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1.  The Crazy Dad at the Furniture Store (1987)

You know when you’re a kid, and you have to go to the furniture store, the idea of it doesn’t sound like too much fun .  Unless you have an imagination .  And I wasn’t the most behaved kid in public spaces, being 4 years old at the time .  So off I go, me and my older sister just jumping around on beds creating ridiculous games that consist of ad-lib rules and simultaneous wins .  Of course we wouldn’t be the only children there who were left unattended by the many parents who seek to complete the day’s deed .  My dad was over at the counter talking the bed biz with an employee, so I sheltered myself at home in a fortress of Sealy, Serta, Simmons, Sterns and Fosters, and Spring Airs (old-school bed brands yo) .

Then here comes this other kid trying to encroach on my designated territory .  He looked like he was about the same age as me, so I had no problem gettin gangsta .  The kid jumps up on “my” bed and I totally shove him down .  He didn’t really respond much to that, and just walked away without a word .  So I walked after him and punched him in his back .  I have no idea why I felt this would accomplish any such goal .  It’s just kid logic .  Little asshole kid logic .

Out of nowhere, his dad pops up !  Kind of like in a really old videogame where the boss of a level just appears suddenly because of really bad graphics .  The dude looked like a Filipino Burt Reynolds, but with an evil mustache instead of a glorious one .  And he just grabs my shoulders and shakes me extremely hard, the way you’d shake an extremely mysterious Christmas gift .  Then proceeds to slap me twice across my beautiful child-actor face .  I remember him yelling “WHY’D YA HIT HIM !” each time he smacked me across the ladykiller .  I was in a weird daze; I remember my sister just watching and somehow getting the attention of my dad, who was across the store .  He comes running up, all 80′s style (whatever that is).

My dad walks up and just stares down the other dad .  My child brain kicked in again and I figured my dad was literally going to kill the guy .  And to my mind it made sense and seemed fair .  Hell yeah, justice .  But my dad just continued to cold-stare, the kind of look you’d expect from a guy standing in front of a huge sign, that can’t read, but is very determined to figure shit out .  The kid’s dad was stuttering with fear, and I remember him saying, “Well .. I .. I was just trying to stop him !”  And from then on I don’t remember what happened or how this story ends .

To this day, I still have the image of that guy’s face in my memory .  I wonder what ever became of that kid I punched .  Or whether or not he has the same recollection of this event .  Judging from how numbly he was taking the situation, I don’t think his brain had developed the sense of ‘giving a shit’ yet .  But his dad sure had that sense over-developed .  I mean, seriously, if you have to jump in and assist a fight between two 4-year olds, then either you’re REALLY overreacting, or your kid has some kind of disabili-   oh crap .

2.  The Bicycle Bum (1998)

Welcome to my sophomore year of high school .  At this time, I’m a shaved head AZN wearing baggy khaki’s and a big white shirt .  Yes, on purpose .  I also had the freshest K-Swiss shoes, kept white by the Finish Line shoe cleaner I kept in my backpack, WHICH the employee talked me  into buying .  It’s a very exciting time in life, as I was getting closer to figuring out the most precise way to act hardcore .  Don’t smile for pictures, always talk as if black (or mexican, which worked better for me), and never ever display an enthusiasm for anything !

I was at Huntington Beach with my friends .  We were all playing basketball at one of the courts between the sand and the street .  Like true gangstas .  See ya’ll just don’t know .  Well actually, I wasn’t playing .  I was sitting off-court (real sports term?) next to my Igloo cooler which I’d jam-packed with cans of soda, while listening to a trance remix of a Bob Marley classic on my Portable CD Player .  Yes, I should’ve been shot for this .

Anyway, I see this raggedy old bum ride by on his bicycle down the beachwalk .  Real slow .  I mean, his eyes were weird .  He was pedaling like a zombie with his vision fixated in a spaced-out way, almost like how an asshole friend does when you’re talking to them and they want you to know they’re not paying attention .  Why did I notice this ?  Because I wasn’t doing anything better .

Suddenly, I had this strange urge .  I looked at our igloo cooler full of soda cans, and I felt compelled to give one to him .  Just because I took a fat look at our lives at the time, and thought, wow .  We’re lucky to be living this way .  I’m a 15 year-old kid who probably owns more things of value than that 60 year-old homeless guy .  I picked up a can of Sprite and jetted .

I ran up next to the bum, who was still pedaling at his aforementioned pace .  Here I am, pacing next to him, like a mobile drive-thru attendant .  I was like, “Excuse me, sir, are you thirsty ?”  The dude doesn’t even flinch .  It’s like I’m not even there .  “Umm, I wanted you to have this .  It’s a drink .”  There I go, totally insulting his intelligence .  But he still doesn’t give me a single look .  No change of pace, no difference in movement, just .. nothing .

I was starting to get tired of running next to this guy .  I was already a quarter-mile away from the basketball court, and this bum just wasn’t giving me a single ounce of attention .  I didn’t get it .  Maybe he had a mental thing that blocked him from asians that were just too gangster for society, whatever .  I gave up .

He ended up biking along as I stopped chasing after him (next to him) .  He was going extremely slow, so to have traveled a quarter mile by now, you gotta believe I was being a side-car for QUITE a long time .  I was just standing there in the middle of the beachwalk, just watching him slowly pedal away .  Weirdo .  I was like, pshh whatever yo .  Like a true G .

Suddenly, I’m startled by the sounds of a horrible cough !  There was this Mexican guy sitting with his back against a wall, coughing and trying to catch his breath .  His bicycle was leaned against the wall right next to him .  This dude didn’t look like a bum, but he definitely didn’t appear much richer .  I went up to him immediately, and gave him the can of soda .  “Here, man, drink this .”  The guy just looked up at me strangely, the way the Power Rangers look up at those huge alien monsters that get REALLY huge near the end of the episode .

“Thank you ..” he stuttered out .  Still staring at me weirdly, as if nobody had ever done such a thing for him .  Almost as if a drink was the one thing he needed at that very moment, and somehow it came to him just in time .

I absolutely hate stories that end like this, but I shit you not .  I looked down the beachwalk and the bicycle bum was gone .  And in the pace that he was riding, there was no way he could’ve rocketed beyond the horizon in that short amount of time .  Strange but true .

Or he could’ve just made a left turn or something .

3.  The Cruise Ship Waiter (2001)

Senior trip !  This time I’m hangin out on a cruise ship with my entire senior class .  Not that impressive though, because our senior class had like 50 students ?  So yeah .  Still fun though !  And best of all, dinner time was about to start !  We all gathered in this nice banquet hall area of the ship, and they started to serve us the main course .

Little information about yours truly; I used to eat like a beast .  I was fatter then, “significantly” I might add .  And I had a huge taste for the red meats .  STEAKS per se .  I would eat so much .  Let’s just say this .  If Chipotle were around back then, it wouldn’t be around now .  Cuz I would’ve eaten the entire company by 2001 .

As I’m sitting at a table with my friends, all dressed appropriate and ready to pig out unclassily, the waiter delivers the first round of entree .  This, of course, is everybody else’s ONLY round, but for me it will be the first of many .  It’s a STEAK !  Not just a steak actually, it’s a prime rib .  16 ounces of tender goodness, ready to be consumed by the blades of wrath which are my braces .

It’s over swiftly, and my stomach still remains grossly unsatisfied .  And as the waiter makes another pass through my table area and sees my empty plate, he gasps in terror !  “Sir !  I’m sorry, were you given an empty plate ?”  I realized everybody else hadn’t even begun to chip away their prime ribs .  So of course, few would believe I’d just straight-up EATEN the thing .  “No, sir, I actually finished it .  Could I get another one, by any chance ?”  The waiter looked at me in disbelief .  I almost felt like he was gonna check my coat pockets .  But instead he left and returned with another fresh plate of 16 oz. prime rib .  Like a true best friend .

I ended up eating that prime rib in the same amount of time .  And he came back and gave me the same amount of look .  A whole buttload of disbelief and flabbergast .  My friends were chanting me up to eat a third one .  I acted like I couldn’t do it, just for entertainment sake, and stalled a bit before asking Mr. Coolest Waiter of my Life to fetch another slab from the kitchen .  He hooked a brotha up and there I was, working on my third prime rib of the night .  Onlookers from the other tables had gathered around me to witness the spectacle which is the demonstration of my abyssal stomach .  I consumed #3 no differently than I had eaten #1 and #2 .   With the same grace in chewing and unrelenting fury of digestion which occured naturally to my then-chubby self .

“Go for number four !”  I remember everybody saying .  Like hell I was gonna do that .  I was an eating machine at the time, but i knew my limit .  Three was the highest I’d ever gone, steak-wise .  And these prime ribs were no joke .  They weren’t getting any smaller by the round, and I didn’t even believe the waiter would give me a fourth one .  But before I asked, somebody had already asked FOR me .  Dammit .

“WHOAAAAAAAAAA !!”  is the first thing I hear .  An orchestrated crescendo of voices, resounding in a domino rally as the fourth steak is being carried through the banquet hall to its destiny, my table .    But this is not just any steak .  I sensed it as the waiter brought it down from above my head .

“This is a special prime rib .  This is called the prime rib end-cut .  It’s very flavorful and much larger .  You will enjoy this .”  the waiter says to me with a million-dollar smile .  Actually, the smile was more mischievous, as if I was James Bond and he was an undercover counter-agent, trying to kill me with beef .  I took a long stare at the hulking mass of meat in front of me .  It was quite literally, the size of a healthy American newborn baby .  I didn’t know if I should eat it, or slap its ass .

I ate it .  It took forever, and I believe I died a few times in the process, but I ate it .  There was a resounding cheer at my completion, and the deed had been the banquet hall event of the night .  The cruise ship tilted in my direction for the rest of the evening .  But it was amazing, and I was highly impressed with my record .  I don’t even know how many ounces that last prime rib end cut could’ve been .  Probably needed the next unit of measurement to gauge it .  But it was big .  Bigger than any mass of beef I’ve ever been allowed to eat .  You know the tablets that Moses had, with the 10 Commandments on them ?  Yeah, it was like eating the first 5 .  Not easy .

The waiter loved it .  He stood there and watched me accomplish what he had never expected could be done by a 17 year-old kid .  Okay, I wasn’t really that FAT, but I was pretty thick .  Not in the Latina way that we all love, but in the chunky-face cheekbone-less unattractive mustache-having Asian Hilfiger way .  That waiter had an awesome time, and he smiled at me when it was all over .  Like a proud father, after watching his kid win a baseball game .  A baseball game versus steaks .

So that’s the record of my biggest EAT ever .  I think it’s safe to say, and obvious to point out, that there were two personal records broken during that cruise .  I’ll let you imagine what the second could be .

Props to the coolest waiter ever .  So damn cool .. I hope he still thinks of me when serving all those wimps their ONE steak .

. ryan