Chapter 77: Stop Me if You've Heard This

This past Saturday night I got a flat trying to get out of my driveway. I’m going to spare (no pun intended) you the details because I am over it but to make a long story short I ran into the ditch, hit a broken piece of concrete just right and killed the tire. So I called Ducky and she came over and talked me through it which I thoroughly enjoyed because now I can say that I changed my own tired, self sufficiency here I come! So today I took my car to Pep Boys to get a new tire and maybe an oil change while I’m at it. While I was there I think I got hit on by one of the mechanics. Now I’m not altogether opposed to mechanics, there’s actually something very appealing about that oil stained hands baseball hats. My uncle’s a mechanic; my favorite cousin on my dad’s side is a mechanic. I’ve just never been hit on by one, which means I’ve never been hit on by one of those really attractive ones that I’m not altogether opposed to. Today was not the day where we find me in a situation where I’m waiting to be hit on and we don’t find the mechanic as the most appealing, probably because to me he is old enough to be friends with my dad, I say my dad’s friend rather than my dad because let’s face it, my dad is old. Regardless he has hit an age that is beyond my limit. I was standing there while he was taking lunch orders from the other guys and things quite down for a bit and he asks me how I’m doing. I politely answer back and ask him how he’s doing. I make small talk; I’m used to making small talk with strangers due to my former employment opportunities. He asks me if I want anything from the place he is going to get everyone else’s lunch and I tell him my sister is coming to pick me up so that’s okay, but thank you. Then one of the other guys starts giving him a hard time because he had complained about everyone else giving him orders but here he was asking a stranger. Someone else said something about flirting and I just tried to ignore all of that. Then I left and met my sister out in the parking lot, and the mechanic came out a couple of seconds later and told me to have a good day and waved and all. It was weird. But I don’t know if he is just that friendly or if I got hit on.
I have to go back after work and pick up my car and I kind of hope that he won’t be there, not that he was a creepy man or anything like that, but I find that whatever happened there this afternoon (someone being friendly or someone being flirty) makes me feel uncomfortable, and I’d rather avoid any future occurrences of that.
In the meantime yet another pair of pantyhose has gone to a better place. We went to the “pumpkin patch” (A.K.A. Strange’s (flowers)) today to get our pumpkins for our activity on Friday (at work). We first went to Wal-Mart and since they had a total of three pumpkins we called around and ended up at the flower shop, they had a million pumpkins! I think mostly because they over charge people, but whatever, my opinion doesn’t lower prices. We got 14 pumpkins and on the way back we took a turn and a pumpkin stem hit me in the leg, ripping my pantyhose, I know, late breaking story huh?
Also, since we are wondering about my wardrobe malfunctions I have fixed my squeaky shoes. My right shoe would squeak causing me to begin to walk funny in order to reduce the volume of the squeakiness. I did a little scientific investigation in the whys of my shoe squeaking problem, the first obviously being the width of my hobbit feet, the second I found that there is a lining made out of the same material as the shoe that rubs up against the shoe due to the width of my feet. Then I found that if pulled upon there can be space between these two pieces. So I grabbed a tissue, ripped it up and stuck little pieces all throughout, now I can sneak up on just about anybody!

Chapter 76: Mary, Mary Quite Contrary

There are some people in this life who are contrary just for the sake of being contrary. Do they play well with others? No. Am I happy with those individuals at the moment? No. Do I wish that it was within my power to make them do things my way? Yes.
Let me start off with a story of how my morning went. First, I woke up at 7:05, not because of my alarm but because someone was being very loud as they left the house. I looked at the clock which is set 10 minutes too fast and realized that my alarm would be going off soon. Instead of being productive and getting up early since I was somehow blessed to wake up on my own, I rolled over and thought it would be nice to get 10 extra minutes of sleep. I woke up again and looked at my clock and it read 8:45, meaning in real time it was 8:35 and I’m supposed to be at work at 8:00. I jump out of bed, throw on a sweater and a skirt, eat a cookie for breakfast because it happened to be there, and then throw on my shoes grab my keys and run out the door. I brushed my hair in the car and pulled it back. Luckily most people are on time to work and the traffic was minimal and I got mostly green lights on the way, oh yeah, and I live 5 minutes from work so that’s another positive thing. I get to work and just hope that no one noticed that I was late. I sign into my e-mail and have 12 new messages, this is new. But 3 of them were a chain of e-mails that had started around 8:35 (hmm…interesting, that’s exactly when I woke up). So I read them and it had to do with something yesterday that I should have done but it didn’t work so I went into my boss’ office and tell her I’m sorry and she tells me that I don’t need to be sorry because I’m still learning. So I took the apology back. She must have thought I was dying though because I was sweating and I was light headed because I had just woken up maybe 15 minutes before and I had run up the stairs in twos. So I go back to my desk and get to work. Now, on with the day.
At work we have a little situation. I schedule interviews with people, and then I get the managers to agree to give those interviews. Today I got an e-mail from a young man who has decided to accept another offer at a different company. He was writing to let me know, and since his interview was schedule for this Thursday I thought that we could bump up some interviews that had to be pushed back to the following week or even the week after. This is not an easy process, although it should be! Considering the fact that every single manager had already accepted the original Thursday interview without any problems I thought this would be a painless, seamless, process. All I had to do was insert the other interviewee into the original Thursday spot. Again, everyone had accepted. So I first cancel the old one so not to confuse myself. I updated the interviewee that I was bumping up and then I sent out the new interview invitations. I shouldn’t call them invitations, it sounds so pleasant, I think they should understand that I am demanding this. So there is this manager, let’s call her L.B. (took the name from Ducky, it stands for ‘Little Bitch’, but since I am trying not to cuss I will call her L.B. like Linden B. Johnson…minus the ‘J’). Anywho, so L.B. declines the invitation! I double check what I had for Thursday; she had indeed accepted the original request for Thursday at 1PM. I had just cancelled the old one, how did she come up with something to do so quickly. Of course, she didn’t put her reasons for not accepting, which is what polite, nice, individuals do, mostly because they actually have a valid excuse, but L.B. doesn’t have an excuse, I’d bet my next paycheck on it! She just doesn’t want to do it! You know what I want to say to her? I want to tell her to suck it up! I do things every day that I don’t want to do but I do it because it’s my job! Stop being so freaking immature, grow up and take responsibility! These people need to be interviewed and you are not allowed to hit that damned decline button!

Chapter 75: Catch and Release

I never wrote about the date with Mr. Collins, maybe that would have been nice of me to keep people updated. Granted it’s already been a week and I currently have difficulties with my memory, not as bad as Ducky, but still, so if details are left out or if you don’t get the full effect of the date then I’m sorry. Mr. Collins was off to a rough start on Friday evening. See, Bachelor #2 turns out to be a tough guy to have to go on a double date with, meaning that Bachelor #2 is charming enough to go on a date with two girls at once. The type of date a girl wouldn’t mind being the 3rd wheel to. Anyway, Bachelor #2 was running late and he called Ducky to let her know this, he still showed up before Mr. Collins by maybe 2 or 3 minutes but they arrived at the front door at the same time (#2 parked somewhere else). Did I receive a call from Mr. Collins? No, and you would think that since I ran away from home once when he was late he would call to ensure that I didn’t run again. While waiting my roommates, Ducky, Uncle Jellybean, and I planned our course of action if he was 15 minutes late. We’d run out the door, go to where we were going to eat, Uncle Jellybean would fill in as my date and conveniently squeeze Mr. Collins out of the picture. But as I already said #2 and Mr. Collins came through the door together.
Ducky is an amazing individual, have I ever said that before? She somehow influenced the entire group to ride in my car, leaving me as the driver and plenty of distance between Mr. Collins and myself. #2 opened the door for Ducky and I quickly went to my door to not give Mr. Collins a chance to open it. When we arrived at the restaurant I quickly got out of the car and hurried towards the door so as not to give him a chance again. He actually picked up the pace and jogged a few steps to “beat” me, which he didn’t, to the door. He mentioned something about it and I just smiled like I had no idea that’s what he was trying to do. We sit down at our booth for dinner (I usually like booths, but I wanted more than anything at that moment to be at a table) and of course I have to sit by Mr. Collins who makes himself a little too comfortable, ever hear the saying, “This town ain’t big enough for the both of us?” I almost wanted to say that the bench wasn’t. It’s not that I need a lot of room to spread out, I just need some space. Thank goodness that Ducky and #2 were there because Ducky actually engaged Mr. Collins in conversation, very impressive on her part. Then #2 started to and then they got me to. I mostly jumped in when Ducky was telling #2 about our plans for next Friday because I did not want Mr. Collins coming along. I think I distracted him enough. During dinner Mr. Collins didn’t pull out one magic trick, granted he talked an awful lot about video games and practicing magic, but he didn’t grace us with any tricks during the meal. I was grateful.
On the car ride from dinner to the theater somehow Mr. Collins attention came to the fact that I don’t like dancing. He asked if it was because I didn’t know how or if I really didn’t like it. I told him I really didn’t like it, I’m not comfortable with dancing; during dinner Mr. Collins had stated how much he liked dancing. Oops.
We get to the theater about an hour too early and we also see that the movie playing is not the movie we thought it was going to be, but we took a vote and decided to walk around and come back to see the one they had scheduled. Walking and talking was not on my agenda for the evening and I would have much rather been able to simply walk with Ducky, or even #2, but I endured and it wasn’t all that bad, not as bad as I had dreaded it would be.
Where we were walking there happened to be a lot of Oriental rug shops and every time we passed one he would state what type of shop it was and ask if I thought that they would have a flying carpet. I said ‘no’ because I was not about to humor him. He asked why not and I said because it said it on their disclaimer. We went through this with about three stores when he finally says, “I don’t think you mean disclaimer, a disclaimer is if they say if you get hurt while flying on a flying carpet we are not responsible” then he proceeded to tell me that what I meant was a ‘notice’. Don’t tell me what I meant to say, I meant to say disclaimer, whether or not I had the definition correct it was still what I meant to say. If he knew what I meant to say then why didn’t he just let it go, what kind of chances do you think you have for a second date by trying to make me feel stupid? Besides if we are going to get all technical in this conversation why don’t you think about what you meant to say, I’m pretty sure an intellectual genius would know better than anyone else that flying carpets aren’t oriental! They’re Persian you nitwit! Why is it that the whole conversation felt like something I would have with The Antagonizer in my Rexburg residence?
Anyway, I’m pretty sure I’m leaving things out, but like I said in my disclaimer in the beginning (and yes, I know it wasn’t a disclaimer but screw you) I’m bound to have forgotten details.
We go get in line for the movie and Collins pulls out his first and only magic trick of the evening, which involved his movie ticket (which Ducky paid for thank goodness). I told him I could see the ticket and then he goes off about how people are always trying to accuse him of trying to deceive them, which wasn’t what I was doing, I just felt good that I had seen it. I told him I wasn’t trying to accuse him, and then the rest of the conversation is a blur, wouldn’t have helped writing this sooner either, I think it was a blue from the moment it happened. I already explained earlier on the date that I would be sitting next to Ducky; I had said it more of as a warning so he would understand when we made an obvious switch to make sure we were sitting next to each other. He sat on the right side and Ducky on the left (good thing too because of her bad ear). He immediately put his arm over the back of my chair and I don’t know if he was doing it intentionally and with a purpose or if he was, as usual, making himself comfortable and me totally uncomfortable. I was leaning forward most of the time and when I wasn’t I wouldn’t let my back touch the seat. The movie was actually pretty good and I fell in love with the hero of the story even though he had long hair, but he wouldn’t be the first that that’s happened with.
Car ride home I don’t think anything special happened. When we got to the house I was ready to make a clean cut and go. Collins got out of the car and #2 and Ducky did as well, but they were standing back a little and I panicked, why weren’t they coming? I later found out from Ducky that it was because she wanted Collins to know that this date was over. So I had to braved the walk to the door on my own. He thanked me for the date blah, blah and then gave me a hug. I didn’t want to give the hug but I did anyway. Overall though the date wasn’t bad but I didn’t fall in love either, or even in like.
Then Sunday rolls around, two days after the date. I went to church late (on purpose) and got to sit Collins’ free except that he was a pew away and I got to see that he had his arm around another girl! I was excited to say the least, if things panned out with this girl I was in the clear and even if they didn’t I could act the jealous type and tell him I never want to see him again. I had an out either way. Turns out that he really had his arm around her, not like me in the movie theater, and they were holding hands at some point and I think the rumor was that he was rubbing her arm too. I think I am officially off the hook.

Chapter 74: Rage-oholics Anonymous

Last night, scratch that, yesterday was difficult for me. Sometimes I’m unsure of what is wrong with me, but I think it all boils down to being a girl. I knew the day would be rough in the early hours while I was getting ready for work. Now, I must have blocked exactly what happened from my memory because the only thing I really remember is thinking, ‘if it’s already happening the whole day will be effected’, what exactly ‘it’ is I’m unsure.
At work I had to schedule a bunch of interviews, about 8 or 9 of them, and the schedule kept getting thrown out of whack. A project that I thought would take half an hour to an hour went from 8:30 to 12:15. The afternoon went much better but I was still happy for the day to be over. When I got home I went to talk to Diva for awhile. Diva, Ducky, and I were going to carpool to our sports night activity. I would say at the last minute, but it wasn’t the last minute, Diva bailed. I was on the phone with Ducky at the time and complained about how I was surrounded by flakes. Ducky and I set up a time to met so we could still carpool and then I went to talk to Diva some more. While we were sitting there MM came upstairs to tell Diva that Jellybean wanted the two of them to sing in her wedding (Jellybean is getting married by the way in case I never mentioned that). MM went downstairs to grab the tape player and bring up the music so that Diva and she could “listen” to it. When she was gone I looked at Diva and almost asked if she was sure that she didn’t want to come, but I didn’t say anything.
I went to Ducky’s place and I was running a little late. When I pulled into the parking lot I couldn’t see Ducky’s car and I half wondered if she wasn’t even there. So I pulled up to my usual parking spot (the curb because parking at Ducky’s is dismal) and I whipped out my cell phone to give her a ring. She didn’t pick up. A momentary splash of Rage-ohol to my face. I sat there contemplating what to do, I was already late so if I waited too long we would both be late to the activity, and we had the keys and has to set up for it. So I finally decided to call again. This time she picked up and I asked her where she was and she said she was at home but had moved her car so I could park in her spot. I told her I had found one and was waiting. We hung up but I think we forgot the important part of establishing whether or not I was coming in or she was coming out. I had backed up my car to be in front of her door and I was waiting for her to come out and I could have sworn (at the time) that she said she’d be right out. I waited a little bit longer and still no sign that she was coming out. So I called her again, turns out she thought I was coming in and that I had just had to park really far away. At which point I doubted myself, maybe I had said that I was going to come in. But we finally were both in the car and headed out. Then we had to drive down my most despised road in Richmond, Virginia to get there. As an afterthought I remembered a different way I could have taken to get there. I got stuck behind this white van and it was ticking me off, Ducky said something about how it probably wasn’t trying to bother me but I pointed out that after he had switched lanes right as I was about to he continued to not pass the car that he had been behind. Why switch lanes if you don’t pass or make a turn off the road? If you’re going to stay on the cars bumper you might as well do it from behind not from the side. I have horrible road rage once a month.
I was still a bit peeved about the amalgamation of small stresses throughout the day when we finally got to the church building. I had already decided that I was going to be mad if no one showed up (which by the way is no way to go through life, making predictions that could very well come through has never brought me an ounce of happiness, but it does save me from hurting too much when the disappoint rolls in). What a surprise then when no one did show up! It was just Ducky and I. We started to shoot some hoops and then Ducky says that we need to discuss Ireland. See, many moons ago, Ducky and I had decided to go to Ireland because we were both tired of being people who will say that we will do something and then end up not doing it. The moment that she said that we needed to discuss it I said, “It’s not going to happen, I know.” She asked how I knew and I said, “Because I know people”. I didn’t mean it to be a personal attack, it was simply a statement. I think that there is something that is encoded on every person’s DNA that makes us susceptible to flakiness, just like with addictions or cancer, some people are more likely to have problems with it then others, but in the end we could all easily have problems with it some are just worse off from the get-go. Is this making sense? Ducky went to play the piano not long after I said that, and part of me worries that I did offend her, it was not my intention, however by filter burst and I haven’t been able to control too much lately. So much so that I didn’t issue an apology to her for it.
While I was alone in the gym I took the opportunity to think, which is probably something I shouldn’t do. I wasn’t upset about not going to Ireland; I really did already figure out that it wasn’t going to happen. I think I knew back in September anyway, it’s why I didn’t really tell that many people. Most of the people who knew were told by my mom which is why I don’t really tell her things. Oh, I just had an epiphany; MM will some day have daughters who won’t tell her anything that they don’t want the whole ward to know. I am of course in no way comparing my mom to MM; my mom is way more entertaining. Focus. I wasn’t upset about Diva not coming to the activity, or no one for that matter. I wasn’t really upset at anything, though I felt I had to be angry at something. So I just played a little harder at basketball and forgot to think about anything except how much I such at playing.
When Ducky came back in we were talking about a series of books we had read which lead to a slight conversation about Buffy the Vampire Slayer (the movie, it’s a classic, if you haven’t seen it you should) then we ended up talking about TDH for some reason, I can’t remember why, but knowing me I probably brought it up. I think I have explained how seeing him is my incentive for losing weight, but I have been emotionally eating lately that I’ll be lucky if I maintain my watermelon shape (right now it’s one watermelon, it could easily turn into two at the rate I’m going). It’s been three weeks now since I last saw him. I told Ducky that it was never going to happen, I’ll never see him again, and when I said the words I really believed them, if I stuck to the course I was on I never would see him again, and then I told her that it is probably for the best. I will never be with him, and wanting to be with him hurts so much (when I let myself think about it), so I should just get over it. Why would he ever be interested in me?
On the drive home I drove too fast and was a little too quite. I didn’t mean to be, but when I get into certain moods it’s hard for me to pull out of them. Instead of going straight to Ducky’s house I stopped by Wal-Mart, not my usual favorite place to go, but the one by her house isn’t so bad. Unfortunately my reason for going was bad, I was stocking up to emotionally eat. Before we even got anywhere I saw a movie that someone had misplaced and I picked it up, it’s a movie that highly disturbed me but I liked so I kept it and intended to buy it, hoping it had come from the $5 bin. I grabbed a bag of chips and a cake mix (which I had no intention of eating at the time, I just like to have cake mixes around for a rainy day). Then Ducky asked if we could go by and look at the movies even though I had mine picked out. So we looked around and she picked up one of those two in one deals and then we went to the $5 bin. Big mistake. So we were digging through and I found three other movies I wanted, one of which happened to be Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I was elated; we had just been talking about it, so I took it as a sign that I had to own it. Ducky was upset and asked me to help her find a copy. We were digging through again and I told her that it was unlikely that we would be able to find one in the huge bin, then, just as I had given up I pulled up a movie and it happened to be another copy! So I handed it to her and we merrily skipped back towards the registers. We stopped by the candy aisle though because even though I had four new movies I needed some white chocolate. Then we went to the registers and I mentioned the fact that I was buying 4 movies. Ducky said that she thought we each should just get three and I thought she was trying to get me to choose one to put back because she had her three movies in her hand. I told her ‘no’ four good selections that stumbled upon by chance? I wasn’t going to take the risk of never seeing them in the $5 bin again, I did that before and it was the biggest mistake of my life. Okay maybe not the biggest.
We go through the checkout and got back to Ducky’s apartment, we watch the best television show ever and afterwards we start talking about something. She said something , I honestly can’t remember, but I think it was an attack and I reminded her that I found her a copy of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. She shoots back, “yeah but you kept it for yourself!” I was dumbfounded, two copies, I had found two copies, one for myself and the other for her. I told her to look at her movies that she bought at the store. She picked them up and looked at the covers and was more then a little embarrassed. She’s done this once before, she may or may not have a brain tumor, but I told her that was my gig so she’ll have to get over it and come up with some other ailment.
As I was leaving Ducky’s I mentioned to her to try and get her ticket for this haunt thing we planned to go to Friday night. I have a ticket that was meant for Ducky but out of pride she will not accept it, (however, though I say ‘out of pride’ which may have negative connotations attached but not by me), I back her up 100%. She told me she would call in the morning and again the little negative aspect of my personality already knows it’s sold out and she won’t be coming and it will just be me and this dreary individual who purchased the tickets. Still there is still an ounce of hope that she’ll get one, otherwise I wouldn’t have reminded her. I finally leave Ducky’s to go home only to find that once I get there my house key is no longer on my key chain. Diva was home and luckily I had my phone so I called her but she didn’t pick up. I left a voicemail message that may or may not have come across the wrong way, I was mad at myself for having lost my keys and I was worried that my tone in the voicemail may have come across as me being mad at her, which I am not. Luckily most of my anger is really just at myself. I knocked on the door but felt like I was waking up the whole neighborhood so I sat on the porch, wondering if I had the patience to wait for MM or Jelly Bean to get home. I decided that I did not and I called Diva again. She picked up and sounded slightly confused (come to find out she hadn’t heard the voicemail yet so that would explain it) She hadn’t been near her phone the first time I called. She let me in, I let my dog out, and then I vented.
After venting MM and Jellybean came home, needless to say I was still pretty peeved about my evening and recent venting session with Diva. Jellybean asked me if I wanted my clothes from the dryer, so I came and got those and then I asked MM how Frisbee was because she had gotten a group together to play Frisbee rather then coming to the activity. She said it was good and asked how the activity went, I said it didn’t. I may or may not have snapped at her and said things that this morning I regretted. She will be issued an apology by post, mostly because I think it would be nice to get a letter in the mail that isn’t a bill. Speaking of which I need to write that. Oh and did I mention that I got an e-mail from my brother and I went over my texts...again.
After all of this I get online and I talk to Eeyore (as much talking as can be expected when engaged in a conversation with him). I wrote him first this time because on Facebook he was leaving all the Richmond groups, he had changed his network, and his status said that he was sad. I asked him if he was moving. He said he didn’t know and I told him he sure made it look like he knew. Then I asked him to not take offense but asked him if he needed help. I really do think we are dealing with a severely depressed individual here. He said ‘no thanks’ and I just mentioned that I wasn’t talking about with moving. I even offered to put him on my dating list if that would make him happy. I do worry about him, but also Eeyore is a strange kind of contagion. His mood can greatly affect yours if you’re not careful. You hate him (not him but what he does) sometimes and you just want to cut him off, but then you can’t help but feel the pull on your heart strings. He’s like a little child in some ways, a depressed little child who needs someone to take care of him and since most women have that innate maternal instinct I think I’m safe to say that I’m not the only person who feels this need to help him.
Oh by the way, I kept meaning to call Bachelor #1 and see if he still wanted to go out this weekend and kept letting other things get in the way. So instead of calling him super late last night I e-mailed him, intending to call him tomorrow but just letting him know I haven’t forgotten. I wrote that if he was still interested in going out this weekend that Saturday would be best and that we could either go bowling or to the batting cages. He wrote back almost instantly and told me where so batting cages were that we could go to, which I’m figuring means that Saturday is good and that’s what we’ll be doing. Then he wrote back again asking if I had asked because of his status. So I had to check his status on Facebook which said that he was wondering where the girl for him was. I didn’t really know how to take that so I wrote him back and said, “oh, I hadn’t seen your status, funny how the timing worked out on that.” Not really sure what my answer means either. This is the problem with me, I don’t know what people mean, not even myself. Then I ask if 6 or 7 works on Saturday and asked if I should pick him up (since I asked him out I fully intend to be in charge of this date though I do happen to give him a lot of options). He said I could pick him up if that’s what I wanted to do but either way was fine and that 7 worked better. Then he e-mailed me again later and said, “I have to ask, why me?” to which my initial reaction was, ‘why do you have to make it sound like I’m torturing you?’ I finally decided to tell him that I didn’t know him very well and I was being more proactive about my life and decided to get to know him better, though I took more time and thought into exactly how to say it so trust me when I say it sounded more put together when I sent it to him. The moment I hit the sent button I thought of a better response. I should have just said, “Why not you?” But I am the queen of afterthought lately. Regardless I get this reply back, and I am going to just paste it verbatim, “Ok. I should have asked you out earlier. I guess I hoped that always showing you I realize you are around when I Tell You "HI" you would say something or ask me out. I'm a loser.”
I didn’t know how to react to that. Yes, he is a loser for not asking me out sooner, but that’s a natural byproduct of procrastination. However, part of me knows that if he had asked me he wouldn’t stand much of a chance. I had to be the one to ask him in this situation. And what does he mean by, ‘I guess I hoped that always showing you I realize you are around”, like I’m some troubled teen who acts out because my parent’s treat me like I’m invisible, "I see you Annie!" (sorry movie qoute). Yet at the same time that I am so cynical I actually kind of think it’s sweet. I wrote back and told him he wasn’t a loser (I figured leaving someone hanging on an ending note like that wouldn’t be a polite thing to do) and then I mentioned that I just don’t noticed things very well but it must have worked because I asked him out. Seriously whatever he did had to work because when I first thought up my list of bachelors he was the first to come to mind. Strange how all the guys lately seem to have their magical powers out, the power of suggestion with Bachelor #1 and the hypnosis that got me to go out with Mr. Collins last week. Very interesting. All I can say is that Bachelor #1 is lucky I got proactive or we may never be going on a date
In the meantime it is supposed to rain today but I have no clue if it is or not. I wish I had a window.

Chapter 73: Unappreciation

Last night I went to my Happy Place and Ada Giggles-worth was working. She asked me what I was doing tomorrow night (tonight) and at first I almost said nothing, our friend is in town for her “fall break” at school. I told her I had a date and Bull Dog was there, he starts picking on me in an unusually high pitched saying, “oh you’ve got a date.” I disregarded the urge to pick on him in return simply on the grounds of him sounding like a sissy. So, I proceed to explain to Ada and Bull Dog that this is not an exciting date, not even one I want to go on, and Bull Dog tells me that I need to call him up, tell him that I don’t have other plans, I just don’t want to go out with him. I told him that it of course makes sense, why waste everyone’s time, but I just couldn’t do it. Then he says, “Do you want me to call and pretend to be your older brother and say, ‘she’s really doesn’t want to go out with you’?” Um, no thank you. It’s just one date, not eternal marriage, so I think I’ll just get through it and that will be that. After that maybe, just maybe, I’ll be able to say, “You know what, magic creeps me out, so no.”
Background, on Wednesday night Mr. Collins called me to confirm plans for Friday night. I somehow missed the call (I really am interested in how since I had my phone on me. Am I sad about it? No.) So he left a voicemail for me to call him back so he could tell me the plans and I thought to myself, why not just leave them on the voicemail? I’d like as little contact as possible. Since Mr. Collins is under the impression that I still work my crazy job I find myself in no hurry to correct him. If he thinks I’m still working 11 hour days and mostly nights I feel more than willing to let him continue to think so.
Needless to say I didn’t call back until around 8 o’clock last night a good 24 hours or so. I’ve been busy, what can I say? So I finally call him back and he picks up on the first ring! Who picks up on the first ring!? When he picks up I can tell that he is somewhere public because of all the background noise coming through. We go through the usual greetings and then he tells me that he is at someone’s wedding. I knew about the wedding, but completely forgot and either way I didn’t know either of the participants very well to begin with so it wasn’t a heartache for them if I forgot. So I say, “Oh, forgot about that,” to which he says, “Oh were you invited?” Which pissed me off a little bit, invited? The whole ward knew about it, it’s not one of those things where it’s a by invitation only. Why does he think he’s so freaking special and “invited” to things that others are not? I think I have used the phrase socially inept before, not with him, but I’m certainly going to start. So I just say, “I don’t know, but I was just saying I forgot.” I let it go, on the surface at least, but he is inching closer and closer to being the single most burnt fry in the bunch.
So he tells me the plans, the park at 5:30, have some food with us to eat there (oh a picnic how disgustingly romantic…by the way I’m not a romantic individual so when someone tries to get me to do things that they assume all girls enjoy I get more grossed out…like the time that this kid in high school made me dance in the parking lot with him at night, it wasn’t romantic, the lack of music and the height difference made it awkward.) So I roll my eyes to myself a bit, I drop in, “so you just want to meet there?” to which he says, “Oh I was going to pick you up.” People tell me the right lines to say but not what to do with the other person’s response. Then he goes on that the park closes awfully early (my intention) and that maybe we should find something else to do afterward. I don’t do the marathon date thing but apparently he was planning on it. So he mentions going to the Byrd, the oldest theater in Richmond, I happen to like the Byrd and it’s a movie, no time for magic tricks or talking, so I say that might be cool. I also threw in there somewhere that Ducky and Bachelor #2 wanted to come along as well and I told them that would be okay. He asked, “Oh we’re turning this into a double?” and I said, “Yeah I guess so,” of course it could be a complete non-date as well and I’d be happy.
So Ducky comes over and I tell her the plans and she tells me that Bachelor #2 has to work until 6 and the earliest he could meet us at my house would be 6:30 so I text Mr. Collins and tell him that 5:30 isn’t going to fly because of Bachelor #2’s schedule. I rearrange the time to be 7pm (I’m happy because I have shaved off 1.5 hours from the date right there!) Then I also put in the text that we may have to forget the park. I tell him that we will go out to eat and then go to the movie. This eliminates the chance for him to do something romantic, like provide dinner. Now it’s just casual. So he calls me while Ducky and I are watching our show so I ignore it, no one calls me between the hours of 9 and 10 on a Thursday night! So I call him back when the show is over, he explains to me that he would have just texted me back but he was driving. The whole time I’m trying to talk to him I hear his little G.P.S. system speaking to him. I don’t know how I feel about G.P.S. systems…if you can’t find it on your own what kind of man does that make you? You need a little voice to tell you to take a right and drive 13 miles? It just seems like you can’t take care of yourself, you’d be completely useless giving directions. It just makes you seem less of a person that you have such a dependency on the G.P.S. I have to admit though that he isn’t as bad to deal with on the phone, he irritates me it’s probably because he can’t do any magic tricks for you. But I also hope that maybe I sounded disinterested enough on the phone, which I know that I probably don’t. I really think he pulls some kind of hypnosis or something. I tried to have awkward silent moments too during the second call. I’m used to feeling the need to fill the space, not last night. I sat their quietly for a moment and waited for him to end the call and he finally did.
In other areas of my life my mom had asked me to pick up Thorn from work yesterday and take her to the house for dinner, she also asked me to pick up dinner (which is why I was at my happy place). It wasn’t so bad, the drive from Thorn’s work to my parent’s house seemed a little long with her asking me all these questions and I swear that she repeated one of them once. I just answered it the same way I had the first time and wondered if she then realized what she had done…she probably didn’t. So we get the house and my dad was hustling, trying to get all the food on the table and get it done with. So I helped him out as best I could and then we sat down to eat. Now my mom wasn’t able to be there because she had to work late last night (hence the reason for me picking up Thorn from work). I got to see what life would be like without my mom at the dinner table and let me tell you, the room seems darker and no one is there to get everyone talking. My mother truly has a gift for gab and not in a bad or annoying way, but I realized that my dad isn’t a man of many words and while I knew that I had also assumed he could invite people into conversation. Not so much.
Since we had peace and quiet for dinner with the exception of Spam eternally embarrassing herself I was more clearly able to hear the annoying and disgusting way in which Thorn eats. She breathes through her nose as though she’s out of breath but trying to hide it as she eats just as sloppily as her children. In fact I think her children left less of a mess around their plates than she did. Not only did she eat that way but she continued to eat! Taking no thought as to the fact that my mom hadn’t eating and that’s all the food we had. I was glad I had decided to double my order though! She ate the two pieces that technically was allotted to everyone and then she gives Spam some more chicken though she shouldn’t have and maybe she should stop acting like her hard earned money was going into the meal and ask if it was alright if the little pipsqueak got another piece. When Thorn brought over the dish with the chicken Spam started freaking out because there was something on the chicken, thus solidifying the fact that she is an over reacted teenage drama queen (and she’s only 9) the air was filled with “ew”, “gross”, “get it out!” and then a slight gagging sound. I quietly looked at her from my seat with the, “Holy cow you’re annoying and if you don’t stop I will find a way to quiet you forever” glare. The only reason I didn’t say anything was because we had other guest besides Thorn. Thorn says that maybe it’s just BBQ sauce that’s gotten on there and Spam is squealing about how it’s not BBQ sauce, maybe its blood. I just rolled my eyes and said, “Maybe it’s a tomato!” and it turned out to be in fact a tomato. At this point Thorn gives Spam a wing and Spam freaks out that it’s a creepy looking leg, and I say, “Cause it’s a wing”. Finally we take the wing away from her because Thorn found a leg. Then Spam eats that leg and asks if she can have the wing back, to which I say, “No, she doesn’t appreciate it” and you would think since it was my money that provided dinner that I would have a say in it, but then you would be thinking wrong. Thorn gives her the wing and Spam simply complains about what it looks like and struggles to eat. Then Thorn asks Burrito if he wants to split a wing with her. So she pulls one in half and gives the larger half to Burrito who then lives in his own personal delusion that it is a small and slightly funny looking leg. I tried to tell him that it was a wing and not a leg and he tells me that it’s all attached to the foot anyway, and that’s when I stepped back from the conversation, it couldn’t end well, my IQ was the only thing in danger of dropping and I had to remove it from the situation. Then I hear Thorn ask Spam if she wants to split a wing with her. So she does this! The whole time I am thinking nasty thoughts that I won’t even write down here. But seriously Thorn could eat a whole chicken by herself and not see anything wrong with it. I limited myself to one piece of chicken since it’s obvious that Thorn may need to pack some more in (Oh I told myself I wouldn’t write such mean things). I get up to clear the table and then to pull out dessert for family and guests. Ice-cream. My dad asks me if I want any and since I am trying to see TDH (part of my new weight lose program, I can’t stalk TDH until I’ve reached a semi-goal in weight lose…doing pretty well this week by the way) I declined. But I got it all out for everyone else and Thorn wanted a cone instead of a pull. She made out with her ice-cream a little bit longer than everyone else took to eat it and all the while, the nasal, heavy, breathing. I tried to focus on something else but the only other noise was Spam making fun of the way someone speaks in her class. She makes it sound like he enunciates, so I asked her what was wrong with that, no one would have to ask him to repeat things like they do with her. She goes on about it some more, ignoring my insult, and then she says something about how he never repeats himself like she does. I wonder if for some strange reason she thinks repeating herself is a good thing. Any time you have to repeat something it can’t be that good, just ask Burrito about having to repeat Kindergarten. I just sat there thinking that while she may be “gifted” according to educational standards she is by no means intelligent, or mature, or special in any other way other than the fact that she test better than their unusually low standards expected. I just think education is dwindling to a sad state when someone like Spam can be considered for gift-ti-tude (like I’m one to speak, I make up words at will). She just bothers me, why make fun of another “gifted” individual, they should be tight considering they are all in the same educational basket.

Chapter 72: My Own Magic

I have decided that I will not be a victim of circumstance. I will not have my only date be with Mr. Collins, I absolutely refuse. If I have to go on a date with him then I’m going to be going on dates with other people as well! I don’t have time to sit around and wait for some guy I know to sit up and take interest, Collins and I could be married by then! So to avoid that fate I made the call to Bachelor #1 last night. Even though I have no interest in Bachelor #1 I was still nervous. Diva sat in the room while I did it and I don’t know if that gave me more courage or made me wimp out. I got his number from Facebook, the only true and valid form of stalking. Then I went to save it into my phone in case I wimped out so I could call later when I had more courage. As I was in the process of saving I accidentally called him, looks like fate stepped in and said, “You aren’t going to wimp out tonight!” I couldn’t hang up after it starts ringing, it was already sending my data to his phone whether or not I stayed on the line, then he would call back and find out that I was the gutless terd calling his phone and he would then proceed to ask why. So I let it ring, telling Diva that no one picks up for numbers they don’t know and then just like in the movie Hitch the other line picked up! Who answers numbers they don’t know!? I don’t! So I informed him who was calling and it took him a second, which I expected, we barely know each other and until last night we didn’t have each other’s numbers. I would have done the same thing. Then once we established my identity I proceeded to ask him out for Saturday night. He said that he was going to be out of town but that I should save his number and call him when he gets back (and I’m thinking to myself, I don’t know when that is) and then he told me he will get back on Wednesday. So I said I would and finally hung up the phone. It was almost a relief and at the same time not because I’ll have to do it again next week, except I know this time that he’ll go. Diva and I then went upstairs and watched a movie. When I got back down to my room I had a new e-mail (on Facebook) and it was from Bachelor #1 before reading the message I thought to myself, “calm down, I’m not in love with you,” which is the standard reaction from the guys I know. He just wrote to apologize again for leaving town and told me that he would really like to get together when he got back and then asked if I had any ideas. Right then and there he removed himself from burnt fry destiny. No matter what ends up happening he will not overcook in the fryer.
In the meantime Ducky called last night and we tried to devise a plan to make Friday night with Mr. Collins more bearable. She is going to try and get a date (actually with my current Bachelor #2, but they are subject to number change….except for Bachelor #1 because he has confirmed a date). Hopefully she can, if not I’ll just have to grin and bear it and remember that starting next weekend I will be going on a date with a different person, thus helping to make sure that I can’t be a permanent dating fixture in Mr. Collins dating pool. And maybe one day it will get easier to lie to him about what my plans are.

Chapter 71: The Cast System of Fries

So, due to my moment of complete grief last night I feel that to some extent I am desperate for someone to enter my life and “save” me, save me from myself, from Mr. Collins, from G.I. Joe. I was thinking about it…Remember I said that G.I. Joe and I could be friends if he would stop creeping me out. I don’t know if it is because we have family in common that he has the chance to obtain at least friendship, but with Mr. Collins I don’t even want to be his friend. I know I should feel bad, but I don’t. He’s a nice guy I’m sure, but as Ducky said, it’s his approach. He’s a little overbearing, and I just can’t even stand to be around him. Yes, the pit of my stomach aches and I think I am growing physically sick by the minute. I swear if he sits by me at church this coming Sunday I will stop going. It’s just not worth it to me…not that church isn’t worth it to me, but going to that particular building isn’t worth it to me. It’s a 45 minute drive and what is more appealing about that ward than the one that is a 5 minute walk from my house? So far the one closest to my house is winning…I don’t have to leave the house as early to get there on time, I could walk there instead (saving gas and losing weight), I could blend in where no one would even notice me. Now for the pros of the 45 minute drive: I made a kicking church CD I can listen to almost completely on my commute, I have some friends to sit with there, oh…that may be it. The fact that there are single guys there does not entice me, why? Well, if you have to ask why you’ve never come for a visit to our ward.
Last night I got online and Eeyore was online too. I felt a rush of some strange desperation and wrote him first this time saying, “Come home”. Strangely enough I think I want to cleave to the only normal guy that exists in that ward. He told me “never” and I told him that he was a cruel man. He asked how FHE went. I told him he missed ghost stories and an almost magic trick. Then he got offline suddenly telling me to have a good night and then he was gone.
I kept working on what I had been writing before and then he was suddenly online again and asked if anything else exciting happened at FHE. I told him that he said, “Goodnight” so I didn’t feel like I should have to talk to him after that. He then said that he heard that Mr. Collins brainwashed me into going out with him. I started to guess who it was who told him (there were really only 3 people who might). I told him it made me angry (not that someone told him but that Mr. Collins asked me out). Then I asked what he had been up to (he’s out of town if you haven’t guessed). So he starts to give me his agenda of hot girls he is going to be hanging out. Half of the conversation he was Eeyore and the other half he was Asshole, a real Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. I didn’t realize that he had been in the ward for 2 months before anyone said anything to him. He told me how in his old wards people would come up and introduce themselves but not in our ward. I told him how I moved into my house in May and people were still surprised in December when they figured out that I was living with the girls I was living with. I’m pretty sure that doesn’t happen anymore but who knows. I told him that our ward just wasn’t friendly, but I also told him that I wasn’t used to being the center of attention so I didn’t notice at first. I told him that he had people going over to his apartment all the time now to play Wii. His response was that they come to play with the Wii not with him. I promised him that if he came home I would come over and play with him…and then I rethought that statement. It’s almost like the other night when Ducky was over and she got on under my name and told him that I said if he came home I would give him some action. You’ve got to be careful with what you say. Especially to him, I think I’ve been weirding him out lately. Not that I care, but I think its happening.
In the meantime TDH made contact, it’s because he’s in love with me *rolling eyes*, I wish. He asked how the new job was going. I don’t remember what I said back, but this morning as an afterthought I added that I still expect the picture that he promised and even the blueberry fritter. He needs to just be my boyfriend so that Mr. Collins will back off. I left out G.I. Joe because I happen to know that he doesn’t let the fact that a girl has made her choice get in the way of him still hoping she’ll change her mind. Simply knowing this fact should put me in Buddyland, but somehow it still hasn’t. Who would have thought I’d see the day where I desperately wanted a passport to Buddyland? I mean, I’m used to being there, but who would have thought I’d want to stay there.
I’ve decided to take a more active approach, I’m going to be a highly effective person and go with habit one of proactivity, not a real word apparently but who cares, I’m going to be proactive. I’m going to take matters into my own hands. I’m going to start to date. It’s not like I am increasing my hopeless search of finding a boyfriend, it’s that there are some people I want to get to know, and one good way to do that is to go on a date with them. My first victim, er, I mean, date is going to be someone who I am slightly annoyed by. This way I can decide if it was just a moment in time when he got on my somewhat bad side or if maybe there’s more to him than I thought. Unfortunately for Mr. Collins he is already on my burnt fries list. But I am going to give some burned fries a chance to redeem themselves, and some shoestring fries a chance to advance to steak fries or a chance to return to the deep fryer to sit in the oil for much too long.

Chapter 70: Easter Grass and Mac Trucks

I finally e-mailed Twitch. He was the last one on my list from the old job and I just happened to get bored enough to do it. Now I realize that the previous sentence makes it sound like I didn’t want to e-mail him. I loved working with Twitch, but I felt a little weird e-mailing him because I didn’t feel like we were that close and also he’s married, I have a thing about married guys, I try not to have too many conversations with them. It’s an old habit from back in the day when I worked at a catering service and a married man there kept trying to have too many private conversations with me. When he started to ask how long it had been since I had really been kissed I decided then and there that if at all possible I would avoid these situations altogether. So you can understand a little more now why Twitch was at the end of it. However, it didn’t stop me from calling his voicemail and leaving blank messages. He is the prankster of the team and deserved to have some pulled. I don’t know if I ever wrote in here my last prank on him as a member of the JSD Team. I took an envelope, shoved it full of Easter grass and put a note in the middle so that he’d have to pull it out and possibly get Easter grass all over (yes, I just happened to have a lot of Easter grass lying around when I was sending out my store mail). He got it last week and today when he e-mailed me back told me that it was “on par”. He is like my evil prank master and I love getting compliments on the magnitude of my work. I guess in a way I’m a little prank Igor and Twitch is Dr. Frankenstein (or Dr. Prankenstein…ha-ha, man I’m lame). Twitch told me that he sent the envelope with the Easter grass to TDH and put in a new note that told him that it was his turn. Why did that job get so fun right before I left? Twitch also mentioned that he got a blank voicemail the other day and figured it had something to do with me. Then he told me how he is going to lay off for a while, lull everyone into a false sense of security and then his time will come. He is totally Dr. Prankenstein.
So I e-mailed Twitch back, telling him that I was glad my envelope of Easter grass was making the rounds. I also told him that he should dare TDH to send it to Red. Then I informed him that when his prank hiatus was over I would be more than willing to help him if he needed assistance. I offered to send him my resume and my list of qualifications as well as a few references if he needed them. I actually could scrounge up some references if Twitch asked me to provide them. I do love pranks, I don’t care if they are cross-company pranks, I mean, who am I going to pull them on here? I don’t know anyone well enough…yet.
Aside from that today was probably the most boring day ever, and remember it has last Monday to compete with, but at least last Monday I killed some time walking around being introduced to people and taking a long lunch, I didn’t have that today. I have had a headache since about 11:30 this morning.
I went to FHE tonight. They were going ot be telling ghost stories…how could I resist? I picked up Ducky and when we first got to the church we sat in the car because there were only 5 people out in the parking lot. Then new roommate, who still doesn’t have a name yet, (I’m befuddled) came and got in the car and we were sitting there talking while the group gathered in the parking lot. Then Ducky told me to “become part of the car” I think that’s how she worded it and deep in the pit of my stomach I knew that Mr. Collins had arrived, not the first one to arrive…learning M.S.T.(Mormon Standard Time) I see. My car was on, but the lights were off thank goodness, so when his back was turned I slid the car into reverse and backed up a space behind a truck. Very simple procedure and no one noticed. Then when everyone had finally gone inside I scooted back up to my original spot.
We sat talking until Diva showed up and then we tried to sneak into the activity, which by the way, we walked in at 7:30 or later I’m not sure and they were still going over announcements. The darn activity is supposed to begin at 7…am I wrong? This is just like ward stare my last year at school, and we know what happened to my attendance with that (and in case we don’t know I stopped going because it aggravated me). Anyway, it was a little hard to sneak in since the door squeaked when I opened it. I avoided eye contact with every one, I didn’t want to take the chance of accidentally making eye contact with Mr. Collins and that giving him the impression that it was okay to speak to me (didn’t matter in the end anyway). I sit down and luckily for me the activity required the lights to be out so it made me feel like I wasn’t in a room full of people. More importantly I didn’t feel like I was in a room with Mr. Collins. Then after the activity for some reason Mr. Collins made us all be his “audience” for a magic show, of which never happened because of mechanical malfunction and then everyone got up to leave but Mr. Collins caught me at the end of my line. He shook my hand and said that he hadn’t seen me in forever. I told him that I was being anti-social lately. He asked why and I told him I had family in town. Just trying to keep it short. Then he throws out of nowhere, “what are you doing on Friday?” and I honestly went brain dead and couldn’t answer. This is when I get made at myself. I hate the fact that I can’t come up with an excuse quickly enough, I hate that I feel bad if I make up some excuse. I really hate that he doesn’t pick up on the fact that I don’t want to go anywhere with him. Does he really believe that it was an accident that we didn’t ride together to the party? I freaking ran away from home! A girl my age running away from home is a horrible sign. Then he called this past Thursday, did I ever call back!? No! That’s a huge sign! That’s a “Leave me the Freak Alone” sign, in neon lights down a dark alley.
Anyway, long stupid story short I am going to “hang out” at stupid Maymont Park. The last time I was at Maymont Park G.I. Joe was trying to seduce me. I’m going to have very bad feelings towards that park. I did get out of put-put though. I hate put-put; I loathe, detest, and despise it. Almost as much as I loathe, detest, and despise bowling. I actually like bowling, and put-put with the right group of people can be fun, but on a date with someone I don’t have any interest in it’s my own personal hell. I almost wished he would just say, “Let’s go see a movie”. I could do that, I like movies and it would give me a chance not to have to talk to him and maybe even see a good movie while I’m at it. Hey my first date ever was to a movie and it’s was a darn good one…the guy however was a flop.
I just hate my life. Did I mention I got a speeding ticket yesterday? No? Well, it was my sign that this week would be the pits. Then I get asked out. To make matters worse Ducky asked me what our game plan was so I wouldn’t run again. I’m the runaway date; I don’t know how I like my eggs so I run away!! But wait...I know how I like my eggs, scrambled and cooked until they are mostly golden brown, oh that’s right, I just don’t attract normal people and I’m a freaking wimp. I told Diva, New Roommate, and Ducky that my solution to the whole ordeal was a hot bath and a razor blade…or maybe a Mac truck if I’m lucky.
At this point I really do wish a Mac truck would wipe me out.

Chapter 69: All Things In Moderation

Yesterday I went to the mountains with my family. Navy Seal Ken and my sister are in town, so we decided to take a trip up for the fall festivities at some apple orchard we always go to (I however haven’t been in at least 5 years due to college and working on Saturdays). Along with Navy Seal Ken came his family, and of course that meant G.I. Joe was coming. Now I don’t know if it’s because I already know I have no interest in G.I. Joe or if I just get annoyed when people are obvious, but it bugged me yesterday how he was trying to ride in the same car as me, but tried to make it look like it wasn’t his decision. He kept saying that he was the odd man out on his side of the family and he kept telling his other brother that he didn’t want to listen to Barry Manilow (meaning he didn’t want to ride with his brother), he kept trying to ride with us in our car.
While we were at the orchard G.I. Joe came up to me and was like, ‘So, you don’t have to work nights anymore huh?” I answered in the positive, I’m proud I have my nights back. Then he starts to tell me that this girl he works with (who I met last week), her husband plays poker on Tuesday nights so he’ll have to call me so we can all go to a movie. I just nodded and then told him how I had finally seen Bourne Ultimatum. If I didn’t worry about him liking me I think we would have a greater chance of being friends, it would be nice to have a guy friend who I actually hang out with, however, since there is that feeling that he may like me as more than friends I’m just guarded around him.
When we were getting ready to leave the orchard he was back to trying to get into our car by asking his sister-in-law if he should just ride with us since they may have plans to go home. They had said that they were going to lunch but in the end decided to just go home and took G.I. Joe with them. It was for the best; lunch would have been awkward because I know he would have sat next to me and called me “Jessie” some more…stupid nicknames with the “i-e” endings.
I just don’t understand, I have Mr. Collins calling again (I know it’s only been a week or two since he stopped but I really thought I was in the clear) and G.I. Joe is back to trying to get me to hang out with him and the one person I want to try won’t (Of course we are talking about TDH here who else?). It’s probably for the best though, but still, why is life like that? Why do I finally get some guys interested in me and I’m not interested in any of the options given me? I like one guy and I can’t have that one be interested?

Chapter 68: Party Like A Rockstar

So MM is leaving…I don’t know how long but she’s going to be gone when I get home from work so I’m happy.
TDH e-mailed me at work yesterday. I had e-mailed him in the morning because I was about to blow my brains out with the boredom handgun. So I sent him a spelling test because I thought that would be funny of me. Just so he could semi-survive without me. He e-mailed me back telling me how his interview went on Tuesday and telling me a little bit about what the job really entails, not quite what he thought it would be considering it’s for a marketing position and this one was more programming. It was odd; he said that the position should have been for an “IT Dude”. Then he asked how work was going, so I of course wrote back with what I’d done so far, admitting that I really missed training on Monday because the day was absolutely the pits. The e-mail may have been too long, but I don’t care, I was bored at the time I was writing it.
I am however beginning to think that TDH just enjoys people listening to him, so maybe I shouldn’t get so excited about all the talk time that we got my last week of work. My goodness, I can’t believe it hasn’t even been a week, it feels like so much longer.
In the meantime Mr. Collins called me again, I unfortunately miss the call because I was still working…sarcasm there…and his reason for calling me this time was to inform me of a “Conference” Party this weekend. Um, no thanks. I think I should tell him I’m seeing someone, even if that means I am in all actually just stalking TDH for a glimpse here or there. I envy people whose faces he doesn’t recognize. It’s so hard to be a stalker with the stalked recognizes you. Diva taunted (unknowingly) me today by informing me that she had seen him. I’m a little jealous; I’m not going to lie. Oh, detour sorry, I was just saying that I actually see a lot of people, so it wouldn’t really be a lie to say I am seeing someone.
I thought I was done with this.

Chapter 67: Sleepwalking

Apparently when your soul reenters your body you get sick, a though your body might reject your soul after such a long absence, so long an absence that it seems your body doesn’t recognize your soul as it’s own. Dramatic? Maybe. But yesterday I got my soul back and today I feel sick as a dog. My nose is what started first, and that was yesterday, halfway through my final last shift at work. Then it progressed from there. I attributed it all yesterday as just being tired, I hadn’t had much sleep; I had done a 3 mile walk in the morning, worked, went to the broadcast last night, and had the worst Cold stone ice cream experience of my life. Then last night I woke up around 1:30 a.m. in the most pain I’ve been in for a long time. The fact that it woke me up is proof enough that I was in a lot of pain. At first I thought it was my tooth, I was certain it was going to fall out, but since I just had a dentist appointment three days ago and my teeth seem to be in perfect health I tried to look past the tooth pain, and then I realized the real pain was coming from below my eye, to the right of my nose. It hurt badly; I took all the Advil I could find and some sinus medication. Then I laid down in bed rubbing my face until I fell back asleep. Now I may or may not have overmedicated myself because I finally woke up eleven hours later, and I was still tired. So I must conclude that I am having an allergic reaction to my soul. I’ll acclimate, it’s the only choice I have.
Deep in my medicated stupor I had a really weird dream, a mix of real life, a book I am reading, and maybe more than one subconscious desire, and of course random elements that have nothing to do with my life whatsoever. Do I remember it? Not anymore. I did remember it when I first woke up, but I suppose I waited too long to write it down.
I was groggy through the hour of church that I made it to, and I had trouble driving to and from church today. When I went to my parent’s house I was sleepy and groggy. My parent’s had a “good luck on the new job” cake, but it was from the enemy store and had whipped icing. I despise whipped icing, and when I’m sick I don’t try as hard to cover up how I’m feeling. I wasn’t all together too happy because my mom had invited G.I. Joe. I wasn’t very talkative considering the medication and my mom came into the room and asked why I was mad at G.I. Joe. Luckily my sister had been there and stood up for me that I wasn’t mad at anyone, just not feeling well. We had spaghetti for dinner (not a favorite) so I didn’t eat much of that and then when my mom pulled out the cake and I saw that it was the whipped icing I declined. I could have just taken a piece and scraped off the icing, but I wasn’t in the mood to even attempt it. Then I slugged around my parent’s house until G.I. Joe told me I should leave. I didn’t mind that part because I don’t really like staying at my parent’s house so long, but I always feel obligated to do so. I had mentioned to my mom what I had taken (two cold and sinus tablets and two Advil) and she told me not to take anymore until I was ready to go to bed. Good thing I mentioned to her what I had been taking, because I would have probably kept going and killed myself accidentally. That would have been tragic.

Chapter 66: Treasure Hunt

Today at work we had a meeting and then a team building activity. It was suppose to be a reward for all the hard work we put in while we opened a new store. Training was on overload for a couple of months because of it. I don’t know why I had decided to go to the meeting, I mean, I didn’t need to be there, and yet I sat there and took notes. When I came to sit down TDH smiled and told me that he meant to buy me a blueberry fritter that morning. I smiled back trying to figure out if I was missing out on an inside joke between us but I couldn’t remember. I just told him I don’t eat blueberry fritters and he said I would have tried it for him. Then he told me that he was going to print off our team photo and sign it for me, but he didn’t. His excuse was that his printer was only printing off in purple. I told him I expected to get that picture some time. Later in the meeting Big Red was having trouble putting up a flip chart and TDH asked her if she needed help. I looked over at him and asked, “Why? So you can say you were going to help but didn’t?” He got the reference and knew I was just joking around.
Before the meeting started we went around the room to introduce ourselves because there were a lot of new people to the team. When they got to me I just said my name and my manager’s manager looked at me and said, “and?” so I just smiled back at her for a little bit and finally said, “and today is my last official day.” I train tomorrow as well, but today was the last day working with anyone. Then they went down the line, Twitch, TDH, new guy…when New Guy introduced himself he also announced that he had just accepted the full time position to train for my stores. Awkward! It was so final. I hadn’t known that he was replacing me, it was news to me just like I assume it was news to most everyone else. I know it shouldn’t have upset me, but in a way it did and I almost wanted to take it all back. What if I don’t like this new job? What if they don’t like me? I was so certain that I didn’t want the job I have now anymore, but now that it’s quickly winding down I don’t know if I want to let it go. I mean, regardless I will, it’s too late to take it back. Though someone else mentioned to me today that I should stay on and just work Saturdays as a promotional trainer…interesting because TDH had just mentioned it earlier this week. It just came up faster than I thought it would.
After our meetings (because we had two on our fun day) we went to lunch…at a Mexican restaurant. I don’t know if I have ever mentioned this but I am extremely picky. So I was filled with dread when I found out where we were going. I carpooled with TDH, Twitch, and New Guy…this is the way I like life, chilling with the boys. TDH drove and Twitch had called shotgun but when we got to the car he said that I was taller so I should sit shot gun. I thanked him, but then looked into TDH’s car, it was a mess! There was trash all over and a case of bottled water in the back. SO we all pitched in to clean up quickly. I just made some smart remarks about it that I wish I could remember right now. When we walked into the restaurant I wasn’t sure where to sit, it’s always awkward when you want someone to sit by you and you know you can’t force them to, but you want it to look like just chance that you happened to sit next to each other. So I just decided to sit down, and without thinking about it I sat in the middle seat of three chairs, there were chairs on the other side though, so I didn’t feel like I was forcing TDH to sit by me. He could have gone on the other side and sat by Twitch or by New Guy, but he sat down by me. Which of course made me happy. There wasn’t much to talk about if we wanted to avoid talking about work, so we all took note of the 10 or so televisions that all were tuned in to the same station. It was a soap opera and I leaned over to TDH and said, “I bet you were worried you were going to miss this one.” He just laughed. Later though I happened to look up and see that this blonde lady was in a conversation with a man who had an obvious fake mustache. I mentioned to TDH and Twitch that the guy looked like he had time traveled from the 1920’s and forgot to try to look like he fit in. The sad thing about soap operas is that his character could have been a time traveler. We went back to talking about something else, anything else. Then later I looked up and the blonde was kissing the time traveler! I threw my hand up over my eyes and said that I couldn’t watch it! Then we joked that the mustache (which looked incredibly fake) might have accidentally come off on the blonde. The waitress finally brought us our food, which by the way I got a chicken Caesar wrap…not something I would normally get. So I started to get it with a fork, I’m not going to bite right in, it doesn’t give me the chance to eat the proportions that I want. TDH laughs and I look over at him and ask what, he just shook his head and finally said, “eating a wrap…with a fork?” I told him that some of us just like to be careful and make sure that we don’t got food all over ourselves. Twitch and TDH seemed to use the buddy system to go to the bathroom and while they were gone New Guy and I made up an elaborate plot for the silent soap opera surrounding us. It was pretty intense and the other female trainer on our team told me that I shouldn’t watch the stuff, I should write it. I just shrugged my shoulders, anyone could have thought of a priest forcing a pretty blonde woman into the nunnery with her son watching on, all the while the priest is her half brother and the father of her child. But the father of her other child stormed the church to try and stop her from taking a vow of celibacy, and of course silently we watched as she ripped off her nunnery clothes (a hobbit? Heck if I know what they are called) and her younger son and half-brother watched in dismay as she ran off to her life of sin with her former boyfriend and his mustache.
Anyway, so then the people came to lead us in our team building activity, a treasure hunt through Richmond. Before we embarked they gave us a few moments for a bio break (using the little girl’s room). I got up to go and so did two other women but they had their purses with them and I had left mine where I had sat it down, so I nudged TDH and told him my purse was on the ground and he should let anything happen to it. Then I went off to use the bathroom. When I came back I got to walk on to the most adorable scene, TDH was standing with his back faced towards me and what did I see dangling from his hand? My purse. I walked up with a slight chuckle and told him how I wish I had had my camera ready for that picture. He just smiled and handed it back to me.
TDH, Red, our scheduler, and a guy from the food service team, and I were all on the same team. Twitch and New Guy were on different teams as we split up to go on a treasure hunt. So we started out and went to our first place and found our clues. I was able to figure out the first one and decipher the message and that was pretty fun. It was a lot of fun at first. So then we went to our second clue and started to work on the clues there. We found the cannon and started looking around from what we were supposed to see. Suddenly TDH sees a golden coin (there were 2 golden coins throughout the hunt and if you found one it knocked 20 minutes off of your final time). So needless to say TDH was pretty excited and he bucked at the tree and said, “what now?” which…was pretty interesting. Then he starts saying how he ruled at Easter time because he always found the biggest brightest egg…like it was a natural talent or something. We then went to stop three of four and that’s when it began to get frustrating. We were making it harder than we had to and spent too much time there. We ended up giving up and going to our last place to get a clue. That was when it became really annoying and I wanted to throw up. We quite possibly spent the longest amount of time here, looking for a clue that the riddle said would be easy to see for those who looked and some crap about a whisper waiting to sing. Finally the guy from the other training group found a sticker on the back of a sign and we called the number on there and they told us the answer. So we then went back to the museum to try to find the clue we had given up on. We figured that we had the answer but we hadn’t found one piece they told us we needed but we gave up and went back to where we started. It was kind of depressing. Our feet hurt, we were tired, and we didn’t have the energy to go looking for the missing piece. The people in charge simply opened the treasure box and gave us our last clue. We quickly figured out the answer and I ran up to tell the lady the answer. Even though we were the last group back our gold coin brought us in at second place.
Once the results were announced and we got our trophies we headed out. We got back to the main office and all of us had decided not to go back in and then we were all walking through the door together, all with our different reasons to go in. We waited for Red to get back, even though she was in a car that left before us (we figured they got lost). In the meantime Twitch and I talked, he was trying to attach some pictures to an e-mail and I was talking to him about how I already had those pictures. He laughed and closed the e-mail and said it wasn’t worth it, then he admitted that he was going to download a bunch of pictures and e-mail them to me. He is always pulling pranks. He informed me of several ideas that he had for pranks for me. Then he verified my cell phone number and I told him to never call me at 4 in the morning. We were also talking about something else and I said something about him being an alchy (don’t know the spelling) and he said, “Recreational” and I asked, “You’re a recreational alchy?” In fact this is where the don’t call me at 4am comment came in. He said he would call me at 3 am then and I told him I would call him at 8 or 9 am when he was sure to be sleeping and yell loudly as I spoke to him, “What?! Am I talking too loud? Oh do you have a hangover? I’m sorry!” He thought that was funny.
Twitch left first, asking if I was coming at the same time but I told him I wanted to go talk to Red first. So he left and I talked to Red and what to do with my stuff when I finish up tomorrow. Then we both walked back to join New Guy and TDH as they tried to print something off. I asked TDH what he was working on and he said he was printing the leader’s guide for Part 1 for New Guy. I looked at New Guy and said, “If you really want to do a good job at it you should just take my notes because I do it better than TDH.” Everyone started laughing and Red said, “She’s humble too”. I told them that I just take a compliment and run with it. I also told Red that I may be calling her every once in a while to get a compliment in case my new job didn’t like me. If I just get a compliment then I could be good for a couple of weeks. Then we all got ready to go and Red and New Guy went to talk, surely about what he needs to be ready to do next week and TDH and I left the building.
We had parked at opposite ends of the parking lot, so we got down to about where our cars were and then we stopped and talked like Tuesday night. People kept driving by this time though because we weren’t in an empty parking lot. Red finally came out and she mentioned one last time that she was sorry to see me go. I really believe her too, so it’s nice. I’m glad I decided to get her a goodbye/thank you gift (A Dilbert wall calendar, she loves Dilbert). Then TDH and I kept talking. I told him how I had really felt when I did Part 1, like adrenaline was pushing me forward and I had no idea what I was saying. I told him how it was too easy and that’s why I kept checking to see if I forgot anything. He told me that I had done Part 1 perfectly…he really used that wording. It made me feel good, like maybe I should have kissed him. This time our conversation was interrupted by Twitch who was calling TDH to hang out. So he had to get going. I told him that if he and Twitch ever get bored they should give me a call so we could all hang out. When I got to my car I realized that we had been out there for 45 minutes. Why is it now that he suddenly stops and talks to me for long periods of time? Not that I mind, but it’s just that this was probably the last time.
I checked my phone and saw that I had missed a call from my mom so I called her back and she invited me to dinner. I was calling back a little late and asked if they had already eating but she just told me to come. Luckily they were eating near where I was so I just headed in that direction. As I took the turn on to the street by the restaurant I looked at the window to see if they were sitting in their usual spot (I know this sounds sad, but they have a usual spot there) and I saw my mom and then the other face I saw was G.I. Joe. I was bad and let some profanities slip by. All I could think was, “Shit, she tricked me,” and it wasn’t so much thought, but thinking aloud to myself. I was ticked off almost instantly. How quickly my mom deflated my good feeling produced by TDH. Luckily my dad was there too, but suddenly it was like being on a double date with my parents. Talk about awkward. It was almost painful, but considering some of the things I’ve been through in the last week not as painful as having to sit next to Mr. Collins on Sunday. With that in mind I did invited G.I. Joe to come to church on Sunday. I hope he doesn’t think that this means anything, because it doesn’t, I’m simply choosing the lesser of two evils.
Why does dating have to be so much like the treasure hunt through the city today? Fun at first, even a little exciting, then you slowly start to get frustrated and can’t seem to see the clues that are right in front of you because you feel like it’s supposed to be deeper than it really is. Then of course in the end you walk back to the starting point, defeated and your feet in pain.