the hours, happy and sad
I did something social every day this weekend! So, let's start.
Friday evening, I walked straight from work to Bill's Off Broadway at Pine & Harvard to have my February Happy Hour with Laney. I have a new, pretty reliable system worked out now: bring a three-shot cocktail in a thermos with me to work, and drink it systematically over the course of my walk, then order just one more cocktail to have over Happy Hour. This saves a ton of money and also yields pretty much the perfect level of buzz over the course of that couple hours or so at the bar or restaurant. The trouble here is, because the Happy Hour drinks there are so inexpensive, along with very cheap Happy Hour small plates, I actually had two cocktails, to keep pace with Laney, who for once actually ordered Manhattans instead of a non-alcoholic drink. This was because Jessica was not joining us after all as opposed to the original plan, as her man-friend took her out for Valentine's Day dinner, and without a smoker around now Laney knew she could drink without it making her tempted to bum a cigarette off of her. Anyway, next time at Bill's: maybe just two shots in my thermos cocktail, instead of three. Or! I could just decline a second cocktail at the establishment, right? As it was, I got a tad more buzzed than I really wanted, though not by too much.
I still felt compelled to drink three full glasses of water with two Aleve before bed, and I then had to get up to pee three times in the night, and take a third Aleve when I got up in the morning. It still wasn't too terrible that next morning, but it would have been better without that last cocktail. Still, I had budgeted $40 for Friday evening, and I only spent around $28 or so. Laney and I split the two small plates we ordered, one a flatbread pizza and one nachos, both delicious.
I can't remember a whole lot about what we talked about, except that Laney spoke about how cool it would be if our planned continuance of monthly "Happy Hours" from her stops after she retires and goes on the road for a couple of years next year, could be from cool places like the Grand Canyon or other similarly iconic locales. If it's too remote, she won't get enough of a signal, but maybe she can from a nearby lodge or something. Skyping will likely work better over wifi than over 3G networks.
I did have to ask why there was a plastic wedge doorstop mounted on the wall opposite the toilet in the men's room. The waitress did not know and had to ask the manager when he came in. Turns out it was as a door stop for the stall door, so it did not damage the wall. This would make sense with a regular door-protector, but a plastic wedge one designed for going under doors? Mounted on the wall? That was sort of weird. Also: the men's room "man" symbol had been overlaid with a sticker of the same style outline of a man, but with his legs crossed like he really had to pee, which cracked me up.
In any event, Happy Hour with Laney was fun as always. I'm not sure how long we were there, maybe a couple of hours. I walked the rest of the way home and . . . well, I can't really remember how I spent the rest of my evening. Oh, I did watch the Tom Papa Netflix comedy special. Shobhit did not get off work until 10:15—the very reason he suggested we do Valentine's Day breakfast since we could not do dinner (which thus allowed Laney and me to stick with Happy Hour on the second Friday of the month)—and I really did try to stay awake until he got home, as he was hoping I would do. But, by the time it was nearly 10:00, I just knew I was not going to make it, especially after I had had some drinks. And I went to bed and zonked out completely.
On Saturday, Shobhit worked 12:45 to 9:45, and so we spent some time mid-morning going out to do a bit of shopping: picking up a few items at Greenlake Village PCC; stopping by the Shoreline Costco for gas and to get his cashback that he's taking with us to Australia; getting a few bags of cat treats at Petco. I then dropped him off a little early at work in Northgate, so I could have the car for the duration of his trip. I then drove down to Renton to do a test run on Danielle's hairdresser she recommended, convinced it would save me money as compared to the haircut I last had in Belltown at Bang, which—for a haircut only—cost me fucking $97, including tip.
Now. I normally would have waited to get my hair cut again until April, as I always do it during my Birth Week. But, Shobhit got his haircut in anticipation of Australia, and he suggested I do the same—adding that I should get it colored too. Well, I did not particularly want to use the boxed home color kit from Bartell Drugs again, as when I did it last, I had a headache for three days. I decided if I was going to color it this time, I was going to get it done professionally, with product that won't likely be as hard on my hair, head and scalp.
And I did get that. The woman's name was Dagmar, she's from the Czech Republic, and she did an excellent job, giving me exactly what I wanted: a blonder color that would blend in well with my very gray roots as they grow out. This, however, predictably necessitated foils rather than an all-over color, which I knew would be more expensive, but I did not bother asking her by how much. I was already there, after all, and I wasn't just going to walk out.
I had already told her how insanely expensive my last haircut had been, and she told me she only charges $30 for men's cuts, even for hair as long as mine was. She actually did tell me the color would make it pricier, which I expected: "I use expensive products," she said.
Still, I was kind of unprepared for the total she quoted me when I went to pay: $155. Holy shit! Danielle had told me the last time she got her hair done it had cost her $80, so that was kind of what I was expecting. Maybe I should have stated that as basically my budget constraint, but the problem there is that it would have meant not getting the color I wanted and really needed. I don't want to get my hair done and not have it done right. I still gave a 20% tip, which took the total to . . . $186. When I told Scott and Noah this morning how much I had paid, Scott said, "Did she cut every single hair individually?"
I went into my budget history excel document to find out what I had paid the last time I had a professional cut and color done rather than coloring it myself at home. At had been at Rudy's Barbershop, in 2017. And there, I had paid $194. So, I guess I did save some money by going to Renton to have it done instead. I saved eight bucks!
Shobhit later complained that I still did not get it blond enough, but a) there is literally no fucking pleasing him at all ever with this stuff—in which case I'm not sure why I bother trying at all—that is, of course, unless b) if I had done it at the shade of blond he likes best, it would have grown out with a clearly defined line accentuating my roots. And I won't do that anymore, not for him or anybody. Bottom line, I am happy with it, and I'm actually glad I had it done before the trip after all, as it will actually make my hair easier to manage on a day to day basis.
I did not think to take a before-and-after photo on Saturday itself. But, I just went into the bathroom to take a selfie this morning, so you can see the cut here. You will perhaps not think at first glance that it looks worth $186—and, okay, arguably it's not worth that no matter what. She did spend about two hours on me. But! A big part of the value is what cannot be seen, which is the point: no one will be able to see the difference without looking closely, as my much grayer hair grows out over the course of the next eight months or so.
I may try the home box dye again when I have my hair cut in spring 2021, I don't know. I won't have it colored professionally again, though; I'm thinking of this as kind of a "last hurrah" for the sake of our trip to Australia. After that, the choices are either to just leave it naturally gray, or color it at home. And if I get that fucking three-day headache again, then I'm done with coloring it at all for good, whether Shobhit likes it or not.
Anyway, so then I swung by Danielle's place, as it was only 10 minutes away. Even Danielle was pretty surprised by the price of the haircut, but she agreed it looked good. She wanted "to see her work" and what Dagmar had done to my hair. And I just hung out and visited with her for a few hours, first in her living room and then in her kitchen while she cleaned it in preparation for making dinner. I did not stay for dinner though, and deliberately left early enough to get home to feed the cats before I then left again after a little while to go pick up Shobhit from work.
Danielle told me more about her ongoing challenges with Morgan, who is 16 now and as difficult as ever. She is almost always at Patrick's when I visit; this time, it was only Rylee who was at home with her, and Rylee spent most of her time in her room. Danielle did make vanilla chai tea for us, and when we both needed more water, she asked Rylee to fill our cups for us. I was like, "Hey, maybe I should have had children after all!" Then I had to ask Rylee to put more water in my cup as she did not fill it very full—I did ask nicely, and she filled it more for me—and so I joked, "That's it, no tip for her!"
Danielle is trying to get her kids to eat more healthy cereal and they got a large bag of raisin bran, which apparently the kids then never touched. It was all in a big plastic cereal container, and Danielle just offered it to me. I hate raisins but Shobhit might like it, so I took it. She said it could be in return for the box of Special K Strawberry cereal I gave her when she saw how many extras I had at home the last time she was over. She also gave me a bag of jalapeños to take to Shobhit, as I guess it was a lot more than she was ever going to use. Anyway, that's how this text exchange happened this morning.
Anyway, I later went to pick up Shobhit from work, and when we got home we watched TV until going to bed around midnight.
As for yesterday, Shobhit and I went out for breakfast again—even though we had just done so for Valentine's Day only two days before. We were smart this time and split just on dish and a side of toast, though: the seasonal scramble, with country potatoes. Truly, all of it was delicious, even the toast, which is rare. Oh and it was at the restaurant called Smith on 15th, which Shobhit found highly rated on Yelp but had never been to. I had been there a couple of times before, once with Jennifer during her January 2015 weekend visit, and then with Evan for our Birth Week dinner in 2016. I want to say I have been there another time since, but maybe not. In any case, the food was excellent and even Shobhit thought so.
We walked back home, and watched a bit more TV. Shobhit worked yesterday 2:30 to 9:15, and I had a phone and online tutorial with Apple scheduled for 2:45. I had gotten an email from Apple saying it was free so I thought, why not! And I set up an appointment. Some guy from Austin called me on the phone while we were also connected in online chat, so I could see anything he wanted to show on his iPhone screen. I did it to learn more about the camera features on the iPhone 11. There was nothing earth-shattering I learned, but it was still worthwhile as I learned several details I did not know before.
That lasted about half an hour, and soon after that I took the bus to the U District AMC 10 to see Downhill starring Julia Louis-Dreyfus and Will Ferrell, which I quite liked a lot more than the MetaCritic score of 49 might have made me expect. I don't know why other people seem to have a problem with it, or why the original Swedish film on which it's based, called Force Majeure, was so much more beloved by critics—but I found the American version to be far more fun, accessible, and of a much more reasonable length.
I bussed back home, prepared some dinner, and wrote my review. Once Shobhit was home from work we watched the season premiere of Last Week Tonight with John Oliver before finally going to bed, my ongoing issues with Office 365 apps in the new macOS Catalina still unresolved. The whole Office thing on my mac, with this new operating system, is getting increasingly frustrating.
To more quick things, to round out my weekend.
I woke up with a stiff muscle in my back, upper right shoulder, yet again. This happens semi-regularly now, after apparently sleeping wrong. This shit got old really fast. Today the pain was persistent enough that I started to feel nauseated, which I took as a nudge to take a couple of Aleve. Soon after I did that, the pain improved, although I can still feel it. So do I just have to resign myself to dealing with this on a sem-regular basis for the rest of my life, or what?
And then, the really horrible news, a Facebook post by Valerie that had been posted about an hour before I noticed it on my phone busing home from the movie last night: Auntie Rose is, officially I guess, dying. She included a really great, recent photo of her, and because it was shared friends-only I can't link to it, so I'll just share what she wrote here:
My mom is dying. We are not sure why. One of those cases where there is no medical explanation to explain why she has declined so rapidly in the past two weeks. She want from walking with her walker, telling us what to do, and getting her food two weeks ago, to bed-ridden, confused, and in anguish. We welcome all prayers and thoughts as we navigate this hellish journey. This is her last smile, taken Friday.
It seems pretty clear that Auntie Rose has little time left now, and, barring a miracle, she will not be joining me for a visit at Fort Worden State Park as part of my state-park-themed Birth Week on May 1 after all. I think I already mentioned recently that we exchanged emails only just last month confirming this plan. In retrospect, I am so grateful Valerie invited me over for dinner at her place in Bellevue when Auntie Rose was staying with her last November. If it weren't for that, the most recent I would have seen her was during my Birth Week, April of last year.
I did post this as a comment on Valerie's post: She is one of the most special people ever to have lived. That’s all I can say. 💔
But, then I saw Sherri's comment, posted all of about half an hour earlier: Remind Auntie Rose we have a luncheon date in June. We also have to have our lavender ice cream at purple haze.. So, I contributed to that thread: We have a date at Fort Worden on May 1 too! I’m going no matter what—I’ve already decided I won’t break the plan we made—but I sure hope she can be there.
I was heartened by Valerie's reply: I may join you if she can't. I know how important your lunches and walks are to her. As I then responded, I was actually going to ask you, once it felt appropriate enough to do so. I would love it if you joined either way. As in, I have already been thinking about this: I will go to Fort Worden by myself that day if I have to—I will not change the plan no matter what—but I would truly love it if Valerie joined me, especially if Auntie Rose is unable to. Or even if a miracle happens and she is able to!
Anyway. Seeing that news on my phone threw me for a loop and I actually shed a couple of surprising tears on the bus. But, Auntie Rose isn't dead yet, so far as I know. I was in the middle of texting with Danielle when I saw that, and told her about it; she very sweetly texted me this morning to ask how I was doing. Honestly I hadn't really thought about Auntie Rose again this morning until I got that text. I did mention that it will really suck if she dies right when Shobhit and I are leaving for Australia, but I will not cancel the trip if she does. Uncle David and Mary Ann don't necessarily have a huge amount of time left either—he will have his 73rd birthday on March 2. That's not super old anymore, true, but it's still the beginning of a decade in which a lot can change, and it makes more sense to be with the uncle who is still living. (Also, I won't throw away the huge amount of money I already spent on this trip, which I consider to be a reasonably practical thought as opposed to callus or insensitive.)
That said, of course I still hope that I am able to attend a memorial service, whenever it happens. Danielle asked me if I wanted to go visit Auntie Rose, and I said . . . probably not. As with Grandma when she died, I do not want that to be my last memory of her, and right now it's probably best to leave her with her far more deeply impacted immediate family anyway. I won't have this same kind of attitude when it's my own parents; that is obviously a very different thing. In fact every time something like this happens, it makes me think of how I'll never be prepared for it when I start to lose my own parents. I doubt it's possible to be prepared for that—and that is precisely what Valerie is going through right now.
As Danielle texted me this morning, Yeah, I mean death happens and it's never timely. Indeed. And she lost her dad in 2015, far earlier than anyone should have to. At least with Auntie Rose, as Shobhit noted—also via text—She has led a good life. It's time. Well, we'll see on that last part. But, probably.
[posted 1:11 pm]