Reality and Fantasy

I just got harangued by a little old lady. Little and old, at least. Shuffling along with a walker, on her way to the IGA next door. I was just coming back from scoping out the fruit to see what new dessert the restaurant should have. I was reading, and she stopped right by me and started in on how dangerous reading and walking was, and it would serve me right if I got hit by a car.

Now, there are two problems with this: I was on the sidewalk, not the street. The carless sidewalk. And I do look up when it's time to turn into the driveway of the office. I mean, if I were on safari and wandering the veldt reading and not watching where I was going, well fair enough. Let a lion eat me. But on a sidewalk, with no driveways or side roads I figure I'm pretty safe.

The second problem is that I was in the book WAY too deep. Normally I read something simple at work - ever since I found out that my co-workers mock me when I read at lunch, because I don't seem to have a clue as to what's going on. They left me once (boss included) at our morning coffee break reading away, just to see when I'd realize that it was time to go. (If you must know, I didn't notice until the early lunch people arrived in the coffee room). So I try to stay away from the deeply absorbing books. Today, however, I was at a compelling part of a decent book. It's set in Rome, and the main character is a shape-changer. The paragraph I was on was describing her difficulty in keeping her alternate self hidden when she was out amongst the people. I was thinking how cool it would be to have your human eyes change into wolf eyes when you're talking to someone who was annoying you. And that is the point that the woman started her harangue. So I'm totally confused - what happened to Rome? Where are the soldiers that were chasing me? What happened to the escape route taken to avoid the soldiers? Who is this woman, what does she want and can I make my eyes look like wolf eyes to her?

So I stood there staring in confusion, and let her have her moment of chastisment. She came from the retirement home on the north side of the office - I may be the only person she gets a chance to yell at all day, so perhaps in the end it was a good thing to let her have her say.