After a slow week of taking last week I am pleased to announce that I am off to a pretty good start this week. My friend Danielle and I had lunch at a place called The Noble Pig which is pretty darn good. In fact its so good that you can see everyone looking at what all other customers are eating and thinking about taking their food. When you eat there you learn quickly to keep your fork pointed upward so that if some stranger comes to try to nab your sandwich you can fight back. I can't really talk about the specifics of some of my previous visits because the Austin Police are still investigating and let's just say I had to leave through the back door when the cops showed up. Enough about that.
Danielle fully understood the potential ramifications of having lunch with me because she is one of the 5 people (I like to think of you all as my fan club) who subscribe to this blog. So, right off the bat, Danielle said she would pay for lunch so that I could "take" her money. Score! What a good sport she is!
Here is Danielle:
In addition to our sandwiches Danielle ordered some potato salad for us to share (so I could take some) which was quite delicious. During lunch I took Danielle's time by regaling her with my parenting philosophies (she has a 2 year old daughter named Addison), my list of grievances with Stephanie, my thoughts on the latest issue of the UFO Sighter's Guide, and the fact that Whitney Houston's death was a government conspiracy terrible tragedy. Danielle, like most people, was fascinated with my views and she even called me Empress twice (to be fair, I had to remind her to address me as Empress) so I know she had a great time. There is no way that she could have felt that I was "taking" her valuable time and dominating the conversation because if she felt that way it would mean that maybe my conversation isn't as scintillating as I had previously assumed. Impossible!
After we finished our delicious lunch, Danielle, always a good sport about The Year of Taking, bought us each a desert tart:
The deserts that Danielle got sounded really disgusting when she told me what they were. Each of these is a tart with chocolate ganache topped with bacon. I thought maybe she decided to torture me by seeing if she could trick me into eating something nasty...but my natural paranoia was misplaced. Sweet Danielle treated us to an interesting and surprisingly terrific treat. She explained that the salt in the bacon brings out he sugar or the chocolate or something.....blah, blah, blah. I think I dozed off during the explanation but it was really good.
After lunch Danielle begged and pleaded with me to come to her office and spend the rest of the day telling her all about my interesting and correct perspective on life, the Universe, and Everything (Douglas Adams reference for you nerds). But I told her she had taken quite enough of my time today thank you and what did she think about me anyway? That I have nothing to do besides help make her smarter by lecturing her all day? The nerve of some people. Danielle just couldn't take no for an answer and when she grabbed my arm and started begging me to come to her office I had to distract her by pretending the restaurant was on fire while I ran out the back of the restaurant and hid behind the dumpster until Danielle stopped crying enough to get in her car and go back to work. It was such an embarrassing spectacle. Mostly for me though because while I was hiding behind the dumpster the restaurant staff missed when dumping out a big pail full of pig parts so now I have to get my car cleaned professionally and I have no idea when my hair will stop smelling like pork. Pretty gross but my dogs really want to snuggle with me now....
After escaping back to the safety of my home and hosing off in the backyard I opened the mail. I was surprised and disappointed to find that the University of Chicago ripped me off! They took from me!! If you are a regular reader of this blog (which is doubtful if you have any self respect at all) then you know that a couple of weeks ago I responded to an email from U of Chicago which offered me a free set of ugly playing cards in return for a $25 donation to the college. I received no playing cards and, instead, just got this crappy letter:
What a freaking gyp. They lied to me! I can't believe it. I was lied to and had my money taken under false pretenses. Thanks a lot University of Chicago. Enjoy spending my $25 and playing with the deck of cards you didn't send me.
Me! Me! Me! - I have no self-respect, but you already knew that about me, right?
ReplyDeleteI think the take away from your U of C "giving" experience is that if someone takes from you, but then offers to "give" you something (like lame cards) in return - they're lying.