April 29, 2006 - Sorry It's Been So Long

Okay, a bit had happened since the last post. I bought a new hard drive for my computer. No problems installing it, but big problems finding all of the old links to the websites I frequent. Idiot me never saved my list of favorites. But, I did manage to find them all again, so no worries.

Dee has left. Ironically, Dee has stated before her last day that she had no intentions whatsoever of moving to Boston with her boyfriend because she just didn't trust the relationship. I asked why then would she leave the job and she just said she didn't like the job and didn't trust the higher-ups and wanted out.

In the vacuum caused by her leaving, the position that she filled already gone up on the block. I went up for it and got past the first round of interviews, but in the end someone else got it. The woman who landed the job was always considered a shoe-in, but I felt I had to try. She starts Monday (5/1/06).

Tess and that Coast Guard guy ARE still together. A few days after I posted that entry I had heard her talking about going with him down to Boston to attend a trial where this guy's captain is being accused of grounding his ship a few weeks or months ago and causing Mass Coast Guard to rescue them. Something tells me theirs is an open relationship as my memory remains unchanged about her talking about dating some new guy.

That blond at Wal-Mart I avoided for about a week. Last Sunday (4/23), I had to pick something up and we actually talked for about 10 minutes. Not about anything big, but she initiated the conversation. She is still off limits, but it would be nice to get to know her better in any capacity. Had that incident not happened, I MIGHT have viewed that as being a positive sign.

Of course, as all readers of this (if there are any) know my life enjoys having many and varied soap-operatic themes, and now that things were settling down, that trend has once more regenerated itself. A new girl started working at my job about two weeks ago. Her name is Jennifer*. She's very pretty and used to work for a local grocery store (not Wal-Mart). I used to kind of flirt with her, but about a year or two ago she disappeared... until now.

She has a boyfriend, but I know that she remembers me as I do her. She doesn't avoid me or anything, if anything it's the opposite. Thankfully, I know she has a guy so I know where the lines are drawn. Still, a new friend can't hurt.

April 10, 2007 - Sooner Than Expected

Unfortunately this is not a positive post. Nobody's hurt, the General has not been wrecked, and I still am employed.

Earlier tonight my brother and I were walking around Wal-Mart doing some shopping. I saw that blond girl who works there on her day off. I think she was with her boyfriend. He wasn't very good looking, but I had to go behind them in line. She saw me and I did try to smile, but it just came out a wince and I just looked away.

Obviously that vibe I had gotten from her was misread. I had actually found her on that myspace.com. It was a few years old, but the picture was definitely her. She had listed her status as single, but... I saw them leave in a single car, so if they are boyfriend/girlfriend, they must cohabitate or at least spend a lot of time in one domicile. They do not look alike, so I would not think brother/sister. The fucking odd part is that there were times in the last few months that it seemed she would actually seek me out, but... I cannot believe that they just got together. That means I misread her, and that also means I have been making a fucking fool out of myself for no damned reason. Well, it could have been MUCH worse.

I really don't know why it is affecting me so much, but I suppose that I had hoped when I lost a bit more weight, I could try something, but not now. I do not try to fool myself. I know that being unattractive does not help, but I hoped if I could just fix some of my issues, things could be different. I will not try to blame society for my faults and claim we live in a very appearance driven world, as I do the very same thing. I do not seek out over weight, non pretty women. Why should I expect any less from them?

I hate being single, I hate being lonely... but I think... that is my fate. There are some people who never get what they really want in life, I may just be one of them.

I suppose something else that is bothering me is that, in my severely romantic mind, I had imagined going out and doing simple things like grocery shopping with my girlfriend. I imagined arguing over what kind of toilet paper to buy, and what kind of pasta sauce to get. The ability to perhaps claim her lips in the frozen food section. Simple run of the mill common shit so many others take for granted. To see someone else doing that... jealousy burns at me.

April 7, 2006 - Dee Has Put In Her Resignation

Did it about two or three days ago actually. Her last day on the job is 04/18/06. It kind of sucks because I don't think she will find real happiness in this relationship, but obviously she is committed to trying, and I find myself only wishing her the best.

Meanwhile, her departing has left open at work a Team Leader position, and having gone about a year since the last internal job posting, tension for advancement has grown to the point of a fever pitch. At least 5 people, aside from this writer, are going up for it. That of course means that while all of the current hopefuls will try their damndess to get the job, only one will. I do not envy the decision makers here, as a lot of those going up for this are very well qualified. The leg up I have is that while all of the others have quota's to meet and are assets to the company, I am not. I have no quota's or thresholds and have been there since the day the doors opened. I had gone into the planning stages for a supervisory run last June and the vast majority of my co-workers supported me. Another guy from outside the company got it, but this job isn't being posted out of the building.

Anyhow, I think Tess and her National Guardsman boyfriend have already hit the skids. I say this because I over heard her telling a group of women around me that she just recently had a first date with another guy and made mention of 'going slower' this time around. I knew that the Guardsman guy was going to have to go away now and again, and I theorize that perhaps it was just too new to survive that. Of course, they may just have an open relationship and both might date other people.

This past Sunday (4/2) Jim and I almost had an accident in the General. We had taken her out on a very long drive (about 75 miles). At one point we got into a town and the speed limit was dropped to 40. I was cruising along and all of a sudden a green light about 30 feet away turned red. I had no intention of running a red light so I hit the brakes. Big mistake!

Old cars like the Charger are not like anti-lock brakes. Rather than pump the brakes so you do not lose traction, the Charger's drum brake set up locked up. First we started drifting towards the drivers side, I fought the wheel a little too well and than we corrected and went towards the passenger side, all the while going forward from the momentum. We stopped about 5 feet shy of the light, in our own lane, but in the end we had done a full 90 degree turn. Nobody was hurt, we hit nobody and the car was undamaged.

Jim was, understandably, pissed off and I quickly got into a parking lot. I checked the road for tire marks, but there were none. We checked to make sure everything was alright and to calm down and as I was getting ready to pull out a police cruiser pulled into the parking lot and slowed down to see what I was doing. I pulled out to the road and the officer went in right behind me. He motioned to me from his car and the lights went on.

Apparently he did not see what happened but someone had called it in, thinking that I was doing stunts like that on purpose. He checked out my license, registration and insurance and warned me that having a 'General Lee' stuck out like a sore thumb. In the end he could not give a ticket. He wanted to, I know it. He claimed it was because he was from a different county that the one he pulled me over in. That may have been part of it, but I also think that he couldn't because he didn't actually see what happened and I am most positive that if he could have gotten me on anything a local cop would have soon arrived.

So, void a few days off my life, I lost nothing. I may be watched now, but ever since I had that car I have been watched, so that does not scare me. The way Jim and I look at this is that it was a valuable learning experience. I know now what NOT to do with that car, and I also recognize that unlike the Buick I have to reevaluate just how much space I need to stop that thing. Better to learn like that than, say, on the interstate at 60 mph.

Well, bye for now.