If You Can't Say Something Nice

What fun is that?

At the deli yesterday, the SJG let loose with the free-wheeling vocab for which I'm famous, and disturbed a few of the better-behaved diners.  As we revisited our Warner Avenue graduation photo from 1969, a sprawling portrait I haven't looked at since, well, 1969, both Ned, the newly-reelected Westlake politico, and Mickey, the visiting orthopedic surgeon from Michigan, were far too classy to speak disparagingly of former classmates.  "Oh, yeah, he lived down the block."  "Oh, yeah, he had a cute sister."  Their commentary was tame and adult-like.  Mature and nostalgic.  The SJG, on the other hand, had no problem operating verbally on a target or two.  Am I sentimental about that period of my life?  Let me think about that.  No.  You'd have to pay me millions to go back to those days of uber-shyness and endless, unrequited boy crushes.  "Look, there's so-and-so.  What an asshole!" I said, pointing to a certain butt-heinous individual in the third row.  Ned and Mickey stared at me, in horror, as if I'd committed a major karmic no-no.  I looked at Ned, still one of my closest friends on the planet.  "What?"  All Ned could do was shake his head. I looked at Mickey.  "What?"  All Mickey could do was fiddle with his utensils.  "Oh, for @#$%'s sake, what's wrong?"  "The way you said asshole," Ned began, visibly shaken, unable to finish his thought.  Mickey took it from there.  "It was chilling."  Ned looked at Mickey and nodded.  The two of them were sharing a moment.  "When you call someone an asshole, you really mean it," Ned continued.  "It's powerful stuff," Mickey agreed.  "But he was an asshole to you, Ned," I reminded him.  "You're right, he really was," Ned said.  "Go on, say it.  Come on, it's liberating.  What was he?"  "He wasn't a good guy," Ned said.  "Seriously?  That's all you got?"  "I'm from Indiana."  "Oh, for @#$%'s sake, let's order."