Just Because

On January 20th, around lunch time, I was stopped at a traffic light with my window down. A Toyota Prius, one of those non-descript gray/green/taupe ones, pulled up beside me. The lady in the passenger seat rolled down her window and we had the following conversation:


lady: "Are you listening to the inauguration?"
me: "Yes."
lady: "Can you tell me what radio station you're listening to?"
me: "I'm listening on WBAP 820 AM."
lady: "Ugh. Isn't that Limbaugh!"
me: "Yes it is. Doesn't NPR come pre-programmed on the Prius?"

She rolled her window up and they hummed away in a huff.

Just because I drive a compact car doesn't mean I voted for Obama.

One day I was at the dog park letting the poodle run and had the following conversation with a lady who was wearing Birkenstocks. She had three rescue dogs named Eco, Gaia and Che.

lady: "I've never seen a black and white poodle. Is he a mix?"
me: "No, he's a pure-bred ... registered standard poodle."
lady: "Oh. So he's not a rescue or from a shelter? He's registered?"
me: "Yes. I got him from a breeder in Oklahoma."
lady: "Well, at least you didn't get him from a pet store."
me: "Pet store puppies need love, too."
lady: "Well, we don't need to encourage the puppy mills. Using animals for profit just seems wrong, don't you think?"
me: "Without profit there would be no veterinary science industry or 'holistic' dog food or animal shelters."
lady: "Animal shelters are NOT for PROFIT!"
me: "Without profit somewhere, where would the money come from to support 'non-profit' animal shelters?"
lady: "They are run on donations with volunteer efforts."
me: "Somewhere along the line, someone had to make enough profit to afford a donation."
lady: "You know, typically shelter dogs are more balanced than ones that come from breeders. Pure bred dogs have a lot of behavior and health issues."
me: "You think so? Did you notice that Che has chewed all the hair off his ass and that Gaia [Ed. note: a female beagle looking mix] is trying to hump that basset hound?"

Just because I paid a breeder for my dog doesn't make me a bad person.

On another dog park excursion the poodle started playing with an
overweight Bichon Frise. The owner of the Bichon, a thin man, 40ish, in a shiny yellow soccer warmup, asked me about the poodle.

man: "I've never seen a black and white standard before. Is she purebred?"
me: "He's a boy, and yes, he's a full blood standard. They call them 'parti-colored'."
man: "Oh. I didn't look at his 'business', I just saw the purple collar and assumed it was girl. Sorry about that."
me: "No problem. My wife picked out the collar because it matches the car."
man: "Your wife?"

Just because I have a standard poodle doesn't mean I'm gay.


One Friday afternoon, at the office, a couple of co-workers and I had
the following conversation.

co-worker1: "So, big plans for the weekend?"
me: "Not really. We've got a couple of church things going on ... nothing too exciting."
co-worker2: "Church? What church do you go to?"
me: "A Presbyterian church in North Dallas. Bentwood Trail."
co-worker1: "Heh heh heh. Yeah. I'm going to worship, too. We're having spaghetti tonight."
co-worker2: "Heh heh heh. Yeah. Me too. Spaghetti. Meatballs. We're gonna be touched by his noodly appendage."
me: "That's nice. Hey, you guys should be Pastafarian missionaries. Take the message to the Muslims in Saudi Arabia or something. Christians are too easy, everybody ridicules them, you should be bold and take a stand for your beliefs ... teach the Muslims the error of their ways."
co-worker1: "No way, dude. Christians have preachers that get caught with their pants down, Muslims have suicide bombers."
me: "Good point. You better stick with ridiculing the tolerant."

Just because I'm a Christian, doesn't mean I support creation science.

The conversation continued.

co-worker1: "No. Really. Seriously. Is your car going to be 'unmanned' when 'The Rapture' comes."
me: "No. I'm not too concerned about eschatology."
co-worker2: "Eska-what?"
me: "End times theology/philosophy. The end of the world."
co-worker1: "The end of the world? The bible talks about global warming?"
co-worker2: "Sure! You never heard of hellfire and brimstone?"
co-worker1: "What about gay people?"
me: "What?"
co-worker1: "Gay people. Do they go to hell?"
co-worker2: "I bet gay people aren't Christian."
me: "I bet they aren't Muslim."
co-worker1: "Do they? Go to hell?"
me: "I don't think so, no."
co-worker1: "Don't all Christians think all homosexuals go to hell?"
me: "Do all homosexuals think all Christians are homophobes?"
co-worker2: "Yeah, I think they do."

Just because I'm a Christian doesn't mean I believe in 'The Rapture', snake handling, bombing abortion clinics or persecuting homosexuals.

A friend of mine was having a problem with his PC.

friend: "Hey, you do computer stuff all day, can you help with me a problem."
me: "No."
friend: "I'm trying to get my Sony camera to work with my Dell PC."
me: [ silence, with a practiced look of extreme disinterest ]
friend: "I think the driver won't load because it's not a Sony computer."
me: "I doubt that's the problem."
friend: "Do you want to come over and look at it?"
me: "No."
friend: "Oh, okay, well, I can send you an email with the error message."
me: "No. Don't."
friend: "Oh, you know what the problem is?"
me: "No, I don't. I don't do Windows."
friend: "Well, you do computer stuff all day. This would be easy for you."
me: "I don't do Windows. I don't fix problems with Windows. That's not what I do."
friend: "Why not?"
me: "Because it sucks and every time I have to use it, it steals a little peace from my soul."
friend: "Oh ... I don't know what to do if you can't help."
me: "Maybe you can find a Dell camera on eBay."
friend: "Good idea!"

Just because I 'work on computers' doesn't mean I work on Windows.

Just because I'm a conservative, middle-aged, Christian white guy don't assume I fit your stereotype. On second thought, go ahead and stereotype me ... I'm not too concerned about your opinion or being politically correct ... I'm going to do what I think is right regardless.