Men Are From Mars...

It's Friday! I rolled out of bed, but not just any bed - nope - its my newly appointed bed, sometime just after 5:30am. And at least for a couple of days, I will spare readers the pain of reading about my mornings before work unless, of course, something unique transpires. Until then, I'll simply refer to my morning as the routine. Let's see, anything interesting? .... nope. I went through my routine. Soon I was ready for work. Before heading out I picked up my guitar and cranked out a few licks. Too, I grabbed the second CD in the Tchaikovsky set Mindy let me borrow and took it along for the ride to work. Tchaikovsky beats Bob Conners any day - hands down! There was another pretty sunrise, again giving cause for me to question why I don't bring my camera to work. I'm gonna start, though.. I'm missing some gorgeous sunrise pictures. I arrived to work with Mindy on my cell phone. We talked right up until about 7:57am. This has been a tough, tough week for her. All of her "big rocks" came to roost this week. Being a guy, I had all the answers, of course. But don't think for minute that I was not keenly aware of the male curse. You know, the curse that overtakes us when a women discusses her concerns, problems and issues with us. What do we do? WE SOLVE THEM!! We can't help ourselves. It's what we do. And we're good at it! Shit, I thought for certain that I heard a question mark at the end!!! I remind myself, oops, she probably just wants me to listen, but when I do, I am usually quiet. You know, when I listen, I can't talk. But what's the women do? She asks, "are you there? Are you listening to me?" :) Can we ever really win? I've got to hand it to John Gray. He figured this whole thing out about ten years ago. He's a multi-millionaire because of it too. I guess I'm a decade late. I should write a book titled, Mars & Venus - A Decade Later. Although, I'm wondering if we're even from the same galaxy! :)) Friday morning at the office went smoother than most Fridays. We had a number of engineers off too, so it was doubly impressive that we were on top of everything. The morning did move sorta slow though. But as it always eventually does, run time finally rolled around. I made it to the gym kind late - 1240pm. Going through my inventory of apparel, I realized I had forgotten my jacket and my extra layer. Lucky for me I did have my light pullover jacket that I typically use when it's above 45 and sunny. Today was not. I was 39 degrees when I departed. Too, I did have my hat and gloves, so I made it a point to wear both. I tuned the MP3 player to downloaded tunes again today. As it turned out , I was pretty comfortable in my attire. I finished my run and was back in my office at around 2:00pm, just three or so hours left before the weekend kicks in! Speaking of the weekend, for the first time in a number of weeks, I don't have any significant events planned. No dinner date with Mindy, no party, nothing with my daughters, nothing! It feels good too! I had promised Mindy that we'd spend some time together Friday night though. I still wasn't sure if I would be doing Barley's or not. Come 5 o'clock I packed up my gear and headed for the hills. I was so impressed with the improved look that the new 2" inch wood blinds gave my bedroom that I stopped and bought some for my 6' living room window. I bought their last two. One of the boxes was opened but it looked to contain all of the goods. When I got home I hung the remaining blind over my garden tub. It took about an hour because I had to shorten the length. It turned out well. In the meantime, I had washed and dried the new black valances I bought too. I went ahead and hung those over the bedroom window. I need another for the garden tub but they were out. I got the last two. I told myself that if I really liked the look that I'd drive up to Lowe's on Sawmill to see if they have any in stock tomorrow. After finishing up the room stuff it was closing in on 8:00pm. After the exhaustive work I decided that I wanted to go to Barley's for a beer or two. In kind, I called Mindy to let he know that I would heading to Barley's, but would be over soon after. I knew it would be a quiet night at Barley's. Bob and Mary Ann were in New York skiing, so they wouldn't be there. Also, I didn't think Jeremy and Courtney would be there either given her recent heart issue. My buddy Rick was there, and Thad and Monica showed up about a half hour after I got there. I did meet two school teachers from Westland HS. They were both Pittsburgh Steeler fans looking forward to Sunday's showdown. They had some funny teacher stories too. I had two beers, an IPA and a Russian Stout off the firkin. Come 9:50pm I left for Mindy's. A quick call to Mindy confirmed that she was all but asleep. She agreed to my company. I arrived shortly after 10pm. We talked and shared a double batch of popcorn before retiring to bed. We were in bed by 11:30pm - probably earlier. I took two Advil just in case.