How to Handle a Roman with Tact

The following was taken from one of the best books in known history, written by Christopher Moore, not to be confused with Michael Moore, who is a total crackpot. The book is entitled Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal. In it, Biff, Christ's (aka Josh) best friend, Christ and Maggie (Mary Magdelene) are at the funeral for a roman soldier. I don't have permission to publish this, and I hope Mr. C. Moore doesn't hold it against me, because he writes the yummiest books ever, and I would hate to have to boycott them because he turned out to be a total douche.

...I dove into the mass and crawled under people's feet until I came upon a pair of hobnail boots which indicated the lower end of a Roman soldier. The other end, equally Roman, was scowling at me. I stood up.
"Semper fido," I said in my best Latin, followed by my most charming smile.
The soldier scowled further. Suddenly there was a smell of flowers in my nose and sweet, warm lips brushed my ear. "I think you just said 'always dog,'" Maggie whispered.
"That would be why he's looking so unpleasant then?" I said out the side of my charming smile.
In my other ear another familiar, if not so sweet whisper," Sing, Biff. Remember the plan," Joshua said.
"Right." And so I let loose with one of my famous dirges. "La-la-la. Hey Roman guy, too bad about your getting stabbed. La-la-la. It's probably not a message from God or nothing. La-la-la. Telling you that maybe you should have gone home, la, la, la. Instead of oppressing the chosen people who God hisownself has said that he likes better than you. Fa, la, la, la."
The soldier didn't speak Aramaic, so the lyrics didn't move him as I had hoped. But I think the hypnotic toe-tappiness of the melody was starting to get to him. I plunged into my second verse.
"La-la-la, didn't we tell you that you shouldn't eat pork, la-la. Although looking at wounds in your chest, a dietary change might not have made that big of a difference. Boom shaka-laka-laka-laka, boom shaka-laka-lak. Come on, you know the words!"