Been doing another round of radio interviews in a desperate attempt to drum up interest in the show. At the second one today I was greeted by the presenter in the waiting area. As we walked to the studio she asked me, “Do you want a glass of water?”
I said that would be good and she stopped by the water dispenser and filled a plastic cup. Assuming that when she offered me a glass of water she had intended to procure it for me, I reached forward to accept the drink, but noticed she was already apparently moving on without offering me the cup. She in turn noticed my outstretched hand and stopped in her tracks. There was a moment of awkwardness where neither of us budged an inch.
“Is that for me?” I asked.
“Yes,” she replied unconvincingly, and gave me the glass.
We then walked in silence to the studio, where the last record was still playing. The atmosphere was a little strange. I was feeling embarrassed for assuming that the woman was being polite enough to pour me the water that she had offered me (or at least to let me pour my own before she pushed ahead and thought of herself). Presumably she was either feeling embarrassed by her faux-pas, or more likely I felt from her attitude, that I had been rude and presumptuous by expecting her to actually pour a glass of water after she had offered it. I wondered if perhaps I was reading too much into this. Maybe I had misunderstood the signals. But I still felt uncomfortable.
The woman then introduced me to a man in the studio, (but didn’t say if he was a producer or a co-presenter) and then said “I’m just popping to the bathroom.”
The man and I sat in awkward silence. And he couldnÂ’t even know about the water incident that had caused all this bad blood. HeÂ’d just taken a dislike to me for no reason at all (unless this was a test that the woman always played on her guests. So him seeing me walking into the booth with the cup in my hand would be enough evidence to confirm my guilt).
After a minute or so of silence, the presenter walked back in. Tellingly she had a fresh cup of water in one hand. So unless she had just become thirsty in the last 90 seconds, (and I am not convinced that she had been gone long enough to both urinate and fill a new cup of water. I would say this was only possible if she had urinated into the cup, but the smell and colour of the liquid was not consistent with the presence of uric acid), this proved to me that she had fully intended to take the first glass of water for herself and that I, her guest remember, had been expected to pour my own, AFTER she had self-interestedly got her greedy hands on her own cup of water.
Also she had shown she wasn’t embarrassed, nor that the getting-her-own-water-first incident had been an absent-minded mistake. Anyone suffering guilt for the rebellion against all social niceties would have kept up the pretence that she didn’t want any water, at least until I had left the building. Then she would have blushingly quenched her thirst saying “I can’t believe I offered him water, then just took a glass for myself. How rude am I?”
No, she was bringing in the other glass of water in order to say to me, “No, of course that water wasn’t for you, how dare you presume such a thing? It is you, not I, that is the rudest person alive and have forced me to lie about needing the toilet, so that I can get the cup of water that I craved.”
The strange atmosphere continued throughout the interview. I notice that her opening gambit to me included no actual question or conversation starter and I was forced to dig myself out of the hole she had dug for me. She didn’t say it, but her face said “Yes, my failure to ask a question is entirely due to the cup of water incident. Not so clever now, are you, cock boy.”
I had no chance of recovering. The interview was strange and stilted. Also assuming it was a co-presented show I had sat in the wrong seat and was much too close to the moisture-coveting woman who hated me so much. To make matters worse this was most popular community radio station in Melbourne. This was the kind of mistake that would have gone unnoticed at the second most popular community radio station in Melbourne, but not the first most popular community radio station in Melbourne.
That night I had the smallest and quietest audience of the run so far. I fear that these two events are not unconnected.
So as you have learned my unpopularity in Melbourne is not due to me being shit, but to giant sperm men and selfish women who think they are too good to pour me water.
