2006 Review and 2007 Predictions

Major things from 2006.
Started talking to chic in early part of year only to find out by mid summer she is absolutely nuts. Liked a lot for a while. Communication with her is back but only as a joke almost.
Bought a house that most of the readership has seen as did Poot.
Finished grad school in June and finally got my piece of paper in early December. I think I need to get that framed soon.
Had a big ass party to celebrate birthday and the two other good things listed above. Awesome time seeing everyone. Chic in first comment was a bit of a buzz kill there but oh well.
Joined a social club to get out and meet some other folks since bars = talking to the same few people I went out with and spending lots of cash and having a 50/50 shot at making a fool of my self.
Sat through a football season with lots of hype and promise to watch it fall apart down the stretch.
Met a couple chics that I enjoyed talking to and spending time with. The one in Charlotte is a straight friends zone thing. The one in the upstate is really awesome but may never speak to me again because of the train wreck that was this past Friday night. For those details talk to Poot, Agent, or Jessie. I recommend the second two for a clearer rendition of the night. Sometimes you get what you deserve.
I thought I had gotten better about getting plastered. The reality is, I am just as bad about it as I was if not worse. Instead of spreading it out though, I throw several days worth into individual evenings and end being a real dumb ass. Effects are probably worse this year than in ones past as the stories aren't any funnier but the things I do have much longer staying power.
Married off several friends and watched another get engaged. Congrats to all these folks.

2007 Predictions/Expectations/Direction
Keep doing the social club. Will try to do some of the stuff that aren't happy hour and sports related. Otherwise my under 35 network won't expand, which it hadn't really been doing as planned. I'll probably get frustrated with is by late spring and say screw it.
Get more involved in doing things for my professional organization as I am in line to be VP then President of the local chapter beginning fall of this year and rolling through 08-09 on the time line.
I will be attempting to cut back on the booze. It's fun at the time. It accomplishes nothing. I'm too old to act like I'm 20 on weekend nights. Any help or friendly comments to take it easy will be greatly appreciated. Hitting be in the head when I take these comments as a challenge to prove I can drink more will be acceptable and is officially encouraged. Please have someone print this off as a reminder I said it.
I'll actually get to the doctor and get my body checked out. I'm sure this crap with my skin will be something extremely odd and will continue to piss me off as it gets worse before they find a medicine that must be taken 14 times a day to get better. Alcohol won't be recommended with it, which won't be as big a deal. Unfortunately, neither will be lots of summer sun without 30+ sunscreen. My pastiness will continue.
I'll keep being a workaholic and hopefully doing well. Little things at work will continue at piss me off after they build up in which case I will look into other job options. The likelihood I actually change will be less than 5% as I get away with a lot at my office.
I'll enter the 07 college football season with high hopes. The Tigers will find a way to dash those. Some one will be the new Proctor.


Keep on keeping on and see what surprises pop up. There is always something out there that blindsides us. Who knows what it will be in 07.

Mid-Holiday Report

So this is how things have shaken out since the post last Thursday afternoon:
Got email diss from Charlotte girl and went to the party with Poot as mentioned in comments on the last post. Party was a pretty good time. Good drink special, decent music but low on scenery other than the girls that work at the place, which can never be complained about. Called to wish the other a Merry Christmas while traveling from one house to another on Christmas Eve. Rang three times, then sent to voice mail (typical when someone sees who is calling and hits the ignore option). No text messages, calls, or emails since, sent or received. Last night I drank a big glass of fuckitall and have said the hell with them. They have to make quite an effort for any further attention.
As a funny side note, I did get a Merry Christmas email from crazy girl from this summer. Apparently I am still in one of her email lists for some reason. I replied, more to be a smart ass than anything. I'm guessing she didn't realize I am still on that list though I haven't received anything in quite a while from her and she would peridocially send forwards to a large list of people. Anyway, referenced seeing her at a big social shin dig though I we never spoke. Wished her well and said to let me know if she ever wanted to get together or chat. I expect nothing more than a smart ass email from her or nothing at all. I have little desire to see her unless she decides she wants to prove some big talk in the bedroom from before. I really don't expect to hear from her at all.
On to nothing inparticular but at least not going to think/worry about where I stand with what was believed to be current options. Will laugh if I hear back from the crazy girl from summer. Any suggestions on how to fill some time this winter are more than welcome.

Confused...In Need of Help

I'm once again in need of the publics’ opinion. As Agent Orange once stated, I live in a Soap Opera and it entertains him greatly. Some of you are familiar with my efforts over the past few months, some, not so much.
Quick re-cap. There was slump buster that most of you know about. She has not been and won't be part of any future considerations of options and hasn't been in them for over a month now. Her purpose has been served outside of being a decent person to hang out with in town with other friends present. These other two individuals of interest have been at least acquaintances since early in the football season. One, a person I met here in Charlotte, the other, a person I met during the season that lives in the upstate.
Breakdowns:
Charlotte girl. Cute, kinda country as she grew up outside Aiken. Lives here and we know each other through friends. We have dinner or hang out occasionally. Tonight possibly being one of those nights. She will randomly call without prompt and talk for 10, 15, 20 minutes or so. She has mentioned New Years plans and asked if I want to join her and two of her girlfriends. I have somewhat declined as I am not interested in the uptown on NYE thing. The last two years this has been attempted and neither has been a rousing success due to crowds and additional cost in comparison to a normal night out. She is quite attractive as Poot can attest. I can’t read her or her intentions. Though she definitely shows interest in keeping contact. Joining three girls out sounds like a sucker punch for a free sober driver or an attempt at a set-up with one of the friends. As mentioned, I can’t read her though.
Upstate girl. Many of the general readership has met this one over the course of the last half the season of home games. She took my extra ticket to GT along with MD and NCSU. We hung out a little prior to the USuCk game as well. I stayed at her place the Saturday of NCSU and slept on the Aerobed as I intended. She has come to Charlotte, and stayed at the house with several of her friends for her birthday a couple weeks ago. Contact prior to that was sporadic via phone and every couple of days while checking on football plans via email prior to her visit. Now emails are at least every other day and we have spoken on the phone in similar intervals, with time lengths anywhere between 10 minutes and close to an hour. I am not making half of these initial calls/emails either. I even received an email this morning after she didn’t get a chance to call me back last night as she was out late, asking if she could call me back this evening while she was traveling. That came along with the text message sent late last night indicating she would call today instead. She has no NYE plans and they haven’t really been discussed past the fact she has friends that want to do something in downtown G’ville and may possibly do that. She, like I, am not too geared up for heading out on NYE with the clustered masses and would much prefer hanging out with friends or a house party. The funny part about this one is she has told mutual friend(s) that she doesn’t want to give me the wrong impressions or that things are “like that” between us. My quandary with this one is I don’t know many, if any girls, that aren’t interested in a guy that make this kind of effort to stay in regular contact with them. May be it’s the time of year and she’s single. Maybe she is interested. I was filled on the past relationships the other night without prompt so I know she is getting pretty comfortable with me and the info she passes along. Now if she would just make her intentions or wants more apparent, I would know how to handle things and which way to go.
Now, here is what I feel my options are and I would like general feedback to he above, alternate opinions, or your thoughts on the following:

Option 1- Hope to hang out with Charlotte girl tonight. If she makes a special effort to hang out, see what happens. Push to do something on NYE or at least the night before depending on how her out of town visitor situation plays out. Mainly hoping for her to show her cards tonight and go from there with her.

Option 2 – See how conversation with Upstate girl goes this evening, and assume it goes well as it has been, especially after the wealth of personal info given last time. Parlay it into additional conversation over the holiday weekend by phone and suggest to just hang out NYE with her doing something low key just to have something going on.

Option 3 – Let tonight happen as it may. If Charlotte girl doesn’t call to hang out, I go meet Poot at some party around 9:30 and get my conversation in with Upstate girl prior to or on the way to meet him. Don’t mention any plans unless they are presented to me by either female. Assuming none are, play things by ear over the next week. Don’t bring up the subject of NYE put don’t avoid it, and be as equally prepared to head out of town or out on the town next weekend as I would be to sit around and watch football all weekend.

There it is. Let the fun begin.

Number 3?

I hope not. Saw the crazy girl last night that I was big time "into" this spring/early summer. I didn't speak but it was the first time I had seen her out and about since I quit. Her friends that are so damn cool usually are having parties and I have been out of the downtown loop for a while. Presence was duly noted with an eye lock across the floor fora few seconds but no other acknowledgment or attempt to communicate. The only reason I ask if this could be good thing three is I had been waiting for this to happen at some point, especially with holiday social parties going on. I didn't know how I would react, had come up with some things to say, but didn't know if I actually would. Obvisouly I didn't. I'm not worried about it, and glad it has happened so now I'm not doing double takes when I catch a red head out of the corner of my eye. I thought it would be more of a bumping into her kind of thing in, forced contact and forced speaking but am the encounter or lack their of went as it did.
Now to cross my fingers and hope this was more of bound to happen thing and that my number three is actually waiting around the corner sometime in the next few days. Hopefully so as I believe these things happen in a week to 10 day time frames and that span will quickly have come and gone by the end of the week.


UPDATE: Number three has been completed. My class ring was found in Clemson by a meter reader and returned to the alumni association and should be back in my possession Friday.

Official

We all hear about bad things happening in three's. Maybe this is a week for me to have good things happen that way. With a little help from Paul, I finished decorating Casa del Wha for Christmas (not the holiday's) yesterday evening. I must say it actually looks like we are adults and know what we are doing. No foam finger tree toppers (sorry Poot), and no beer cans from the tree. I even have multiple wreathes hanging about.
The second good thing of the week was my MBA diploma showed up in the mail at the office today. Classes, as you probably know, have been done since June for me. I expected to get this sometime in September or October as my paperwork would process with the rest of the summer finishers and diplomas were to be sent out. My name is due to appear in the program the end of this week though I don't plan to go through the ceremony and have another hot dog stand incident. After battling the admin departments in the grad and business schools, along with another office (registrar maybe) who swore it had been mailed previously, I reign victorious and without an additional dent to the pocket.
Now for the third thing. Who knows what it will be as my prior hurdle was reached over a month ago, thus being a singular event (which did pretty much happen in triplicate itself) so I have something else good coming. Tomorrow night is Second String Santa. A large sociallite shin dig in Founders Hall at the B.O.A. coporate tower. I am hoping I can hit all three over as many days, otherwise something good better come up towards the end of the week.
My confidence is high, which usually sets me up for disappointment, but hey, maybe I'm on a roll for a change. Stay tuned, blog activitiy and the fun factor may be on the rise!