Does anybody read these?

Lunch, with side bars

I promised y'all that I would tell you about my lunch yesterday, so I should probably do that. I will warn you now that I've had another allergy attack and my right eye is pretty much useless, but it's not as bad as it usually is when this happens.

However, if there are typos and/or crazy talk, then just ignore it. I'm hopped up on drugs and can only see out of my weaker eye.

Work is calming down a little bit, just in time for me to design the next issue of our magazine. I just finished our newsletter today.

Have I ever really explained my job? I know this will be hard for some people to understand, because it does mean that I am a real, live, legitimate journalist, which you all know I've been lying about since high school. So perhaps I don't have a job at all. Actually, I'm typing this from a freeway overpass.

OK, seriously, I want to tell y'all why I've been so busy lately. My job is a communications specialist for an organization here in Tennessee. I write press releases, newsletter and magazine articles, and I do layout for two different publications and I design many of the brochures that come out of the office. We are busy all the time, and this is before our boss leaves to have a baby for two months. I am sure y'all won't hear from me then.

The reason I've been so busy lately (aside from all the things that I mentioned above), is because I had my annual awards program that I manage, which is in conjunction with our organization's big week of observances next week. Basically, I read entry forms with the life stories of 102 notable Tennesseans and wrote press releases and made certificates for all of them. Already we're starting to get some ink on the whole thing, so I'm feeling good about it, even though it engulfed weeks of my life.

Anyhow, I did manage to take time out of my busy schedule to have lunch yesterday. The girls at the office were very excited when a cute man came to pick me up and take me out to eat.

I was excited too.

I made him chocolate-chip cookies, because those were always his favorite. He remembered them and was quite excited. I gave him a "Bush's Last Day" bumper sticker and some magnet about blaming the Republicans, just because they were fun and he'd like them.

It was like we hadn't missed a beat. The only thing that was really different was that I knew that the story doesn't ever get to end the way I want it to. (Well, that and that I get to hear fun stories about a certain closeted CNN anchor at Atlanta's gay bars.) We're still the same people, and it's very nice to be on good terms again. I'm not really sure how I've managed without him in my life. I don't ever want to try again.

He'll always be Will Truman to my Grace Adler. We know each other better than we know ourselves. Still, after all these years. I worried that I'd be jealous and bitter, but I can't be. Because I can still tell that he does love me. And he tried really hard to be in love with me, but if you're not wired that way, it's not going to happen. Seriously, if anyone who reads this honestly, truly believes that people choose to be gay (I don't mean drunken sorority girls who make out with their friends, I mean really gay ...), then you should've been there yesterday.

But all that made me realize something. As you know if you've been reading here for any length of time, you know there's a boy in my life who is only around when it's convenient for him. He says that he cares about me and likes me very much, but he has a girlfriend. And I only hear from him when they are on the outs, which usually leads him to call Miss Convenient when he's done talking to me because I just remind him that he needs someone and I'm inconvenient. (How the fuck is someone with a husband and two kids convenient, I'll never know ...)

Anyhow, I realized yesterday that I am completely, totally over his bullshit. Because I am worth so much more. If a gay man can spend three years fighting genetics and still look at me to this day -- 10 years later -- like I'm the shit, then a straight guy who wants to be with me needs to be beating down my fucking door to make it happen. It's taken me a long time to realize that I do live up to the hype. If someone wants to be a part of it, they are more than welcome, but to take a line from my new favorite movie, "The Holiday," every woman needs to be the leading lady of her own life.

I'm not playing second fiddle to anyone, but especially not a tramp who thinks a man is worth more than her family. And newsflash honey, he's not.

Because if a guy thinks you're worth it, he'll move mountains to be with you. Sometimes it doesn't work out -- for whatever reason -- but we all deserve the best.

Speaking of which, I have my best friend back, and it rocks, even though his jokes about my love of whiskey are entirely inappropriate.

He's the only one who can get away with it, so don't think about it!

Song of the day: "Find Out Who Your Friends Are" by Tracy Lawrence, with special guests Tim McGraw and Kenny Chesney. If you're going to sing that song, you might as well sing with your best friends, and if it doesn't get nominated for vocal event of the year, I'm going ape.

posted by Laura at 12:34 PM