4-Meteofag
Ugh, we’ve made it to one of the most annoying person I have ever met (and, sadly, talked to) in my entire life: Meteofag.
Similar to Biblefreak and his obsession with the Bible, Meteofag is obsessed with meteorology and, specifically, whether it’s going to rain or not. He talks about the chances of rain – and how long it’s going to rain, and how heavy it’s going to rain, and what kind of rain it’s going to rain – nonstop. This guy is a huge and total tool. The first time he came to talk to me, the very first words he said were:
“It’s raining in Charlottestown.”
Looking back at it, I really shouldn’t have reacted, or I should have pretended I didn’t speak French. But, but, it was early in my writing career and I still gave everyone at the café the benefits of the doubt! What a little naïve fool I was.
What followed was a long and uninterrupted peroration punctuated with quick checks on his computer for real-time weather forecasts for the next 20 days. At one point, he explained to me in great details how there was no way it was going to rain tonight and how raining was absolutely impossible – something about atmospheric pressure, humidity index, period of the year, quantity of sunlight, quality of sunlight, number of clouds in the sky, types of clouds in the sky, blah blah blah. As he was talking, I turned my head towards the window and realized it was actually raining heavily at this very moment.
But Meteofag doesn’t trust windows nor his own eyes: he trusts governmental websites and data, preferring to draw his own conclusions using complex temperature and wind maps. He talks at length of the “meteo-nazis” (his words, I fucking swear) who manipulate the population using false meteorological forecasts.
“Ever wondered why everyone say weather forecasts are always so wrong? Because they are!”
According to him, the government (who else owns weather stations?) manipulates the population by purposely feeding them false information, for example forecasting heavy rain so people don’t make plans to go to attraction parks and zoos on a day that is in reality going to be beautiful and sunny. The government’s final objective? Force all zoos and fairs into bankruptcy so they can be grabbed for the pennies on the dollars and establish a monopoly on them.
“And the population just sleeps peacefully without a doubt on what’s really happening. Bread and games,” he adds eloquently, gazing at the horizon, lost in years and years of corruption, lies and manipulation. Crazy lunatic or next Snowden? You decide!
Meteofag can tell the exact time it’s going to start and stop raining, down to the second. His weirdest prediction was “It will stop raining in 15 minutes, then start again in 2 hours, and then stop in 2 hours 20 minutes.” Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if he knew the exact number of raindrops that were going to fall. As if he wasn’t irking enough already, Meteofag also loves to tells the dumbest stories known to man – stories that would make Twilight look like a masterpiece, or even more than the masterpiece it already is. During my first (and last, thanks God) conversation with him, he told me:
“You go to the grocery store, you buy one tomato, it costs you $4. You go to a farmers market, you can buy fifty pounds of tomatoes for ten bucks. That’s so clearly a scam!”
When I told him his tomatoes would rot before he could even eat a fraction of the 50 pounds, he simply replied:
“Well, you gotta eat just tomatoes until you run out of them! And who cares if the last few are a little bit ripe, that never killed anybody. You see, that’s yet another fraud pulled by the government…”
On this, I have to give him credit: we throw away way too much food that’s still perfectly edible. In fact, Meteofag sometimes strangely makes sense. Speaking about another of his obsession (keep in mind I talked to him once), he says:
“Traffic is a tool used to control the population. If you spend an hour in traffic the morning and an hour the evening, you are wasting one twelfth of your life. See, that’s the government in play, again…”
I dare not bring up week-ends and vacations, a little bit afraid he will claim these are another conspiracy (have you noticed Saturday and Sunday both start with an “s”?); still, here again, I have to give him points. How it represents a conspiracy, I’m not sure (what could the government gain from traffic? Oil companies and car companies maybe, but the government? Or does the government gets kickbacks for it?), but I know he loves his goddamn bicycle, except for the fact bicycles are another conspiracy.
From an employee, I actually learned he was fired from his job at some research post at a university. Obviously, the openings in meteorology aren’t huge (I’m going to assume that it’s his job), and since then, he just hangs around in coffee, trying to save lives by warning people about the dangers of water. Some day, I will introduce him to Biblefreak – but I will make sure to mention Biblefreak that Meteofag is a Palestinian first.
Unlike our religious fucktard who is at least manageable, Meteofag has a slight particularity that makes him infinitely more annoying: he actively moves and follows you around, and comes to sit next to you. At first, I thought it was a joke: the first time he talked to me, I was sitting at an empty table, far away from him (I didn’t know who he was at the time), and he stood up, paced around, and came to sit next to me to talk to me. I thought it was a joke at first…
“But F.S., tell him to shut up!”
I’m too polite to rebuke him right away. I’ve told him I was working – he replied that he was working too (on his bullshit rain odds). I’ve told him I had to focus on what I was doing, he said he had to focus too. I’ve told him I couldn’t talk to him right now, he said he understood, and he kept talking. I’ve put my iPod on max volume and ignored him for half an hour straight – he kept going on, and I got tired before he did. Thank God, he’s mostly present when, well, it’s raining or about to rain (or when he thinks it’s about to rain). I haven’t met him during winter yet, but I’m scared to death. Like a Pokemon, he probably evolves to the “snow” mode at some points – or maybe he won’t be able to come to the café anymore on his bike.
Alternative theory: Master Sailor
A veteran sailor, Capt. Baldhead lost his entire family one tragic night. After reading very clear and positive weather forecasts, he decided to sail to sea with his entire family. That night, he faced the biggest tempest he had ever seen, losing his boat and everything he had, as well as everyone who would at least somewhat tolerate him. The only thing he managed to keep? A crate of tomatoes and a bicycle (which he had on his boat for some reason).
The sole survivor of the tragedy, he now seeks to save lives by developing a perfect weather system that would solve all traffic problems and make tomatoes grow faster.
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