Candid camera

This is real. I think it also shows how horribly out of touch with humanity I am.

I went to pick up salads from the Gaucho for Cary and my lunch. Studio City's Gaucho Grill is in the strip mall on the corner of Laurel Canyon and Ventura, just around the corner from TJ's, the post office, the nail place, the book shop, Urban Outfitters and of course Pinkberry. The restaurant is upstairs, bang next door to DSW shoe warehouse and you know me, I never can walk past a shoe shop without browsing. As I venture in (as I step one pink be-clogged foot inside the door) a spotty employee in a headset and green t-shirt approaches me with what has become my favorite greeting: "Er Mam?" I turn slightly left to face him. "Yes?" I say. "Could I give you a High Five?" he says, with menacing exuberance. I am momentarily frozen with horror (yes, I'm THAT bourgeois). "No," I reply, "absolutely not." He looks flustered. "Let me give you a special savings coupon," he says and thrusts it towards me. "Oh dear," I say, "would you mind awfully leaving me alone, I really just wanted to have a quick look." He skulks off and I feel awful. I realize that I was appallingly rude. Horribly rude. Have probably scarred him for life. But let me ask this: Who on God's green earth wants to be high-fived like a bloody lottery winner upon setting foot in a shop? Is this an American thing? I can just see my friend Lucy getting into it, giving him a hearty high five, and a low five for good measure, with that big ol' beaming smile of hers. But then she likes Vegas and Disneyland too. And she's nice. It is now official. I'm not.