Lunch, interrupted

I'm slightly hesitant to bring this up b/c I'm still paranoid about the world's stage that is the blogosphere, but there are maybe four people tops reading this, so it's probably ok.

I went to lunch at the Indian buffet yesterday. It's just so good, and it was my first day back to work so I needed a decadent treat (since I didn't have enough decadence in Utah, where I stuffed myself with ethnic foods to the point of horrible gastric distress). Desfortunadamente, or unfortunately, I was approached in the buffet line by a 50-ish man who would. not. stop. talking.

He was not what I would classify as truly disturbed; in fact, I think he was just manically high on his own ego. I had encountered him a few years ago at the same restaurant, where he'd sat at the next table and butted into a conversation I was having. He is some sort of physiologist at a local institution, a fact he made known immediately, along with his excellent medical/educational credentials and the fact that he'd scored incredibly high on his MCATs. Again, he was in his 50s. My friends can vouch that, since my early 20s, I have rarely made reference to my academic achievements except on resumes.

This dude just would not let up. He came over to my table twice to ask techy questions (once he found out my line of work) and even to ask if his teenage son could contact me to talk about creative careers and my line of work. I was stupid enough to give him my card. The thing is, he may be an egomaniac, but not a stalker. It's too much about him to ever involve anyone else, whereas stalkers are consumed by their object. Stalkers obsess about "me" and "what I want" because they want to fill a void they perceive in themselves. My lunch friend, on the other hand, was perfectly self-satified.

Here's the punchline. He has a web site, which I will not link here. Try googling power posture, and you'll find him. His appeal to visitors to read the home page if not the entire site (and, having just read a book on web usability, I can say with authority that there's more text on the home page alone than the vast majority of visitors would ever read) is classic Lunch Interrupter.

Is it any surprise that today I opted for a take-out sandwich from Quik-Chek?