With Mer out of town Sunday afternoon through Friday evening, I was left on my own to “batch it” for a few days. Happily, I have good friends who look out for me and made sure I had social options.
On Sunday evening, I was paying bills in the office at about 8:30 when I heard the doorbell. I ran upstairs and opened the door, and to my surprise and delight, I found two of CVCA’s just-graduated students, John and Ben. John was in my Connections group (small group of students who met with me once a week), and Ben worked for me last summer and this summer. I know them both quite well, and they are great guys. As an illustration of that, they had been over on CVCA’s athletic fields playing Frisbee, and when they were done had remembered that I was alone. So, on the spur of the moment, they came over to see if I wanted to see a movie. I was quite pleased and impressed, so I said sure, and after we talked comic books for twenty minutes and had a comic book exchange, I headed off with the two of them to the video store, then the gas station for some junk food, and finally over to John’s house, where we joined John’s father in the basement den to watch the silly comedy Johnny English: Reborn. It was a foolish little comedy spoofing spy films like James Bond, but it was amusing throughout and very funny at times, and I was with good people and had a very good time.
On Tuesday, Zach and Londa called and asked me if I would like to join them for dessert. I was quite pleased to do so, and Zach suggested Sweet Frog, a top-your-own frozen yogurt place nearby. I remembered that I had been lukewarm about frozen yogurt when I’d tried it in Chicago, so this time I planned on using just a little yogurt with a whole lot of toppings. Zach and Londa picked me up, and we drove to Sweet Frog, which is fairly new. The line went all around the store, and after we got in line, the employees started asking people to wait outside for fire code reasons. It appears to be a popular place. Zach is the seventh grade Bible teacher at CVCA, and is a very popular teacher. He managed to have three or four CVCA student sightings in the yogurt place. We also saw another CVCA teacher, Ray, there with his son and his son’s girlfriend. Zach and Londa and I visited for over an hour total, and my toppings-intensive yogurt was excellent.
On Thursday, I hosted a student Batman night. John and Ben had thought it would be great to see a couple of animated Batman movies, and so John arranged it with some of his friends. I supplied Batman and the Mask of the Phantasm, and John was going to bring Batman: Under the Red Hood. I took a half-day off so I could bake and nap for the evening, and people came over around 5:30. By 6:00, there were five of us, me and four other students, but John was nowhere to be seen. We finally started the evening at 6:15, and found out later that John had gone on vacation with his family, and they had extended their stay by a day, so he was out of town, which was too bad for our group. A little ways into the second move, my colleague Craig showed up, and so we had a good little party going on. It was a great time – food, good movies, and cool people with whom to hang out. Mer and I had bough a new couch the previous Thursday, and it had been delivered on Wednesday, so I had good seating for everyone. I also went out and bought a thirty-two-inch LCD TV for the occasion (it was an open-box, discontinued model that was forty percent off). I missed Mer for sure, but evenings like this helped soften the loneliness.
Mer was due back on Friday evening, but I had one last hurrah left. I took another half-day off, and Ben and I played the video game Civilization V for about four hours. I was doing very well in the game, and was reminded of why I cannot ever own the game in my house – I find it too addicting. But it is a good time when played sparingly with other people.
Over the few days, I also did some work in our main bathroom, adding a towel hook and a towel ring, and getting a new shower-hanger for soap and shampoos and the like, and I got and installed a new faucet; now everything in our bathroom is silver and matches. It was not all play while Meredith was away in Florida.
I did finally get Mer back; her flight came in on time at 11:30 into the Akron-Canton airport. She was back just in time for us to have a busy Saturday followed by leaving for vacation on Sunday. I may have been batchin’ it, but I suspect she is the one in need of rest.