The Shrine

So I'm woken up by a serious shouting match between a girl and a mush-mouthed, presumably drunk asshole going on next door. I listened for a few minutes to figure out if it's just an argument, or if it was going to turn violent. I got keyed up as soon as I realized he was talking about being slapped, and she was talking about being punched. The arguing starts rising to a pitch, and then it sounds like it's gotten violent.

I grab the phone from my room in my left hand (to call the cops if I feel like I can't handle the situation), march outside and pound on their front door with my right hand. Since I'm wearing just what I sleep in, the asshole is greeted by me looking pretty much like this:



"What's going on here?"

"A whole lot of ... not a whole lot." I'm not convinced. Not sure if he's drunk. I size him up in a second, and I'm pretty sure I can take him.

"It sounds like something. Do you live here?" I know the answer should be no. I don't know my neighbor - at all, really - but I know I live next to a girl about my age.

"No, she does."

"Then get out. Now." And I point outside. And he walks out and away.

I knock on the door, calling to my neighbor to see if she's alright. She still has a hitch in her breath from crying, but she seems okay - no obvious signs of abuse. She's thankful, says she'll call her dad, and she went to stay with someone else for the rest of the night.

Now it's 3 am, and I'm too keyed up to get back to sleep.

But. Ordering a stranger out of an apartment and making him walk away with less than five words? That's intimidation.

I dunno about the rest of you, but if I was wasted and Leonidas showed up outside and sized me up I'd back down too.

*Opens door*

"....errr"

"THIS IS MY APARTMENT!!!"

*Gets kicked off the balcony in slow-mo*

I love how sad the other guy looks in that picture.

Yes, that would be intimidation. I have a few friends that can pull that off with just about anyone. I've seen my one friend do it to a guy twice his size. He knew he could take the other guy and it came out in his voice. The other guy knew it, too.

It's cool that you stepped in. Most people wouldn't have.

That's awesome!

Very good, man. Most poeple don't like to "get involved" even when they should.

Eric - all I thought about when I read your post was Kup sitting there screaming "Leave, unholy fiend!" :-)

Eric wrote:I dunno about the rest of you, but if I was wasted and Leonidas showed up outside and sized me up I'd back down too.

Rad, dude. I haven't had to intimidate anybody in a long time, but if I do I guess it's handy that I almost always have big, razor-sharp knives within reach.

Blotus wrote:Rad, dude. I haven't had to intimidate anybody in a long time, but if I do I guess it's handy that I almost always have big, razor-sharp knives within reach.

It lacks some of the badassery of doing with it nothing but your boxer shorts, your physique, and your Spartan glare, though. If Synder ever does a prequel to "300" Kup ought to kick Gerard Butler out of the way and ask for the lead.

Well, personal avatars are all the rage, so...

Hey, look at that!

Pure awesome.

lol very cool man, good show.

Now I have to ask the question that no one else will but I'm sure was thinking-- is your neighbor hot?

I tend to stay away from the girls who lack the sense to tell whether or not any given guy they invite up to their room is going to be a violent drunken asshole by 3am in the morning.

It's really not that simple. Several of my female friends have been victim of physical and sexual abuse. A friend from my undergrad days was murdered by another friend: http://www.roanoke.com/news/roanoke/wb/xp-14696

Sue was as educated as a woman can be about the dangers of exactly the kind of violence that ended in her murder.

People aren't Transformers; you can't rub their forehead and find out if they're evil. We are also mostly irrational creatures, particularly when it comes to our lovers.

Kupek wrote:It's really not that simple. Several of my female friends have been victim of physical and sexual abuse. A friend from my undergrad days was murdered by another friend: http://www.roanoke.com/news/roanoke/wb/xp-14696

Sue was as educated as a woman can be about the dangers of exactly the kind of violence that ended in her murder.

People aren't Transformers; you can't rub their forehead and find out if they're evil. We are also mostly irrational creatures, particularly when it comes to our lovers.

=/

My best friend got beaten up by her boyfriend, who was one of my best friends before this happened, and none of us knew he was capable of such an act. He was always a bit of an asshole, but damn. You cannot know what someone is capable of until they actually do it. Working at a bar there's no shortage of drunken assholes who are probably (or would probably) be better to their women than most of the bullshit I end up seeing.

Luckily now she's gotten her shit together, as something of this magnitude threw her life into disarray for a long time, and he got what he deserved - he's alone and unhappy. She was my roommate at the time and I had to go home one night fully thinking I was going to have to physically oust him from the house, but luckily one of our other roommates talked him into leaving peacefully before I got there. I also sabotaged a couple of his relationships by pulling the girls aside and telling him about his anger issues. Now I don't have that involvement with him at all, but he's going (gone?) to anger management and I can't exactly spend all my time going around playing enforcer or whatever. His parents made him go to the classes - if you're an asshole you really shouldn't borrow my phone to call your parents because you better believe I'm keeping the number.

In any case, good work with the intimidation. I find that my size does most of the work for me when I'm throwing people out of the bar. If the drunk guy doesn't get intimidated by my size, then his friends are. Or we call the cops.

Kupek wrote:It's really not that simple. Several of my female friends have been victim of physical and sexual abuse. A friend from my undergrad days was murdered by another friend: http://www.roanoke.com/news/roanoke/wb/xp-14696

Sue was as educated as a woman can be about the dangers of exactly the kind of violence that ended in her murder.

People aren't Transformers; you can't rub their forehead and find out if they're evil. We are also mostly irrational creatures, particularly when it comes to our lovers.

That didnt answer the question...

Okay, I think I miscommunicated. I can see the implication there and I wish I hadn't just typed that out without thinking about it. I apologize, I understand how hard a problem this is, and I regret that my statement came out the way it did. It was pretty knee-jerk and unfair.

It was a reaction to the inappropriateness of Tess' question. If I had been in your situation, trying to intimidate away a drunken asshole, the LAST thing on my mind would have been "Is this girl hot?" It would have been something like "I hope she's okay", and then the question of her attractiveness would have still not been on my mind because, for better or worse, the whole thing would have been put in my "romantic drama I don't need" category. I just think that what Tess said was a little out of touch with the situation, and that's what I was trying to imply. I should have said it that way in the first place.

And, I completely agree. Logic and questions of rationality become completely moot when romance is in the picture. I'm sorry about your friend, Kup.

"Love makes fools of us all."

Tess's joke didn't bother me, actually. On the other forum I post at, that was the first question I got, and it wasn't as polite. The joke part aside, it is natural to wonder, and being a normal guy, I thought about it. We evaluate the attractiveness of other people as instinct.

On the other hand, I'm not going to answer the question. And you're right that it's more trouble than I want right now.

Also, Shrin, give me a call if you want to come take a look at the townhouse I'm in.

I suddenly found new respect for kupek. seriously. it doesn't matter if you look like a badass. what matters is that you did the right thing. It doesn't matter if the girl was hot or not. none of that matters. what matters is that you did the right thing.

Nice work Kupek. Intimidation can have some very good uses =)

It can often be the best way to diffuse a potential conflict. Or break one up.

Kup, with that new pic, you're gonna have to change your name from "The Littlest Mod" to something a little more appropriate :-)

Seriously guys I meant no disrespect, I was just trying to lighten the mood. Even though it looks like I only offended Mental, which doesn't surprise me, I wanted to make that clear-- just a joke.

You didn't offend me. You're not really that important to me.

Zeus wrote:Kup, with that new pic, you're gonna have to change your name from "The Littlest Mod" to something a little more appropriate :-)

Why? I didn't attend that competition...

Kupek wrote: Also, Shrin, give me a call if you want to come take a look at the townhouse I'm in.

I'm definitely still in. Sorry about being lax about calling you and checking it out. I'll give you a call some time in the next couple weeks for sure. Been a bit hectic for me lately.

kali o. wrote:

Zeus wrote:Kup, with that new pic, you're gonna have to change your name from "The Littlest Mod" to something a little more appropriate :-)

Why? I didn't attend that competition...

And your name ain't Kup :-)

Zeus wrote:

kali o. wrote:

Zeus wrote:Kup, with that new pic, you're gonna have to change your name from "The Littlest Mod" to something a little more appropriate :-)

Why? I didn't attend that competition...

And your name ain't Kup :-)

He's still the "Littlest Mod"