Elise and I went to HEB today to purchase some pasta sauce. I was introduced to the “check yourself out” line. We scanned our own groceries, swiped the ol’ debit card and went on our way – with absolutely no human interaction. It was convenient, but I’m notorious for making witty small talk with our check out person. I felt alone and without an audience. I asked the box how she like working there… she just told me to grab my bags and leave. Not a very personable experience. Technology. Woof.
I haven’t written much about our new apartment. This is mainly due to the fact that it’s an apartment. We’re sick of apartments. It took us approximately an hour to find this place, decide that we could cope with it and sign our lease. We’ve never had an icemaker in our apartments. It’s amazing how the little things can impress a struggling-to-make-ends-meet husband and wife team. Tap water has taken on a completely new meaning.
When I moved up here to live alone for a week, all I had was an air mattress. We neglected to bring a hair dryer with which to inflate said floatation device/back spasm-inducing personal sleeping unit. Elise and I took turns huffing and puffing on the bare living room floor while watching The Shining. Mr. Geek Genius here decided to scour the unfurnished apartment for some streamlining means to inflate my temporary bed. All I could come up with were plastic grocery bags. I needed a source of wind. Seeing how my diet had recently consisted of very soluble food sources, I had to find some artificial source. “A-ha”, says me. I attached a plastic grocery bag to the vent for our stovetop. It inflated. After an intense structural design meeting, Elise held up the mattress while yours truly held the bag to the vent with the appropriate inflation accessories. It was quite a scene.
We ended up watching the rest of The Shining, both suffering from lightheadedness.
In other news, John and I visited an old classmate in the hospital on Tuesday. Are you getting old when you visit a peer in the hospital after having a heart attack? I’m almost a month older than our friend. I’m twenty seven. I installed handrails in the shower – fearing that I could break one of these brittle hips any day now.
Work is great. I’m busy as hell. I sit there, chugging away all day. Before I know it, nine hours have gone by. It’s so unbelievably good to finally have fulfilling work to do. I’d go into details, but I don’t think you’d want to read about how to parse carriage returns and line breaks through a fax form handler. It’s weird how little things can consume a whole day – but sometimes it’s the little things that are so rewarding. It’s pretty cool, what we’re doing.
I’ve been flossing daily. I really like Johnny Cash covering songs like “Hurt”. I decided not to purchase RHCP tickets this past Saturday because I’m getting old. I believe I said something like “Uhhhh, I think we need to pay bills… or something.” Hey, my friends are having heart attacks. Elise is doing well. She said she was disappointed because she hasn’t seen anything new on the site recently. Then she said “I guess I could write stuff on the site.” I concurred.
It’s past my bedtime.