Amy in L.A. Pt. 1

Daily Overview for June 20, 2005
Get on with it already! Get over your hesitance and take that big, daring leap.

Sometime during the course of the day, the tension becomes unbearable. Try for either a good laugh or a quick escape — or both. Plan to run, dance or vent with friends this evening.

Take those too narrow expectations and drop ‘em like they’re hot. Really, why go limiting yourself by setting down strictures about how something or someone ‘can’ or ‘can’t’ be? Let yourself have a little more freedom than that — and as a bonus, once you loosen up those requirements of yours, you’ll start having a lot more fun as well. Put this into practice as soon as possible and people will start remarking how much happier you seem.

—–

I’ve come back to the hotel. I’m not entirely sure why, I’m simply taken by the feeling that I’ve forgotten something: something is missing. I’m sitting in the downstairs lobby; lacking the requisite key to go back up to the room that housed me and others in our inebriated nose dives last evening. Four days ago, this wasn’t even a possibility in my mind. My mental state, my exhausted body, and this room I am in were simply unimaginable. Posh furniture all around, a beautiful fountain and business people preparing for their day as they chat and read the L.A. Times, I am more than a little out of place. I’m trying to figure out what happened; organize and catalog this past hurricane of a weekend. Pen and notebook in hand, I’m scribbling down whatever thoughts come to mind; most of them not good so I suppose I’ll head to work. L.A. traffic being what it is on Monday morning I am not really excited about the drive but I have to get out of the matrix eventually.

I’m not the best at navigating the city so I usually just call someone I know who has lived here for years and ask them. I dial Ray’s office line but he doesn’t answer, trying him on his cell reveals he is still sleeping off the effects of Saturday night. It’s 10 a.m. Monday morning. Nice. A second phone call finds Lamont at work and able to quickly give me the most direct route to where I need to be. Lucky for me I’m already late for work by a couple hours, since I don’t heed directions very well. The city gives way to rolling hills and trees and I’m thinking this is probably not the way to work when I see signs for Venice…

I have a long drive back with lots of time to think about the last few days. Most of it doesn’t make sense yet, but I’m calmer than I have been in days, so maybe I’ll get it sorted out in time.

Prior Thursday 2:24 pm

Daily Overview for June 16, 2005
Ready for some deep thought? Seek out like-minded people for tag-team introspection.

The conversation starts casual, and it seems light enough, but there’s something deeper going on. Find out what, exactly, by asking questions that get serious. Don’t be afraid to take it to the next level.

You get a gold medal in the Olympics of charm, and with hardly any work on your part either. The heavens have put an amplifier and some serious base on your not-insignificant charisma, and it’s attracting attention in droves. Wherever you go, people stop to listen. So if there’s something at work or elsewhere you’ve been desiring influence, now’s the time. Your opinion is worth its weight in gold.

—–

Amy calls. This doesn’t happen often, but when it does it doesn’t bode well. I’m in the other room and miss the screeching phone, but ring her back to find out what’s up when I have a minute.

“Hi.”

‘I was in the other room earlier. What’s happening?’

“Well, kind of a lot. I think.”

‘That was definitive. Thanks for the enlightenment. I’m a little busy at work.’

I know the longer I am on the phone with her, the worse this will be.

“Wait, I wasn’t finished.”

‘You don’t say? Well then…’

Apparently, she is done with school, in between jobs, and her mom has a week off, so she
has convinced her mom to come to L.A. for the weekend on vacation.

‘Great,’ I say, ‘Have Fun.’

Waiting the requisite few seconds for a response before I sign off, I’m surprised when she continues speaking.

“I talked my mom into coming out there for a reason,” she says hurriedly, pausing before blurting out, “I have to see you.”

To understand how surprised I am at this you would have to have been privy to at least a hundred conversations between myself and myself, and no one in their right mind wants that burden; suffice to say my thoughts are comparably chaotic and distinctly less organized than the sacking of Rome at the moment. Trying vainly to continue to use English for the remainder of the conversation, I’m left sitting at my desk in stunned silence for the next several minutes.

I’m yanked rudely from my internal monologue by Charlie ‘Coif’ Mathers. I swear to god, this guy has had the same hairstyle since 1905. He just has one of those smiles that says, “I have a number of large bladed weapons in my office, and children tied up in my basement.” His grin is disturbing like Fat Albert is chubby. Being one to tempt fate, I have taken it upon myself to enrage and infuriate him at every given opportunity just to see if he will really snap and go on the killing spree we all so richly deserve. Today he explains to me that he has managed to delete a file, a file that wasn’t ever really there, he doesn’t really know where ‘there’ is, and wants to know if I have it. I couldn’t have asked for a better opportunity on my birthday. I spend the next nearly 30 minutes making this diminutive excuse for a man run mental circles that would kill a puppy half his age and with twice the mental fortitude. Once he finally leaves, frustrated and degraded, he is bright red and sweating profusely; scary grin plastered even more forcefully across his face. I briefly entertain the thought that perhaps I have gone too far this time. Oh well, we’ll find out in a minute. Hopefully the screams will give me enough notice he is coming to find a decent decent place to hide from The Shining.

I get on the phone and call Checkered, a buddy I know predominantly online. He lives in Riverside now and I haven’t been down to see him since he moved into his new place. I missed his birthday this week. And his new car was just stolen. On his birthday. Yeah, sounds like we are getting hammered when I get there.

Feeling distinctly pleased with myself for having survived another day at the hands of the teeming unwashed masses, I pack up my stuff and jump in the van to drive home. Upon my arrival home the cat promptly informs me that I have been lax in my duties; meowing and crying running around the house in confused circles. As good a time as any, I sit down on the couch with a brush and brush down an ecstatic cat for a half an hour while wondering what the hell I am getting myself into this weekend.