Babe Magnet

Oct 9, 2006 So I'm sitting outside a cafe in Seattle, and my two sons are bracketing me. The older is mid 30s, the younger mid 20s. Both are athletic, slim and handsome. I'm burly, balding and a graybeard. My sons are drinking some godawful soy latte concoctions. I'm drinking a triple ristretto. My gray beard is fluttering in the breeze.

A pretty girl about 20 or so crosses the street and, as she passes to enter the cafe, she looks at me and grins ... okay she twinkles ... as does her nose stud and the gold glitter in the blue patch of her otherwise black hair. I smile back and she winks at me as she goes in.

My two sons look at each other across me and shake their heads disbelieving.

"Whatthefuck Dad?!" says the younger. "I'm the one without a date."

My wife and my older son's wife walk past on their perambulation between shopping venues. My daughter-in-law deposits my baby granddaughter on my lap, and the two disappear into another store. A moment later the girl comes out, but now that little Amelia is on my knee she won't make eye contact.

My sons relax. It must be okay. Dad's not THAT attractive.