Sunshiney sunday

Today was lovely. An absolutely gorgeous day for driving back to Amherst, which is what I spent my late afternoon doing.

I went into Halifax last night to meet up with some old friends from the store for a house-party, and then a trip to the Penny. It was a really good time. I was going to stay at Randy & D's house, but ended up at Alicia's instead. We stayed up talking until 6:45 this morning though, so I'm absolutely exhausted.

Had coffee with Billy this afternoon, and it was quite lovely. We get along so very well when we're in the same room. We even had a very pleasant MSN chat tonight. I was best pleased about it. Not in the least because I didn't really feel much of anything. I wasn't pining, I wasn't twingeing. I was just having a nice chat with a friend.

I want us to be friends, because I can't be acquaintances, and I am not really interested in writing off the last 2 years of friendship as an experiment in poor judgement. I'm never going to be involved with the man in any real way again, so I really have nothing to lose by being his friend.

Actually, I think one of the things that made me realize that I was okay with stuff, was that I went up to his apartment to drop off his replacement gift (one was slightly defective--they sent a new one) and sat for a few minutes to admire his new banjo. I got to pluck the strings and hold it (it was HEAVY!) for a bit. I had him play me some things he was learning to do. It's COOL! Then I admired his new mandolin. It's about a month old now, but it's new to me as I hadn't seen it yet. I held that too, and it was sooooo light compared to his old one. He played me a song on that too, because I asked him to. The point being (yes, I'll get to it eventually) that when he was playing, and from the minute I got there, he was jittery. His hands were kinda shaky and he looked nervous. It was a wee bit odd. Endearing, and mildly comforting to know that he was slightly anxious to see me.
(Possibly in case I was going to hit him again *heh*) Or it could have been that he drank a pot of coffee on his own that morning. Who knows. But he was shaky, and I was fine. It wasn't weird being in his space, it didn't feel too casual, and it didn't feel too awkward. It was just 'hanging out at a buddy's place' normal. It was good. Anyway, that's a really long paragraph to say a whole lot of 'I think I'm fine with it now'. But I do. And I am. And it's Good.

I've had a really hectic week all told, actually. Most of it fun, but even fun can wear you down.

I posted on Wednesday about DD coming by last Sunday for a visit and staying until the wee hours of the morning. Well...Thursday it happened again. It's nice to have the company, and he's a really nice man. But I don't know if I'm interested in starting something that involves a co-worker, no matter how far removed from my specific day-to-day job.

There was a very legitimate reason for DD to be in my store on Friday--and he had committed to doing that last week when the 'situation' arose. So he headed into town on Thursday night. He knew that I was closing, so showed up at the store to fix my surveillance camera at about 8:30 pm. After work he invited me out to eat, but I was pooped. Thursday was a VERY stressful day at work, and Friday was promising to be worse--so I didn't actually feel like going out.

I had some work to do, so told him he was welcome to come to the house and have a drink/eat food/chat while I did work for a little bit. He did. He brought both my favourite beer, and the beer that I always order when we go to the pub. Woot for a man with keen observation skills.

Anyway, we chilled in the living room, both on our laptops doing personnel performance reviews. We chatted, and beveraged a little bit. It was really quite pleasant and low-key. He informed me that The Proclaimers are coming to town in April. Not my town, but one town that I love, and another that I have to visit periodically for work. He invited me to attend the show at the second town (the one where he lives). I said 'sure! I love a good show! Fun!'

I then thought 'uh-oh--I think you just made a date. For a time 2 months from now. Shee-it.'

We chatted and chatted. I had an insane day planned for Friday--and was quite concerned about not getting all my homework done. But not concerned enough to stop the chatting and give him the boot before 2:30 am. Yeah, I know. I'm an idiot. He's NICE though. And a big fat coward. Heh. That makes me a little bit safer, I think.

Anyway. I don't know what I want to do. I don't know him THAT well, but I don't think we'd ever set the world on fire as a couple. But he's really nice, seems to be pretty into me, and he's kinda cute. And tall. Did I mention the tall? Because I REALLY dig The Tall. BUT...corporate ink and all. I know better. At least it's his nature to be secretive about his private life, and discrete in all his dealings. We'll see. I figure I've got at least 1 more uneventful visit before I have to actually have a conversation involving whether or not I want to kiss him. To be honest, it's kind of a nice problem to have for a change.

Friday at work was INSANE. Mainly because I had to be there at 6:30 to open up. So with my 3 hours of sleep, that was a great time. I then had Head Office visitors all day long, in a steady parade of people coming through my office.

I have a whole lot of staffing issues going on right now--the COB pulled one last cunty move before she went out on sick-leave, and one of the sales people is out with bronchitis for at least 2 weeks. One of the salesmen is being all passive-aggressive and approaching district sales managers behind my back and telling tales out of school. I have to discipline him for that, and I don't really want to. I mean, it's annoying--but there's got to be a REASON and I'd rather figure out what it is than give him shit for doing an end-run. However, I don't think he'll understand my 'kinder, gentler' method. I think he'll only stop his bullshit if I call him on it and lay down the law--complete with yelling and possibly some bad words. So I guess that's what I'm going to have to do.

I was supposed to have all my performance reviews completed, the interviews done, and then have everything submitted by Friday past. I don't. I'm about 6 short. And I'm out of the office Monday and Tuesday of this week. Argh.

I'm heading out to SJ tomorrow morning for a 9 am meeting...which means leaving here by 6 in order to make sure I'm there on time. Blech. I'm pooped, but really wanted to post, so I am.

I wonder if I'm going to get a phone call tomorrow night asking if I want to do something in SJ. Heh. I think it's likely to happen if he's in town at all. Which is kinda funny, kinda cute, and kinda sad all at once. I don't know whether to hope he's in town, or hope that he's not.

They DO say that the best way to get over someone is to get under someone else...and whoever They are, I'm sure They're fucking brilliant!

Well, it's 12:25 am, and I have to be up in 5 hours. I haven't had a lot of sleep all week, and tomorrow's bound to be a long day so I'm off to bed. Have a lovely week, poppets. More from the hotel tomorrow, I'm sure.