The setting: on line in the local Bank of America lobby. A young woman, between 20-25, pushes a stroller containing a sleepy-looking toddler directly behind me, and places a call on her cellphone.

Hey baby.

Hey, baby.

Where you at?

At the bank. I have to move some money around, see what I have, you know.

I’m in the lobby, on line.

It’s nice in here. It’s cold.

So how is it in your car? (laughing)

Baby who you talking to?

Baby, who you talking to?

Baby, who you talking to?

(pauses)

So, baby, are you H-O-R-N-E-Y [sic] for me?

I wanted you so bad last night.

I wished I could have come over there and been with you, but I didn’t want to get all [indistinct] on you.

At this point, I looked over at Jen, whose eyes were as big as dinner plates, and made the gun-to-my-temple motion as the woman pushed the stroller over to the teller’s window.

Hold on, baby.

Hold on, baby.

(to the teller) Yeah, I need to know how much I have in this account?

(into the phone) So, you have to go to the Wal-Mart?

(the teller asks her something from behind four inches of bulletproof glass)

(to the teller) Hold on.

(into the phone) What do you have to get there?

(to the teller) Hold on.

(into the phone) What?

(to the teller) [indistinct]

(into the phone) You should get that at the Wal-Mart, baby. They give you more pills there.

(to the teller) [indistinct]

(into the phone) Yeah, but at the Wal-Mart, they give you ten pills for free.

It was at this point that I left the line and tuned the moron out so I could count my cash and lament the end of cultured, modern Western civilization.