A Little Light in Ultimate Randomness

My brief entry in my other book last night came out of desperation, I suppose. Not that anything serious is happening or will, but I get like that at times. It always feels worse than it actually is. I guess where it came from was Sunday. Had a nice day off and spent it with my dad. If anybody has ever seen American Pickers on the History Channel, they probably know that the guys have two stores: the original in Iowa and a newer one here in Nashville. Well, my dad and I finally got out to visit the store, one of the things we had both been wanting to do. Beautiful place and the items were awesome. Even saw a few things I had remembered seeing the guys discover on the show. For anyone looking to get off the beaten path in Nashville, the whole area is well worth exploring. Before that, we had gone to a place called McKay’s, which deals in used books, movies, music, and video games. A person could easily expand their book collection for a very small price in that store. Some paperbacks go for as little as a dime or a nickel even! My dad grabbed a few books and I grabbed a couple of DVDs. Even got the first season of Heroes for $3. That’s a steal if ya ask me. We finished out the day by getting some burgers. All in all, it was the first truly relaxing day I can remember having in a long time. In fact, I honestly couldn’t remember the last day that I’d felt so relaxed. Therein lies the problem, friends. Just to give a little background:

The ex bought a new house and has moved all her stuff in over there, including the pets. While it is nice to not have to worry about taking care of the dogs and cats that all seem to destroy everything they touch, I do miss them. I got really used to having the dogs sleep in bed with me and now, being alone in the house anytime I’m not at work, just makes me more lonely than I already am. There are good parts and bad parts to the whole thing. As for me, I won’t be there much longer either. I am moving in with some friends shortly and it should be a much better situation for me, but the stress of two moves has been a bit. And, of course, just being lonely. The thought of trying to date or anything, at this point, just seems so far out of the realm of possibility at this point that I don’t even think about it. But I do very deeply miss the feeling of having that one person to hold and hold me. The reason to say everything is going to be alright and the person that makes me truly believe it. It’s the only time I have ever truly felt whole and it has felt like insanity trying to fill that hole with other things. But I’m still trying, so at least there is that.

As far as the job goes, it is still kinda new, but I have settled in and it can be a great place to work, but it still feels like work. Soul sucking, draining work, most days. But, it is a job and the pay is good for what it is. I mean, it is just a food stand in one of the local malls. A bit more upscale than a simple food court....but just. Still, the owner is a great guy and my only boss was my boss at the café. We were both transferred over together, at least. It gets busy at times, but there is a lot of time for people watching. Too many good looking women walk through that place. It can get distracting, but in a good way. But it hasn’t been anything more than just a place to work…well, until right after I wrote that entry last night. Hence why I am writing this one.

The way the stores are set up, my store is in a corner near the Macy’s entrance into the mall. In the middle of the open area between us and the stores on the other side of the…well, not a hall, exactly, but an open area of sorts, there is an Auntie Anne’s pretzel stand. Along the other wall of stores, there is a Brookstone. I have gotten to know the mall employees through my job, since we offer a discount to mall employees on all purchases. One of the pretzel stand employees is named Nick. The other week, he came up to me and said that he had been talking to three of the people at Brookstone and they were interested in playing D&D, as they had talked about it but none of them had ever played before. Nick seemed to intuit that I might be interested in playing, and so came over to ask if I wanted to. Since it was something different, a chance to get to know a few people better, and to have fun doing something now that nobody is really expecting me home by a particular time, I said sure. Well, last night was the first night we all got together to play and I had a blast! I love doing something creative and D&D allows the players to be creative like that. Since it was the first time the others had played, and I had never played in a proper game before, the characters were premade for us to use. It was me and Nick, along with Leah, Caleb, and…I think his name is Andy. Gonna have to fix that oversight. Anyhow, we ended up playing from 10 PM until about 1:30 AM. Some of the time, I spent doing almost nothing except bragging how my character was going to remove someone’s leg and beat them with it. Brutal, yes, but my character was a brutish kind of guy with a grudge against another member of his clan. So I played the part. While they used cunning and technical know-how to accomplish their tasks, I acted as back up and dumb muscle for most of the game until we got almost to the end. The group ended up being attacked by the character my character had a grudge against and the battle ensued. While my group worked support by fixing the ship of taking pot shots at the enemy, I did what it seemed like I would do best: full out hand to hand combat. The battle was tough, but the dice were kind and, in the end, I accomplished the mission from my character’s backstory and defeated his rival, beating him with his own leg. Yup, I pulled it off…man, what a bad pun. Anyhow, I had a great time and am looking forward to the next time we play. So two days in a row, I got a chance to relax and have fun for the first time in I don’t know how long and it was exactly what I needed. I genuinely feel better this morning than I have in a long time. Will it last? I don’t know, but I hope at least some of it does. I like the people I have just started to learn about and could easily see myself hanging out with them more like this. So I hope we get a chance to play more and keep it going for awhile. They probably think I am really weird considering my seeming obsession with the leg thing, but that’s just the kinda guy I am. I find something I can make funny and I stick to it. So we will see how that turns out. As for now, back to my second day off this week. It will be a weird week, but for the first time in awhile, I feel like I may not go into each day quite so angry or down.