Very mundane and highly pointless, but this put a smile on my face, so I’m sharing.
So just now I was standing at an intersection near a bus stop. The bus let off some guy who pointed behind him to a woman a little over a half block away, running toward the bus, waving her hands, signaling for the bus to wait. The guy said to the driver, “You have one more,” to which the bus driver responded by beginning to close his doors as if to drive off. Oh, come on! I threw up my hands and exclaimed, “Dude, come on! Don’t be like that!” The driver then re-opened his doors and let the lady on.
Oh shit, sweet! I heckled someone into being cool. I wonder how much further I can take this. I think I’m going to head to the liquor store with no money, shrug to the cashier and be like, “Be cool, man.” Or maybe I’ll face a speeding ticket (lead foot) and will just look at the cop and go, “Dude…”
So I was just happy because people are such dicks that I didn’t expect my appeal to work. I just thought I was letting him know that I found his behavior to be dickish, but then then he stopped, and it was as if the world got slightly less dickish, as if there were a break in the clouds. But then, come to think of it, I don’t say anything when I see people being jerks. I just shake my head and internally lament what jerks they are. From now on, I’ll see how often I can shame/dude people into awesomeness.
Must be Cali. Being able to wield that word in such a native way has transcendent properties. I use it for all kinds of situations, but shaming/duding people into altering their behavior is THE BEST.
Well I live in flyover country now (Chicago), but I think the dude powers I learned in the fatherland are strong enough that they work even here. When I’m in a long line at the post office, and I see an employee walk by doing nothing, I’m going to look at her, exasperated, and go “Dude!” This should work.
As a fellow Californian living outside the state, I can report that your Dude powers stay with you. And don’t get me started with the Laughing Dude-speak version - Du-hu-hu-hude!! I can get *New Yorkers *to tone it down a notch with that one
If you really need to get Cool on their asses, you need to pull a full Bill and Ted and say: “Be *excellent *to each other dudes!”
