The head injury

I'm here, I'm here, sweetie dahling, don't panic. I'm here.

Life's been work, work, work lately. As a result, I've neglected my personal life, home, and of course, this blog.
What else is new?

So no work for the rest of the day. I am at home on this beautiful Friday afternoon, listening to jams from the 90s (thank you, cable TV) and having a glass of wine. I escaped from the cubicle farm because of some very negligent Thai restaurant owners I encountered at lunch today.

Let me explain.

My lovely co-workers and I were having the mildly pleasurable small talk that people have before their orders arrive, talking about our plans for the weekend and emitting little fits of semi-forced laughs to enhance the experience of being out of the office for an hour when an air conditioning vent fell open, knocking a rather large picture frame off the wall. The corner of the frame hit my forehead, intially scaring the shit out of me, then embarassing me. Everyone in the restaurant reacted, which annoyed me, including the owner/waitress, who seemed scared shitless that I was going to shut her hole-in-the-wall restaurant down.

We moved. Our food arrived, I hardly touched it, trying to get past the incident, all the while an increasing pain developed in my forehead. I asked my co-workers if it looked bad when one of them gave me a compact and there I saw it. A scratch that looked like someone dug their thumbnail into my head...a little red, but overall, not life-threatening. But seeing this sent my blood a-boiling because the prospect of a scar on my face past the age of 7 is frankly ridiculous to me. Plus, it's my face, dammit!

I tried masking my escalating anger by eating, putting the fork down, attempting a joke or two. But my attempts at light-heartedness were sullied by the desperate, miserly owner/waitress, who showed me the bill and pointed out that our $1.19 iced teas were free. Oh really? Okay thanks.

Then co-worker #1 went to order a Thai tea to go, bringing three cups back, saying the lady comped them. Again, thanks, but the idea of a scar on my face still lingered as I tried (really hard, mind you) to be nice and not make faces. We decided to leave because our hour was up and as I approached the counter, I pulled out my wallet to pay. The lady screwed up her face, looked at the bill, then away, then through her broken English I understood the words, "no pay."

So no pay it was. And then I went back to work for 30 minutes, decided I was still agitated, and cut my week off short by leaving work and coming home to my beloved Internets and 90s music.

I digress.

Last night Matt and I had a "date"...you know, those things couples forget to have after seven years of being together. We sat at the bar at Pappadeaux, ate, drank wine and talked for two hours. Then we came home and watched David Letterman. It was the most splendid evening I've had in a long, long time. And I won't tell you any more because I'm a lady.

And I've just forgotten all about my little lunchtime mishap.