Obviously, He Is Very Insecure

(I’m riding the bus with my partner and a friend of ours who’s a few years younger than us. We’re all in our twenties and very nerdy. We’re making silly jokes about sorting the crew of “Star Trek: The Next Generation” into Hogwarts houses or something when another passenger turns around and looks at us. He’s an older man wearing a Hawaiian shirt, not very well-groomed, and reeking of cigarettes. He directs the following remarks to my partner, completely ignoring our friend and me:)

Stranger: “Hey, you!”

Partner: “Um, yes?”

Stranger: *in a weirdly sneering, accusatory tone* “What’s your job?”

Partner: “I work in publishing.”

Stranger: *clearly a bit thrown by my partner having a “real” job, but forging on anyway* “Well, do you know anything about securities?”

Partner: “No.”

Stranger: “You don’t.”

Partner: “No.”

Stranger: “Why not?”

Partner: “It’s not my job.”

Stranger: “Oh. Huh. Well. I just thought… uh, you sounded like a real smart guy there, so I thought you might know something about it.”

Partner: “Nope.”

(The stranger gets off the bus at the next stop and I start laughing.)

Friend: “What’s so funny?”

Me: “Well, you remember how earlier today I was having lunch with my friend from high school, the one who’s a lawyer? And how I invited her to come along with us, too, but she couldn’t make it?”

Friend: “Yeah?”

Me: “Well, clearly El Rando there was going after [Partner] because he thought he was the ‘alpha male’ of our group or something. But [High School Friend] actually specializes in banking law… with an emphasis on securities. She’s gonna be so grumpy she missed on an opportunity to lecture some sexist old man about legal technicalities.”