I’d like to speak to the manager!!!

For the start of a new year on our lovely planet, I told Adam that I was going to get back to writing. I miss it. I enjoy decompressing (I typed decomposing) at the end of the night.  

So let’s get caught up.

Yesterday was my birthday.  

My 58th birthday.

How the fuck did that happen?  

Seriously.  

Two months ago, I was in 2nd grade with Ms. Smith, who I wanted to marry. I was so pissed when she married Mr. Smith between my 2nd and 3rd grade years.

One month ago, I was in college for the first time. Gay Jeff in a Southern Baptist Liberal Arts College. Go figure.  

3 weeks ago, I was in Kansas City, Atlanta, Lexington, Cincinnati, Lexington, Tuscaloosa, Cincinnati, New York, San Diego, New York, Iowa, Oklahoma, New York, Maine.  

2 weeks ago, I was in grad school. 

1 week ago, I moved to Maine. 

And fuck, just last week Adam and I bought a house.  

58!

Yesterday was my birthday.

For my birthday, we went to NYC. This is one of many trips we’ve taken to NYC on my birthday since moving to Maine.  

It was a great trip. Wonderful actually.

We saw some wonderful theater. We saw some mediocre theater.  
We ate some amazing food. We ate some mediocre food.  

We discovered that when staying in a luxury hotel, NO ONE. And I repeat. NO ONE. Wants a bathroom that is a wet room. All tile. No tub. No barrier. ¼ inch of water every time you go into the bathroom especially at 3 a.m. getting back into bed with wet feet. And I appreciate you providing a squeegee, but at these prices, I don’t won’t to squeegee a fucking floor to get out of the shower.  

We flew back home today. 

That was an adventure.  

I realized on Tuesday night that I had not brought enough medicine for the trip. 3 days not 4. When I don’t take my depression medicine it fucks with my sleep. I split the pill, which resulted in bad sleep both Tuesday and Wednesday.

Wednesday night was the worst.

The A/C in our luxury hotel was permanently set on 72. It was 88 degrees outside. I was sweating like crazy. At 3:00 a.m I was still awake. The alarm went off at 7:00. We got into an uber at 8:00. I was fucking beat.  

We get the airport, check in, walk 4,698 miles to our gate. PS. My knee is cooperating, but not that much.  

We get to our gate. 133 C. We leave at 10:15. For Bermuda.  
What the fuck. 

Fun fact: Adam plans all of our trips. Without fail. I get to offer suggestions. I can say no. I can say perhaps we should do this.  

But he plans them. For almost 15 years now.  

We are at the gate, going to Bermuda.

He approaches the gate. I’m standing far, far, far away.

I know what the agent is saying without hearing what the agent is saying.

For the first time in almost 15 years, my wonderful boyfriend has fucked up.  

He booked us on the 10:15 PM flight back to Portland.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.  

The agent rebooks us on a flight leaving in 10 minutes. It’s 1.9 miles from where we are. 

I take a deep breath, and start walking.  

We got there with time to spare…because they were holding the gate for someone else.

However.

It’s 9:30. I’m dehydrated. I’m tired. We are not sitting together. And I’m pretending to be mad.  

The plane takes off. I doze. I have an aisle. I hate aisle seats. I’m a big guy. I can be small on the window.

46 minutes later we land. I turn on my phone. My boyfriend has texted me hands holding each other. We always hold hands when the plane accelerates. Because that’s when it’s most likely to explode into a fiery ball.  

We land. He gets the car. We drive thru McDonald’s for a soda water. I drink it in five seconds. 20 minutes later I’m on my way to work.  

Get to work.

I’m in the fucking weeds. 170+ emails. All needed responses yesterday.

If anyone reading this, can tell me how to put an out of office reply using the Apple Mail app, let me know. The last time I tried, I emailed everyone who’d ever emailed me in two years.  

At pre-shift, my staff gave me a birthday card with a gift card to Ticketmaster so we can buy more theater tickets.  

At 8:30 tonight, a food runner comes to find me and says Chef needs to see me. I go up to him just as a regular approaches. We all talk, and I’m still waiting to see what I did wrong, when the entire staff comes out of the kitchen singing Happy Birthday, holding an ice cream cake…everyone’s favorite.  

It’s not approaching 2:00 a.m. I got home late because of the crash on I-95. I’m tired.  

But you know what. It was all worth it. To spend time with Adam for 4 days in NYC.  

To have a break before the madness starts in 3 weeks.  

To be celebrated by my staff.  

Oh, and my favorite Sous Chef is back at work.  

Life is good.  

Please tell me that in 6 weeks I won’t be 96 living in a home wearing a diaper.