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...but that joke isn't funny anymore...And then there are days like today.
I played hooky from my god awful soul-sucking job. There may be another entry about how awful it is and why, but essentially - it makes me sad. It used to be so bad that it was funny, now it's too awful to even laugh anymore.
But forget that. Today! I've been meaning to take a day off, looking for the right time, the most advantageous moment. When I woke up this morning with cramps so bad I couldn't sit up straight, I knew my moment had come. I dragged ass to East Village Farm for supplies and discovered that today was beeyootiful. Perfect. Chocolate? Check. Large quantities of Motrin? Check. Several hours of lounging in bed after calling in sick? Check. I was ready to carpe the diem.
I IM'ed jonners first thing because he is recently laid off and I knew he'd be ready and willing to hang out. He in fact already had plans to meet Molly for lunch at 1:00. He invited me along and I said I'd be there, ovaries willing. Only I didn't put it that way because he'd go "Ewwwwwww."
A friend of DEM's (M.) is in town for work this week and staying with us. So I laid around while M. and DEM made coffee and primped for their day - M. to go to work, DEM to do DEM things (he was laid off a while ago, don't know if I mentioned). After M. left, DEM and I talked about our upcoming moving plans and our building's crazy management company. Then more napping.
By the appointed hour I did indeed feel well enough to do lunch so I set out for Union Square. We decided to go to Republic where I have never actually been. Really. I've often gone in, but always choose to go elsewhere because it's so loud in a bad echoey way. But it didn't bother me today. It was really weird though because, and I'm surely not the first to notice or mention this, it's exactly like this noodle place Ryan and I went to in London called Wagamama (that jonners told us about in fact). Duh, I guess. I had curried duck noodles, jonners had chicken pad thai and Molly had a noodley salmony broth. All top notch. And I don't want to drink anything other than Lime Lemonade for the rest of the Spring and Summer. And my thirties.
Molly had to go back to work then (boo hiss) and jonners and I set out shopping. Oh, it was the perfect day. We stopped into Urban Outfitters and I managed to buy nothing, then Barnes and Noble where I bought everything. jonners quite daringly smashed his pre-set food budget at Whole Foods and Garden of Eden (Japanese breadcrumbs, people. He and D are Out Of Control), and one other place I shall not divulge. Never!
I got home at exactly the same time as DEM and that's when the real fun began. DEM is trying to liquidate some of his fancy designer furniture before we move out (next month!) and so placed flyers around the 'hood. He got two calls today. One guy interested in some of the chairs left a message and when DEM called him back they got to talking about whatever and it turned out Chair Guy works part time for a designer named Bill Sofield, who designed the interior of the Soho Grand amongst other things. He happens to be a favorite of DEM's so he was like "No way!" and the guy was all like, "You know him?" and then somehow talk turned to possible employment for DEM at Sofield's place. Possible employment as in, could I possibly have employment? Chair Guy, possibly in an effort to get in DEM's good graces so he wouldn't sell the chairs out from under him, said he couldn't come by to look at the furniture tonight, but he was having a party and some people from work would be there and he (DEM) should come by. This stuff only happens to DEM.
Then at 7:30, we were expecting a girl to come by to look at our apartment. The Laziest Broker in All the Land is already beginning to give prospective renters our number so they can call and make arrangements with us to come see the place. Yeah, they call, we arrange, and he gets thousands of dollars. Blood sucking bastard. So a little early, the buzzer buzzes and up come two stylish New York ladies with jaunty haircuts who seem to really like the place, what with all the smiling and the "I love it!". I am a veritable gumshoe.
At one point the shorter girl spies DEM's Moby CD and picks it up laughing, "Hey!" she says. DEM says later he was thinking "Duh, Moby. It's NYC, everyone has that CD." I was thinking about saying "Hey, he lives around here too, if that floats your boat." Luckily neither of us says anything since her next words are "He's my boss." Ah, well then. They ooh and aah some more and head out the door, remarking on how cool the furniture is. I mention it's for sale and DEM jokingly remarks that he'll give them a free chair if they give him a job (such a networker, that one) and the taller girl asks what he does. She works in publishing apparently, a magazine. "Oh, what magazine?" "Jane."
When they're gone DEM and I sit on the couch and stare into the middle distance, slackjawed. "Moby's her boss." "Jane magazine."
How did those girls get my life?
Then M. comes home and after we relay the weird stories, he and DEM set to primping for their party and for a while the apartment is alive with half naked men and hair products and cologne. After they leave, I order some Thai food, pick through the spoils of my day of shopping and sit on my cool couch in my cool living room and realize, "Maybe this is my beautiful life."
Posted by beth at March 08, 2002 05:03 PM
