More funny, awkward and interesting quotes overheard from the SWAT family.
11-18-13, cooking in the kitchen before the one of the last fall practices starts...Wes: "Hey guys, what's up?" Haley: "Oh, not much. Just that Holly is trying to burn the whole building down." Holly, indignantly: "I am not!" Haley fires back: "Ya sure? Cause if I hadn't helped you with that stove's settings..."
11-18-13, Becca and Haley are talking about being single. Haley: "Yeah...I know there's somebody out there eventually for me. But I think he must have died of a childhood disease, or gotten run over by a car, or else he lives on the other side of the planet and doesn't speak English." Becca: "So? You could communicate by baking food like this, and y'all could just point at stuff."
11-18-13, practicing our second silent skit for the end-of-semester BCM meeting. After about eight rehearsals of bruises, scrapes, carpet burns and slapping Kevin and Samantha, several of us say excitedly, "I like playing a demon! It's fun." In the middle of it, Deb and Daniel P. both come in at different times and stand there for a minute, wondering if we've perhaps lost our minds. (We're kind of the loose cannon of BCM ministries...) "Uh....what're you guys doing?" "We're practicing! What's it look like?!" "Um....I'm not sure..." "Yes, of course we're practicing. What else do we do?"
11-21-13, heading back to Tahlequah after getting lost in Sallisaw, Becca driving, Jacob shotgun, with me, Susan and Elizabeth in the back. Susan says to Elizabeth randomly, "...I think I'd like my cat to have your personality, and not mine; I wouldn't like a cat that was like me. But you would make a good cat... " We stare at her. "I'm really tired, okay?! Don't judge me."
12-2-13, after the last fall BCM meeting, we're still wearing our demon costumes from the silent skit(each with a sign on their shirt depicting their specialty; Adultery, Lust, Pride, Gluttony, Murder, etc). Samantha's husband Nick congratulates us on the performance. (To me) "Oh, by the way....you don't happen to struggle with pride, by any chance, do you?" I shrug and grin it off, seeing he's teasing. "A little bit, but doesn't everybody?" He nods. "I thought so....it's kinda written all over you."
1-13-14, There's free biscuits and gravy down in the basement that Deb made after the first BCM meeting of spring semester, everyone from every type of ministry is down there. TJ, Jacob, Susan, Elizabeth, me and James are all talking, with Holly, Caleb, Skylar, Ja Li Si, Samantha and Haley all somewhere nearby. James brought a friend along, so we introduce ourselves and go on with whatever we were doing, to show we're friendly and will give him space, you know. We're all yelling over the top of each other, conversation mainly revolving around James-germs being in everyone's apple juice and jokes about Bubba Jacob being a polygamist. At one point, Elizabeth asks completely seriously, "Am I allowed to slap him(James)?" I think half a second. "Yeah, go ahead." She reaches across the table and slaps him lightly across the face. James' friend Jordan looks horrified. Susan, at McDonald's later that night: "We probably terrified that guy...."
1-13-14, after the BCM meeting, Jacob, Elizabeth, Susan, TJ, James and I all head to McDonald's for a coffee run to catch up. What followed was two hours of conversation and laughter ranging from Princess Bride quotes to riddles from The Hobbit to complaining about school to complaining about the government to some really dark off-the-wall comments....somewhere in there Elizabeth says, "Wes, you are like, the king of leaving really awkward phone messages. Just sayin'..."
1-13-14, the guys jump in James' red Firebird and we got there and had to wait for the girls, TJ swings open the door and enters dramatically(well, she is a theater major...). "I am a sorceress." and immediately vanishes towards the bathroom. We look at each other. "Okay....?" Elizabeth and Susan come inside, catch our puzzled expressions. "No, seriously! We got green lights all the way down Muskogee!" "EVERY SINGLE ONE of them! I have no clue how she did it!" (You kind of have to know Tahlequah geography to get this one, but Muskogee Avenue is one of the two main streets, and the stoplights are programmed to go red every time there's a car coming. Every time.)
1-13-14, Still at McDonald's, we're in the middle of a discussion about whether James or TJ could murder somebody. "No, James is too obvious; so he couldn't-" "TJ kinda is, too-" "I can't see Bubba Jacob killing someone, either. He's too nice-" "I was just thinking that about you, Susan-" Then Elizabeth jumps in. "They always say it's the quiet ones who come unhinged or get away with it....therefore I'm betting on Wes. Or me..."
1-13-14, Jacob mock-proposes to TJ, much to her frustration and the amusement of the McDonald's employees standing around. The rest of us make a big deal about if that really happened we needed video evidence, and the girls begin complaining about how humiliating it would be to actually be proposed to in a McDonald's. Spontaneously on cue, perfectly together, Susan, Elizabeth, Jacob and I burst out "MAWWIAGE. MAWWIAGE is what BWINGS us toGEtha TODAY. DAT BWESSED AWWANGEMENT, dat DWEAM WiFFin a dweam...."
1-13-14, just after that and the naturally following exchange of witty Florinese banter, James comments, "I've only seen that movie, like, maybe twice, so I can't quote it like you guys can." With incredulous looks, the five of us turn and shout "You WHAT??!!" "HOW is that possible?" "Okay, we ARE SO watching it together sometime." "Heck yeah we are."
1-20-14, waiting for the first spring practice to start, Becca flops down on the couch in the living room and it flies backward and almost falls over. "Don't tell anyone I did that." "You mean, like not tell Jacob or Elizabeth?" I ask innocently. "No! They'd never let me live it down." "Yeah, I can just see it....'What happened to Becca?' 'She lost a fight with a couch.'"
1-20-14, still waiting on everyone else to show up, we search for the basement light switch for ten minutes in complete darkness until Justin walks in. "What are you guys doing?" "Looking for the light switch!" He walks over to the stairs, flips the switch hidden there and the lights come on. "You guys didn't know where the light switch was, after all the time we've spent down here...."
1-20-14, Haley during welcoming speech, "...and we've got two shows in Sallisaw in February-" Everyone involved on that trip last fall snickers. "That's assuming we don't get lost," I mutter. By now everyone has totally lost it, hysterical laughter. "We promise we'll get there this time!" Samantha declares. Still snorting at the memory, we exchange dubious looks. "Yeah, and I might be driving the bus this semester!" Haley adds. Now the expressions are Buzz and Woody's "A puppy?" faces. .
1-20-14, this is Samantha's greeting to Jacob: "WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?! Didn't your aunt just die?! Shouldn't you be with your family?!" Jacob and Elizabeth together. "My aunt...?" "No, him! Didn't you text me this afternoon saying you wouldn't be here today because your aunt died and you had to make a trip to Texas?" "No....that would take some dedication..."
1-20-14, during "The Powers That Be", Quincy the uncertain angel(me) says to the Commanding Officer(Haley), "Well, sir, there are two of us here, and-" "Yes, there ARE two of you there. I'm glad you can count." "Thank you, sir. I've watched Sesame Street." "Good! More of you should do that. And today's letter of the day is H."
1-27-14, Me and Jacob are shooting pool before practice, he's telling a story to Elizabeth. "So it's like, 10:30 last night, I'm just sitting on my bed watching Netflix, cause there's no way I could get to sleep with that wind. Anyway, Skylar starts banging on my door and I open it and he says, 'Do you have extra forks?' I mean, yeah, I do, but...isn't that just the most random thing to say to a neighbor ever?" Caleb, listening. "He mentioned he used my microwave, don't have any idea what he could've been eating, though." (They're roommates.) Me, "What I want to know is; why were Skylar and Ja Li Si eating dinner at 10:30?" This opens up a new trail of late-snack habits; Elizabeth and I will both eat peanut butter straight out of the jar(same with Nutella), Jacob will do neither.
1-27-14, Samantha asks brightly, "So, who's got plans for Valentine's Day?" All heads swivel to look at Skylar(Ja Li Si was in worship practice; they were dating at the time) and then at Jacob and TJ. As for the rest of us, Kevin, Susan, Becca, Justin, James, Caleb and Holly giver Samantha "Are you kidding?" looks while Elizabeth and I add the audio portion of the message with sarcastic snorted laughter.
1-27-14, Haley ditches her commanding drill-sergeant voice as the Commanding Officer for "The Powers That Be", using instead an unnervingly sweet gentle voice. By the end we were pleading with her to never do that again. "I'm a little frightened right now." "Please yell at us again...so much easier to be a soldier to." "And we like being called maggots!"
1-27-14, during the middle of the gladiator scene for "One Willing Monk", James pulls out an imaginary pistol and shoots me with it!? I try to look appropriately bewildered, and that pretty much ruined the whole take for us and the audience. (That one gave us so much trouble...)
2-3-14, while not technically SWAT-related, still worth mentioning. At BCM basketball practice at First Baptist-Tahlequah after the Monday night meeting, Caleb to other players standing within earshot on the sidelines watching one of the scrimmages: "Well, we may not win State, but we'll at least have the best hair on the court."
2-13-14, Jacob to Ja Li Si during the Thursday night meeting, who's wearing a sleeveless shirt on a 50something degree day. "How are you doing that?" "Doing what, wearing this?" "Yeah! It's like, cold." She shrugs. "It's not that bad." "Right, I mean, it's not that bad compared to what it has been, but-" "It's the Indian blood." "...Oh. Well, can you share some of it, please?" "I don't think so....I like my blood, think I'll keep it." "Come on, just a bit....I'm a skinny guy, freezing over here." "Oh, yeah, we're just gonna have a transfusion done right here in the basement..."
2-13-14, me, Jacob and Elizabeth are talking about something, she starts singing "Here comes Peter Cottontail..." I jump in eagerly. "...hoppin' down the bunny trail...." Together: "Hippity-Hoppity, EASTER'S ON ITS WAY!!!!" Elizabeth to me, "Where were you in my freshman philosophy class? Me and this guy named Chad used to sing that all the time." Jacob, with quizzical expression: "I've never heard that song in my entire life."
2-17-14, Elizabeth and I are shooting pool before practice. I slap in one of her balls by mistake(This happened three times. And then I scratched on the 8-ball.), the following exchange is slow, pausing often as we alternate shooting with speaking. Elizabeth: "Hey, thanks. That makes my job a little easier." Wes mock-seriously: "You're not welcome." She gives me a look. "Hey, what happened to hospitality?!" "That disappears whenever there's competition involved." I reply matter-of-factly. She thinks a minute, then grins slightly. "...That's true."
2-23-14, Samantha filling in for James during pre-show rehearsal of "Push". She kept pronouncing "motor" as "mow-TOOR", as opposed to the more usual "MOAT-er". We couldn't help snickering. Actually, that was basically the theme of that entire rehearsal....for "Monk" the gladiators thumb-wrestled due to not having any of their weapons around.
2-23-14, while killing time just before our first show of the semester, James, Susan and I play Meow That Tune. We totally twice-up-the-barrel-once-down-the-sided it.
2-23-14, Haley as the Commanding Officer in "Powers"; "...they're binding empathy, tradition and religion!..." That'd be a good thing, sir, wouldn't it? Much better than "apathy, etc", as the line actually goes.
2-24-14, Samantha to James, talking about a hastily-prepared set of wooden swords for "Monk":... "We ARE NOT using these! They're got snails in them!" Those within earshot nod vigorously, then do a double-take. "...I said 'snails', didn't I?...I meant 'nails'." James, quietly: "They're actually screws, but..."
3-24-14, during practice of "Flow", Susan pauses over one of her lines, perplexed. "Where are we going next? I'm confused, not sure what to say there." Samantha: "Just say you're donating to Blank Church, which is led by Pastor Blankety-Blank ." (Pause) Silence for about half a second, then everyone falls apart howling with laughter. "That was not what I meant, you guys! I did not mean to act like I was cussing." (To Susan) "Uh, just say the BCM for right now in practice."
3-24-14, killing time in the living room, TJ sneaks up quietly behind Bubba Jacob and gives him a bear hug. Everybody greets her excitedly, Drew rushes up to her. "TJ! I've got something to tell you!" Susan protests, horrified, having just revealed something embarrassing and tease-worthy. Drew, stage-whispering: "James gave me a magnet!" She looks unimpressed. "Okay, so?" Susan rolls her eyes. "That's not what he meant to say..." She whispers in TJ's ear. TJ recoils fifteen feet backwards in absolute horror, shaking with indignation. "That did NOT happen!" The rest of us immediately die laughing, literally rolling on the floor. Once she recovers enough to speak, Susan nods dejectedly. "Yeah, it did...."
4-3-14, everyone's commenting on how soaked I am after walking across campus in a thunderstorm. Ja Li Si: "Did you just walk all the way from Ross in the rain? What did it feel like?"
4-4-14, this week's episode of Flapjack Friday with the Lunch Bunch became a singalong to the Backstreet Boys and NSYNC, led by James, Ja Li Si, Daniel P. and Jordan. It was really hysterical to watch.
4-6-14, backstage before the human video, I'm struggling with tying my robe back to where I can walk. James: "Can't you just tie it single?" "Nope. This is the only way I can get it to stay, otherwise it'd just fall off, I'm too small." James: "So get fatter." Susan raises an eyebrow. "How does he do that?" "Well, I should amend that to 'Get fat'; you have no volume at all."
4-6-14, Jacob is telling me and Elizabeth a story about people he works with at Wal-Mart while we're greeting people coming in to the church. "You wouldn't believe how many people come up and ask me, 'How many kids do you have?' I guess it's because I'm good with kids, I don't know...I'm like, 'Um...none right now, I've got a long ways to go until that happens.'" Very gleeful snickers from his audience.
4-6-14, Elderly Man from Cookson Hills, walking into church. "Mornin'! You're with the SWAT team, is that right?" I nod. "Yep, that's right, thanks for coming." "Well, good! I feel safer already, knowing the building is secure and all." Smiling, he goes and finds a seat.
4-6-14, thanking those who came to the Cookson service, much like our greeting-session. A little girl comes up to Jacob and says, "Were you the one who was behind the mask?" He nods. "That's right, that was me." The little girl nods and points at her sister, "She wanted to know, and disagreed when I said it was you." Then, she adds this zinger: "You weren't very scary." (This same little girl also blurted out how old the preacher was after he'd mentioned it was his birthday.)
4-6-14, riding back from Cookson on the way to the BCM, and from there to Bob and Deb's, trying to figure out who's riding with who. Holly: "I can have some people come with me...I just need to clean, like, 12 gallons of bleach out of the front seat." Everyone else predictably over-reacts, giving her a hard time. Deb: "I'm just a wee bit concerned about that statement. What have you been doing, Holly?" We also called her "Haley" all morning to bug her.
4-6-14, everyone's gathered at Bob and Deb's house for lunch, Bob to Samantha's husband Nick: "I thought you weren't wearing a shirt, and I wondered, 'When'd he get all those tattoos all over his chest?'" Nick to Samantha: "Bet you didn't know about this when we got married, huh?"
4-6-14, Bob, driving the van to Muskogee as we're pulling out of the BCM parking lot. "Does anybody know how to get wherever we're going?" After a minute, Justin says he's pretty sure he knows how to find the church. Bob: "You're pretty sure you know the directions?!" Becca: "I'd trust Justin's 'pretty sure' a lot more than Jacob's, just sayin'." Most of the rest of us(who were a part of the Sallisaw experiment) start laughing in agreement.
4-6-14, James in monologue: "...Take it from Telemachus, a monkey in the first century."
4-6-14, the elderly friendly pastor of Muskogee Central is chatting with me, Justin, Becca, Elizabeth and Jacob; about teaching and marriage advice. His Rule #1 - "Learn how to say 'Yes, dear', and you'll live to learn everything else you need to know."
4-13-14, Samantha as the Commanding Officer in "Powers": "...Next, you'll remember the Bible-smuggling turkey. Er, the Bible-smuggling incident in Turkey..."
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