Ed and Ava spend Saturday Morning Together

There are a variety of places and events to which I should never be invited or asked to attend.  My sisters intuitively know that camping and hiking are out of the question.  They know that “outdoor activity” means “open air” mall to me.  I assume that my spouse of 23+ years knows these things about me as well, but maybe not.  This morning, I swear to god, he said, “Let’s go to the gun show downtown.”  So I extended my right hand and said, “Hello, my name is Ava.  What’s yours?”

Gun show?  I can’t even behave in a restaurant let alone a show where weapons are the main attraction.  How would I ever control myself?  What would I do with my sarcasm?  You can’t just leave that in the car – now can you?  It’s been my experience that a lot of gun enthusiast don’t have a big sense of humour or come to it, any sense of humour at all.

“Why?” I say.  Picture your spouse with a blank look on his face -yes, that’s the one.  “To look at guns,” he says.  “Why?” I say.  This conversation isn’t going well.

Forty minutes later and a car ride.

The parking lot attendent says, “That will be $8.00 please.”  I say, “$8.00 for what?”  She says, “To park.”  I say, “Here?”  Her red face says her patience has worn thin.  I think, she’d better hope I don’t buy a gun today.  It cost less to park at DisneyLand, the happiest place on earth, and you want to park there.

Ed says, “Are you going to behave yourself or what?”

Are you freakin’ kidding me?  Shouldn’t THAT question have been asked before we left the house?  Before the forty minute car ride?  How about before the $8.00?

“Maybe I should wait in the car,” I mumble.

Here’s what I found at the gun show: jewelry, clothes (not camo, real clothes), cats (the ASPCA was invited), purses that conceal guns (I did look those over, they were purses after all), oh yea, there were guns, guns with pink trim, guns that James Bond uses, guns – I swear – “Light enough for your grandmother.”

I only aggravated about a half a dozen people with my gun questions or comments before Ed decided he’d had enough pitying glances and was ready to leave.

On the way to the car, he said, “Did you have to ask the 300lb ex-navy seal why guns don’t come with interchangeable grips to match your outfits?”

Before I could answer, he said, “Why?  Why would you tell the guy selling the semi-automatic weapons that his three chihuahuas were sissy dogs?  Didn’t you notice they were wearing little spiked collars?”

“And, we weren’t there to adopt a kitten.  What made you think we were?”

Really?  Because I have no idea why we were there.  I have no idea why I was taken to a gun show on a perfectly fine Saturday morning –  but, I’ll bet I won’t be asked to go to a gun show again anytime soon.  Probably never.

On the way out, the parking attendant gave Ed his $8.00 back.  I think that the tears streaming down his face might have had something to do with that.