~Sunday~ Wash. Rinse. Repeat. Slept in. Sesame seed bagel with honey walnut cream cheese. Yolkless hard-boiled egg. Coffee.
What can I say? I’m and ESFJ, and I like routine. The good news is that that was the last bagel. Look for a change-up tomorrow.
I’ve been meaning to capture this: Although I didn’t attend any of them, I received invitations to three New Year’s Eve parties, and I do recognize those as implicit affirmations. Thanks Leo and Jen; Sarah and Harry; and Ben, Dale, Steve, Stephen, and Joe.
Although it’s an issue that I’m not at all passionate about—due to the fact that it’s not an institution to which I aspire—I think this graphic, pointed to me by my friend Hugh, is a great summary of all the rhetoric around Gay Marriage, both for and against. It’s best viewed on a large screen monitor to minimize both the vertical and horizontal scrolling.
I went into my office in the early afternoon, where I worked on the minutes of the November 11th UITC meeting, which need to go out in the morning.
I stopped at 6:00 and rode over to Leo and Jen‘s new place downtown. I was actually invited there by our mutual friend Jason, who among others, had helped Leo put together a new grill and were testing it out with Italian sausages and brats, which were first boiled in beer and onions and then finished off on the grill.
I enjoyed two of them—one spicy Italian sausage and one brat, which were delicious. More than that, though, I enjoyed listening to a bunch of straight men, among other things, assessing and comparing how many times each had been “Heismaned” during 2009, including debating the definition of being Heismaned, which essentially came down to meaning you tried to date someone (not just fuck them) and you ended up getting rejected (outright) or dumped (eventually).
It’s quite rare that I hang out with a group of all straight men for any amount of time, much less get specifically invited to such a gathering as opposed to it happening happenstance. I definitely count it as an implicit affirmation.
I left there at just before 8:00 and went back to the office before heading back downtown at 9:00 to meet Joe at Flex for karaoke.
Tragic elements featured at scareyoke tonight:
- A somewhat regular who is very socially awkward, has few friends, and doesn’t sing anywhere near as well as he imagines he does, sang about every fourth or fifth song, because there we so few people singing tonight.
- At one point during the evening said person, who had been standing by himself for ten minutes or so, came over to stand next to me, Joe, and this other guy who was talking to us saying, “It’s my birthday, and I don’t want to be alone.” That was just so sad.
- Another guy, who isn’t there very often (thank goodness) and who usually gets totally shit-faced when he is, did not disappoint tonight. He was all over everyone—meaning both in the faces and with his hands all over the body of everyone he talked to. He started in on Joe who eventually took the guy’s arms, pushed him away, and said, “Personal space. You need to honor people’s personal space.”
- Later in the evening said person told (not asked) each and every one of us why we should give him a ride home. I told him he should call a cab. Eventually the bartender did just that, and when the cabbie came in looking for him, the guy was nowhere to be found. Bless his mess.
- The aforementioned birthday boy asked me at close to 10:30 if I would give him a ride home. After indicating he lived in North Raleigh, I said, “Honey, I’m sorry, but I can’t drive way out there.”
“I gotta run then to see if I can catch the bus, then, before it stops running,” he said darting off.
Good grief! I had already told him I was going back to work when I left there. People!
Joe shook his head and asked, “Do I look like I have the word taxi written on my forehead tonight?”
“No,” I quipped looking at his forehead like I was reading it, “All it says is, ‘Honor My Personal Space.'”
For the record: I have nothing against people who can’t sing very well, and who know it, but want to sing karaoke anyway. It’s the people who have not so good—or even outright terrible—voices, but act like they’re some kind of overlooked American Idol candidate up there that I struggle with.
Speaking of tragic messes, I stopped back by the office, where it took me until 3AM to finish those damn minutes! Rhetorical question: Why do they call them minutes when they take hours to complete?