Tonight some friends and I opened a show (in the unlikely event that anyone who doesn't know me is reading this, I am a stage actor). Just a two-weekend silly little cabaret thing--I have three bits total. No biggie.

One of the actresses was heroically performing with the stomach flu. She's really sweet, and if you, say, felt like stabbing her in the ribs for some reason, she would probably apologize for nicking your knife blade right before she died. She certainly wouldn't be so crass as to bleed on your shoes.

So she was a little under the weather. And here are the various (totally unintentional, but hey) ways I inadvertantly tortured her tonight:

I wandered around the dressing room eating a very pungent hot pastrami sandwich, mouthing inanities such as, "Come to me, bread and meat and cheese!" It should be noted that the sandwich also had oil and vinegar on it for that special added "I am raping your nose" effect.

As she was sitting around innocently watching the acts, I stepped on her bare foot with my leather shoes. She couldn't even scream, because there were performers doing their thing. So instead she hissed, "I kind of hate you right now."

And finally, the coup de grace. While backing my car out of the lot, I ran over her incredibly adorable small child, who was playing with G.I. Joes and flexing his dimples. When we were done unpeeling his remains from the tire treads, he resembled a spectacularly unsuccessful lasagna. All I could do was shrug my shoulders and say, "Aren't I a stinker?" And we all had a good laugh.

Okay, so the last one isn't true. But I kind of felt like it might be in the cards. Some nights one should just stay home.