Conversations using only words ranked 6,301–6,400

Okay, I have to say it: sitting at a riverside table with a cold beer at two in the afternoon feels a little bit illegal.

It does! But this brewery is right on the water, so honestly they are asking for it. They make everything here, you can smell it from the parking lot.

So what did you order? That glass is glowing pink.

Strawberry and green tea. The menu calls it a crossover between a fruit beer and a Japanese dessert.

That sounds like a crime against tea. Let me have a sip.

One small sip, Ken. Not half the glass.

Wow. That is genuinely nice. Weird, but nice. How strong is it?

Nine percent.

Nine? You said that so casually, like you were reading the weather.

The guy at the bar said the same thing. He told me the yeast they use keeps eating and eating until the beer gets that strong.

So the tiny thing that makes bread rise is also the thing that ruins my Saturday.

Exactly. Mine is a full pint, too. I think I should have gone for the small glass.

A whole pint at nine percent in the daytime? You will be feeding the ducks and telling them your life story.

The ducks are excellent listeners, actually. And there is no drunken singing today, I promise.

You promised that last summer too, and then the whole street learned your karaoke set.

That was one time. Anyway, half of this is just the novelty. Pink beer, river, sunshine. Next week I will be back on normal lager.

No you will not. Next week they are doing a miso one.

Miso beer? Okay, I am free on Saturday. Bring water this time.

Water and a taxi. Drink slowly, I like you talkative, not horizontal.

Windows down, coffee in the holder, mountains everywhere. Mika, this has to be the most scenic road I've driven all year.

Every curve looks like a postcard. Although we'd enjoy it more if that white van ahead moved faster than a snail.

Honestly, a snail in my grandmother's garden has more ambition than that guy.

Be kind. Maybe he just wants to let his eyes wander over the valley instead of staring at the road.

His eyes can wander. His wheels should not. There are eleven cars behind us now.

That is proper congestion, on a mountain road, on a Tuesday morning. How is that even possible?

It's the southeastern route. Everyone driving up from the beaches in the southeast joins right here.

Don't even think about passing him on this curve. You can't see a thing, it would be completely unsafe.

I know, I know. I'm a patient man today. Look at the tilt of that guardrail though. Somebody already learned that lesson.

Oh, stop, stop! Look in the grass on the left. See it?

A rabbit?

Bigger. Long legs, enormous ears. That's a hare, and it just crossed the road faster than every car in this line.

Beautiful. We've been overtaken by wildlife. The moment that van turns off, I'm going to accelerate so smoothly you won't even feel it.

You said that last spring too, then you accelerated like we were late for a flight, my coffee went everywhere, and the day went downhill from there.

That was one time. And the road was empty.

One memorable time. Anyway, there's a lookout in two kilometres. Let's park, let the congestion clear, and wander around with the camera for a while.

Deal. And if that hare shows up again, I'm asking it for driving lessons.

Ask nicely. It clearly knows the road better than you do.

Mina, brace yourself. I just opened the fruit drawer.

How bad is it? On a scale from slightly sad to truly dreadful?

Truly dreadful. Something in here has melted, and I do not want to know what.

Okay, hand me the bananas first. These two are perfectly ripe, so we eat them today.

And the brown, squishy ones?

Peel them and freeze them. Bananas in the freezer means smoothies all week.

See, bananas are so versatile. Breakfast, dessert, ice cream, all from one sad brown fruit.

Exactly. What about that pear hiding at the back?

Hard as a rock. You would need serious teeth to chew this thing.

Then leave it on the windowsill for three days. It will soften.

Fine. Now explain these boxes. Why do we own nine empty cardboard boxes?

Because someone said we might move someday.

That was four years ago. Flatten them. They go out tonight.

Can I just shove them behind the fridge for now?

No shoving. That is exactly how the last mouse moved in.

Fair point. Oh, pass me that garlic. The whole bulb is sprouting green shoots.

Plant it in a pot. Free garlic, and it looks nice by the window.

Speaking of things that need fixing, the bulb over the sink flickers every time the door opens.

I will change it tomorrow. Put it on the list.

Also, let us keep an open box of baking soda in the fridge. The absorption of all those smells really does work.

Does it really? I thought that was just something people say.

It is science, more or less. Anyway, do not argue about something so trivial while a melted peach sits by your elbow.

Point taken. Trivial debates later, peach emergency now.

And once this kitchen is clean, I am making banana pancakes.

In that case, watch me clean twice as fast.

Mika, come look at this. The news just cut to a live report and I cannot stop watching.

What happened? Wait, is that the dictator everyone was talking about? The one who ruled that country for thirty years?

That is him. Or that was him. They are saying an assassin got past his guards last night.

An assassin? In his own palace? He had total dominion over that country. Nobody could even sneeze without his permission.

Right, and for years he would suppress any story he did not like. Journalists disappeared. Newspapers just stopped printing.

So now that his demise is all over the world news, the whole thing must feel unreal to people there.

Look at the crowd in the square. Some are crying, some are dancing. Honestly, it looks like a festival.

But that kind of joy can turn fast, right? I keep thinking there will be a backlash once people realise nobody is in charge.

They already set up something. A general went on TV and called himself the provisional leader until an election.

Temporary, sure. Every temporary leader in history said exactly that sentence with a very calm face.

You are such a cynic. Although, the reporter said his authority is completely unofficial. No parliament voted for him.

And of course the state channel is calling him the savior of the nation. They put his face over dramatic music.

Meanwhile the hospitals are in dire condition. No medicine, no power, and people queueing for bread since dawn.

That is the part that breaks my heart. The flags and the speeches do not feed anyone.

True. I hope in a year we are watching a boring report about a normal election there.

Boring news is the best news. Now turn that off and help me make tea. My hands are shaking a little.

Tea coming up. And Mika, thanks for watching this with me. It would have been heavy alone.

Mika, are you ready? The taxi comes in twenty minutes and you still have one shoe on.

Almost! I just need to finish my face. Pass me that little pot of rouge on the table, would you?

This one? It is very pink. Your cheeks are going to be brighter than the flowers.

That is the idea. It is not every day two of our best friends wed, Ken.

True. I still cannot believe they are actually getting married today. Did you hear Yuki is wearing her grandmother's veil?

The old lace one? Oh, that is lovely. She said she will keep it over her face until the very last moment.

Very dramatic. And the dress code said colorful, so I am wearing this green jacket. Too much?

No, I love it. The whole party is going to look so vibrant, all those bright yellows and oranges in the photos.

Speaking of photos, did you hear about the thing with Aunt Sachiko?

No! Tell me. You have that face you make when there is gossip.

Someone made a remark about her outfit at the rehearsal dinner. Something about looking like a traffic light.

Oh no. Was it a joke or was the person being earnest?

A joke, I think, but it landed badly. She went strangely quiet for the rest of the meal.

Poor thing. That kind of silence is worse than a loud disagreement, honestly.

Right? Nobody argued, nobody shouted, it just sat there. I hope he had the sense to apologise afterwards.

He did, actually. Yuki told me he said sorry properly the next morning, and Sachiko hugged him.

Good. She deserves a nice day. She practically raised Yuki after all.

That is why they gave her an honorary place in the family line for the photos, even though she is not a blood relative.

I did not know she was not related. She feels like family to everyone.

Exactly. Right, my cheeks are done, both shoes are on. How do I look?

Like the second most beautiful woman in the room. Sorry, the bride gets first place today.

Okay, I am officially stealing half your sandwich. I have been at my desk since seven.

Take it. Honestly, take the whole thing. This crunch is killing us both, and the deadline is still Friday.

Right? And who decided to assign the whole client report to one person? Me, apparently.

That was Dan. He gave you the biggest piece and then asked me to handle the optimization of the database on top of my own work. Making it faster is fine, but not in three days.

Three days. With that planning tool from 2011 that nobody can log into.

It is so outdated. I opened it yesterday and it asked me to install something that does not exist anymore.

So we are working around a broken system, which makes every meeting completely ineffective. We talk for an hour and nothing actually moves.

And team morale is at the floor. Nobody laughs in the group chat anymore. That is my official warning sign.

Yours too? I thought it was just me being tired. What I cannot get over is Monday.

When Dan shouted at Priya in front of everyone? Yeah. I still feel sick about it.

She raised a real safety issue and he just chose to disregard it. Waved his hand like she had said nothing.

That crossed a line. A manager humiliating someone publicly is misconduct, not a management style.

Agreed. So it is imperative that someone reports it. If we stay quiet, it happens again next month.

I will go with you to HR. Two voices are harder to brush off than one.

Thank you. Honestly, you saying that is enough to spur me into doing it today instead of thinking about it for a week.

Good. Send the email, then come find me. I am buying you a very large coffee and a sandwich that is entirely yours.

Now that is leadership. Dan should take notes.

Okay, Mika, the loan papers are here, and they are thicker than my cookbook.

Let me see. Oh, look at this line. It says all the conditions stated herein are final once we sign.

Final. That word makes my stomach flip. Did you find the part about what we put up as collateral?

Yes, page four. The bank wants my car, not your apartment, thankfully. And we repay it over five years.

Five years of paying them back. Honestly, right now I don't have a dime to spare, not even ten cents.

That's why we start small. By the way, where does the shop's landlord reside? I'd like to meet him face to face.

He lives two streets away, above the bakery. He's lived there for thirty years.

Perfect. Now, the coffee beans. Have you called that distributor who supplies the shops downtown?

I did. They deliver twice a week, and their prices are fair. But under the current circumstance, we can only order in small amounts.

Small is fine. Once we have money coming in, we can order more.

And how do we tell people we exist? We can't afford to advertise on television.

We don't need television. Free samples on the corner, some photos online, and the neighbors will do the talking for us.

You know, your optimism is almost annoying. In a good way.

It's not just hope. Look at the numbers on the last page. That's something tangible, something we can actually point at.

You're right. Okay. Pass me the pen before I think about it too much.

Here. And when we make our first dollar, I'm framing it on the wall.

Deal. Right next to the picture of us looking terrified today.

Mika, my hand is still cramping. Three hours of notes and I only understood about half of it.

Same here. But honestly, that was the best anthropology lecture all term. Ancient bones, early cultures, the whole story of where we came from.

The part about our cousins really got me. Those other human groups went extinct, but pieces of them are still sitting inside us.

Right, we're genetically a little bit of them. My grandmother would say that explains my temper.

Then she jumped to disease and I got completely lost. Something about how early villages could transmit infections so fast once everyone lived close together.

Yes, and the prevalence of certain illnesses shot up the moment farming started. More people in one place, more sickness going around.

And some people were more susceptible than others, didn't she say? Same village, same air, but certain families got hit harder.

She did. Partly genes, partly food. Anyway, did you catch the lab part at the end? The frog egg experiment?

The one with the little sac of fluid around it? I honestly thought it was just a bubble on the slide.

That pouch protects the egg, Kenji. And then she added a chemical to stimulate the cells so they'd start dividing faster.

That's where my notes fall apart. I wrote oxide twice. Was there zinc oxide on the dish or did I dream that?

It was in the coating, yes. She compared it to rust, oxygen grabbing onto metal and changing it.

Okay. So statistically, what are my chances of passing this exam?

Statistically? Not great. Realistically, come study with me on Thursday and you'll be completely fine.

Deal. I'll bring coffee and a pen that actually works this time.

Bring two pens. Knowing you, one of them will go extinct by the second hour.

Hey Mika, you look wrecked. Rough night?

My online lesson, Dan. Ninety minutes with the strictest tutor on the planet. She makes me repeat one word until my mouth hurts.

Which word broke you this time?

Thoroughly. Try to pronounce that three times fast. She said my R sounded like a sad L.

Brutal. Did the sound work okay, at least? Your mic was dying last week.

Worse. My laptop announced that the peripheral device was not connected, so I sat there totally mute for five minutes while she waited.

She must have loved that.

She typed one line in the chat: are you alive? Then she made me erase it so the next student would not see it.

Okay, that is a little funny. Does she still forbid translation apps?

Completely. She forbids them in class, and honestly I get it. My phone is not a translator I can carry into a real conversation.

My cousin actually works as a translator at conferences, and she says the same thing. The app gives you the words but never the feeling.

Exactly. Although I did sneak a peek once, and she caught me in two seconds.

Two seconds? She is a machine.

She also cut half my essay. She said it was full of needless words that added nothing.

Painful, but she is probably right. You do love a long sentence.

Rude. And here is the sad part: I am starting to enjoy it. I stayed up reading about vowel sounds. I have become a total nerd.

Welcome to the club. I once made flashcards on a beach.

That is genuinely tragic.

Fine, I also drew a little face on every card, which was immature, I know.

Send me a picture. And maybe your tutor's number, if she survives me.

Deal. Fix that mic first, though. I want to hear you say thoroughly.

Next week, loud and clear. Probably.

Is this seat taken? I always end up standing for the whole softball game because I get here late.

All yours. Sit, Dan. You look like a man who needs a folding chair and a nap.

That obvious? The baby was up at three, then five, then six. How do you stay sane with three kids?

Coffee, honestly. My dependence on it is a little embarrassing. Two cups before I can form a sentence.

Same. Yesterday I tried to change a diaper half asleep and got poop on my sleeve. I wore it to work.

Oh no. And nobody told you? That is the kind of stupidity only a tired parent can pull off.

My wife laughed for a full minute. She goes back after maternity leave next month, so it gets worse.

You will survive. Watch the field, your daughter is up. Nice swing! Did she inherit that from you?

From her mother. I throw like a broken windmill. Hey, what are you making there with the needles?

A hat. I knit during games. It keeps my hands busy so I do not yell at the umpire.

Smart. So tell me about the teenage years. My oldest is nine and already rolling his eyes at me.

Fourteen is the fun one. My son spends an hour on his hair and complains about acne every morning.

Poor kid. I remember that. I thought my face would never clear up before the school dance.

And he thinks crying is not manly, so he just slams doors instead. I keep telling him tears are fine.

That is a good message. Is the phone stuff hard? I hear all the stories about kids and the internet.

We had one honest talk about pornography and what real relationships look like. Awkward but worth it.

I am taking notes. Diapers today, that conversation in ten years. I need to grow up first.

You are doing fine. Look, she just made it to second base. Stand up and cheer, tired dad.

Look at that. Okay, I am awake now. Same seats next week? Bring the yarn, I will bring the coffee.

Deal. Two cups, Dan. Do not test me.