WARNING: Don't Become a Same-Sider!!

You know who you are. You might not admit it to others but one day they'll see you out and about and they'll know the truth. You will hang your head in shame and then beg for forgiveness. That's right, you're a same-sider.

If you aren't currently cowering in fear, you might not know what a same-sider is. Let me explain it to you. You walk into a restaurant. It could be a Chick-Fil-A or it could be a 5-star fancy restaurant. You sit down and in the next booth over there are two people staring right at you. You think. "hmmm I guess the third person has gone to the bathroom." You guessed wrong. These are same-siders. They are couples who purposely sit on the same side of the table when they go to restaurants....

To answer the question that is formulating in your brain right now.....no, I don't know why they would do that.

But they are still there and they are still staring at you. Why do I dislike same-siders with such passion? Well I'll tell you.

1. The Staring - When sitting across from each other your head blocks out the person behind you. With same-siders that blockade isn't there. This leaves your face in direct line with both of them and the staring commences. This is the point that I start to freak out. Why are they looking at me? did I drop honey mustard on my shirt. My nose itches, but if I scratch it they'll think I am a public picker! It's really quiet overwhelming.

2.The Conversation -  Believe it or not, the human head blocks roughly 83.4% of conversation. When that head is no longer there, guess who receives a full 100%??? I mean really, do I have to hear EVERYTHING that you are saying?  I mean really, I get to hear about your hernia surgery? Yippee! I'm so glad that I'm eating right now.

3. The Cuddlers - When you add the first two to the third you get a lethal combination. Cuddlers are same-siders who apparently forget that the booth at a fast food restaurant is a different social atmosphere than their honeymoon. They are practically sitting on top of one another and have given each other 14 Eskimo kisses. Add that to the conversation of "no, after you my snookie-wookie-ums" (ah yeah! a Jersey Shore/Star Wars reference! I think that might be the first in history.) Or "This tea will never be as sweet as you, my love."  That line alone makes you want to heave a large cup of sweet tea in their general direction. At least they are sitting close you might hit both of them.

The only way to fight "the cuddlers" is to randomly point at them and scream "HAND CHECK!" If you time it right, you might just break the cuddlers up. Other than that they just sit there and stare at you all while giving you looks that imply "you'll never be as happy as me!"

4. The Lack of a Face Checker -  We've all had it happen. We get a little something stuck in our teeth. We have some ketchup on our cheek. It's all good though....if you have someone in front of you to see it and tell you. But what happens when that person is sitting next to you and can't see your face?? that's right. You look like an idiot. You might be in a happy relationship friend but you have a waffle fry stuck to your face. I usually feel bad for a guy and try to signal him about it. This leads us to an awkward game of charades in which we are casually making hand gestures and motioning to our faces. He never realized he had something on his face but he is considering stealing third base.  Seriously though, never underestimate the usefulness of a face checker.

These are a few reasons that Same-Siders drive me crazy. Do you have any reasons?

The Absurdity of It All

I have a gift. That is to say that my wife and I share a gift. It's not something that we asked for and worked hard for but it is something that we have somehow obtained. Our gift is that somehow we are always around annoying people or annoying situations...perhaps you are thinking that maybe my wife and I are just easily annoyed...that may be so, or perhaps it could be that we are in the wrong place at the wrong time. Let me give a few examples of what I mean.

1. We are usually near a crying baby in a restaurant. The nicer the restaurant the louder and closer the baby. Just think of how nice a dinner at The Melting Pot could be.
2. At the movies we are always behind tall people and always in front of people who like to kick the seat.
3. On airplanes we usually sit near a couple making out...apparently PDA rules don't apply in the air.
4. We do usually get a waiter/waitress that is extremely odd. We once had one who would sneak around and then pop up at our table scaring the crap out of us. We had another who said that following "now that you've ordered you have to wait for your food." umm ya think? But we have countless stories of weird waitresses and waiters.
5. When we get a hotel room we have gotten multiple rooms that "used" to be smoking rooms but now smell like the backseat of a chain smokers car.
6. Anytime we go to a place that has a mascot(sports,red robin, etc.) the mascot always comes and tries to talk to Mollie.
7. Anytime we recommend a restaurant to someone, the food/service/bathrooms are all terrible at once.
8. Any number of other random things that would cause someone to question their sanity.

I don't mention these things because that have happened to us once or twice....these happen multiple times, every where we go. The weirdest part of it all is that we've actually grown accustomed to it. And now we think it's funny. It happened to us a couple of weeks ago. We were at a Wendy's with a couple of teenagers grabbing some dinner. One of the kids we were with went to the counter to get some barbecue sauce. He waited at the counter for someone to get him some sauce, and waited, and waited, and then waited some more. I decided to go up and get a refill and help my friend in his quest for barbecue sauce. When I got up to the counter some other guys were ordering and asked for barbecue sauce as well. So after their request I made our petition for barbecue sauce as well. the woman turned around grabbed two more sauces....Amazing! Our waiting has finally come to an end. We are overjoyed with the expectation of our barbecue sauce. She turns puts our sauce into the other guys bags and walked off. We were left standing there, no sauce no one to help us. My friend walked off beyond frustrated. I decided to get my refill on sprite. I asked for no ice so that I could get more sprite in my cup. The gentleman behind the counter still filled my cup up enough so that it would be full.....IF THERE WAS ICE IN IT! A full 2 inches remained in my cup. I got some sauce, took my cup and sat down. I laughed the entire way.

I'm sure that annoying stuff like this happens to everyone. I'm sure it might happen to you on an expensive date or when you are in a hurry or otherwise easily annoyed. The one thing that I've learned through the years is that these annoyances are really just petty. We can either let them overwhelm us or just laugh them away. So the next time you are sitting in a restaurant and the kid next to you start wailing like an air raid siren, just deal with it and laugh at the absurdity of it all and don't let it ruin your night. Let it happen enough times and you might just have some good stories to tell to your friends...