Blood Pressure Cuffs and Truck Nuts

I've been reading a lot about language and it's cousin, communication, which could be argued to be our species' most powerful adaptation/creation/gift from God/write your personal favorite here (choose your own adventure/worldview). I've also been using all two of my eyes to see things that make me second guess humanity's claim to the number one spot on the Earth's Billboard Chart in the category of "most intelligent species." Combined, these two things probably amount to little more than fodder for slightly pretentious party banter for all those fancy soirees that I'm so often invited to (which is zero, probably because I had to google how to spell "swaray"). But I'm going to take that annoying party banter banging around in my head and turn it into an annoying blog post (you're so excited)! And in case you are wondering, I am of the opinion that it is grammatically legal to start a sentence with the word "but." And, "and." Also, by default, clearly I think you can use them to end a sentence as well. With all that in mind, this story covers both ends of the spectrum of human potential; the absolute pinnacle of humanity's ability to transfer information across distance and time, and humanity's ability to communicate mountains of stupidity in a mere nanosecond. If this post had a title (it does) it'd be called Blood Pressure Cuffs and Truck Nuts.

To start, I should inform you (that's you! reader number one and two) that for a short time I worked at Walmart a large retail store known for it's colorful customers, outstanding customer service/short wait times, and a seemingly infinite benevolence towards its workforce. The "why and how" of my two week stint at this company is really boring, so if you are the type of reader that needs "explanations" or "back-story" here's a quick children's book version of events; An evil wizard wanted to rule the land, and he killed the nice and pretty employment princess, and his first act as the new ruler of our lands was to force me to work at NotWalmart for two weeks. Fin. Satisfied? Neither am I, but let's move on anyway. In my two weeks at NotWalmart, I experienced a few things, which are these; 1) There are far fewer "colorful customers" at the large retailer than the internet would have you believe, but when they show up it's like watching a clown SUV unload, 2) the people who work there are, by and large, incredibly nice people who are overworked (not true!), underpaid (liar!), and generally crapped on by the corporation at large (gasp! fiend!), and 3) if you make your store "gender neutral" the people at NotWalmart will totally make fun of you endlessly, despite their political leanings. While working there, I was gifted with an experience that I have not had in many years, and this time, it occurred in the reverse.

I should inform you of one other thing before pressing forward; I have lived in South Korea. Twice. I know that might not be the kind of revelation that merits two whole sentences, but it was a big deal to me (and eventually, my wife). (And no, I am not implying my wife is Korean. She's as white as Donald Trumps dreams, and if you are wondering, so am I). The adventures I (we) had while south of the 38th parallel are probably varied and crazy enough to elicit their own blog (dear god no please not another one nopleasenodon'tdoit!), and perhaps in the future I'll share some of those stories here. For now, however, let it be enough to tell you that I spent a lot of time gesticulating like a break dancer forced to do the robot for eternity. Like any sane person you probably assumed I would only go to a country if I spoke that language at some fundamental level, which would lead you to thinking "whoa! this guy speaks Korean and he's not Korean?!?" But I do not speak Korean. In a pinch, should I find myself in the R.O.K. again, I can order a beer, some water, and I possess the capability to hand a Korean taxi driver an address already printed out on some paper to avoid having to try to find a way to tell him I am in his country and have a 1.5 year-old's fluency in his language. Also, I can point to a menu even when it doesn't have pictures (please, hold your applause), which is how I got a popular Korean delicacy delivered to my table one evening. It was cooked silk worm larvae, by the way. Delicious (just kidding, it's probably more disgusting than it sounds, but to each Korean their own). The important thing to keep in mind, though, is that I have been the guy in the foreign land trying to get someone to show me where something is without being able to tell them what I'm looking for verbally. Life, as I've experienced it thus far, really likes its circles, like some crazed 5 year old with glazed eyes just tracing endless circles onto a sheet in an effort to ensure that no circles go un-drawn. So approximately one week ago I was the guy who was trying desperately to understand someone who clearly did not speak English.

I wish I could say that this was not your typical "he-didn't-speak-my-language-and-it-was-hilarious-to-watch-him-try" story, but alas, I lay no claims to originality. As I was busy being grossly overpaid by NotWalmart (sarcasm, for those keeping score) I was approached by an Asian gentleman that appeared to be in his mid to late 50's. He did not say one word, he just shoved his cell phone in front of those two eyes I was telling you about and expected me to decipher the characters before them. Now, if he had been using some kind of translator, this move would have made a sh*t ton of sense. Instead, what he appeared to be showing me was a dictionary entry for some complicated idea (let's say...love) that was written in Chinese and then translated into Korean, placed in a bottle and sent across the ocean only to be discovered by some California born Vietnamese man who subsequently translated the message one final time so that this man could show me what he wanted and have it be as clear as dawn breaking over a valley on a crisp summer morning. Wow, that was beautiful, I think I just wrote the next Nicholas Sparks novel...What I'm getting at is that I do not read whatever Asian language he was showing me, and this must have registered on my face because the man looked me in my two eyes and said the only English phrase that he would speak for the rest of our time together. He pointed to his chest and said, "I, no English." And then he smiled the kind of smile that one uses when you desperately need something and have no way of conveying it. With those three words and his body language he communicated mountains of information (Help! Jesus how do you not know what I just showed you on my phone?!? Is there really no one here that speaks Mandarin/Korean/Klingon?!? I just need a F@$&in'                 ). What it did not say, however, was what he needed.

He moved on to attempting something I used to do in Korea; Charades. I'm pretty sure he was doing his Charades in Chinese though, cause I was a lost little lost puppy for a good 5 minutes. In that 5 minutes he made the same few moves and produced the same few sounds repeatedly while he waited for me to simply guess what he was looking for. He placed his right hand on the upper part of his left arm, then moved it in a circle to the bottom. He then made a "hmmmm, shssshhhs" sound. He followed all of this up by placing his hand in front of him in a fist and saying "gump gump, gump gump," while he pulsed his fist. I stared at this little play for some time before I realized what he was looking for; a blood pressure cuff. And that's not really the point of this little adventure. Once I got him to where we kept our blood pressure cuffs (NotWalmart sells F$@#ING everything) he thanked me profusely and would not stop shaking my hand, but I only had one thought. Thank all the Gods that I never had to track down a blood pressure cuff on my own while I was in South Korea, because I don't remember seeing it on any of the menus I pointed to. This guy gets a bunch of my respect, because he got me to see the picture in his head while only speaking 3 words of my language (which only conveyed that he spoke no more of my language than that) and having a willingness to wait for the stupid white kid to figure out what his flawlessly executed pantomimes were signalling.

You know who doesn't get any of my respect though? People with "truck nuts." If that seems like it came out of nowhere, clearly you did not read the title to this post. Are we all caught up? Great, let's press. Truck nuts, if you are unaware, are nuts for your truck. Yes, as in testicles. Boys (and possibly some girls) put fake rubber testicles on their trucks in an effort to signal that they are at the bottom of the gene pool and should not under any circumstance be expected to make good life choices (I'm assuming, but I think this is a pretty safe assumption). This, in reality, is a true gift, because I've always wanted a readily visible signal to let me know who to avoid. It may seem that this whole "truck nuts" thing has little to do with our Asian hero from not even one paragraph before, but I assure you they have much in common (and no, it's not testicles...well technically yes they share that in common, but not the point). Why are we (still) talking about truck nuts? Well, our hero, who communicated that he needed a blood pressure cuff, probably to keep himself alive, was communicating without words just like our Truck Nuts "friends." What's more, and what really brings us full circle (life loves those circles) is that within less than a weeks time I witnessed a moment of communication with almost no words that brought back some of my fondest memories of being a traveler in a distant, but friendly land, and this amazing ability to communicate without words (or even with them) is not limited to people who don't put rubber testicles on their metal penises (seriously, it's not even a question that what they are implying is that their truck is their penis, and if you think otherwise you should probably put some Truck Nuts on your vehicle), but sometimes I wish it was. I don't really believe in censorship, and I'm sure that as soon as I hit "post" some comedy genius will vindicate the use of Truck Nuts in some witty film that appeals across generations and cultures, but in the time between finishing this and hitting "post" I'm going to go ahead and say people who use Truck Nuts scare me.

Yes, this is just a silly blog where I post my less refined thoughts, and one of these thoughts is not as complex as I've probably made it appear here; your Truck Nuts are stupid, but that being said they represent in some small form humanity's ability to communicate across time and space. Which has got to be humanity's pinnacle achievement. And there is probably something profound in this thought with regards to the internet and it's vast, ever expanding data piles (oh my God, there are data piles everywhere. What did you do?). I don't have the get-up and go to make something so poignant, however, so you're just going to have to deal with posts about Truck Nuts.