21 Down, 19 To Go

If you haven't read "40 Ways To Vacation Like You Were Dyin'" yet, scroll down to do so. Otherwise you might be a little lost...

Wednesday
Finally got started on my list around 1130am...

1145am... (25) Email at least five people I haven't talked to in a really long time. Sent an email to Susan Christiano, who was a journalism buddy of mine in college--we haven't spoken in at least ten years I would say. Well, she did email me first, but I email her back with a longer "here's how I am, how are you" letter. So that's one down.

1230pm... (20) Have a conversation with a total stranger. On my way to accomplish (16), I realized I was heading in the wrong direction, so I turned around to go where I was supposed to. And I stopped in Waffle House for a quick lunch... I have figured out that I'm resuming my Weight Watchers diet on Monday, so I felt okay to do so. Anyway, a girl named Jennifer was my waitress, and I got to talk to her awhile. She'd actually be perfect for Starbucks--I may go back and recruit her.

1pm... (37) Get the MYM ball rolling. Made a few phone calls, am starting this process quick enough.

115pm... (16) Out-serve Steph. This is hard to do, because she does so much for me, but I tried. She and some fellow Creative Memory consultants have a booth set up at Kid's Market, in the old Winn Dixie building up on 150. I came in to give the girl in the CM booth, Angie, a lunch break.

A few observations:
--The booth next to CM was Southern Living Home, manned by a lady named Sybil Johnson (yeah, I thought the same thing too--when I mentioned it, she pursed her lips and said "I know her" in a way that made me think I wasn't the first person to bring this up). She was hardcore, though... every time anyone walked by, she was hollering "Sign up for a $50 gift certificate??!!" I didn't do anything of the kind for the CM booth. I'm there to man it, not market.
--To mark the different sections of the Kids Market, they had removed the Winn Dixie lettering off the walls. Apparently, they didn't have enough letters to go through all the sections, hence signs that read "A CESS RIES", "SAFET CE TER" and "KIDS MARKET & M M"
--Big lady sitting across from me. She was on her phone. She was wearing a short skirt. Needless to say, I cringed when I discovered she was wearing white underwear. Have you ever conciously NOT looked straight ahead for any given amount of time? Its hard to do.
--We had a fish bowl for people to sign up for the drawing (a basket full of free stuff). Some little kid walked by and put his hand in it, picking up cards. Before I could even say anything, he drops them all, says "Them ain't baseball cards" and walks off. I can't help but think some how some way my taxes will be paying his welfare in a few years.
--When Angie came back, I walked out. The security guard said "I can't help but notice you movin' in a fast pace, man."

245pm... (30) Fold clothes. Piece of cake. Did that while (4) watching the pilot episode of Heroes (it was intriguing), then when I finished the clothes, I moved onto (17) sorting pictures, though that will take me more than today.

Alright... so it's 4pm, and I'm off to accomplish #33, #34 and #38. Wish me luck. More later.

9pm... Never got around to doing (33), though I did see both Melissa and Michael, and wished them Happy Anniversary. The special day has been acknowledged, a card now would be overkill, so I'm marking this off the list. I did (38) drop off the books and pay the $2 fee, but I didn't get to (34) pick up the b'day card.

Thursday

2am... It's way too late. However, I just (24) emailed Blair Andress, and even invited him to the game this weekend. It would be good to see him.

240am... I was laying on the couch (this late at night, I just sleep on the couch, for fear of waking Steph in coming to bed--she's grumpy the next day) and just finished (4) watching Jericho, the first episode, on my iPod. Its a pretty good show... leaves you curious. I'll watch it again before I commit to it.

1048am... Now that its daylight, and I'm up and moving, I'm about to go shower, then head out to knock out (11) get game tickets. I'll probably try to get (34) b'day card while I'm at it. Then, hopefully, I can do a series of tasks this afternoon, one right after the other, like 1, 2, 6, 11 ,12, 14, 15, 21, 22, 26-29 and 35 before I dig into some of he longer tasks.

1pm... Headed down to UAB Ticket office. Just had lunch at Sneaky Pete's, and got to see the Presidential Motorcade pass by (Dubya's in town for a speech). Got to UAB's campus, parallel parked as pretty as you please, then found the box office. Along the way, they've got "The Fall of Troy" written everywhere, with badly drawn dragons all over the place.

If you've ever seen Roxanne, a complete underrated and little-seen brilliant Steve Martin movie from the 80s, there's a scene where the mayor is kicking off the town's annual Oktoberfest Celebration... in front of a mic, he holds up a forthy beer, sounds a whistle and says "Let Oktoberfest... BEGIN!!" The camera pans out to about three people walking down the street, not paying the least bit of attention.

This is what I'm guessing homecoming at University of Alabama-Birmingham is like.

Anyway, they have this deal where, for $40, you get four tickets, four hot dogs, four cokes and a t-shirt, and I need to buy 2 for the 8 people that are going to see the game on Saturday night. Well, the smarmy guy at the window said I could only buy 1 pack per family.

Of course, this probably had something to do with my Troy shirt I was wearing, plus the fact I told him I needed tickets to "The Rise of Troy on Saturday night". As I typed this, Wookiee called me and said he was going to pick up the other tickets, so (10) get tickets for football game is taken care of.

150pm... On the way back, I (34) got the b'day card, then (35) called Hallmark about our Gold Crown membership. These are things you never imagine doing until you get married.

220pm... Stopped by Starbucks on 280 to continue working on (37) Elisabeth's Make Your Mark project. Also, I spent two hours last night doing nothing but vegging out in front of the computer finding friends like Liberty Leak and Anna Kelley on myspace, so that will quailfy for (23) spending two consecutive hours doing nothing of value. And this morning, I (26) emailed Anna Kelley, someone I haven't talk to in a really, really long time.

340pm... As soon as I hit "publish", I'm going to start working on (6) retype skits for WalkAbout. See you soon.

Friday
1208am... Well, I just finished (2) inventory of my new comics. That took a long, long time, much longer than I expect. Steph had the girls Bible study here, like usual on Thursday nights, so I went to Vestavia Starbucks... now I could have done several things, but I did something that I forgot to put on this list, yet was just as important... cast skits for WalkAbout. That took the better part of an hour or more.

Then, like a goob, instead of working on (7) finishing a book, I actually started another one. Duh. I won't even tell you what it is just yet, because I'm only ten pages into it... I may not get any farther.

I did, however, (6) retype my skits.

And so I'm going to update the DFC Blogspot page, then go to bed.

1124am... Got up late. This did bother me, but hey, I'm on vacation. Just finished (27) emailing Bradley Grantham, an ol' college buddy of mine. Also (28) emailed Ambre Lake, another college buddy (and one time FH Formal date... whatever, she's no Stephanie).

1218pm... Finished (39) catching up on the Sports Guy columns. This stuff is just plain funny... where else would you see sentences like "The 2006 season has been overtaken by NFL coaches with man-boobs." and references to "Dustin Diamond's sex tape"? Hilarious.