Creepshow

Waiting for another friend to arrive at the Art Festival, L and I watched the crowd move through the entrance. It's an artsy crowd. It's not unusual to see all kinds, but this guy...this guy stood out. Not only was he approaching (I'm guessing) six and a half feet in height, he was wearing a straw fedora, a linen jacket with the sleeves rolled up, no shirt, Bermuda shorts and flip-flops. He had that pumped-up look, all brawn and no brain. What? Do I judge? Well, yes! He was a walking cartoon. He was also every bit of fifty years old. Ridiculous. L and I are perfectly capable of discreetly noticing the outrageous and pointing it out to each other. We did. We watched him as he wandered about the artists' booths, chest puffed up and eventually he disappeared into the crowd. Wow.

We mentioned him to our other friend, V, after she arrived. As we walked among the crowd, the topic turned to hats. The teenage son of V wanted to know what exactly was a fedora. After we went through that description, the conversation quickly turned to other topics and the Cock of the Walk was forgotten for the next three hours. I wish it had stayed that way.

We decided we'd had enough fresh air, sunshine, and art and we made our way back to the main gate. I asked V's son to snap a quick picture of the three of us next to a signpost for the festival. We moved close together and started to flash the requisite smiles. That's when Mr. Fedora showed up, standing behind our photographer, just standing there - smiling at us. Very, very creepy. Just as suddenly as he appeared, he took off walking down a path. I turned to V and said, "Did you see him? That's that guy?"

He gets about 100 yards away, turns around and heads back towards us. The guy headed right at us, nearly brushing into us.

I have no idea what his deal was.

I'm pretty sure I don't want to know.

I'm hoping he was some sort of plant for a social experiment and we failed. If he wasn't, I'm seriously creeped.