cheese the roof gays
Jess: Chair (and maybe only member) of the Social Committee, organizer and host of the event
Alan: Building Manager
Sam: New guy from Charlotte, NC who works in the gaming industry, I think. He had a lot of knowledge of the history of the Chinese opium trade.
Edmond: New guy of Asian descent with a relatively weak Australian accent (maybe many years lived in the U.S.?), from Sydney, who was also very short
Liz: Woman from Ethiopia (also probably in the U.S. since childhood: very American accent)
Jonathon: Guy who lives in the unit directly below ours, on the third floor
Andrea: Woman with a very thick Peruvian accent
There was another Indian guy, even from Delhi just as Shobhit is, but I don't remember his name. I do remember I found him very attractive. There was a few others who showed up near the very end of the 7-9pm time scheduled on the rooftop deck of the West Building, but they weren't around long enough for me to remember their names. The basic attendance was the group listed above, plus the other Indian guy, Shobhit and me -- who arrived first, aside from Alan and Jess herself -- which made ten people. Aside from Alan, who lives in another building a few blocks away, nearly all of us, curiously, live in the East Building -- Sam, Edmond and Andrea, in fact, all live on the same floor as Shobhit and me!
In fact, after the barbecue, we happened to see Andrea come out of her unit at the end of the hall. She apparently bought that studio in 2015, moved to a place closer to her work at Boeing and tried to rent out the condo, but when she couldn't, she moved back in in July last year. I couldn't believe I had never seen her before. We invited her in briefly to see our unit and also the view that was once much better before that damned other building on 14th was constructed (REO Flats blocks half the view now from our unit, but the skyline view still remains mostly intact from the rooftop deck of the East Building), and we even wound up exchanging numbers. That's the only reason I remember her name, because she typed it into our phones. She suggested hanging out sometime.
It was during this brief visit with her that I realized something about Shobhit that I never noticed before, in all the fourteen years we've been together. I can have a really, really hard time understanding people with particularly thick accents. I don't even think Shobhit's accent is excessively thick, and sometimes even now his accent can get in the way of my comprehension. This happens a lot at work, particularly with one Asian lady (I don't know her nationality) with a thick accent and another guy with a thick Russian (or Russian-adjacent) accent. I noticed, though, that Shobhit seemed to have no problem whatsoever understanding Andrea, in spite of her incredibly thick Peruvian accent. That language and accent are wildly different from that of Shobhit's native India, but my theory is that both of them being speakers of English as a second language somehow makes a difference.
Jess told us she's hosted barbecues that had as many as 35 people attend, but these things can be very weather-dependent -- although it didn't rain, it was overcast all day yesterday and barely cracked 73° -- and she didn't know until yesterday itself that there was some big Amazon picnic event that a bunch of people who might otherwise have come had gone to instead. I figured there would be vegetarian options, and the best there was to offer when we arrived was corn on the cob and tortilla chips. So, I just went back to our condo and grabbed a couple Field Roast patties, which I would have likely preferred over anything Jess would have gotten anyway. Still, I do love me some free food. We got free hamburger buns and condiments, at least. Although I put barbecue sauce on mine because I only saw the "sweet and smoky" words on the bottle and thought it was a smoky flavored ketchup. So my condiment was way sweeter than I actually would have wanted, but whatever. It was fine.
I had a good time and look forward to attending the next social event. It may not be for a while though because Jess said she'll be out of town for work for the next couple of months. I suppose it's possible for it to be warm enough for another barbecue in September, but it doesn't seem likely.
I just rode my bike to Beecher's Cheese at Pike Place Market and back, because I didn't want to have to leave work even earlier than the earlier-than-usual time I plan to leave later this afternoon, so I can see Eighth Grade at the Egyptian Theatre at 4:45. But, Shobhit wanted me to pick up some Beecher's cheese curd for the samosas he plans to make for dinner with Lynn and Zephyr tomorrow night. Actually he wanted me to get it yesterday, but I totally spaced it after leaving work fifteen minutes later than usual yesterday, thanks to Aimée, the Office Manager working the front desk, catching me as I walked by on my way back from the bathroom and chatting me up for that period of time.
Beecher's was really busy, and I was both annoyed that it would likely delay this fairly quick lunch errand and relieved I chose to do it now rather than get delayed similarly later this afternoon. But! It turns out, that long line stretching out the door and up the sidewalk was just for the café side -- people waiting for prepared lunch. Unlike how it usually is after work (as I regularly stop in there for a cheese curd sample on days I walk home, something I haven't done in a while since I've been biking for a few months now), the actual packaged cheese line was totally empty. I grabbed my half pint tub of cheese curd and got out of there in probably record time.
As for talking to Aimée at the end of the work day yesterday? We talked a lot about Trudy, who can be . . . to be generous and diplomatic, let's say, eccentric. Apparently she warned Aimée earlier in the day that a tall guy with a head injury might be stopping by to see her. The guy who did eventually come in looking for her was not tall at all, apparently. I guess he turns out to be a gay friend of Trudy's son's girlfriend, who had recently been assaulted, just got out of the hospital, and currently has no home. And Trudy is offering him a temporary place to stay. According to Aimée, Trudy actually asked her, "Do you know of any gay male communities that aren't into sex or drugs?" Talk about a throwback generalization! What is this, 1990? Seriously, you name it, no matter how innocuous the interest -- from movie groups to softball to whatever -- there is an organized gay group devoted to it. We're not all just fucking each other and snorting coke out of each other's ass cracks at all times.
Anyway, Aimée apparently told Trudy that she didn't know, but I might. "So don't be surprised if Trudy comes and asks you about it," Aimée said. (This hasn't happened. Yet?) I was telling Shobhit about this yesterday and he asked if I was the only gay man at the office. I had to think about it. I may be, actually? I know there used to be others, but the first one who comes to mind left for other career pursuits a few years back. Statistically speaking, there would have to be at least one or two others. I bet there are. I just have no idea who they are.
I do need to quit with some of my own assumptions, though. I was talking to Claudia the other day about my assumption that I likely lived closer to the office than anyone else, and she immediately said, "Beth lives a couple blocks from here." And then two others came up who definitely live closer than the 2.4 miles away that I love too. So much for that idea!
[posted 12:45 pm]