Happy hour; Engagement party; Things continue to break; &c.
10/14
Post-car shopping, I had Stephanie drop me off at Buffalo Wild Wings for a graduate school happy hour. Wings were eaten. Good times were had. I talked to Danae a bit; she's engaged but super cute and reminds me very much of Lindsey Bacon from the high school days. I also spent some time talking to Kim, who I completely failed to remember meeting at Char's party the previous weekend, until I asked her what she did, and she reminded me that we had that conversation, and that I had started it out by asking, "So, what do you work on? In two sentences or less?" Oh yeah...
Anyway, Kim's a grad student across the street at UT; her connection to all of this mess is that she's funded by the same organization that funds me. I got her back story; she's from somewhere midwestern. She spent a good deal of time bitching about the fact that her boyfriend hadn't called her in a week. I informed her that I was in no position to be giving out relationship advice, but that it seemed like a bad sign. Turns out that he was from back home, had moved down here, lost his job, was unhappy with his options here, and had returned from whence he came and they were doing the long distance thing. Maybe I was in a position to be giving advice after all.
Cindy showed up and told me that we needed to talk. I got a little scared, not having any idea where she was going with this. She, in her endearingly awkward way, first said that she thought there was an "attraction" between us, that it wasn't just a drunken hookup, and I agreed. She then told me that she didn't feel like she had time for a full time boyfriend, and I told her that I thought we both had lives and friends and school and weren't ready to sacrifice any of that yet, and that I was OK with keeping things fairly committment-free. We then moved onto the subject of continuing to date other people, and we were in agreement that this seemed like a good idea.
So I was relieved. No bullshit to deal with. Excellent.
The night went on, and Char and Leroy attempted to gather people up to transition to their place. Kim had insisted that I ride with her, and Persistent Sara joined us. Turns out that Kim has absolutely awful tastes in music. Staind and their ilk. I'm going to burn her Death From Above 1979. Maybe it will be a step forward.
We got to CLW's place (Char-Leroy-Will), where the guys outnumbered the girls by quite a bit. At one point, I was sitting out back around the fire pit, with Cindy, Sara, and Kim, and there was some sort of vaguely sexually harassing behavior going on from some of the other guys that were there, and I considered life's little ironies. I started feeling embarassed for the guys that were out there and went in, confident that the ladies could fend for themselves.
Awkward ratios aside, there was a good time to be had. Char and Leroy made the mistake of putting their Crown out and then were surprised when it was gone by the end of the evening. Apparently Val flashed people at one point, though I missed it. Rodrigo was there and, as is typical, was a little rough in expressing his affections in his drunken state, which almost got him in trouble with Leroy and Char. Kim was taking off and asked for my phone so she could put her number in—a first for me. Cindy was ready to go soon after that and I had her give me a ride home again.
10/15
Saturday night was Graham's engagement party at his parents' place near Rice. Due to car issues, I didn't have any clothes that were quite as formal as I would have liked, but I made due with my dressier jeans (don't you dare say a word, Sabrina), the nice Banana Republic shirt Rebecca had given me for my birthday (which I had to iron), and my brown sportcoat. I looked pretty hot, in the end.
Char, Jessie, Tiffany and I arrived, got some wine (no red, sadly), and moved on to check out the spread—and an impressive spread it was. I was glad I hadn't taken time to eat.
Char and Graham have a history of exchanging pranks; somehow, Jessie ends up as the third party that helps either of them get the other. That night, Char and Jessie were determined to steal the keys to Graham's Audi. Which they managed to do, and parked it down the block.
Most of us were mystified when, during the toast, everybody kept referring to Graham's fiancé as Angela rather than Kennedy. Turns out that Kennedy is her middle name, and she hates it, but a professor from college started calling her that, and it stuck with all of her college friends, through whom Graham met her, and thus that was how we were introduced to her. When they got engaged, she demanded he start calling her Angela.
That's his story, at least. I think that, maybe, they're twins, and Graham's trying to switch on us without us knowing. Maybe they killed the real Kennedy. Poor girl.
Later on, Graham broke out some scotch that pretty much killed all of us except him. I know I at some point accused Bellowes Bourbon of tasting like gasoline, but this really did. Nothing smells like that without being seriously bad for you.
People filtered out. I got to check out Graham's B&W speakers (which probably cost maybe five times what mine do), and I could tell why people pay so much money for them—accurate or no, they sound impressive and detailed.
Char and I took off eventually, and stopped by the West Alabama Woodrow's to visit Leroy, dropped back by Graham's, gave "Angela" a ride home, made off with a plate of the spectacular desserts that Graham's mom had cooked, and called it an evening.
10/16
Jeff was nice enough to take me to the grocery store so that I could stay fed through the following week of carlessness.
Cindy picked me up to do dinner at a Thai place in the village (whose name eludes me). She suggested we should order two entrees. I ended up eating pad thai and tom kah gai for the rest of the week. Not that I complained, mind you. Our conversation was characteristically awkward. But hey, I guess these things take time.
10/17-20
The next week was relatively uneventful, for the most part. My parents picked up the car (not without incident, as it was lacking side airbags which he let slide, and they tried to charge him a fee for transporting the vehicle from another dealership which he didn't). Chris was nice enough to take me shopping for car alarms. I spent some time researching car alarm and iPod hookup options.
The clock battery for the iMac finally arrived, and I installed it, only to discover that it didn't fix the problem. I tried a few other things and pretty much came to the conclusion that the iMac was dead. Bah.
Post-car shopping, I had Stephanie drop me off at Buffalo Wild Wings for a graduate school happy hour. Wings were eaten. Good times were had. I talked to Danae a bit; she's engaged but super cute and reminds me very much of Lindsey Bacon from the high school days. I also spent some time talking to Kim, who I completely failed to remember meeting at Char's party the previous weekend, until I asked her what she did, and she reminded me that we had that conversation, and that I had started it out by asking, "So, what do you work on? In two sentences or less?" Oh yeah...
Anyway, Kim's a grad student across the street at UT; her connection to all of this mess is that she's funded by the same organization that funds me. I got her back story; she's from somewhere midwestern. She spent a good deal of time bitching about the fact that her boyfriend hadn't called her in a week. I informed her that I was in no position to be giving out relationship advice, but that it seemed like a bad sign. Turns out that he was from back home, had moved down here, lost his job, was unhappy with his options here, and had returned from whence he came and they were doing the long distance thing. Maybe I was in a position to be giving advice after all.
Cindy showed up and told me that we needed to talk. I got a little scared, not having any idea where she was going with this. She, in her endearingly awkward way, first said that she thought there was an "attraction" between us, that it wasn't just a drunken hookup, and I agreed. She then told me that she didn't feel like she had time for a full time boyfriend, and I told her that I thought we both had lives and friends and school and weren't ready to sacrifice any of that yet, and that I was OK with keeping things fairly committment-free. We then moved onto the subject of continuing to date other people, and we were in agreement that this seemed like a good idea.
So I was relieved. No bullshit to deal with. Excellent.
The night went on, and Char and Leroy attempted to gather people up to transition to their place. Kim had insisted that I ride with her, and Persistent Sara joined us. Turns out that Kim has absolutely awful tastes in music. Staind and their ilk. I'm going to burn her Death From Above 1979. Maybe it will be a step forward.
We got to CLW's place (Char-Leroy-Will), where the guys outnumbered the girls by quite a bit. At one point, I was sitting out back around the fire pit, with Cindy, Sara, and Kim, and there was some sort of vaguely sexually harassing behavior going on from some of the other guys that were there, and I considered life's little ironies. I started feeling embarassed for the guys that were out there and went in, confident that the ladies could fend for themselves.
Awkward ratios aside, there was a good time to be had. Char and Leroy made the mistake of putting their Crown out and then were surprised when it was gone by the end of the evening. Apparently Val flashed people at one point, though I missed it. Rodrigo was there and, as is typical, was a little rough in expressing his affections in his drunken state, which almost got him in trouble with Leroy and Char. Kim was taking off and asked for my phone so she could put her number in—a first for me. Cindy was ready to go soon after that and I had her give me a ride home again.
10/15
Saturday night was Graham's engagement party at his parents' place near Rice. Due to car issues, I didn't have any clothes that were quite as formal as I would have liked, but I made due with my dressier jeans (don't you dare say a word, Sabrina), the nice Banana Republic shirt Rebecca had given me for my birthday (which I had to iron), and my brown sportcoat. I looked pretty hot, in the end.
Char, Jessie, Tiffany and I arrived, got some wine (no red, sadly), and moved on to check out the spread—and an impressive spread it was. I was glad I hadn't taken time to eat.
Char and Graham have a history of exchanging pranks; somehow, Jessie ends up as the third party that helps either of them get the other. That night, Char and Jessie were determined to steal the keys to Graham's Audi. Which they managed to do, and parked it down the block.
Most of us were mystified when, during the toast, everybody kept referring to Graham's fiancé as Angela rather than Kennedy. Turns out that Kennedy is her middle name, and she hates it, but a professor from college started calling her that, and it stuck with all of her college friends, through whom Graham met her, and thus that was how we were introduced to her. When they got engaged, she demanded he start calling her Angela.
That's his story, at least. I think that, maybe, they're twins, and Graham's trying to switch on us without us knowing. Maybe they killed the real Kennedy. Poor girl.
Later on, Graham broke out some scotch that pretty much killed all of us except him. I know I at some point accused Bellowes Bourbon of tasting like gasoline, but this really did. Nothing smells like that without being seriously bad for you.
People filtered out. I got to check out Graham's B&W speakers (which probably cost maybe five times what mine do), and I could tell why people pay so much money for them—accurate or no, they sound impressive and detailed.
Char and I took off eventually, and stopped by the West Alabama Woodrow's to visit Leroy, dropped back by Graham's, gave "Angela" a ride home, made off with a plate of the spectacular desserts that Graham's mom had cooked, and called it an evening.
10/16
Jeff was nice enough to take me to the grocery store so that I could stay fed through the following week of carlessness.
Cindy picked me up to do dinner at a Thai place in the village (whose name eludes me). She suggested we should order two entrees. I ended up eating pad thai and tom kah gai for the rest of the week. Not that I complained, mind you. Our conversation was characteristically awkward. But hey, I guess these things take time.
10/17-20
The next week was relatively uneventful, for the most part. My parents picked up the car (not without incident, as it was lacking side airbags which he let slide, and they tried to charge him a fee for transporting the vehicle from another dealership which he didn't). Chris was nice enough to take me shopping for car alarms. I spent some time researching car alarm and iPod hookup options.
The clock battery for the iMac finally arrived, and I installed it, only to discover that it didn't fix the problem. I tried a few other things and pretty much came to the conclusion that the iMac was dead. Bah.
posted by L. Maxwell Ward at 11:39 PM
