June 7, 2005

• Wow. What an………..er…………interesting couple of days. Part
  fun. Part frustrating. Part embarrassing. Overall, yesterday was great.
  I got to sleep in ’til about 9:15ish. I exercised and relaxed getting
  ready for work. I was even able to have my favorite blueberry pancakes.
  I checked my email before work and Don had forgotten the Cubs tickets
  at home, so I was going to have to stop at his house before heading to
  the game. I strolled into work about noon for my grueling 3 hour and 45
  minute shift. It went quick.

  I got home about 4:25. Called Kelli. The original plan was to pick Dave
  up from work (he works in Bolingbrook, not too far from Don’s house)
  and go from there. That changed. He was to come home from work.
  Suprisingly, he was on time. He did, however, take 20 minutes to get
  ready. Out the door at 5:20. Made it to Don’s about 5:35ish. I was
  thinking we should still be ok. Game starts at 7:05, this leaves us
  with about an hour and a half. Without traffic, its a 40 minute drive.
  I knew it would take longer then that, but thought we were in good
  shape. How wrong I was. I55 was a disaster for some reason. I could not
  figure this out. I thought it would be bad, but not this bad. Dave kept
  saying we should take I90.I thought this was a bad idea. Traffic got
  better after we got past 90. I thought Lake Shore Drive would be ok. We
  got to LSD about 6:20. It was a fucking parking lot. I HATE HATE HATE
  HATE HATE traffic. Its so fucking hopeless. Nothing but cars the whole
  way on LSD. It was awful. As it turned out, we didn’t even get to the
  park until about 7:40. By the time we got food and made it to our seat,
  it was the start of the 3rd inning (and they were down 4-0) which upset
  me, I haven’t been late to a Cubs game………..well, in years. And I
  haven’t been this late since my first game, some 19 years ago. The hot
  dogs, however, were amazing. I know what everybody is saying, “why not
  just order from the vendor dude?” Well, because he doesn’t have the
  grilled hot dogs with those REALLY good onions.

  Our seats were pretty good, upper deck, lined up with 3rd base. I love
  sitting upper deck at Wrigley. You can see everything unfold. Its
  great. The people in front of us were from Canada and therefore, Blue
  Jays fans. Great. 38,000 in the ballpark and we were stuck behind
  Toronto fans. They were nice thought. It was 3 ladies. We talked a
  little baseball and I explained to them how my sister in law is from
  Canada.

  One thing that was very very surprising, was, Kelli actually had a
  hotdog. She, as you probably don’t know, is a vegetarian. But, she is
  also pregnant, so she got a craving for a dog. Dave was so excited, he
  kept saying the rest of the night how he couldn’t wait to take her to
  Portillo’s. I’ll tell you, pregnancy does weird things to people.

  The game went by quick because there was no scoring after we got there.
  In fact, we didn’t see the first run until Aramis Ramirez hit a homer
  in the bottom of the 9th. This would have been great if if was the only
  run of the game. It was not however, and they lost 4-1.

  On the way out of the park, there were teens giving everybody high
  fives and just generally being fun. We, being fun people, joined in.
  Dave was of course, drunk, so it didn’t take much for him to join in.
  Now, it was Dave’s birthday, so he was in a very good mood. He had been
  saying since we left the house that he wanted to go to the Cubby Bear
  for a drink after the game. So, we headed across the street. The place
  was PACKED as you might expect after a Cubs game. It took Dave forever
  and a day to get the bartender’s attention to get a beer. He came away
  with 2 Corona’s in a can. I have never seen Corona in a can. After he
  was done, Kelli was wanting to leave but he wanted another one. I was
  the driver, and I knew Kelli wanted to leave (she had to work in the
  morning) so I put an end to it and we headed for the car.

  We had to drop Don off at Midway so that he could pick up his car. The
  whole way there, Dave kept saying he wanted to go to Denny’s. Kelli
  kept saying she had to be up early. Eventually, Kelli relented and we
  went to Denny’s. All and all, with the exception of the traffic and the
  Cubs losing, we had a fun night.

  Today at work, I found out that I fucked up a couple of weeks ago. Our
  work is participating in something called Relay For Life. I wrote about
  this a few weeks ago. Its a charity thing for cancer in which you hang
  out at some place all night and do shit.  They had a little seminar
  thing at work, in which you can ask questions and shit like that. Well,
  I was asking questions and in my own little goofy way (you really have
  to know me and know my sense of humor to understand) asked if “I raise
  enough money, can they bring my mom back to life?” (my mom died of
  cancer 5 1/2 years ago). They didn’t seem upset by this and just sorta
  laughed it off and said no. Well, today, I was told that I was not
  being allowed to participate in this because I was “rude to them.”.
  What I find amusing is that I managed to find a way to get banned from
  a volunteer charity thing to raise money for cancer. And it wasn’t just
  work. No. The American Cancer Society was there and heard me say this
  and said specifically that they did not want me to participate. Anywho,
  I thought it would be a good idea to apologize. I told this one girl
  who was in charge of the whole thing for our department that I was
  sorry and wasn’t thinking……….you know, all the shit you are
  supposed to say when you apologize. She said I should watch what I say,
  because sometimes I offend people and hurt feelings. She suggested that
  I go to the HR lady that was in charge of the whole thing and
  apologize. Not a bad idea. So, I had a couple of hours to think about
  this. I wanted to apologize directly to the people I offended. I walked
  into HR and repeated what I said to the other chick. I asked her if I
  could talk to the others I upset or even write them a letter, but she
  said she would just pass it on. I guess what I said was so awful, that
  she didn’t even trust me to make it right with them. Now, obviously, I
  didn’t intend on hurting anybody’s feelings. And maybe I’m being
  insensitive here, but you tell me. Are they over-reacting, or am I being
  insensitive? Or both? It was not a comment or joke about cancer. I
  would never make any joke about cancer, after all, I know how awful it
  is. It was merely my way of finding humor with every situation. I can
  understand them being a little upset, but to ban me from the whole
  thing is a bit much. I can, however understand that I would be
  representing my work there and whatnot. But, as is my understanding,
  the American Cancer Society doesn’t even want me to go even if I were
  to go and not be a part of my work…………you know, just go on my
  own. After all, the comment was about my own mother, and it wasn’t mean
  or derogatory at all. Damn, I’m a social fucking idiot at times.

  • 11:32 pm
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