What the huh?

Anna says I "have to" get a date for her wedding (something about screwing up seating arrangements at the head table or something).

Here are the problems with that pronouncement, in no particular order (except maybe my own head-logic):

• Most, if not all, of my current guy friends already have girlfriends. (If they don't, I don't know it; nor do I know how to find out if the ones whose girlfriends I don't already know or know about are single or not without seeming nosy. I refuse to ruin someone's relationship out of ignorance.)
• Even if they don't have girlfriends already, I haven't known any of them long enough to even consider dating them even just casually.
• I'm going to be meeting new people in my class this semester (which starts--belatedly--tomorrow, provided school doesn't get cancelled due to snow again), but the wedding is only two weeks away, and I won't have known anybody in that class nearly long enough to even consider them friends, much less as possible romantic partners.
• Asking someone to be a date to a wedding is a big deal, and in my opinion, should only be done between couples who have an established relationship. It's simply not a "casual date"-type event, and even if it were, I will never go on a blind date, no matter who is trying to set me up.
• Two weeks does not an established relationship make.
• Finally, and most importantly, all of these reasons add up to: I would not be comfortable so much as asking a guy to come to Anna's wedding as my date, and it's kind of presumptuous of Anna to try and dictate my love life all for the sake of filling a chair. Granted, it is her wedding, but even so, requiring that people bring dates, no matter their current relationship status, is going too far.

I shall now say no more on the matter. On to a different topic:

Last Monday, I had an appointment with the allergist (as opposed to just getting shots), and he gave me some Nasonex and an order for a limited sinus CT scan.

The Nasonex was to help with the stuffiness due to allergies. Even though I thought I had a cold as well, I think it might've just been extremely, severely severe allergic rhinitis, because I've actually been taking the Nasonex as directed every day for a week now, and early this morning, I found myself breathing through my nose as I drifted in and out of sleep!

Dr. M (the allergist) is out of the office this week, but I'll call him next week to get the results of the CT scan. He had me get it because I've had problems with my sense of smell for years now--in other words, I don't smell much of anything. The most common cause of a lack of smell (and by connection, a dulled sense of taste) is an inflamation of the sinuses in the forhead area pinching the olfactory nerve.

So, since I've had this problem for years, and he hasn't had much luck treating it so far, he told me to get the CT scan to make sure it really is a sinus infection, and not some other thing pinching the olfactory nerve.

Last Tuesday, my first class was cancelled due to snow. I was supposed to have Intro. to Business on Wednesday evenings, but that class got cut due to insufficient enrollment. I couldn't choose another section of the same class, since they all clashed with my work schedule, so my only choices were: a) don't go to school this semester, or b) choose a different 3-credit class that I can go to.

I looked in the course catalogue for all the subjects that seemed interesting and also had sections after 5:30 pm on weeknights (none of the courses I looked at had Saturday courses, I think, and I've never had school on Saturdays before so I'm not intending to start now), and came up with an English course and an Art course that looked promising.

The English course (or at least the section I was looking at) was full, but I was lucky enough to get the last seat in the Art class (Drawing I). It meets Tuesday nights from 6-10pm. Sadly, that means that I won't be able to play in the Paranoia game that Matt from the Haven was planning to start, but c'est la vie.

You win some, you lose some, I guess.

I think I have a new show. Yesterday, I hung out in Mom's room for hours, and she was watching The Closer. The 4-6 episodes I saw (they were having a marathon) were pretty good, and I like the characters and stories so far--even though Kyra Sedgewick always looks like she's going to cry for some reason. Maybe once I finish watching my MacGyver DVDs (and have some extra money) I'll get caught up on the series or something.

I have a plan to save money faster so I can get a new computer. I'm going to stop buying lunch at Beans & Bagels (except for on payday, to treat myself) and pack all my lunches from now on.

In order to do this, I have to make sure that there is always bread, lunch meat/cheese, other stuff to put in my lunches, and cereal and milk for breakfast in the house. So I bought myself a mini-fridge from Sears (it's going to be delivered sometime this week) and a bunch of storage drawers from Wal-Mart (also to be delivered this week) so that I can keep my own food and drinks in them.

I have a box I'm going to keep apples, oranges or other whole fruits (not grapes, cherries or strawberries--those are strictly fridge-bound) in, plus a set of plastic drawers for bread, bagels and lunch-size chip bags, and a crate-like-thing for cereal boxes. My new fridge has a place for soda cans to dispense vertically out the bottom, which I think is pretty darn cool. I would've gotten the 6 cu. ft. model, but that was way too expensive.

I don't have any money to put anything in it yet, so I'll just have to set it all up and wait to get paid again. I don't think I'd get a tax return before my next paycheck, even if I filed them today, so I won't hope for that to come first.

Advice

A word to the wise: if you're going to be biking more than a few blocks to the grocery store, then eat breakfast first!

Seriously. I was out of milk, so I couldn't eat cereal on Saturday morning, and I didn't want any fruit--I still have half of a grapefruit and a whole bunch of honeydew in the refridgerator. So, I grabbed my waterbottle, and started on my way to Wal*Mart (to get some sunblock and a couple other things) before heading to Church Street so that I could find out how long the trip would take me.

Cumulatively (I made a couple of stops along the way) it took me about 40-45 minutes to get to the building where I work from my house. And by that time, I was--literally--about to pass out. I'm going to have to get into a little better shape before I even think about biking to work on a regular basis. That's kind of a bummer, because that was my main plan for getting into shape in the first place. Ah well. I guess I'll just have to try and go swimming (and bike to the pool) more often than I usually do.

When I got there, I called my parents' house, and asked Mom if her truck was working. It wasn't. So, I asked if Dad or Uncle Andy were there, but it was only Mom and Jason at home. I decided, belatedly, to get something to eat, so I told her that I was going to get some lunch at one of the restaurants nearby. She said she'd have Dad or Uncle Andy call me when they got home.

I walked the bike to Beans, Bagels and More, this little coffee/sandwich shop about a block from my work, and got a bowl of fruit and another bottle of water. Of course, I didn't actually manage to order right away, because there were people in line ahead of me and I had to sit down because I was starting to pass out again. I felt better after I ate though.

I sat outside at one of their little bistro-type tables to eat my fruit (a combination of cateloupe, strawberries and grapes), and sat there for a few minutes after I was done.

After that, I really was feeling a lot better, but I knew I wouldn't be able to make the ride back--it's mostly up-hill, and just that little bit of fruit didn't give me that much energy. Not to mention, my bike only shifts up, it's stuck in 6th gear (there are 7), and I can't figure out how to get it to down-shift--believe me, I've tried. So, I decided to walk the bike back home.

Around 6th street or so, I called Mom again to let her know not to worry about having Dad or Uncle Andy call. I made it to the pool house in my neighborhood (had to find out what to do about my pool pass--they said go to dearbought.com and e-mail the pool committee) an hour and twenty minutes after I left the restaurant.

When I got home, I was so beat that all I did was lay down and read for the rest of the day. I took a nap around 5pm, and then woke up at 9pm. Then I continued reading for another few hours before going back to sleep. I needed to buy a few groceries, but I just didn't have the energy to go to the store.

Sunday was Mom's birthday dinner (her actual birthday was on Saturday). We had Hawaiian Haystacks--yum! That was the first time, in the whole decade that any of us had lived there, that we'd had that particular meal at my parents' house. We'd had it before at Grandma's, but never at Mom & Dad's.

I took three containers' worth of leftovers, and then Kimba (who had come over to my place earlier that afternoon and was dismayed when I told her how far in the hole I am and that I still needed groceries) told me to talk to her before I left.

Anna, Jason and I watched Stranger than Fiction on Anna's computer/TV through a site that Patrick J. showed me a week or two ago. It was actually a lot better than I anticipated, and I was anticipating that it would at least be really good.

So anyway, I talked to Kimba as I was going to leave, and she, Dad and Anna gave me a whole bunch of food that was just sitting in the pantry, not getting eaten. They even gave me a gallon of milk. I probably won't have to go shopping for anything except butter and ground beef (they gave me Manwich and boxed mac 'n' cheese, but I forgot that you need butter for the mac 'n' cheese--the last three sticks I had from the banana bread got all moldy a couple weeks ago, so I had to get rid of them--and meat for the Manwich) for at least three weeks to a month or more.

When I got home from work/allergy shots yesterday, there was a whole bunch of stuff on the kitchen table. Jen C. was getting rid of some candles and a whole bunch of great movies. I took quite a few of the movies that were on the table, including VHS copies of The Day After Tomorrow and The Best Two Years. Now, I don't have to worry about recording the first one, and I have a copies of two of my favorite movies!

Snowed In . . . Yet AGAIN

I got snowed in again today. That's all I've got to say about that.

Over the last week and two days, I've managed to get five more bins over (actually, Uncle Andy brought them over for me last Sunday, because my car was at Fitzgerald for a recall). Today, I just finished cataloguing the last of the books in those five bins. I even shelved 3 bins' worth of books! I've got my own, special location codes that I use at LibraryThing in my tags.

I've added a widget at the side of my blog so that people can see a list of random authors whose books I have.

Gabe at work told me about this place called Demonoid.com where people can download stuff using BitTorrent. He had to e-mail me an invitation to Demonoid, so I gave him my e-mail address. We've been e-mailing back and forth, and we both agree that a certain other person we work with is a bit creepy. Talking in the office at work is kinda weird--it's just so quiet, and it kind of feels like talking is taboo, even though it's not.

Yesterday, I went to lunch at Beans, Bagels & More with Gabe. It felt good to actually TALK in the middle of the day like that. We might go bowling on Saturday.

Gabe's cool and all, but I hope he's not expecting much more than friendship. I mean, he's fun to talk to, and we have a lot of the same interests, but I don't have any physical attraction to him at all. And although that's not the first (or even second, third, fourth or fifth) thing I look for in a guy, for anything more than friendship, it's still pretty important.

My bow is still at my parents' house, and so are the last two bins of books. I'll probably get them all on Sunday.

I should probably shovel the sidewalk and the back path today if I'm going to get out tomorrow morning, but my back hurts from lugging the bins up the stairs so that I could catalogue and shelve them.