2003-10-24 - 9:23 a.m.
I've had an interesting last couple of days.
Wednesday I graduated from driving around the church parking lot and drove around on some actual streets, eventually driving around on some BUSY streets. I rule! I only caused whiplash maybe three or four times. Driving a stick isn't taking as long to learn as I was fearing it would be.
I did laundry over at Josh's and made some cookies. Normally I think Josh blows the smaller things in life out of proportion and obsesses over ridiculous things that on occasion have nothing to do with him (just my possibly inaccurate observation) but in this case there's something going on where I absolutely think he's the wronged party and he has every right to be angry. The weird thing is that he seems to be handling it quite calmly. I would be so irritable if I was in his situation.
That night I ended up going out with Jimmie of all people. We went to see Lost In Translation and then out to dinner. He brought me a rose, and I thought, shit! This must be a date! But I like flowers and I haven't received any in a long time, so I also thought, awww... a flower. We played some rummy over at my apartment and discussed why the movie wasn't bad but wasn't good either. I had a good time.
The next day, I went to the gym and had myself measured, and found out that my body fat percentage went down over 2%. It's not something I'm concerned with, but I still felt gratified, especially since I've gained a few pounds. A few pounds of muscle! If I knew how to insert a picture here I would take a picture of myself flexing these big guns. Yeah Baby!
Shortly thereafter, I went over to Jeff Abbott's barracks room to help him move stuff into my apartment. He's staying with me for a couple days since he's getting out of the army and they're kicking him out of the barracks. He's got a secret meeting up in Washington D.C. in a few days, and doesn't want to be up there and pay money for a hotel room for a couple days while he's waiting for this secret meeting. He asked if he could stay with me, and I said, no problem! I'm also keeping some stuff of his here since transportation can't come and collect it until after he's out of the area; they're too backed up. This means a free day off work for me, since I'll be having to stay here all day and wait for transportation when they come to pick up his stuff. I helped him move his things with my gigantic van, which has come in handy on more than one occasion for things like this.
In my mind, this isn't a big favor, but he seems to think so. He bought me a big basket of flowers (flowers two days in a row!!!) and a couple of books and a nice card. The thing about it is, he bought me this Sandman book I showed him when we went to Barnes & Noble one day, and he remembered how much I wanted it! He also remembered how I wanted to read The Mosquito Coast since I liked Paul Theroux so much. The basket of flowers contains my favorite flowers, yellow roses and tulips. In retrospect I probably should have gleaned that he would be buying me some flowers since he asked what my favorite kinds of flowers were, and what kind of guy cares unless they're about to buy you flowers. I was very touched and it was one of the nicest presents I've received in a long time, extremely special since it was so unexpected.
We were going to go to Sharon's fashion show fundraiser but he talked me out of it. This is a fundraiser for the navy and people were going to be modeling some clothes, including Sharon. We were just going to go to support her, but then Jeff told me it was going to be FOUR HOURS LONG, and after that it wasn't too hard to convince me not to go. I feel bad though because I said I was going to be there. I'm going to make rice krispie treats and bring them into work for her; hopefully that will make up for it.
I talked to my parents last night and found out that my cousin Annie had her baby. She's a single mom, and doesn't have her high school diploma, and apparently the father isn't helping out at all. We're all a little worried for her, but she has a lot of family to help support her. She's really taking the hard road by keeping this child, and I have a lot of respect for her for making this decision. I hope things work out. A blessing is that her baby boy is healthy, and she's doing fine.
Yeah... an interesting last couple of days.
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