Chorpler, Yllaria, and Martha Medea,
Thank you for explaining that! Mostly I read murder mysteries and some spy stories, so I wouldn’t have gotten that reference. But I was curious because it just seemed so fabulously random. 
Well, we saw a naked man storm past the parking lot last time we went to get ice cream in the Castro…
A few years back I was headed to a friend’s house the week before Christmas. About half way there I noticed a powder blue '57 Chevy parked along side of a barren stretch of road. Somehow, there were Christmas lights strung all along the inside, probably several of those battery-powered sets. And in the car a man dressed in a Santa suit slowly waved at passing cars.
If it had been connected to a business of some sort, it might have seemed less odd, but there was no advertising on or around the car, and no businesses along there anyway…
OK, two surreal life experiences.
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A guy is driving along, and he sees a sign that says “Horse And Parrot For Sale”. And it turns out that the guy is me, and nothing happened, but I can’t shake the feeling that I was actually inside a joke that withered and died without finishing itself.
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I’m up on the roof of my house fixing something, and I notice a car stopping on the road behind my back woods, and a very elderly couple and a young girl of perhaps 6 or 8 get out of the car. They’re carrying flowers. They walk into my woods and look around a little, and pause at a spot where they lay the flowers down and then stand there looking at them a little while. Then they walk back to the car and drive off. What’s back there???
Not if you have your Weighted Companion Cube nearby.
Chorpler stopped before my favorite bit. After his confusion lifts, or maybe despite it not lifting, Arthur is delighted to help Ford run to catch the sofa.
“He was terribly pleased that the day was for once working out so much according to plan. Only twenty minutes ago he had decided he would go mad, and now here he was already chasing a Chesterfield sofa across the fields of prehistoric Earth.”
If I ever do needlepoint, that’s going to be in my sampler.
I live in a small town. We don’t get many surreal moments. We don’t even have a colorful local character. The one surreal moment I remember was caused by me and some friends.
A friend, her three daughters and I were going to a ren fest in a town about 2 1/2 hours away. Since we were on a budget we decided we would stop and get sandwich stuff instead of paying outrageous prices for food at the festival.
We had been to this festival once before and couldn’t remember if there was an easy to find grocery store along the way and didn’t want to risk getting lost. So we thought it best to stop in our town to buy the groceries.
It was 7 a.m. The store had just opened. The employees and the few customers there did a double take when in walked two adult women, a teenager, and two pre-teens all dressed in flowing renaissance gowns. We walked all over that store, getting what we wanted, then checked out. The entire time people stared at us like we were aliens who stopped in for a snack on their intergalactic trip. Not one person asked us about our costumes. We could hear whispers of “Did you see that?” as we left.
Oh! Just remembered the time I dressed as a bunny for work and decided to stop off at a fast food place for dinner on my way home. I went through the drive through but the entire restaurant ended up looking through the window because the person taking my order exclaimed over me. So everyone had to see my painted on nose and whiskers, bunny ears, etc. I actually had to explain when asked that I dressed up for a party at work. No one connected the bunny outfit with the fact Easter was only a couple of days away.
So, wait — we have an Imperial Stormtrooper and Boba Fett in the same thread?
The one problem with New York City is the complete and total lack of the surreal. Currently, the Naked Cowboy is suing M&Ms for using his trademark naked look and attitude on a billboard in Times Square. And it makes perfect rational normal every day sense.
I saw a deadhead sticker on a Cadillac the other day. I’m pretty sure it was on purpose.
I saw an overturned Trabant painted gold.
In olden times a glimpse of stocking…
A friend of mine was on the beach in Norfolk. He found an injured seagull, and being a compassionate guy, decided to help it. So he picked the seagull up in his arms and walked up towards the town to see if there was a vet. He met a passer-by and asked him whether he knew of a vet nearby - and he said that by coincidence he’d just walked past a load of animals down a lane, and there was probably a vet there. So my friend followed the directions and carried the seagull down the lane for about a mile, where he saw a village hall, and he could see people walking in and out with dogs, cats, and so on.
So in he strode - right into the middle of a “bless the animals” religious ceremony. With a horse in the room. A priest sprinkled the seagull with holy water. It died.
I’m making a note here: HUGE SUCCESS.
I’m particularly tickled by the unholy intersection of religion and motor vehicles. I once spotted a nativity scene set up on top of a fuzz-buster (on a Florida highway; the guy was doing about 80); I’ve also spotted a rhinestone-bling Jesus fish on the back of an SUV.
Clearly, wrong denomination.
“There’s a black-winged gull with a broken back
That’s my soul up there…”
When I lived in Sacramento, one day my friend and I were pulling into work.
It was a dreary February. Overcast, kind of chillly. Overall just gloomy. I think it was a Sunday.
As we pulled in, I caught a glimpse of soemthing green over on a scraggly looking tree. No leaves, as it’s February.
So instead of going into work, I talked my friend into walking over with me.
I’m glad I did. We sat there dumbfounded, staring at the tree and it’s occupants.
Had he not been there, I wouldn’t have been able to nudge him in the ribs, and quietly ask “Dude, are those parrots?”.
And he wouldn’t have been able to confirm, indeed, that there were 6 green parrots sitting in this tree. In Sacramento, in February.
Just weird.
california does have wild flocks of escaped parrots. they do add a certain something. more interesting than swallows and pidgeons.
living in a big city you do see quite a few odd things. the highlights:
elmo walking down the parkway.
a large pink gorilla giving out flyers.
a large man in a black fur hat, brown fur jacket, fur man bag, velvet brown pants, untied construction shoes, and a very full beard. it was 40 f out.
a man playing the bagpipes on the street corner, no one wanted to throw money in the bucket while he was playing. the clumps of people would gather at the other 3 corners and when he would finish the song they would scurry across to deposit the money.
2 people swing dancing in the subway station. (people were able to place money in the box during the preformance.)
a man totally dressed in gold with gold on his face and hands, gold hat, riding a gold bike down the street.
viggo mortensen walking up the street toward me.
the annual leif erikson day celebration with the viking ship filled with erics, eriks, ericks, and a bill, sailing on the river.
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Large tattooed man walking along Granville Street in Vancouver, wreathed about with many meters of python.
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Driving with my wife across the border from BC into WA in medieval dress (headed for an SCA event in Bellingham) and being asked by the border guard – in all apparent seriousness – if we had any dragons (!) or swords in the car, and then being waved through… never having to show ID (passports in our case).
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[Not me unfortunately – a long ago story from a friend] Leaving the Auckland University in the wee small hours of the morning (after some drinking) and heading across an inner city park that was covered in deep thick fog. Hearing bagpipes, and then being stunned as a pipe band marched out of the fog and past him, disappearing into the mists. [He caught up with them and found out that one of their members had seen the unusual fog and called the others for a middle of the night practice… and they’d agreed!].
Well, if you can have thousands of the things living in London…
I used to have a colleague who was a keen LARPer and would head off to all the big events. He said one of his favourite things was stopping off at the nearest supermarket for supplies - it would invariably be packed with people dressed as Orcs, Elves, Hobbits, Knights etc, wandering round in their costumes with their rubber swords etc. stocking up on Lucozade, Hobnobs, bags of crisps, paper towels etc.