Misconceptions at the Laundromat

Something happened to me at the laundromat today and I just had to share it with the world. Or, myself mostly.

Before I begin, you'll need to know how I feel about laundromats. They're pretty much near the top of my "Least Favorite Places" list (trailing behind The Dentist and The DMV). Nothing good ever comes from a laundromat. Sure, you get clean clothes, but they're hot and they're crowded and the machines are always over-priced and they never clean as well as at-home machines do, and worst of all, they're always filled with weirdos. I'm not trying to sound anti-weirdo here, but everyone gets a little weirded out by the homeless bag lady who's standing in the corner talking to herself, or the overly-friendly guy who starts up a 20 minute, never-ending conversation with you while you're sitting there with a book and a laptop and headphones on and a giant sign over your head that says "LEAVE ME ALONE" but he still has to ask you 75 questions anyway. So yeah - not my favorite place in the world. Now back to my story.

So I'm walking into the laundromat, the back of my car filled with trash bags full of dirty clothes, ready for my weekly "how-can-two-hours-feel-this-long?" extravaganza of clothes washing. As I walk down the ramp and into the laundromat to grab one of those wheely-cart-things to pile all my crap into, I see a man sitting just inside the doorway. We do the awkward eye-contact thing, and he's sort of frowning at me but maybe not looking at me, and I'm kind of frowning too because I'm at the laundromat and the sun was just in my eyes and it's a million degrees outside.  I think nothing of it and grab a wheely-cart-thingy and head back to my car.

As I'm walking up the ramp, I see-hear-feel him walking behind me. Briskly behind me. So I get that little prickly uh-oh-he-might-be-a-weirdo feeling at the back of my neck, but I try to ignore it and just get to my car where I can sort of hide behind it.

He's yelling something behind me, and I realize that he's saying "You don't come in! You stay! You've been warned!" and at this point I'm rolling into OH SHIT PANIC MODE and trying to push my wheely-cart-thingy faster up the hill but it's all bumpy and oh god make this guy go away already...

Finally I get to my car and hide next to it, and he goes to the car next to mine and keeps yelling "you've been warned. Oh now you're hiding. You stay here!" and I'm doing anything in the world but looking at him and just frozen there half bent over my car and not knowing what in the world to do.  And he's whooping and sort of barking now and I think this guy must be COMPLETELY insane. I'm thinking that this might be the end of my life and what the hell should I do in this situation? Do I yell for help? Do I curl up into a little ball? Do I tell him to go away? I decide to just ignore him, and I take a big brave deep breath, where I'm planning to head to my trunk to get my clothes and go back inside as quickly as humanly possible.

That's when I look over at him, just for a second and see him looking into the back of the car he's standing near.

And inside is a tiny puppy. That apparently has been barking. And that he's been addressing the entire time.

And he didn't even see me.

And I feel this hilarious sense of relief and did-that-just-really-happen-to-me and wow-don't-I-feel-stupid all at once.

So I head into the building, smiling at my own unrelenting necessity to panic over nothing, and think that maybe the next two hours won't be as bad a usual. At least I'll have something to think about.