Chapter 6 of 12 · 2'39"
What starts as a complaint about Pete becomes a fight over whether a break-in that found fantasy baseball was funny or selfish. "You know, you should just support everything I say because at this juncture in my life, I'm allowed to be wrong!" Loyalty, not the ball game, is what they are really fighting about.
❝ Monologue · 4 lines Expected a Woman, Found Nerds
❝ Monologue · 4 lines Mocking the excuse
She quotes the brotherhood line, then insults his friends and dumps the consequences on him.
Get Out of My Car
In a car, talk jumps from a gynecologist's machine to Pete. One person calls it one of the most selfish things they have witnessed. The other finds the break-in funny: they expected a woman and found nerds playing fantasy baseball, and claims to understand where Pete is coming from. A demand for total support and a fight about sacrifice follow, until someone is ordered out of the car.
The fight pretends to be about Pete. One person will not drop how selfish he was. The reply softens the charge with "I would say," then asks for a laugh: they broke into a stranger's house expecting a woman and found "a bunch of nerds playing fantasy baseball." That asks someone to treat the night as a joke. The joke is rejected. "Why do guys always go to that place?" dismisses male camaraderie as a reason nobody else has to care about. What remains is a demand: "you should just support everything I say because at this juncture in my life, I'm allowed to be wrong." A list of sacrifices follows, and an offer to pay is met with "You can barely buy spaghetti." "I own this car" is enough to put someone out in the middle of nowhere, and the door stays shut until they are asked whether they have calmed down.
A1–C2 is the CEFR scale. Cards above the level you pick fade, and playback will not auto-pause on them.
“'Cause that had to be one of the most selfish things I've ever witnessed.”
The superlative plus witnessed turns a complaint into a verdict she claims she saw.
Informal
“You know, you should just support everything I say because at this juncture in my life, I'm allowed to be wrong!”
A formal phrase turns the tantrum into a claimed right to be wrong.
Informal
“I've had to sacrifice my job, my body, my youth, my vagina!”
Each item gets more private until the last word leaves him nowhere to stand.
Informal
“Well. Fine. I'm sorry, I'll pay for vaginal reconstructive surgery.”
The apology is three limp words, then her body becomes a bill he offers to pay.
Informal
“You can't pay for shit! You can barely buy spaghetti!”
The swear kills his offer, and spaghetti makes the poverty embarrassingly specific.
Informal
“Have you calmed down? Did you take a breath?”
She turns his plea at the door into a parenting check before she will let him in.
Informal
Well, you won't laugh now, I wouldn't imagine, but, you know, the situation. We break into this stranger's house thinking we're gonna find him sleeping with a woman, and it's a bunch of nerds playing fantasy baseball. If you saw that, like, on television, you would laugh.
Why do guys always go to that place? "We miss male camaraderie." Why do I give a shit? Go hang out with your bearded freak friends. I don't care. You wanna hang out with guys that look like the shoe bomber, it's all on you, man.
Up next · 07fooling ourselvesThe scene: Baby Books, Then VegasThe row has already left Pete behind. One person demands support for every word, even the wrong ones, and lists sacrifices the other person denies. Once an offer to pay is answered with "You can't pay for shit! You can barely buy spaghetti!" the lines that follow are "Get out of the car" and "I own this car." The person told to leave refuses to get out in the middle of nowhere. Ownership is the reason given.
A woman. "We break into this stranger's house thinking we're gonna find him sleeping with a woman, and it's a bunch of nerds playing fantasy baseball." One side thinks you would laugh if you saw that on television. The other calls it one of the most selfish things they have ever witnessed.
It is the justification for a demand, not an apology for one mistake. The line is "you should just support everything I say because at this juncture in my life, I'm allowed to be wrong." They want every statement backed, and they do not want to be told they are acting like a lunatic.
"I'll pay for vaginal reconstructive surgery" follows "It will never look the same after this." The reply is "You can't pay for shit! You can barely buy spaghetti!" The offer is rejected for lack of money, and the fight moves on to getting out of the car.
Someone is explaining the man they went looking for. Once a guy has a family and responsibility, he loses that male camaraderie, and the line is "I totally understand where he's coming from." The other person rejects the excuse: "Why do guys always go to that place?" and "Why do I give a shit?"
