Journal mcgrew's Journal: -- Earl meets the Big Bang Theory 4
"I'm not in love
So don't forget it
It's just a silly phase I'm going through.
So if I call
To ask you out
Don't tell your friends about the two of us.
I'm not in love, no no."
--10CC
"I changed my mind."
Tammy had been calling a few times a day, and making the trip from Edinburg almost daily. I'd been wining and dining her, and spending rediculous amounts of money doing so. We'd gone to Felber's Christmas party, where she discovered that she knew a few of the regulars, and had gone out quite a few other places as well. But she didn't want to spend New Year's Eve with me because of the drive. I couldn't blame her; I wouldn't want to drive all the way there on that night of all nights, when cops are pulling people over right and left and she'd likely not be all the way sober.
Amy had invited me to a New Year's Eve party, but I didn't want to spend the new years at a party where I only knew one person. I'd decided to spend New Yer's Eve by myself at Felber's. So I was happy as could be when Tammy called saying she'd changed her mind. She decided she'd go to Felber's with me and would crash on my couch and go home in the morning.
I'd told Patty about her, and Patty seemed happy that her dad might be on the verge of having someone. Patty knew how lonely I'd been since her mom's divorce, and was really pleased that I might have found someone with a job, an apartment, a car, and all her teeth. Patty had hated my previous girlfriends. She was troubled about one thing -- "she's not some crazy stalker lady, is she?"
"Your mom was."
"Yeah, you told me about how she decided to marry you when she was twelve."
It did unsettle me a bit, though, because Patty has a psycic streak. Yes, I know how stupidly unscientific that is, but when an incredibly huge coincidence occurs, you have to wonder. When she was thrirteen and I was still married to her mother, Evil-X and I were downstairs in the living room of the house we'd just bought a year earlier, watching Star Trek, and Patty came downstairs crying. She'd had a terrible nightmare, and she was sure it was true and that it was going to happen. She was nearly hysterical.
"There were flames and smoke and the ceiling was collapsing and people were jumping out of windows..." We tried calming her down, telling her it was just a bad dream, but she was sure it was going to happen. "People are going to die! Thousands of people!" she sobbed. We did finally get her to calm down and go back to bed.
The date that night was September 10, 2001. The next day, terrorists flew airliners into the World Trade Center.
That wasn't the only prophecy she'd made that had come true. There must be a logical, rational explanation, but I haven't been able to think of one. So when she says something like that, I sit up and take notice.
A day or two earlier, Tammy had been at my house for a while, and when she left Tami called wanting a ride to the store. I gave her the ride, and she gave me some of her boyfriend's pot. When I mentioned it to Tammy, she was livid.
She hates Tami.
I'd finally gotten to kiss Tammy on the lips a few days earlier, and decided to just take it slow and let things happen. Which is entirely logical, as I've never in my life seduced a woman. Every woman I've ever had sex with, the act was instigated by her. I've tried numerous times to woo some woman to bed, but not once was ever successful.
Sometimes it sucks being a nerd.
She called from the driveway, and I went outside to swap cars. When we came in I kissed her... I really like that lady's smile. I made some dinner and we talked at the table for a long time, planning to go to Felber's about nine or ten. We drank a few beers, she told me about her childhood, how her dad taught her boxing and how she boxed at school.
Then she told me about her boyfriend.
Rather, her ex-boyfriend.
It seems she's been seeing this guy or a few years who lives in her apartment complex, and she'd caught him with another woman and beat the hell out of the woman. I had visions of my daughter attacking Tami.
"He's crazy," she said. "He had me arrested after he beat the hell out of me. He goes nuts whenever he sees me with anybody and tries to kill them."
"Well," I said, "Do you have any idea how many guys have wanted to kill me in the last few years because they thought I was screwing their wives or girlfriends? And sometimes I was screwing their girlfriends."
"But he's crazy. He'll do it!"
"So, when he tries something I'll have him put in jail and you'll be rid of him."
"It's not that easy. He's friends with all the cops in town! They're not going to put him in jail. He should have had an attempted murder charge once, but he got out of it."
Shit. This is Illinois, where honest police officers seem to be outnumbered by invisible pink unicorns. And I thought of Lance, who broke into a guy's house and tried to kill him with a butcher knife, and he only spent two weeks in the county jail over it on a plea bargain.
"You have to die from something," I said. "Why don't you just move?"
"I can't afford to. I can barely afford the apartment I have."
She made me think of Linda when she told me she'd raised thirteen children. Three were her biological children, one was adopted, and the rest were foster children. What was a woman like that doing with a loser like her ex-boyfriend?
So it seems you don't have to worry about "no more entertaining journal posts". You might even get a post from the hospital if that guy catches me with Tammy. It seems Patty's psychicness came through again. Tammy's not a crazy stalker, but her ex is, and he doesn't want to give her up. It's like the dream Patty had once where she and my grandmother saw her cat get run over by a bulldozer, and once again came downstairs crying, "Is Princess ok?" The next morning my grandmother fell down in the nursing home and broke her hip. Patty and I never saw her alive again.
Tammy mentioned that she thought I was still in love with Tami. Which explained a lot of her opinion of Tami. That, and she'd heard of some of the rotten things Tami had done to me. "You sure know how to pick 'em", she said. "Look who's talking," I replied.
About ten or ten thirty we left for Felber's.
It was closed! We went down the street to the Brooklyn, and it was less than no fun. We drank one beer and left, going back to my house. We sat at the table again, and talked and drank until the beer was gone. I made a bed on the couch for her, and went to sleep in my own bed.
The next morning I made omelettes for us. She said they were the best omelettes she'd ever eaten!
I went to buy cigarettes for her (and beer for later), and when I came home my kitchen and bathroom were spotless. She'd even mopped the floors. She was still in the bathroom cleaning when I came back, so to amuse myself I put on a My Name Is Earl DVD, the Creative Writing episode. "That's some wierd stuff," she said when she came out and saw a little of it. She'd never seen it before, so I put the funniest one on - the Our Cops is On episode.
We watched Earl and smoked Tami's boyfriend's reefer most of the day, she sitting on the couch with me. Close. If I wasn't such a clueless nerd I'd have had her in bed, as it was I didn't even get my arm around her.
I'm not very good with women. Later in the afternoon she made the trip back to Edinburg.
The next evening there was a knock on the door, and when I openen it, Tammy was back. Her car had broken down in Edinburg and she'd gotten a ride to Springfield. "Can I crash on your couch again and could you give me a ride home in the morning? I've got some beer money..."
It was pretty much a rerun of the previous night, except she made fried chicken for us. I went to take her home, and saw I had less than an eighth of a tank of gasoline about the time we were halfway there. And no money to buy more with; like I said, I've been spending cash like it was going out of style. I was broke.
When we got to Edinburg she invited me in for coffee. Because of the crazy stalker boyfriend we had to sneak in.
Her apartment was tiny; it made the little apartment I'd lived in by Wabash Curve seem huge by comparison. I now understood why she said I had a big house; it's really a very small house, but compared to her apartment it's indeed huge. We had coffee, she showed me pictures of her family, and I noted prayers and scripture in frames and on her refrigerator.
"Call me when you get back so I'll know you're ok," she said, probably worrying about "stalkerboy" (as I'd called him) as much as me running out of gasoline in the middle of nowhere in two degree weather. Two degrees is a lot colder here than in Europe, as water freezes at thirty two here.
I made it to Thirteenth and Ash in Springfield, running out of fuel in front of a church. It was a cold seven black walk home. I called a friend, who gave me a ride to the gas station, a gallon of gas, and a ride to my car.
I went home and put on the first season Big Bang Theory DVD my daughter had bought me for Christmas. I'd watched all but the last episode. In that one, the nerds' cute neighbor threw her boyfriend's iPod out the window and broke up with him because he'd been blogging about their sex life.
Uh oh...
Swings and roundabouts (Score:2)
Think of it this way - you might upset one person, but it's balanced out by entertaining all the people who read the journal. That's got to count for something.
I'm still hoping for a My Name Is Earl movie or a one-off special, or hopefully another series getting commissioned based on DVD sales.
Re: (Score:2)
It annoyed me that they ended the last season with a cliffhanger, then cancelled it. Maybe they could do a movie wrapping it up.
As to "annoying one person," I certainly don't want to spoil my chances with Tammy. The good thing is, she's probably not reading slashdot.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Well, it hasn't actually gotten to the "girlfriend" stage yet. It's a lot harder to cut down a full grown oak tree than a new sprout. And I could have done or said something without even knowing it.