Anyway, this inspired a conversation with my husband-slash-manager-slash-motivator (if by “motivator” you mean “guy who bribes me to do shit by buying me chocolate”)<\/em> during which I’m pretty sure he suspected I had a serious head trauma, if I’m diagnosing the look on his face correctly.<\/p>\n \n Me: So, I saw Dan last night…<\/p>\n Viking: Manboobs Dan, Hairplugs\u00a0Dan or “Only Daniel, never Dan or Danny” Dan?<\/p>\n Me: Hot Dan. With the abs.<\/p>\n Viking: Skinny\u00a0guy down the street? *glares* The\u00a0man who\u00a0doesn’t own a shirt?<\/p>\n Me: Don’t even\u00a0think<\/em> about buying him one, either.<\/p>\n Viking: *glares harder*<\/p>\n Me: What? I said please.<\/p>\n Viking: No. You didn’t.<\/p>\n Me: Oh. Well, I think he’s a fireman. Everybody knows you don’t buy a fireman a shirt. That’s\u00a0goddamned kooky.<\/p>\n Viking: When you say you “saw him”, you’re not editing out the words “through my binoculars” are you?<\/p>\n Me: Shyeah, like you’d let me own binoculars.<\/p>\n Viking: After what you did with the night vision goggles? Fuck, no.<\/p>\n Me: “Blah-blah, stalking is illegal, Allison,\u00a0blah-blah-blah.”\u00a0Could I get to the important part?<\/p>\n Viking: There’s an important part this time? Jesus, I better put my\u00a0coffee down.<\/p>\n Me: Dan\u00a0is afraid of\u00a0clowns, just like me.<\/p>\n Viking: You know this how?<\/p>\n Me: I was wearing my t-shirt that said “Die, All the Clowns, Die” and he bought me a tea. We toasted. It was a bonding moment.<\/p>\n I use my fingertip to mime a tear of sentiment rolling down my cheek. My husband, accustomed to my dorkiness, waits me out with an expectant lift of his eyebrow.<\/p>\n Me: I’m putting him on my Clownpocalypse Survival Team. I think he’d be handy, what with all the muscles and stuff. Man … the hours\u00a0preceding my horrible\u00a0demise promise to be truly epic. *smiles dreamily* I almost can’t wait for the clowns to invade.<\/p>\n Viking: *clears his throat from the distant plane of reality* When the clowns invade, naturally they’ll\u00a0do so\u00a0from … Cirque du Soleil?<\/p>\n Me: Gawd, I hope not. Acrobatic French clowns would be sexy and <\/em>scary.*shudders* My loins won’t know whether to get happy or run screaming with the rest of me.<\/p>\n Viking: So, you think they’ll invade from, what,\u00a0the Big Top? Ringling Bros? Barnum & Bailey?<\/p>\n Me:\u00a0No,\u00a0smart ass, from the abyssopelagic ocean trenches, where they’re breeding their slimey, green-toothed army. Duh.<\/em><\/p>\n Viking: Must be hard to keep the greasepaint on, underwater.<\/p>\n Me: Dude, we don’t joke about that.<\/p>\n Viking: First Rule of Clown Club, don’t joke about greasepaint?<\/p>\n Me: *narrows eyes* You’re not as funny as you think you are.<\/p>\n Viking:\u00a0That’s probably true. So this Dan character\u00a0was pretending to read words\u00a0that fall across your tits, then bought you a tea? And from this you misinterpret …?<\/p>\n Me: He was hardly pretending, he repeated the words aloud.<\/p>\n Viking:\u00a0Allow me to correct your fallacious assumptions. A) he’s had 30 years to practise the\u00a0skill of reading a woman’s shirt while\u00a0scoping her breasts. B) Writing on a shirt\u00a0is practically permission for scoping your breasts. C) He was absolutely scoping your breasts.<\/p>\n Me: *snorts* Scoping. Listerine-ing them. Fresh Mint-ing them. What’s next, he’s gonna gargle them?–whoa!! That sounded a lot less pervy in my head.<\/p>\n Viking: No it didn’t.<\/p>\n Me: Well, allow me<\/em> to disprove your theory. *lifts shirt* Checkmate.<\/p>\n Viking: Not sure what kind of chess that was, but I enjoyed losing.<\/p>\n Me: Clearly, he wasn’t checking out the Itty Bitty Titty Parade. Hmm\u00a0…\u00a0a parade\u00a0would be a bad place for the Clownpocalypse to start. Oh! I think I just scared myself again. *fans self*<\/p>\n The Viking’s lips almost turn up in a smile, but he’s a very smart man who\u00a0knows better than to\u00a0giggle at\u00a0the chest of the slightly cracked woman who has given him two healthy children, and who cooks him non-toxic food, and who tends to lay awake long after he’s asleep and prone.\u00a0He\u00a0surrenders to my logic with a tired laugh.<\/p>\n Viking: Not to discourage your convincing and very scientific display, but does this conversation have a point?<\/p>\n Me: At the moment, it has two.<\/p>\n Viking: And I don’t even have to read anything to scope ’em out. Thanks for that, by the way.<\/p>\n Me: But yeah, I do have a point.<\/p>\n I smile, and it feels like triumph. It feels powerful. If I wanted to, I could terrify the big, strong, clothing-impaired\u00a0fireman, reduce him to a quivering mass who might sleep by nightlight for a few nights because of me. I’ve had many friends who won’t read my book because “I can’t do scary” … and that is so full of win. I’m not sure I can put it into words, so I don’t try. I shrug, sighing happily. The Viking’s eyes widen with alarm, and that, too, feels like triumph. I am a horror writer … and your fears are my balls to juggle. Even tough guys are scared of s<\/em>omething. Everyone’s scared of something.<\/em><\/p>\n Hey, what are you scared of?<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.ajaalto.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/images\/EvilClowns-202x300.jpg\" "\\"EvilClowns\\"")
<\/a> <When faced with an evil clown, remember:\u00a0kneecaps speak louder than words><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.ajaalto.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/images\/web-300x225.jpg\" "\\"web\\"")
<\/a><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.ajaalto.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/images\/20100410-192-300x200.jpg\" "\\"20100410")
<\/strong><\/em><\/a>(Editor’s note: AJ Aalto will now demonstrate her\u00a0keen ability to speak Kitten, by translating the following feline body language. “Mummy, I don’t think you should sweep the floor, ever-never-ever. Therefore, I am putting myself bodily in your way to prevent such an action from occurring. If you feel the need to sweep, you should observe my case of the rampant cutes, and find something more worthwhile to do, like playing video games, or hey, don’t you have toys that make funny noises?” … kittens: little balls of fluff and wisdom.)<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"