I kind of love this shot. It was taken at an odd seating area beneath the stairs that go up to the second floor seating area at Donna's, a great little bar Laney discovered a while ago on Olive Way between Melrose and Bellevue, and so we added it to the agenda for our Happy Hours.

I have for a while now been maintaining an excel sheet of "Matthew and Laney's Social Calendar," because we do Happy Hour twice a month and we see tons of movies together. In fact, I noted to Tracy on Sunday that I probably now see movies with Laney about as often as I used to with Barbara when she lived here between 2000 and 2010. It's been great to get a comparable "movie buddy" again. Anyway, between those things as well as once or twice-monthly movie nights at the Braeburn Condos theater (not to mention other random things like the Pumpkin Carving Party last Friday), it's a great way to keep our plans organized between the two of us.

I think Laney finds a lot of these places just going on walks with different routes around Capitol Hill. She just found another new one to add to the list the other day, but we already have locations chosen until then, so I had to put it on the calendar for late January. It was a similar deal with Donna's: she first brought it up to me last March. This is one that we've had on other dates but bumped it a few times for this or that reason. We finally got around to going there last night.

And we'll definitely want to come back! The drinks weren't the greatest, to be honest. Or just one of mine wasn't: I ordered a Moscow Mule, and it was one of the lamest I have ever had. But then I ordered a Fuzzy Navel, and it was truly delicious. Laney loved her coffee shot and her beer.

It's the food I'd come back for, though. Not the mac & cheese balls, which were low in flavor in my view and super spicy (Shobhit would probably love them). We also shared the Parmesan Fries and the Pasta Salad though—all three were from the Happy Hour menu, $8 to $9—and both were spectacular. The Pasta Salad in particular exceeded our expectations.

Anyway. The above shot is one of my new favorites from a Happy Hour. We were only in that odd spot briefly though, as there was not a conventional table, just a bench with a wide sort of shelf for putting things on that went around the space. We decided we'd rather have a real table, so we moved back over by the front window (I flipped the photo around; it's actually backwards—so that Donna's reads forward.)

The time spent there was lovely as always. We never run out of things to talk about. This time we talked a great deal about sex, and particularly my approach to how things work at bathhouses, which can work better or worse for me depending on the circumstance. We also talked about how the Facebook algorithm has clearly picked up that I will always slow down and check out the photos in men's underwear ads, and so that's what my Facebook ads are now dominated by. In the "reels" section, though, it is often populaed by videos about skycrapers or, as was the case when I brought up the app to show Laney last night, cats. Facebook has me pegged: just show me hot guys and cats, and I'll be happy.

— पांच हजार सात सौ चार —

— पांच हजार सात सौ चार —

Shobhit worked last night, but he asked if I'd have time to cut the carrots he bought at the West Seattle Farmers Market on Sunday (there were actually three that size, not just two), as well as the greens that came with them. I wasn't sure, but in the end I barely had the time. I had them done shortly before he got home, and we then went on a quick jaunt to the Central District PCC to use some more of the free product coupons a broker had given me.

Shobhit was overly concerned with hurrying, because the last time we went, we got into the store at 9:55 and they close at 10:00. We got there last night at 9:30, but for some reason he got it into his head that we needed to rush in and out of there. This put him in a very manic mode. We were looking at flavors of Gomacro bars to get with one of my coupons, and in his haste to pull out one flavor that was a bit back on the shelf, he knocked a glass jar of peanut butter to the floor, where it broke open and spilled.

It wasn't too big of a mess, and the glass did not really fly anywhere. It just broke open and the peanut butter spilled out a bit. Still, it was broken glass—something all of us employees just had to learn about in a recent work safety training video. There was a real emphasis on not leaving broken glass unattended, and we should stay with it until someone who has cleanup tools comes. So I guess the video worked, because I was intent on staying there while Shobhit went to fetch a staff person.

Shobhit was super apologetic to the young woman who finally came. She was very nice about it and was just like, "Oh, this happens every day."

She put a yellow sign up next to the jar. And then . . . just left it. Hopefully someone came to clean it up soon after that.

I told Shobhit he was being manic and needed to settle down. It was truly annoying me. The broken jar would never have happened without his push to rush through, and even at that point we still had 19 minutes until close.

On the way home in the car Shobhit asked about what I had at Happy Hour with Laney, and all he could do was criticize the fact that I had two cocktails instead of one (I always have two), and harp on how many calories would have been in the dishes we shared. Jesus Christ, get off my back! All this did was make me grumpier and grumpier. There was absolutely no reason for any of this shit.

And, in response to my bitchiness, while I was getting ready for bed in the bathroom, he asked me if I was taking Wednesday off for his birthday. He already knew that I was. And then he suggested I not bother and use the PTO some other time.

Honestly I would not even bother sharing all of this, except for how quickly after that he realized he'd kind of crossed a line. Mind you, I made the very tactical, correct, and smart choice of simply not responding at all to that bullshit. And then, within seconds, he just said, "I'm sorry that was passive-aggressive." A rare moment of contrition for him. He even texed me an apology again this morning.

I remain confident he will have a nice birthday, mostly spent with me.

— पांच हजार सात सौ चार —

[posted 12:34 pm]