2001-01-14
feeling kinda
oof. lotsa stuff happened this weekend. and then, on the other hand, not much at all. didn't go far, didn't move much, but lots of movement on the emotional front.
friday, the weekend started well with the Van Morrison concert. erm, actually... let me just get this out of the way first. i had the great misfortune of working (and i use that term loosely) with the biggest lump of a sodden useless sack of shit usher i've ever run across. mind you, i was a house manager in a well-known theatre for several years. and i've worked a lot of local theatre. so for him to be the worst is saying something. this lump showed up for an overstaffed show, announced that he was our leader (i'm sure the supervisor would have been charmed to hear that), left for a long time to 'change into uniform', which constituted taking off a perfectly serviceable button-down and putting on a ratty Harpoon Ale t shirt, and then proceeded to stand in the way, munching on his very pungent burrito for the bulk of the time. y'all, this was not a small man. he took up a lot of space in a crowded aisle. and he was USELESS! i watched him misdirect any number of people to the wrong seats (it's redundant, i know, so sue me). never introduced himself, other than announcing he was our leader. and he yelled for security at one point - As A Joke. do *not* call for security unless you're serious, you idiot - those are the last people you want to aggravate. i tried really hard to work around him, assuming that he had more seniority than i did, but when it came down to the wire and we had to get everyone in their seats, he was standing in the middle of the aisle (read: blocking the whole damn thing) chatting with strangers! i finally snapped and told him to get the hell out of my way. then... then... he had the nerve to refer to me as 'little lady'. ooooooooooooo. how to get my blood boiling in one easy step: condescend to me. i looked at him, at the people he was trying to pawn off on me, and back at him, and walked away.
if i ever have the misfortune to get stuck with this guy again, they can find another station for me, or i'll walk out. you Do Not Volunteer if you can't help. i just wanted to smack him silly for being such a waste of space and oxygen. eh!! those of you who have worked in theatres or concerts will know exactly why this was so frustrating.
::deep breath:: anyhoo... other than the Useless Lump, the concert was great. one of the other volunteers working that post will forever be in my book as Peter, because he looks like Peter Boyle. he was very cool, and as excited as i was about seeing Van the Man. we knew beforehand that it was a 2 hour show, no opener, no intermission. the backing band (the Red Hot Tones, or some such nonsense) came out first and did a few songs with Linda Gail Lewis; apparently, she's Jerry Lee Lewis's half-sister, and she's a talented musician in her own right. then Van came out... oh. mi. gawd. the man is so talented, and so cool, and so blues 'n jazz... rocked my world. he did a mix of new and old stuff, with some Lewis rockabilly thrown in for good measure. he preached the blues better than i've ever heard. and he had an on night - good vocals, good harp, good guitar. one song, he used the harp mike for vocals - what a trip! at one point, i started laughing and said to faux Peter Boyles 'he looks like a lump of coal on a Christmas tree!' the band wore red suits and black shirts, and the backing light was a green wash (shades of The Grinch), and Van was wearing a black velvet suit, shades, and black hat. it was just a very funny visual contrast.
awwwww... he played Moondance... and so much other good stuff... man oh man. it was the only New England stop on the current tour. i'm so glad i got a chance to see him. yay! ::little Panda dance::
the cheapest seat for that show, BTW, was on the order of $50. but that's not the worst price. noo nooooo. i heard that the balcony seats in the Fleet Center for the U2 concert are going for $140. each. that's nearly $300 for two people to see the show thru binoculars. damn. that's just wrong. it's not as if U2 needed the money. if they said the profit was going to a good cause, i might relent. but it isn't. and! and! they have two more dates already booked in reserve, so once the current show sells out (which it will on the first day), they can claim they added two more shows 'by popular demand'.
two things i've learned recently: if they say a show was added by popular demand, they're lying. and if you want to sneak into a show, dress like an usher (carry a flashlight) and act like you know where you're going. but i didn't tell you that.
after the show, i was supposed to meet up with sweetie at his place. he had sounded pretty excited about the prospect of spending time together. i was already asleep (mostly) when he got home. needless to say, this made me cranky. saturday we ran a bunch of errands, including getting his new bookcase, and then ended up at home. um... he was supposed to take me out on a date that night to play pool. so... at some point, i started the conversation. and i tried to be low key about it, but it was rough. basically, it came down to me explaining that i feel like a diversion, and pretty useless overall, because he hasn't been able to, or hasn't taken the time to explain how he feels. pretty much, i've ended up wondering if this relationship means anything to him. as i pointed out, he hasn't even bothered to ask me to come over for the night. i do fully acknowledge that my flea-like patience is part of the problem here. i get frustrated waiting for him to ask, so i call and ask if he wants to do X or Y or Z. that was part of the conversation too. long story short: if he wants this to work, he needs to do more than talk the talk. he needs to walk the walk. otherwise, this isn't going to last.
turns out, as we were talking tonight, he said that felt like the end of the relationship [as in: i dumped him]. we talked a bunch more, and i made it clear that that was never my intention. he's scared that he is somehow going to fail, and i'm scared that somehow we're going to fall back into old, destructive patterns. whole lotta fear goin' on. but thankfully it's balanced by a whole lot of love. i'm not sure where all this is going to go. i don't think he knows either. but we made a deal tonite to try our best to communicate, and look out for ourselves and each other, and keep our fingers crossed. god, that sounds stupid - but i think, if you've tried to put a damaged relationship back together, it might make sense.
i give him all kinds of gold stars for making a real effort today. he went out to pick up breakfast, and took me to Target (another saga, and too much spending... I Love Target), and a movie, and drinks/munchies/music. for someone who said they intended to do nothing today, that was a lot of stuff. and i know he did it to try to address the problems we had talked about. to his credit, it didn't feel like a grudge effort. i think he truly wants to make his actions match his words. or at least, that's what i hope.
i also spent a fair amount of time tinkering around with the digital camera this weekend. yes, this is the one that The Ex Girlfriend bought for him. i played around with it for two reasons: to erase the EGF karma... and 'cuz it's a really neat toy. 8) took a ton of pix of the cats and nickie, and each other, and a bunch of shots for jezebel's mirror. i'll post a proper link to this soon... she basically realized she was taking a lot of shots in mirrors, and posted them, inviting others to submit similar shots. [grrrrrrrr] you don't need the details, but let's just say that software hasn't been my friend today in trying to submit my pix to the project.
and tomorrow is monday. which he has off. and i don't. but the whole state is running on holiday time. have i mentioned recently that i hate mondays?
