Peculiar Day

I'm having one of those days that I'm glad will probably never happen again. I'm supposed to be writing a 10-15 page paper on AT/RT for Monday, but I'm going to take a few minutes to document this before I forget all of the details..

It started out ok.

Last night, I texted Justin, and he offered to give me a ride to clean the church this morning at 9. Sometime while I was sleeping last night, I remembered that he was in charge of cleaning the church this week, because everyone else was going to be gone. That meant that he was probably going to need to be at the church before 9:00 to open it up. Which meant that my 8:50 alarm was probably going to be too late. Somehow, I woke up at 8:30, and was awake to hear his text message come in asking me if I was ready. I replied "almost" and pulled on some pants and a sweatshirt. I grabbed a watermelon jolly rancher as I went out the door, and spit out pieces of the wrapper that I couldn't get off the jolly rancher as I stood and waited for him to pick me up.

After cleaning the church, a girl named Stephanie invited me to go see the new Harry Potter movie. So I headed over to the Boston Common in my pants and sweatshirt to watch HP7. In the car was an older man who I will refer to as Jeffrey, because I forgot his real name.. but it might have been Jeffrey. Anyway, when we rolled up to the theater, it turned out that the girl who invited me needed guys to help Jeffrey out of the car into his wheelchair and into the theater. I felt needed.

While sitting in the theater, I realized that the last two movies I have seen in theater are the Michael Jackson movie, and Avitar. Both of which were 2009 movies. Granted, I was in Germany and things come out a little later there than in America, but it had been a long time since I had been to a movie theater.

And an even longer time since I had watched or read Harry Potter. I think the last time I tried to read Harry Potter was in 11th grade, when I was trying to read Harry Potter for reading pages. We had to read 1000 pages per term, but I was informed that Harry Potter wasn't real literature, so I couldn't count it for my reading pages. So I turned to real literature like Emma and Wuthering Heights which cured me of any recreational reading desires I had.

And I think I watched the middle half of a Harry Potter movie while I was waiting for something somewhere... not sure about that.

Anyway, about 30 minutes into HP7, I had deduced that the pale guy without the nose was Voldemort. After that things made a lot more sense. However, because of my unfamiliarity with the Dobby chararacter, I wasn't crying as I left the theater.

I helped Jeffrey back into the car, and then we drove to drop him off. On the way home, he rolled down the windows and kept making jokes about having to throw up. I wasn't sure whether to believe him or not.

While we were in the car, Sarah, a girl in the car somehow started talking about how her roommate had been asked out to the upcoming Boston area singles' dance. Evidently, the guy had knocked on her door at the very late hour of 10pm. She was alone at home, and didn't think it was necessary to answer the door at that hour. And then three guys started texting her, telling her to answer the door. It was really creepy. She didn't know any of the numbers, but one of them was an 801 number.. Finally, she went downstairs and found that they had left a pie on the doorstep with a cute poem. At first she thought it was for her, but then she was relieved to discover that it was for her roommate. Sarah has a boyfriend. That would have been awkward. Anyway, she searched through the whole pie, but couldn't find the name.. but she put it into tupperware containers and it is in the fridge right now. What a peculiar story.




It was especially peculiar because my friend Justin and I were the guys who were sitting outside for 45 minutes in the cold across the street hidden in the bushes, trying to get someone to take the pie into the house before the dogs or homeless men got to it... I still haven't heard back from the girl because she's out of town until Sunday, so this is still a secret.



Anyway, we dropped off everyone from the car except for this girl, Jeffrey, and I. The car window was down, and we were talking about how there are tunnels that run from Arsenal park to certain houses for bomb shelter and for transporting stuff... they were built before WWI. All the sudden, Jeffrey asked that we pull over. Stephanie pulled into the parking lot of a restaurant. Before she had come to a complete stop, Jeffrey was opening up the doors and.. puking.

I never know exactly what to do in these situations. So I offered to run into the restaurant to get napkins... I came out to a large pile of puke... we wiped it off the car door handle and off of his sleeve, and when he was feeling better, I threw the napkins away. I haven't dealt with puke since I stopped volunteering at the ER at UVRMC. Crazy.

As we drove the rest of the way to his house, he explained to us that he had CMV. It makes him feel sick and throw up a lot. I added it to the list of diseases I don't ever want.

We made it to his house, and I helped him out of the car into his house... carefully grabbing his arm, not where he had puked on it.

He was a funny old man, but had somehow foiled my plan to ask this Stephanie girl if she wanted to go grab lunch.. I was pretty famished, having only eaten a watermelon jolly rancher earlier this morning.

However, the drive back to Inman Square where I live was long, and by the time we arrived, we both had appetites again. So we stopped at All American Sandwich. Which is good, but not that good. Let's just say the reviews were better than the food.

We had a good time, and a good talk.

When I arrived home, I needed to use the restroom. But I heard this dripping noise in the ceiling.

I pushed up on the ceiling tiles, and all the sudden, a bunch of liquid spilled down behind me. I let out something that was half-way between a "woah" and yell, and ran upstairs to inform our neighbors that they had sprung a leak. They said they would call our landlord.



I came back down, and put a bucket under the leak, and mopped up the spilled liquid. The liquid appeared to have a yellow hue. I hoped it was cleaning liquid that had spilled.. The girl from upstairs came down (as I was using the restroom, holding the bucket above my head for protection) and informed me that the landlord hadn't answered his phone. I asked her if cleaning liquid had spilled. She said their toilet was clogged...

So, I'm sitting here, postponing my AT/RT paper, as yellow liquid drips into a bucket in the bathroom..

I've come in contact with way too many bodily fluids today. I guess I'll have to be wary of blood and saliva in my evening activities if I get my paper done.

I'm just glad days like this happen only very rarely.

What does this mean?

So, I'd like to start this post out with a happy picture:



This is a notice from the merciful city of Boston, notifying me that they have forgiven me my parking ticket.

Folks, I don't even have a car.

I had rented a zip car to go pick up a dresser, and because it's Boston, there were no parking spaces in front of the house. So I parked across the street. It was a heavy dresser, and when we had carried it down to the street, I ran and got the car from across the street and backed it up onto the curb between two cars.. there was just enough space. And the dresser barely fit in the back. I ran upstairs to get a AC system that the Craigslist user was also giving away, and when I came back down, a cop was driving away with a smirk the size of a heavy dresser on his face.

But I appealed it, and Boston has forgiven me.

And if you are very observant, there's a little prelude of what's to come at the top right of that picture..

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So, do you ever have times in your life when you wish you had a voice recorder on you? I think these times in my life have been becoming more frequent as the result of two experiences I have had here in Boston:

1. Meeting a girl named Coleen in the ward here, who is a sound engineer.. um I'm actually not exactly sure what she does, but somehow, it has something to do with carrying a voice recorder around. I accidentally stalked her on her website (I admitted this to her afterward, so I don't feel so guilty now), and thought it was cool that she carried a voice recorder around.


2. Hearing This American Life's October 9 podcast Right to Remain Silent which told the story of a police officer who at times even had two voice recorders going on at the same time.

But today, I had one of those experiences. I'll try to recreate the experience in writing:


You can hear idling cars and the chirp of a crossing signal as I walk home from school today. The autumn leaves crunch under my feet and scrape along the sidewalk as they are blown around in little mini-tornadoes. You can hear other people walking, though the crackle of leaves from their footsteps is muffled, as are their conversations. You catch bits and pieces of distorted dialog, like words flung randomly through the autumn air by the wind.

A homeless man sighs on a bench, as he realizes he needs 30 more cents to buy a can of cheep beer.

And then the light changes. Car horns blare, and then the rush of full-throttle car engines fade in and out, in and out, as they rush by.

And then I narrate the story for myself.
I pass Rosie's Bakery every day on the way home from school. In Germany, I was a sucker for bakeries. But here, I haven't gotten into it. Perhaps it's because they don't have Bienenstich here. Or because somehow dollars seem more "real" than euros, so I feel guilty exchanging dollars to satisfy my gastronomical passions.

A hinge creaks, and the long string of little shells clank against the glass of the door as a I push it open.

The car noises fade as the door slowly shuts, while two steps on a bare wooden floor are heard.

And then another door opens, with another string of little jingling shells. (Of course there are two doors. It's Boston, and all businesses, shops, and even houses have two doors to keep out the cold.)

The muttering of two menopausal women can be heard.

And then I narrate again.

Inside, the shop smells like a bakery should. Like cookies and coffee and cake. Two menopausal women are waiting for their coffee as I walk up to the counter and look at a meager selection of American pastries. There are cupcakes and donuts and muffins and bagels and scones. But the scones are eastern-style. More like a flat cake than the deep-fried dough that I call a "scone". Of course, here in the west, they call my scones "fried dough".

More muttering, and some footsteps.

The ladies grab their coffee, and head toward the cream and sugar station, leaving me alone and exposed - embarrassed that despite the small selection of pastries I still haven't been able to pick out anything that has my name on it. I haven't even managed to find the "50% off after 5:00" section, which would have helped me narrow down my choices.

A podgy female voice asks, "What can I get you?"

"What's that?.. no, the other one.."

"That's a blueberry tart."

"Mmm. Looks good. I just have a few dollars burning a hole in my pocket. What is your favorite thing?"

"Our most popular item is this brownie, called an orgasm."

A plastic sliding door slides shut on a pastry display case. Footsteps are heard. The smooth gliding of plexiglass against metal signals the opening of another case.

"Wow. That looks good."

"It's really good."

"Can I get one orgasm please."

You can almost hear my inner glee at stumbling upon an orgasm. In edible form. And at having made a very witty request.

And if you listen closer, you can hear the forced smile of the buxom woman, who was hearing this joke for the ninth time today.

Baking paper crinkles as she picks up the brownie and puts it into a plastic container. The container is closed - snap, snap - and placed on the glass counter top with a quiet thud.

"That will be three dollars."

A cash register dings, the drawer slides open, the metal arm that keeps the bills in place snaps up, snaps down, and the drawer slides closed with a clank.

"Thanks."

"Have a good day."

"Thanks. You too."

Footsteps across the wood floor. Two doors open and close, shells tinkling. As the second opens, traffic noise is heard again.

I couldn't put off trying it any longer. I opened it up and tried my first orgasm.

The cold air was starting to harden the whole brownie, especially the frosting.

I bit into it, and savored the sweetness.

It was rich, with little bits of chocolate, and covered by a generous sugar coat.

But, honestly, it wasn't that good. I had eaten brownies like these before.

My orgasm tasted like a BYU Creamery brownie.

What does this mean?