Rambling Rhodes

Where Have You Gone, Long

Where Have You Gone, Long Weekend?

It never fails. I look forward to a long weekend the way a dog awaits a full dish, trembling, sometimes drooling. Four days! That's like, FOREVER! And then it's there, and then it's gone. It makes me wonder sometimes whether all this emphasis on working and employment is really such a good thing. Sure, it puts food on the table and beer in my system on weekends, but it rips my precious time away, time that could be better spent sleeping and dreaming about insatiable female space aliens who need to procreate with earth males with shaved heads to save their planet. Work sucks compared to that.

My weekend consisted of a two day golf tournament, which meant waking up at 6 a.m. both Saturday and Sunday. A major rule I try to follow is that weekend mornings shall not begin prior to 9 a.m. And, considering my golf game this weekend was atrocious, waking up early, in retrospect, was a totally pointless exercise. My hometown also had their annual 4th of July weekend street dance (or, more appropriately, gravel parking lot dance). For Harmony, this is a HUGE event. I guess I had fun, and I talked with dozens of people I haven't seen in a long time, but it still seemed like work, and here's why. I get along with most everyone, with a couple of exceptions. But, at the dance, I would be talking to someone who would start ripping on someone else, and expect me to join in, even though I truly like the person they're ripping on, so I haphazardly try to defend them and point out how decent they actually are. Case in point: I was talking to a good friend of mine I haven't seen in a long time, and he started tearing into a girl standing about 30 feet away. I then had to point out that the girl was actually really awesome, and that we go out to eat occasionally, and that she's my roommate. And that's the way the entire night went. So, it was exhausting. Fun, yes, but exhausting.

And then, suddenly, and perhaps tragically, it's Monday. And my badge won't allow me access into my building, and security has it's thumb up the butt and won't answer the emergency phone, so I waste 15 minutes waiting until someone in security acknowledges that the phone is actually ringing. I tell them my problem, and they inform me that they're having difficulties with the badge scanner, to which I think "No. Really?" So, now I'm at work. Welcome to Monday, everybody. Watch your step. It's a long ways off until Friday.