr. Keer out the corner of my eye and was about to lose my mind. It wasn't him though, and I told my lovely-then-girlfriend about the guy my parents always saw. She asked who it was, and when I told her, she said, "I know Dr. Keer!" I learned that day that we had yet another thing in common: our pediatricians shared an office. The Keer Connection struck again.
My parents actually have a new Dr. Keer now. Mark the Alarm Guy is everywhere they are now. When it's a sold out Dodger Stadium, it's not super weird since it is Los Angeles after all. When it's in Rome, walking up a little side street among thousands of people leaving a fireworks display, that's a different story. And that story is a little frightening if you ask me. How many times does it take for something to transition from "weird coincidence" to "spooky coincidence?" Five times? Can we vote on this?
Ok, gentle readers, I'm off. Please remember to email ptklein@gmail.com with those things in t.v. and movies that you just can't buy as possible. Thank you all in advance, and I'll see you tomorrow for a very special Wednesday post.
