They’re remodeling the lobby at my office, and the elevator intercom, which used to be used if someone got stuck in an elevator and pressed the emergency button, is now visible on top of the guard’s workstation. It’s all dark brown with rows of buttons, and my first thought was that it looked like WWII radar equipment. Then I said to myself that what it really looked like was a…
1920’s Style Death Ray.
So I said exactly that, just offhand like, to someone in the elevator. No glimmer of recognition, which isn’t surprising. After all, there are only forty- or fifty-thousand of us, and there are six billion people on the planet. So the statistical chance of running into another Doper is, well, very small indeed. But still one can hope. Has anyone else managed to identify a Doper in just that manner?
A Doper is graciously allowing me to live with him right now because I’m down on my luck but I would risk getting thrown out and being homeless by throwing various heavy objects at his head if he used a 1920’s Death Ray or Hi, Opal joke offline.
I went to a wedding last fall and was seated at one of two tables of friends of the bride/friends of the groom. Damn, what a nerdy bunch we were, for the most part! I was very tempted to see if I was the only Doper there, or not – I can’t believe I was.
We should come up with a decent code question, similar to AA’s “are you a friend of Bill’s?” How about “are you a friend of Cecil’s?”
Here are two really good inside doper joke encounters. For those who don’t know me I’m a teacher at a small lib arts college in new england.
Most recent and still as of yet uncorroborated: I was at John Maher’s concert last year at the Orphium Theater outside Boston when I could swear to the universe he said just after a great set…while talking to the croud: Hi Opal! :eek: My eyes got large and I looked at my wife and said, did he just say Hi Opal? She looked at me funny and turned her gaze back towards JM.
Second and more frightening encounter with a fellow doper on accident was when I brought my trusty SDMB coffee mug to work for a few weeks. I’d routinely put it on my lecturn or desk depending on where I was…Then I had a student want to enter my class late (it was near the end of add-drop period) so I allowed it. Then The second day he came in, he had a SDMB T-Shirt on.:eek: Not wanting to be detected I quickly hid my mug to avoid the coup de gras of feared questions from students…“Hey Mister P…your a doper too!!” :eek:
Mr.P->Uh…no. A friend gave me this Mug…whats a doper?
Student->How would you know what a doper is, I never said anything about your mug…???
Mr.P->
It’s just not a conversation I want to have with a student. I like being anonymous…and may present a small conflict of interest.
I was at a mall once and heard someone make a reference to something that had been a recent topic on the boards ( can’t remember what, but it wasn’t Death Rays or Pie, something smaller. Hot funny topic.) and I instantly thought I had come across another Doper in the Wild.
I asked, " Are you a friend of Cecil Adams? You look familiar."
It drew a blank, so I was able to gracefully exit and go about my merry way.
I dunno. I see ‘OBX’ stickers all the time, that supposedly refer to the Outer Banks, a popular motocross destination, or some such… and I swear to you, I believe half the people who have the sticker have no idea what it stands for, they just put it on their cars because they say a bunch of others doing it.
