Day 283
There is nothing like going into the drugstore to buy zit cream when you have a huge zit on your face. I wonder if they train the cashiers not to make small talk with the customers regarding their purchases. If I were working at the drugstore counter I would be the girl saying, "Gee, that's a doozy you got there, that cream ain't gonna do shit may as well save the 6 bucks or buy some chocolate with that money because it ain't gonna make no damn difference if you break out just a little more.
This morning my friend and I went shopping for bike locks. Turns out it's not enough to buy a bike you must lock it as well. Anyway, we rode the bus for a half hour to get to the shopping area that had locks for cheap. Turns out you don't really know a person until you've been shopping with them. There are two types of shoppers in the world. My friend is the type of shopper who meticulously looks at the item she is about to purchase again and again while comparing it to its neighbors and mulling it over, then there is my kind of shopper who looks at shopping as an adventure and when you find the item you are looking for you buy it right away and hold it up like a trophy. Her shopping style wouldn't be so bad except that she needed more than just a lock for her bike; she needed a fan and a power strip and a basket for her bike and maybe a helmet. We were in their so long I could feel new wrinkles forming on my face and my hairs turning white. Then I pretended to be starving hungry before she started deliberating which filtered water pitcher to get.
After I finally pulled my friend from the store we went to a Wendy's. I have not been to a Wendy's since I re-started eating meat. My dad swears they make the best burgers. Once when I was shopping with my mother, she decided to bring him a burger home as a gift. Aren't my parents adorable? Anyway, when we got through the drive-thru to the part where you pay the burger itself totalled around 5 bucks. My mother said, "That's ridiculous! For a fast food burger. If I would've known that I..." But, my dad swears by them so I paid the 8 bucks that they get for a Wendy's burger, fries, and a coke in Canada, trying not to think about how ridiculous it was and that it may be the best burger I have ever consumed. I took a few bites, expecting the wonderment to strike. I chewed. My friend said, "Well? What do you think?" I chewed a little bit more and responded, "I think I am a McDonald's girl." Who ever thought I would speak those words and mean them?
Elliot is taking over my life. Elliot is my blue bike that I just bought two days ago. Yesterday all I did was ride him all over and today I had to go through shopping hell to get him outfitted with a lock so I could have my room back. And, I went to the bike shop to get his handlebars raised and to inquire about my fatty seat. Turns out the cutie latino guy was there to help me out and answer all the questions I had. Questions like, "How do you use gears?" and "Why don't people put neon-colored beads in their bike spokes anymore?" Elliot did give the mechanic a little trouble and the other bike guy said that he really liked the fatty-ass seat I wanted to put on my Elliot. All in all, it was an awesome day and I love hanging at the shop. I wonder if they knew that some girl who came in to buy a 100 dollar bike would be coming in everyday to ask ridiculous questions. Perhaps the bigger question though is come Monday will my thesis advisor take the "Elliot has taken over my life and I couldn't get all my thesis shit done" as a proper excuse?
Tonight I attended a dinner party at my friend and his girlfriend's new apartment. The dinner was a thank you party he was holding for everyone who stored his boxes of his stuff when he was between places. The people attending the party were all people from my residence one of which was a friend I had seen at the bike shop who gave me his number to call him before I left for the party so we could go together. Turns out this meant going together--in his car! I am not sure if he comes from money or if it is because he is going to be a lawyer and probably gets paid a shit ton of cash for what he does but he drives a brand new Prius. Honestly though, if he drove a 15 year old Tercel I would have been just as happy. A car!
We hopped in his car and I was immediately impressed. There are very few times that I have even been in a car that has one of those screens that tells you everything including how to back up. I asked him about the display screen and he showed me how it could be set to Spanish and how it shows what the car is doing. As a joke I asked him if it could play DVDs. "I bet you could rig it to play DVDs," he responded, seriously. The best part though was when I asked him if he liked living in our residence and he said, "It's like living in an elderly care center."
At the party there were many sausages and beers and even a big dog roaming around. We all sat and spoke about things and basically did that foreign-type behavior that grown ups at dinner parties do, you know, asking each other questions and talking to death certain topics that started off as mildly interesting. Who knew being grown up was so boring and formal? Though, there were two shocking things that happened, one good and one bad. The bad thing was my hugely athletic "friend" asking me if I had biked all the way to the party, which is about 3 miles away up and down hills. I have only had my bike for two days and am horribly out of shape and she knows that. I told her I hadn't. She suggested for the third time or so within two days that we ride bikes together. I told her that I needed to practice more before I could ride with her. Her response, "Well I guess we'll bike together in two years then." Gee thanks I like I didn't already know I am out of shape. The good thing stemmed from me having to leave early. As I was saying my goodbyes my Prius-driving friend asked me how I was getting home and suggested he could drive me. I told him to stay at the party but the whole bus ride home smiled at his kind offering.
I was speaking at my mother on the phone (literally, she has lost her voice due to a horrible cold so she cannot talk back) when I was walking home through campus when I decided to take a side road down to my building. I was jabbering away until I noticed only 10 feet from me that something was moving, it was a skunk. I turned to run and was whispering, "Oh my god" on repeat to my mother who couldn't hardly ask what was going on. At first I tried to leave slowly, quietly so as not to stir up the creature enough for him to spray me.
Tip of the Day: Don't sit in the wooden chair unless you want to pull splinters out of your hand all night.
-Canadian Castaway
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