it's not you...

the reason i haven't posted much of anything lately and the ultimate reason behind this next story are the same... basically the past one two bunch of weeks i've been working most waking hours and dreaming (nightmares) about work while asleep. as such little things in my personal life like working out, eating right, picking up after myself have fallen by the wayside. in fact, this morning my apartment looked scarily close to a frat-house with dirty dishes everywhere, papers strewn like a tornado had blown through, day old pizza still out on the counter, clothes - clean and dirty- all over the place. again, i admit this only because it's relevant.

rewind to last night as i'm out at a local bar with co-workers, et al. for drinks and a celebration of kki's departure from the agency. very chill irish bar we always go to for good times and great laughs. lots of people there. anyhoo, i'd not eaten a particular lot for dinner last night (bowl of cereal) which was, in retrospect, bad decision #1 of the evening. in my defense, i was not planning on drinking very much, so i was slotted to be in the clear. during the course of the night, kki comes over and gives a little goodbye speech, which makes me cry (kki is easily in my "top 10 people of all time" list) which obviously means i have not had enough to drink. sure enough, 3 or so shots and a couple beers later and i'm all smiles again. and i'm drunk.

being the responsible citizen that i am, i get someone to drive me home and scan the room for the person who lives closest to me so as not to be a burden for others (i live pretty far on the south side of the city). said safety-driver happens to be a pretty attractive gentleman (and he truly is a gentleman in all senses of the word) who i've been chatting it up with for most of the evening (although not exclusively). he agrees to take me home at evening end.

fast forward a little to car ride home where hot safety-driver and i make idle conversation. pull into my parking lot and thank heavens i'm lucid enough to realize my apartment is embarrassingly disastrous. drunkly contrive plot to just jump out of car while the motor is running with a quick "thanks for the ride", but that doesn't work on my gentlemanly evening chauffeur. no, he turns of the engine, gets out of the car, walks me to my door and in those 30ft or so, takes the opportunity to put his arm around me and literally show me the stars (aka the 4 or 5 constellations he knows). nonetheless, we get to my door and clearly the polite thing to do would be to invite him in, offer him a cup of coffee/water/whatever, and see how things shake out, but there's no way i'm letting anyone see the ruins of my apartment.

evening ends with awkward few moments of silence and a fantastic hug. what i should have said was "it's not you, it's my apartment." le sigh.