April 26th,
1999. Monday
OK. I'm trying to remain calm. But I have this nasty habit of letting things get to me.
I talked to my mom. I figured out i wasn't mad at her..
Anyway, let me tell you about my weekend...
I arrived
in Lexington, VA about 8:30pm. I drove out to Jed's
since Rodzilla was still working. Of course,
Jed was no where to be found. I was fairly aggitated, since his house in
the woods was a good 10 miles outside of Lexington. So I went back into
town to Rodzilla's place, since she was due outta work by nine. She
wasn't there. I called her at work and she seemed fairly annoyed with me
because it was really busy at the time. I understood this, but I
was still a little annoyed that she was so curt. And i didn't get
to ask her how long she'd be. Even if i did, i'm sure i woulda gotten a
heaping serving of "I don't know!" with a big side of attitude. So,
now more enraged than merely annoyed, i called jed, who of course was now
home. I probably passed him on the way back to town. By now supremely pissed
off, I drove back out to jed's. Of course, I'm out there for 30 minutes,
when Rodzilla calls and tells me that she's leaving work now and why don't
i meet her at home. This flew me into a blind rage, because i'd been on
the road since four, driving through monsoon like conditions, and even
a tornado warning, and when i get to town no one is where they're supposed
to be, and the first thing i gotta do when i get to town is drive
sixty mile back and forth between jed's place and town. Of course, I was
all pissy on the phone, she got pissy back, and i ended up feeling like
the asshole. I hate when that happens.
Anyway,
once we actually got back to to Jed's and hung out, things were pretty
good. Jed's neighbor Sara came down to hang out, and brought some tasty
cookies with her better. I always enjoy visits from his neighbors when
they bring food. I think we just hung out there all night. Somewhere
in the evening, Jed and I were sitting on the Suicide Couch watching TV,
and they had a picture of the Supreme Court Chief Justice, and I told Jed
that i heard that the three gold bars on his robe were just put there by
him, cos he liked how it looked. Then we discussed how we should
try to market our own designer robes. I suggested all sorts of designs.
Jed came up with the "cargo" robe, a robe with all sortsa pockets, where
you could keep gavels, important legal documents, band-aids, and Certs.
The idea was really funny, but I found the term "cargo robe" endlessly
hilarious. I couldn't stop laughing. Anyway, even now, I'd really
like to see a tv ad for a cargo robe.
The next
day, Jed's parents were in town, so after considerable debate, Rodzilla
and I decided to drive on up to Charlottesville. Unfortunately, the
Foxfield Races were on the same day, and I had unfortunate encounters with
many drunk fratboys dressed in boe-ties and dirty khaki shorts and sneakers.
I was glad to see that a lot of them were pulled over by the local cops,
and even saw on handcuffed with his head between his legs.
While
in Charlottesville, I thought i'd try to take the Big
Fun sightseeing tour that i'd been planning. Unfortunately, we were
too lazy to stop and get a map or check the Gus's
page for details. I basically drove down Wertland Street and Jefferson
Park Avenue for a little while, but saw nothing that seemed familiar.
I actually found these streets by complete luck. We stopped on the Corner,
so Rodzilla could get a drink, and I stopped in Plan 9 Records, to root
through the used cd's. I picked up Weezer's first cd. I used to listen
to it a lot, but Dan of SHOE fame borrowed
it once while we were living together and it got lost int he shuffle of
escaping the SHOE. Anyway, Rodzilla wanted to go to the Downtown
Mall, but i wasn't really feeling up for it. plus, I told her I didn't
wanna go since she first went there with her exboyfriend that i like so
much. But that's a whole other story. Anyway, after some fussing,
we eventually went. It seemed nice enough. But Rodzilla spent way
too long in a bookstore and i was getting in a rotten mood. There was a
book of 20th Century Icons that she was paging through, making sure to
stop and look carefully at every page. That was
a little annoying. I paced in and out of the store. At one point the shopkeeper
just closed the doors, so I huffed and puffed outside for a bit.
Anyway, besides that, it was a pleasant day. The Downtown Mall actually
reminds me of a very small version of Quincy Market in Boston, mainly due
to the brick walkway and little shops and how it's closed to traffic.
And I did see a lot of Big Fun places. I like to be able to visualize as
much as I can when I'm reading something. i have a very poor imagination
outside of my fantasy life.
So we
had dinner at the Tokyo Rose, ran into more frat boys at the Stop-In gas
station, saw them get pulled over, laughed, and went home. I should
note that when I say "frat boy," I'm not speaking in a deragatory fashion
about every singleperson ever affiliated with a fraternity. But I suspect
that you knew that. Just the stereotypical ones. Anyway...
Saturday
night was spent largely like Friday night, except we went to a bar first.
By "we,' i mean jed , Rodzilla, and myself. Then we headed out to Jed's
where Sara eventually came down again, and agian with cookies. They were
a little burnt, but it mattered not.
So after
watching Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead with Jed, I headed
back to DC. An uneventful ride. Although now that spring is in full
swing, I'm very wary of hitting a dear or something. I saw many various
creatures just hanging out along the highway last night. I saw a deer get
hit on my way to Lex a few months ago. A very gruesome sight right in front
of me. ISo i'm not needlessly concerned. I almost hit a few on the way
back from jed's on friday night.
Anyway,
now we come to the really aggravating part of this long boring tale. Normally
when i get home, i'm mildly annoyed with the small pile of various things
that Berry has left for me conveniently right
in my doorway. I never know why she doesn't just stick it in my room. Anyway,
this weelend, she apparently didn't clean that much. But she did look at
me gravely when I walked in and said that she had some bad news. Of course,
i knew it mad "bad" for me, not her. The news was: she needs me to
move out by May 15. It seems that since I've gotten into grad school,
and was planning on leaving at the end of June, she just figured that it'd
be no problem at all for me to just pick up and leave a month and a half
early. Now, at the time i wasn't upset at all. But the more i mull
it over and let it eat at me, i'm starting to fume. I mean, while it's
true that I never signed the lease, it's not like I'm just some guy crashing
on her couch either. And while I needed to someplace to stay when
i relocated here in September, this was mutually beneficial since our other
rommate moved out at the end of September. Not to mention that after he
took all his furniture with him, I furnished the apartment. Of course,
now i have to get rid of everything in three weeks. Her mom,
who according to berry doesn't take vacation a lot, wants to come up here
for a few weeks and redecorate the entire apartment. that's all fine
and god with me, but i feel like she's being a little indignant about it.
i can't even keep my furniture there till i find someplace to put it.
It just feels like when i moved all the furniture in there, it helped us
both, but now that her mom is gonna decorate the place, it's like "Oh,
I don't need that couch anymore, so can you take it with
you take it with you on your way out?" "Well, can i
keep it here till I find someplace to keep it?" "well, no."
Rodzilla says that I shouldn't get all worked up about this. She
says it's not worth risking our friendship. But at this point, I don't
really even care. I mean, i don't wanna live in a hostile environment for
the next three weeks, but after I move out, I doubt I'll even call.
In the rare case where she'd answer the phone or call me back if I left
a message (which i almost never do), i can't imagine wanting to hear what's
going on with her. I think this is what James
was talking about last year around graduation. It's like the epitome of
her selfishness. She pulled the old "i mean, you were leaving anyway, so
I thought you'd just wanna get out of the city as soon as possible,"
in her trademark way of making you do something by making it seem like
that's what you really want anyway. If she were writing a paper on
selfishness, this would be an A+ thesis. Of course, I've often been
accused of being slefish myself, but I'd never do something like this to
her, or any of my friends for that matter. hell, I wouldn't even do this
to someone that i don't particularly care for. I'd stand up to my
parents if they ever asked me to kick out someone I was living with just
cos they weren't on the lease. not that they would.
So after
my initial shock, i started thinking where i could go. My natural choices
were home to PA or to Lexington. Both would provide nearly expense-free
living. My parents pretty much nixed the Lexington idea in their
normal this-doesn't-make-economic-sense way. Of course, i had no
numbers to retaliate with, so i just had to go along with theire argument.
But i don't know what I'm gonna do. I was gonna try to sell or even give
the furntiture to Matt for a while, but now
if I can't keep it there, I'll just have to hoist it over the balcony and
dump it in the yard and hope some pak of thieves just comes and steals
it. It's a little ridiculous that the notion of me keeping the couch and
bed in the apartment until at least June is so outrageous to Berry.
While I'm sensitive to her family's "fashion" "needs," I'm a little
disappointed that my room has to be completely empty while they decorate
the living room. Just doesn't make sense to me. Then again, she's always
preferred style and looks over practicality and functionality. For instance,
I discovered a few months ago, while lamenting the fact that we couldn't
even afford a coffee table, that underneath the tapestry where her plants
reside is a perfectly good coffee table. When I asked why we weren't using
it, the answer was : "it's
so ugly!" i rest my point.
Interestingly
enough, everyone I've told about this scenario has responded the same way.
Here's what I tell them: Berry's sister is moving in, and her mom
is coming with her and staying for a few weeks, so i gotta be outta there
so they all have someplace to stay. While I expected everyone to be shocked
and find the whole thing ridiculous, everyone i've told has also said to
me "But don't they all just sleep in the same bed anyway?" Even my
mom said that. I guess my journal works really well as propaganda too.
Nora, Jed, Rodzilla, everyone thinks this is ridiculous. Add in my parents'
reaction to my Lexington plan, and I think we're gonna throw down about
this. I mean, I know I didn't sign the lease, but i'm not some stranger
or just some border who happens to live there, and my moving in has helped
her in numerous ways. As soon as she doesn't need what a have, she not
only expects me to leave, she expects me to leave 45 days early.
I'm starting to take offense to that.
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