House Cat

by Thomas M. Pender

I'm not sure what to call this.  It's written like a story, but reads like a poem.  In any event, it's a "Reflection" about something that occurred shortly after moving into my present residence.

 

My house has a cat.

I do not have a cat.  Most certainly, I do not have a cat!

But my house has one . . . or it has the house.  Whatever this strange and dark relationship, it has nothing to do with me, nor I with it.  And yet, I am now involved.

As I stepped out of my shower the other day, I glanced out the bathroom window, which usually reveals nothing but an overweathered balcony and the bottoms of discarded carpet pieces left by the as-yet-unfinished renovators.  Yesterday, however, there was a new sight.  A new eyesore, to be quite frank.  The house’s cat was holding court.

All by itself, happy as a . . . cat, I suppose . . . lounging atop the comfy (for a cat) carpet mountain on the balcony of the house in which I am legally squatting, the felinous beast laid and blinked, until it noticed something.

A movement.  Inside the house.

Me.

His face snapped to align perfectly with mine, and neither of us moved.  For rather a long time.  It was like a silent conversation of the eyes.

The cat’s said: “What are you doing inside my house?”

Mine said: “What are you doing outside mine?”

The cat’s replied: “This is my house whenever I wish, and it always has been.”

Mine answered: “Tell that to the owners, who gave me a key.”

“Well, I’m certainly not leaving.”

“Well, neither am I.”

“I suppose we’ll just have to get used to each other then, won’t we?”

“I suppose we will.”

And that’s how it went.

I don’t know if I’ll see the cat again.  I certainly won’t look for it.  I won’t wonder about it, worry about it, leave water or milk or kibble for it, and I will burn in everlasting fire before I name it.

I’m sure he or she feels the same about me.  And I’m fine with that.  My house, my rules.  Keep your raggedy old carpeting.  Just wait and see if it bothers me.

Stupid cat.

Garrett’s “Daddy Time”

by Thomas M. Pender

Today is my middle son Garrett’s 12th birthday.  Time has sure flown.  He’s as tall as my neck, and way too big for me to carry around.  There was a time, however, that he and I spent many magical moments together. . . .

Garrett has always lived with his mother, and while this was not what I envisioned when I planned a family, this arrangement did mean that his time with me was special.  He would always run to me when I pulled up to his house (and in fact, I was told that whenever a car parked near the house, he would ask if I was there!).  During his toddling years, I loved putting him up on my shoulders.  Sitting at an approximate shoulder height of 5’10” or so, Garrett really enjoyed the higher outlook on his world, too!  He would grab two fistfuls of hair, and ride Dad around the house and yard.  What I got a kick out of, though, was that every so often, he would swing his head down on my right so he could see my face.  It seemed to me that he was checking to make sure it was still Daddy on the other side of the head he was grabbing onto.  It always made me laugh.

When he was a bit older, he started to understand that my visits were never for long . . . and he also started to protest my departures!  He would cry or yell “No!” when I would tell him I had to go, and he would latch onto my leg to make leaving impossible.  For quite some time, I had to enlist the help of his maternal grandmother in order to get to my car.  I would give her a nod when it was time for me to leave, and she would say, “Garrett, come and see what’s in the kitchen!” or “You want some juice, Garrett?” or the like, and when he followed her out of the room (which would be the closest room to the door), I’d duck out.  My son is intelligent, however.  After a few weeks of this, he would still go to his grandmother, but he’d very quickly poke his head back in to make sure I was still there!  A few months later, he was developed enough to hop down from my lap to go see his grandmother, but he’d point at me first and say, “Don’t leave!”

I love the man Garrett is becoming, but I have to admit that I miss the days when he ran to me upon arrival . . . and threatened me before leaving the room.

Happy birthday, Garrett!  I love you!

Shock Treatment, or The Quickest Way To Halt Prying Co-Workers

by Thomas M. Pender 

Landing smack in the middle of the Bible Belt in 1999, I learned right away that the area got that name because the citizens literally carried Bibles around in their belts.  At my first job in Georgia, we got one 10-minute break in the morning, a lunch hour, and a 15-minute break in the afternoon.  By this, I mean everyone in the small company went on break at the same set times.  It was no shock to me on my first day that all the smokers immediately stood up and scurried outside like a herd of antsy buffalo.  The shock came when the remaining non-smokers brought out the scriptures!

Now, for the record, I am a Christian, and a good one.  God and Jesus and I get along just fine.  I even go to see them in church.  Forgive me, however, if I got the absolute willies when I looked around a place of business and saw person after person after person reading the Bible.  I wasn’t sure which would be less uncomfortable: going outside to watch people smoke, or sitting neck-deep in the dogma.  One person on my first day even took the time – in my first five minutes on the job, mind you – to invite me to the daily lunchtime Bible study in the conference room.

That’s okay.  You go right along and tell Moses and the gang I said “hi.”  (Shudder)

It took a month or so to really settle into this new atmosphere, but settle I did.  I worked next to two young ladies who were avid Jesus-break-takers.  As long as they didn’t try to coax or sell their Stepfordness to me, I didn’t curse or tell off-color jokes, and we got along just fine.  Both ladies were African-American, as was the woman in the small picture frame on my computer monitor, so I got lots of questions about how we met and if we were getting married and having babies.  This, too, was fine.

That December, after I’d been at the job for seven months, we were all lazing about in the last ten minutes of the last workday before the long Christmas weekend.  The ladies got into a conversation of all the baking they’d be doing, and bragging on their secret family recipes.  Out of nowhere, one of the hyper-Christian ladies next to me segues from a chocolate-infused recipe into referencing my personal life by saying, “That’s not all Tom likes that’s chocolate!”  The ladies giggled . . . for a second.

Not expecting anything near the unchurchlike comment which was thrown out, yet unshaken, I very simply raised one eyebrow, looked the Bible-thumper straight in the eye and replied, “Yep.  Chocolate tastes better.”  After the chuckling shut off to pin-drop silence, I shrugged and said, “Hey, you brought it up.”

Lessons: If you’re going to be a pious Christian, be a pious Christian.  If you’re going to try to embarrass someone with rather non-Jesus topics, expect some sort of reaction.  Lastly, and most importantly, one should never try to embarrass me.  I embarrass back.

Addressing Corporate Sphincters

by Thomas M. Pender

In an odd sort of continuation of yesterday’s column, on how to talk to people while using public bathrooms, this column also deals with the corporate world, phrasing things carefully, and a-holes.  Just not the anatomical kind.

Twice . . . at least twice . . . during my tenure at a Troy, Michigan insurance company, I was put in a situation where I was to explain to someone exactly how much of a hole in the ass he was.  Of course, this had to be done without losing my job, so my vocabulary came in awfully handy.

I worked in the mailroom, and most days, this involved getting full bins from the post office, distributing this mail, carrying interoffice mail here and there, then taking the outgoing mail to the post office on my way home.  On occasion, however, something out of the ordinary would happen.

The first occurred not long after I was hired.  My new boss Rick had already seen evidence of my wizardry with the English language.  In the first hour of my first full day on the job, in fact, he had tested said magic.  Before he got in on that first day, my desk phone rang.  I hesitantly picked it up, not knowing why someone would be calling me, since no one there really knew me.  It was, in fact, Rick on the phone, explaining that he would be about an hour late.  He also had a project in mind: he wanted me to write a letter to the other candidates for my job, explaining that the position had been filled!  This was a bizarre and fun assignment.  In the persona of my boss, I had to politely thank the unseen unknown people, and tell them that the best man won, who was, in fact, me.  Upon arriving, Rick asked how it was going, and I said, “Well, how do you spell . . . ?” and I sounded a razzberry.

So, with this example of my writemanship and ironic humor, the day came when Rick returned to the office from a business meeting, uncharacteristically steamed.  He put his briefcase down rather loudly, and called me in.  Not aware of anything I had done to cause such a mood, I curiously approached.  He handed me a business card, and told me he wanted me to write to the gentleman on the card, explaining to him that we would not be utilizing his product any longer, and that the man was, in my boss’s opinion, a gigantic poopshoot.

“No problem,” I said.

I quickly typed off a one-and-a-half-page communiqué, using the finest in modern business language, maintaining a cool and collected tone, and being completely respectful, while simultaneously making it clear to the addressee that he was, in fact, the grand poobah of poopshoots.  I turned it in, and knew I had gotten it right on the first try when I heard my boss softly chuckle then loudly laugh.  Rick and I quickly got into an understood thought pattern in which he could tell me what to call someone and why in a sentence, and I could produce a full-page formal directive explaining where the subject could go and how to get there, without saying that.

We had fun at this, time and again.

About two years later, when I was about to be at the end of my mail-sorting days, I was in the process of manhandling some office equipment from the building to one of the corporate vehicles.  While tackling this assault on my college degree, one of the vice presidents walked past, and took the time and energy to shoot me a sidelong comment which amounted to “It must suck to be in a dead-end job and have no hope of ever being respected.”

This story would have much more punch if I could recall exactly what he said, but again, it was in completely acceptable corporate lingo, though the meaning was deliberate on his part and not lost on my part.  I’m sure he expected me to smile and continue with my burden.

After three years at the company, he still did not know who he was messing with!

With a smile on my face, I replied very politely and spoke a few carefully chosen, very formal college-level words to the gentleman.  He paused and looked at me for a second.  His facial expression clearly said, “You just called me an asshole, but I can’t prove it.”  In return, my facial expression clearly said, “Yes, I did . . . and no, you can’t!”  My smile was broader than his.

In many situations Life has handed me, I have found that being armed with a vocabulary and an imagination can keep me prepared to fell the mightiest of oaks, without even swinging an axe.

This feeling is nothing short of awesome.

Calling In Sick . . . With Style!

by Thomas M. Pender

My four-year proofreading job in Atlanta had many plusses and only a few minuses.  One plus that eventually became a minus, but which I turned into my own private plus, was the sick day policy.

At first, it was incredibly easy to call in sick.  I would phone the desk of the composition supervisor at least two hours before my shift began (to allow time to get a replacement proofreader, if need be), let him or her know that I would be out that night, thank him or her for his or her kind assistance, and hang up.  This operation was fast and easy, so therefore, the brains behind all things corporate decided it must be wrong.

One night when I called in, the second shift supervisor asked me why I was going to be out.  “Do you mean why am I taking a personal day?  Oh, well, that would be personal,” I said.  I knew this was not the supervisor’s doing or fault, but when I am encroached upon by forces that don’t deserve to encroach me, I tend to push back a bit.  John, the supervisor, laughed and said, “I know, I know, but now they want me to write down why you’re calling in.”

As it turned out, a legitimate reason for calling in on third shift (which was 11 p.m. – 7 a.m. in Bowne of Atlanta, Inc. terms) was “lack of sleep.”  Since I could never really sleep in the daylight, this was actually the truth, as well, so I went with that . . . at first.  After a few call-ins, which were rare, I became bored with simply telling the truth.  If these invisible buggers were going to nose their way into my business, I was going to give them something worth reading, by God!

John and one of the other supervisors, Hank, had great fun when they asked me why I was calling in, because it became a habit for me to try to come up with the strangest reasons for anyone to do so.  My theory was that if I confounded and disgusted the higher-ups enough, they’d stop asking.

A few gems over the months were “I’m having an unusually heavy period” and “Something green and thick and runny is coming out . . . everywhere!”  My personal favorite, however, was an actual disorder.  Still, it was designed to make my point.

“Leprosy!”

“What?” John asked, talking and laughing at the same time.

“You heard me,” I said.  “It’s a legitimate disease.  It’s also been so long since a true case has been recorded, that it could crop up again.  I mean, we aren’t exactly immunized for leprosy, now, are we?”

“No,” John said, playing along, “but they may be concerned about your ability to work if parts of you are, uh, falling off!”

“Just tell ‘em . . . a fingertip.  Just about a quarter of the tip of my left pinky.  That wouldn’t affect my proofreading abilities at all, being a rightie.”

After a few chuckles, John had to get back to work, so I was forced to submit “Lack of sleep” as a reason.  I was highly disappointed that leprosy didn’t get past the guards, though.  I wanted the satisfaction of dropping at least one corporate jaw.

The Invisible Swords of College Conquest

by Thomas M. Pender

College – or, as I’m apt to refer to it, “The Limbo of Life” – was a wonderful and magical sphere of being, where you get to be an adult, but you get to be a kid again, too!  While you are working to better yourself, it’s also the first time you get to be on your own (assuming you go away to school, as I did) to really find out who you are.  It’s also a great place to meet all kinds of people, and learn what kinds of friends you really wish to have!

To no one’s shock, my chosen friends were all loons.

My freshman year, while being incredibly challenging and lesson-teaching (mostly the outside-the-classroom-lessons-of-Life kind), was made up of nine straight months of laughter and adventure, centered around a goofy crew of a few close-knit men who made the most – and the most fun – of any and every situation.

Dating rituals, for example.  While I have no doubt that those I met and chose as friends were polite gentlemen on their dates (although they’d never admit it back then, whilst trying to maintain their coolness), in our women-free zone of male bonding time, we had great fun discussing upcoming dates, successful dates, women of interest and certainly attractive complete strangers who passed our way.  One ritual that just kind of “happened” was the sword brandishing.

On a random day when one of us in the group was discussing an upcoming date, a successful date or a woman of interest, someone . . . most likely Terry “Trigger” Thompson . . . pulled an invisible sword from an invisible sheath attached to his invisible belt, made the sound of a sword being drawn, held it invisibly aloft and made a sort of pirate-y cry of triumph.

Those of us in attendance proceeded to immediately bust our collective guts, love the action, and mimic the action.  A tradition was born.

After that, whenever one of us had an upcoming date, a successful date or had met a woman of interest to talk about, however many of us in attendance would immediately draw our invisible swords (complete with sound effects, of course!), invisibly clang them together, and re-insert them.

Silly?  Yes.  Immature?  Granted.  Fun and memorable boy fun?  Yar!

As is the case with everything that went on during that incredible year, the tradition has faded as friends have gone their ways.  Still, I know for a fact that the men these kids have become have a silly and raucous side to them, hidden beneath their business neckties and barbecuing aprons.  Should two or more of us meet up, and one have a piece of good news to share, I have no doubt that those in attendance will find that the swords of triumph, first wielded in the dormitories of Michigan State, are still firmly affixed.

Huzzah!

Two Little Devils And A Lady With A Fan

by Thomas M. Pender

Dad went into the Navy right out of high school.  He sailed to ports around the globe aboard the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Ticonderoga, then returned to marry Mom.  Then they were fruitful and multiplied.

When Dad returned from his travels, he looked a bit different.  There were pictures on his white skin that hadn’t been there when he’d left.  On his right arm was a drawing of a scroll, with his military ID number on it.  On his left, the head and shoulders of a lady dressed in frilly headdress and dress, with an equally frilly fan covering her face, leaving only the eyes revealed.  On his shoulder blades, facing each other, were twin cherubs . . . or half-cherubs, sort of.  The one on the left was a girl and the one on the right was a boy.  Each had wings and a halo, and stood on a small cloud.  However, each also had wee devilish horns atop his or her head, a pointed tail and a pitchfork.

These pictures could be interpreted in many ways, but when we were very young, my sister Debi and I believed as Dad told us: that the two characters on his back were pictures of us.  The little boy imp did appear to be blonde, and the female did seem to be a brunette . . . so why not?  I had no problem believing that he had put us on his back.  I do remember staring at the eyes of the lady many times, trying to figure out if she was Mom.  Dad may have said it was her, or I may have assumed it was, but there was something mysterious in that face, which only revealed the eyes.

When I was old enough to repeat the story Dad told, and my younger sister Kristi was old enough to comprehend, I would explain (while touching each tattoo) that Mom and Deb and I were each represented, telling her that Dad had gotten the tattoos before she was born.  (In my retroactive defense, this was the truth.  It just didn't occur to me that it was also before any of us kids were born!)  I was very proud to be artistically represented.  He would tell us that the devilish/angelic combo represented the goodness and naughtiness in us, and this made sense to me, in my childlike way.  I didn’t find the negative aspect insulting, and I probably clung to the positive aspect, thinking myself more an angel than a devil of a child . . . as most of us did, I imagine.

Sadly, these tattoos can now only be spotted in stray photographs of Dad.  As for myself, I was never really drawn (no pun intended . . . well, okay, maybe a little) to having art put on my body.  In my late twenties, an idea struck me that still intrigues me, though I have never gone through with it.  At first, I imagined large angel wings tattooed on my back.  After some thought, I decided that this would be much too expensive and painful to deal with.  My compromise was a pair of angel wings on my right shoulder, complete with a halo above them.  Under the wings, I would write simply “Dad.”  Years later, I realized that I would also have to add the name “Kristi” when my sister passed.  (Also “Sammy,” but that’s another story for another time.)

When I imagined these adult tattoos for myself, they were completely original ideas.  They were not meant to be based on nor echo the "angelic" shoulder blade art of my father.  Only years later did I realize that I would be carrying on a bit of a family tradition if I went through with my idea.

And that's cool, too!

The Birth of “Fun Tom”

by Thomas M. Pender

I’m not a real drinker, nor even a “partier,” but I do enjoy going to social gatherings.  I generally have a great time, just talking and joking with people.  Over the years, I’ve learned that the people around me have a good time, too.  I’m at ease in a crowd, I like meeting and entertaining people, and I love to laugh.  This has helped me whenever I’m in situations with new crowds, be it a new city, a new job or just a new social circle.

A few years ago, I got introduced to a new circle of friends through one particular local buddy when he held a gathering at his house.  I knew a couple of people there, but the majority of the soiree was made up of strangers.  Still, the strangers were having fun, so I mingled well.  At some point, the topic turned to pets and/or dogs, and my friend the host suggested I tell everyone a story about a childhood dog.  It was a tale he had heard a few times, and which I have told countless times, because it seems to be universally entertaining.  My friend made this suggestion loud enough that the roomful of relative strangers turned en masse to face me.  This would probably make a great deal of people nervous, but I just saw a sea of ears foreign to my oft-told tale.  All that were missing were a spotlight and a microphone, but I went into my animated yarn as though they were present.

By the time the five-minute story was over, strangers were friends.  They appeared to be pleased that my friend had invited me, and a feeling of family swarmed around me.  This, I suspect, was my friend’s motive all along.

Not very long after I had concluded by anecdote, one woman in the crowd pointed at me and loudly declared, “Fun Tom!”  I thought this was a little overboard after telling only one decent story.  For all they knew, it was my only decent story!  Still, the feeling of acceptance was amplified, and I dug the new silly nickname.

Afterward, whether at another gathering, or merely coming into contact with one of the people I was introduced to that night, it became ritual for someone to declare at outdoor-voice level, “Fun Tom!”  Juvenile and unnecessary and over-the-top?  Yes.  Appreciated and flattering and awesome?  Definitely!

Reputation is a bizarre animal.  You never know when or how you’re going to gain a reputation, nor if it will be positive or negative; such things are impossible to control.  If I had fallen and hit my face on the kitchen counter at this first gathering, or made a pass at someone’s wife, or answered some long-pondered group question off the top of my head, I would have earned a completely different reputation for each scenario.  If nothing so dramatic had happened at all, I probably wouldn’t have one.  It certainly isn’t crucial to have one in order to enjoy a group of friends.  Still, if I’m going to gain a lightning-quick reputation that will last for a few years among a crowd of people I enjoy, being known as “fun” is probably one of the best accidents I’ve ever had in front of an audience.

Craig and Mikey and the Missing Personality

by Thomas M. Pender

I’ve been exposed to many a personality in my years: angels, clowns, jerks, sphincters . . . the list goes on and on.  It is, however, a rare and puzzling thing when I encounter a human being who is completely devoid of any sort of character traits.  Someone who is more a piece of furniture, or perhaps an alien who just hatched from his pod, than he is human being.

Recently out of college, I got a job in the mailroom of a Troy, Michigan insurance company at the dawn of the 1990s.  A great portion of my day was spent running interoffice mail from office to office, but in the mornings, I would bring bins of mail from the post office to be sorted and distributed by myself and my allies.  One running joke among us lackeys was the question we received practically each and every time we would deliver a bigger-than-an-envelope package to a desk.  As if rehearsed, the recipient of such a package would sit back a bit, startled as though a snake had slithered out from behind their stapler, and ask, “What’s this?”

My sarcasm-laden brain would consistently respond with such inaudible gems as “I didn’t think I was allowed to use my x-ray vision on the job” and “Well, when I illegally opened it in the mailroom, it looked like Chinese porn.”  Alas, I was left to simply shrug and leave or simply roll my eyes (also internally) and leave.  They were apparently never going to understand the foolishness of their question.

Craig was a vice president of the company, and a peculiarly dry piece of human toast.  Normally, I didn’t attempt to pass the time with or amuse Craig, even though he seemed to be only a few years older than me.  I tend to gauge individuals, regardless of rank, in terms of openness, friendliness, and sense of humor.  I have been known to tease company presidents (and, in fact, had done so at this company).  When circumstances allow, and a janitor or a chairman of the board is willing to trade ribbings, I’m right there with them.

Not Craig so much.  Over my many months of working at the firm, I had seen him smile and even chuckle, but it was always with one or both of the other two men in his department, or with a client, or with the president.  He never laughed, though.  He apparently only allowed himself to chuckle at low decibels, and only for two seconds max.

Then one day, I was in a particularly cheery mood when I put a package of respectable size on Craig’s desk.  I was fully prepared for his reaction when he sat back a smidge and asked, “What’s this?”

“Some cereal,” I answered.  “Supposed to be good for ya.”

Now, folks born in the mid-‘80s or later may not get this response, but if you were alive and had a television in your house in the late ‘70s, you knew this line.  It was from an incredibly overused commercial for Life Cereal, featuring three freckly brothers.  It opens with the two older brothers discussing this new product their mother has forced on them at breakfast.  The middle brother asks the oldest “What’s this stuff?” and the oldest replies with the exact wording and tone I had used in response to “What’s this?”  After a few lines, they shove the product in front of youngest brother Mikey, who then proceeds to devour it.

I would have understood if such a reference was not exactly hilarious to our boy Craig.  Perhaps an upward jerk of his moustache would have been enough to prove I had brought some modicum of human humor to his otherwise automaton day.  Honest to God, the man blinked at me like I was speaking in Mandarin Chinese.  He had no conception – or at least, he did not allow himself to reveal that he had any conception – of something as lowly as a television commercial.

I left the office a bit stunned.  I was ready to tip the scale far into the “alien” category for the conundrum which was Craig, but first I had to check something out.  I scooted back to the mailroom, where my two co-workers were co-working, and said, “Okay, please tell me this makes sense to you,” and relayed what had been said upstairs in Craig’s domain.  Both judges laughed in earnest when I got to the punch line, so I could therefore conclude that it did, in fact, make sense.  If these two gentlemen, who were three to five years younger than I, could understand the response, surely an elder of a few years could.

Unless, of course, he had been born in another part of the galaxy. . . .

Garrett Versus The Atlantic Ocean!

by Thomas M. Pender

Living in the Midwest most of my life, I haven’t been to the coast much.  In fact, before arriving in Georgia, I had only seen it up close once, on a one-day trip to Atlantic City, where I could see it from the boardwalk.  The only time I’ve ever actually put my toes in the salty Atlantic Ocean was on a day in Savannah with my sons Nick and Garrett in the summer of 2002.

Two-year-old Garrett wanted to go out into the water.  I took his hand and we waded a few steps in, until the water came up to his thighs.  He delighted in the rare opportunity to feel cool water on a hot day, and for a few minutes, it was pure fun.

Then, that wave hit.

Having never been in the ocean’s waters myself, I was not aware that large rogue waves were to be expected on days with relatively peaceful tides.  I wasn’t on the alert, looking out to make sure no miniature ninja tidal waves sprang up to attack my child.  Instead, I was watching my son laugh and splash, and soaking in the moment.

Out of nowhere, the two of us were struck by a large wave!  It wouldn’t have bothered me if I was standing in the water all by myself, but it was high enough to engulf little Garrett completely.  One second, he was laughing, and the next, water was rolling in up and over his head.  In a parental flash, I was picturing my son coughing, choking and gagging after having swallowed a mouthful of seawater.  I was fully prepared to soothe and cheer him after such an assault.

Instead, after the vicious wave had rolled past, Garrett did two things, neither of which was cry.  First, he blew water out of his mouth.  Second, he looked out over the vast Atlantic Ocean, and bellowed at the top of his two-year-old lungs:

“Not in my face!”

This made me laugh instantly, but I was simultaneously struck with an instant respect for my child.  This little man was not only unafraid of the largest ocean on the planet, but he felt confident enough to bark orders to it!  It didn’t matter that the ocean didn’t have ears to hear him.  He was not going to have his fun day in the sun and sea ruined by a mean old wave, so he simply gave the naughty ocean a directive. After that, he went right back to enjoying the splashing for a bit, then I walked him back to our blanket.

Since that day, I haven’t been overly concerned about Garrett being intimidated by much.