I Should Like October
2008-10-09, 8:18 p.m.

Day 1508

Really, I should. Every so often, the units digit of the calendar and my day counter line up. On rarer occasions, the tens digit will also synchronize. It took me an entire week of October to realize this. October 08 � Day 1508. This is nice because I don�t have to refer to either of my other counting implements to see what day it is.

Those implements are 1.) a 4.5� x 7.5� calendar I keep tacked to the wall next to my �puter, with every other Sunday numbered and 2.) the website Quitnet.net (I�ve linked it before, but I�m too lazy to go look it up again) Quitnet always knows how many days it�s been since I gave up the smoking habit.

Except that well, now that I look at a calendar I see it�s the 9th, not the 8th, so that whole �I should like October� thing just got all shot to hell didn�t it?

Trying to add this entry as an email. Unfortunately, I won't know if it works till I get home tonight. So if you're looking at this between say 3:30pm and 8:30pm Eastern Daylight Time and it looks all hosed up - sorry in advance.

Got my hairscut last night on the way home from work. That�s big news. Last time I had them trimmed? July 7. It says so on my Supercuts card. Went and got a whole 2 inches trimmed off. That�s both good and bad. It�s good because maybe now my head will be a little cooler when working out. Except it�s really not all that thick on top anymore, it�s all sliding down to the sides . . . The bad part? My hair WAS long enough that it didn�t really show horrific signs of bed head. It would kinda lay down and behave, so I could just soot to the gym, get all nice & sweaty and not really care. NOW it�s short enough that this morning? Looked like I had a diagonal Mohawk working. Not a good look, even for the gym. That�s going to add an extra couple of minutes to my already tight morning �get to the freakin gym already� schedule. The folks at the gym willl just have to learn to put up with it I guess.

As I was sitting in the stylists chair, chatting idly with the stylist, I got a text from Eric. He wanted to know what was for dinner. Well, we had plans to do a Chicken Chipotle Chowder Monday night, but couldn�t. We had (almost) all the stuff we needed, so I asked Eric to go ahead and get started on the chowder, I�d swing by the grocery store on the way home and get the last few items we needed.

I got home and Eric was merrily chopping away. But we had no celery. Oops. Oversight on my part. Recipe only called for a � cup, we�d just do without. Anyhow. No Cindy when I got home. It was 5:45-ish � entirely possible she was at the gym. Eri & I continue on with dinner prep.

Before things hit the stove, Eric got a phone call. It was Cindy, calling from �The Shoe Dept.� (guess what they sell?). She�d stopped to get her car inspected earlier. Couldn�t get it done because the Check Engine light was on. Something about some emissions violation that needed to be fixed, and the dude to do that wasn�t there at the moment. Had to re-schedule for another day.

Anyhow � while leaving the Shoe Dept., Cindy discovers that ecause of the aborted inspection, her key fob got left inside the car and she couldn�t unlock it. She asked Eric to run the extra set of keys (with fob) over to the store for her. Mind you, this is all of a � mile trip if you take the long way. Since Eric was sooooo involved in chopping veggies for the soup, I grabbed the spare set of keys and headed out the door. This shoe place is in the same plazas the local �Gates of Hell� (W@l Mart), so I thought I�d pick up some celery to fill out the soup too.

Got to the shoe place in maybe 3 minutes. Found Cindy out front. I pulled up along side the store with the passenger side facing the sidewalk and unlocked the doors. Cindy looked, turned away from me, walked a ways down the sidewalk then circled back and walked around the front of the van, in the rain, came over to my window and held her hand out expectantly, all the while glaring at me like she was disappointed (or mad even) that I was the one that showed up.

Aaaaannnnyhow. I handed her the keys, offered her a ride to her car. Granted, it was less than 100 feet away, but it WAS raining. Thought I�d be nice and offer. You�d have thought I�d offered to cut her foot off instead.

So I left, went to the Gates of Hell and got my damn head of celery. I wanted to get back quick so Eric could get it into the soup.

Getting the celery is a story unto itself. I walked in the store, headed straight for the �fresh� veggies and grabbed a bag of celery. I then turned around and made my choice � which �Speedy Checkout� with 20 *^%#$ items or less was going to be the fastest? I opted for the line with a couple more people, because they all appeared to have fewer items than the folks in the shorter line had. Way I saw it, I was #5 in line. Customer #1 in my line was taking forever. I could see that even the cashier was getting pissed at her. She finally wrapped up her business and we indexed ourselves forward a notch. The other line? Didn�t move. I could see that customers 2 & 3 were gong to be a pain over there. Looked like a husband/wife duo that were splitting items amongst each other, trying to strike a balance so that neither was over the 20 item limit by any more than 10 or 12 items.

My line indexed forward again. The ancient lady in front of me seemed to not notice. I had thoughts of just skipping around her, thinking that maybe she fell asleep while resting on her cart, but just as I was about to bust a move, she woke up and teetered forward. Damn. My hesitation was going to burn me.

Finally, after all of 5 minutes, Miss Daisy is up. She plops her purchases on the counter one at a time. Bologna , hot dogs, orange juice, 4 jugs of cranberry juice (UTI?), assorted other groceries. Easily under the 20 item limit. Meanwhile, the husband of the duo in the other line wrangling with the cashier. His wife had just finished and was still standing there waiting.

Back in my line, I see that Miss Daisy�s total is $38.87 She reaches into her purse and pulls out a wad. She grabbed a couple of 20�s off the top and started to hand them over. Something made her think better of that move though. She withdrew the 20�s and flipped through her wad. Now I know why it appeared to be so thick. She started peeling off singles � about 1 every two or three seconds. After she had amassed 10, she handed them over to the cashier, who reminded her �but the total is 38.87!�. Daisy started peeling off more singles. She got to eight (after a minute or so) and handed them over to the cashier, who still responded, �but the total is 38.87!�. Daisy handed over another single, �but the . . � then she handed over a 20. To me, that added up to about $39. The cashier was still �but the total is 38.87!�, so I chimed in with �She gave you $39�. That�s when the cashier woke up (can�t blame her for falling asleep), counted the wad she was handed, found it contained $40, stuffed it all in the drawer, and made change. Handing Daisy back one of her own singles in the process. What the fuck ever � the transaction was blessedly OVER!.

The cashier looked at my celery, said �This will be quick�, and rang me up. (No � women do NOT say that to me very often). I passed Daisy while she was still making her way to the front door. She�d made it all of 20 feet.

Got home after Eric had started saut�ing the veggies. We tossed the celery in anyhow. Soup came out fine. I got more until she finally left to go do lip service at her AA meeting. Unfortunately, while she was gone I did nothing to gain Eric�s buy in to this home version of an intervention we want to do. Zach & I both need to work with him and get him in the fold. He�s he most bothered, but is also the most reluctant to go for help. Fine combo.

On a more positive note � bowling tonite!! Have to try and recover from last weeks merely average effort. Really need to bare down on those single pin spares. Had 3 last week, and it makes the difference between having a so-so night or a pretty good night.

Plus, I just emailed Cindy too. Not sure it�ll do any immediate good, but I did ask her why I�m getting so much attitude lately. I included a little bit about being appreciated too � like how I never even got so much as a �thanks� for running the keys out to her last night. Might be opening Pandora�s box, might be the little nudge she needs to know she isn�t operating in a vacuum. One just never knows.

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