I had some trouble with bullying in school being malnourished, poor, a social outcast, and relatively smart. Your verbal defense note struck a memory. Sometime

I had some trouble with bullying in school being malnourished, poor, a social outcast, and relatively smart. Your verbal defense note struck a memory. Sometime mid high school, my two friends and I went to pick up a friend from a raging house party. While waiting outside for them, a drunken footballer came over to us nerds and started to point at us, calling us losers. I, uncharacteristically, retorted back with false confidence, “yeah? I get laid more than you.” He was stunned and left me alone while he picked on the other two a bit more. I had forgotten about that one. I don’t think verbal defense would always work, however. I don’t think it would have prevented the one asshole-psychopath who, years earlier, was a few grades older than me and locked me in an older refrigerator and when I finally got out, chased me and threw a hatchet at me.