QUOTE OF THE DAY
MY MOM: (in the midst of a story) So it was around Christmas and your dad had taken a job on a barge...

WTF?!?!?!?!? How do things like that even happen??

My weekend was marginally uneventful. I watched "Romy and Michele's High School Reunion" with my grandma, made my birthday/Christmas list, and then Jessica called from Chicago to urgently suggest I watch this, which I have to say I am estatic I did.



So I think I mentioned in my former blog that the number one thing I love about my jobs is that I have a set schedule. This is partially because it's an rewarding present for my OCD tendencies, and also because I get to be a regular at several restaurants. Now Taco Bell, I'm not tooooo excited about, I mean it is Taco Bell, but all I get there is a free soda. But Hardee's? Oh, man. Hardee's has made me a happy man. I get a free soda, 10% off, and two awesome afternoon employees know my order by heart (shout out to Terri and Justin). I don't even have to talk anymore! As retribution, I know the cost by heart and always come prepared with $1.06.

The problem arises that I now have a crush there, which is NOT good news, in case you were wondering, because the only thing having a crush does for me is tax my nerves and put my thinking on overdrive. Also, my dating record as of late is as mentioned Attention-Whorey, and after screaming at and belittling my last restaurant crush on the phone outside of Buffalo Wild Wings for a good two hours, I'm not much in a hurry to get back to that kind of suckiness.

But at the same time as much as I hate it, the crush intrigues me. And I feel like I have a pretty good shot and it's not just all in my head. The facts are these:

- My crush is the cook at Hardee's, not the cashier person (whatever they call it - POS, front lines, you get the drift). "Well, if he's in the back, how did you ever meet," I bet you're wondering. Good question! When I come in, I usually talk briefly with Terri, the girl who IS the cashier person. She knows my order by heart (and today gave me a second sandwich free!), and then yells it back to Justin, the cook, who soon also learns it by heart. But somedays Terri doesn't work and someone else who is not Justin is cashier person. BUT, whenever I come in, Justin makes it a point to come out and both ring me out at the register AND return and make my food, completely disregarding the other employee.

- So this happens a couple times recently, and then one time I show up and I've forgotten to take off my Target nametag and Terri starts a conversation with me about my second job, which I had forgot to tell her I got (she notes she was getting a little worried about my wearing red everyday but didn't want to say anything). The next day, Terri is not at work and I am not wearing my nametag, and Justin comes out and begins a conversation with me about my jobs, despite the fact he was obviously listening the day before because he is not very good at faking not looking at me.

- He looks at me a lot. And it's annoying, because I was trying to take a secret picture of him with my phone to send to Jessica, and yes I realize that is creepy, that's not the point, but it was impossible. I also had no service, and walked around Hardee's holding my phone up like a retard.

Anyway, it's getting bad because I lose all wit and ability to talk when I don't plan out my crushing before hand. Here is an overview of the week and my failures.

On Tuesday, he got my order wrong. Which after doing it for four months, ringing me out that day, and knowing it by heart was extremely suspicious. His manager was present and I didn't want to get him in trouble seeing as I wasn't positive this was a ploy or not, so I wiped off the mayo and lettuce and went about my day.

On Wednesday, he repeatedly came out into the dining area near where I sit to do menial tasks that didn't need to be done, like organize the straws, or wipe off the dry soda machine. But I was unable to think of anything to say to him, and apparently he couldn't think of anything either, but we cool guy head nodded at each other a couple of times.

On Thursday it got worse, because he actually had something to say. He took over for the guy at the register and rang up my order without asking. I then handed him the $1.06 with similar confidence and then this conversation occurred:

DISCOUNT JUSTIN: (which is his nickname as decided by Jessica) $1.06? Pretty confident I'm going to give you your discount. It's actually going to be thirty dollars today.
ME: (nervous laughing, holds money out again)
DISCOUNT JUSTIN: This is going on your tab. Now at Hardee's, we make your order fresh, so it's going to take about forty or so minutes to cook. That's okay, right?
ME: Yeah, sure. No big deal. I don't need to get to my job.
DISCOUNT JUSTIN: Target?
ME: Good Shepherd.
(I escape quickly as he nods. Soon, I get my food, but instead of returning to the kitchen, he sticks around at the front)
DISCOUNT JUSTIN: So where all do you work again? (despite the fact that he KNOWS already!)
ME: I work at Target in Edwardsville in the mornings, and Good Shepherd Lutheran School down the street in the afternoons. I don't have much time for lunch, so I stop in here on my way.
DISCOUNT JUSTIN: Alright. Well, I work here. I can get lunch and work, so... that solves two problems.
ME: (non-verbal response similar to trying to laugh and choking on my own saliva)
(Someone calls him away so I take to trying to text message Jessica and secretly take his picture, which is a failure)

So then I have to come up with a plan so that this awkwardness won't happen again. These are the two ideas I've come up with.
1. When I'm at Hardee's, I'm always writing in my notebooks. So anyway, I found this notebook I haven't really used (it's a sparkly Lion King notebook!) and wrote a bunch of fake things it that pertain to me and then put my contact information in the front in case it gets lost, and then of course I'm going to "forget" it at my table at Hardee's.
2. Write a love letter and anonymously leave it in the comment card box.

Anyway, this is all going to go down tomorrow, whichever I choose. So expect hilarious stories of failure from that.

Now stop what you're doing and go immediately download "Ballgame" by Kevin Devine.

Oh, andfuckinandsuckinandfuckinandsuckin!!!!!!!!!!