A few months ago I texted my friend Vampirella inquiring about the cellphone number of Ysmault, and after a few minutes she replied with the number. Genuinely grateful I texted back, “Gee, thanks!” I know, must be all the comic books I’ve been reading. Incensed Vampirella replied with, “Why do you have to be so sarcastic? Nasa ER ako and ang daming patients, etc.”

Hurm. Come to think of it, putting a “Gee!” on something may indeed sound sarcastic, unless you live in Riverdale and are ordering something from the Choklit Shop. And it probably didn’t help that Vampirella was in the ER. I told this once to Smoketh, and whenever I would use the word “Gee!” she would immediately reply with “Whydoyouhavetobesosarcastic?!?” Working on the concept of learned behavior, etc. I started to automatically say the entire exchange whenever I have to thank someone for something. For instance:

Me: HIV, paabot ng asukal.
HIV: Here.
Me: Gee, thanks, whydoyouhavetobesosarcastic?!?!

or

ME: Smoketh, pwede bang ikaw na ang magrounds. Tinatamad na ako.
Smoketh: Sure.
Me: Gee, thanks, whydoyouhavetobesosarcastic?!?!

I’ve used this around five times once with Cheapo around. She snickered the first time. Asked me to elucidate on its origin the second time. Made kebs the third time around. By the fifth time she wanted to slap me.

As a project during our Behavioral Psychology back in college Groin wanted to cure me of my attention deficit, so whenever I would turn my head to watch people while in Jollibee Philcoa she would feed me some hot sauce. I must have consumed half a hot sauce bottle, but up to today I still could not sustain attention for more than ten seconds. In return I sought to cure her of her fear of snakes. I proposed to our instructor that as a first step I would surprise Groin by throwing a bunch of fake snakes at her face while she’s studying. It didn’t get approved.

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