So, this morning, I was sitting around fretting over the “check engine” light that ruined my Thursday evening and was doing some damage to my Friday morning, when I checked my Facebook page for reasons that are never truly clear anymore (ever think we’d be this nosy about people who aren’t celebrities)?
Anyway, the first thing that popped up on my timeline was one of those memories. It was a picture of a guy with smoldering hazel eyes, glistening olive skin and the best damn facial stubble since Francisco Cervelli. I said, “Whoa, who’s that fella?”
It was me, from two years ago, when I took a selfie just after I climbed the steps all the way to the top of the Cathedral in Oakland four times (I think it was four–it could have been three).
They say if you really want to know if others find you attractive, you should look at older pictures of yourself when your “current” insecurities have long-since disappeared, and that was proof right there–the world of 2018 had to find that man very, very attractive.
No wonder I hit on every woman with a pulse in 2018.
A similar thing happened to me in 2017 shortly after I began my weight-loss journey. Facebook showed me a picture of myself and two lovely young ladies from back in 2008, and I said, “Damn, why didn’t I know I was that good looking back then?” Even though I was a decade removed from that good looking young man, that picture motivated me to stick to my plan and lose enough weight to look the best that I could as a mid-40’s gentleman.
And I must say, good job, me.
Thanks to that Facebook memory that popped up this morning, I’m now more determined than ever to look like my mid-40’s self again, only, this time, as a late-40’s gentleman.
Truth is, I have been doing much better in undoing the damage that 2019 and Uber driving did to my weight-loss success. I cut out the gluttony after the holidays. I recommitted myself to MyFitnessPal about two weeks ago–that’s really done wonders for holding me accountable.
But, damn, there’s nothing like good old fashioned vanity to motivate a person to lose some weight.
Join me as I continue to bring you a totally self-absorbed series of things from 2019 that made me happy, sad, sore, scared, etc.
In this installment: My most humorously fulfilling moment of 2019.
It’s fitting that my most humorously fulfilling moment of 2019 happened after one of my running group runs, because the runner-up also occurred during one of those runs.
The runner-up was a time when either I or someone in close proximity of me tripped and almost, I say, almost fell (I honestly can’t remember if it was me); a woman from the group who was running a little behind us let out a quick shriek like “Ohhh!” or “Ewwww!” (I don’t know how to spell sounds.)
Anyway, this made me laugh and I continued to laugh the entire run. I often find myself quietly chuckling when I see this woman, because it reminds me of that shriek.
Moving on to my most humorously fulfilling moment of 2019.
It was a Thursday night run somewhere out in Highland Park by the zoo. I don’t remember the name of the place, but the groups meet there a couple of times a year.
The reason I know it was a Thursday run was because the moment involved the little toddler of a couple from the group. This little toddler has taken a liking to me, which is not so unusual when it comes to little kids and yours truly (it’s likely my clown-like features). Anyway, as little toddlers often do, this kid likes to hand things to adults, you know, just because.
In the case of that night at that bar in Highland Park, it was her baby doll, of which I was the recipient. Like the entertainer that I am, I gladly accepted this baby’s baby doll and held it as I stood around and gabbed with people. Around that time, this random young lady, who I guess was there with her friends, walked by me and said, “Nice baby doll.” I retorted with, “It’s my emotional support baby doll,” a line that drew a fairly hearty laugh from the girl.
As hams often do, I kept using this line over and over again to anyone who was in earshot. Unfortunately, it didn’t illicit quite the same response from anyone else.
Oh well, I thought it was funny, that girl thought it was funny, and I felt it was a great use of my quick wit.
I often think of that line and smile, which, I suppose, makes me look even more self-absorbed than these series of 2019 articles suggest.
That’s it, my most humorously fulfilling moment of 2019.
You might be wondering why I’m posting a music video by singer John Mayer as the intro to a post about my favorite moment of 2019. It’s because Mayer, one of my favorite musicians of all time, was part of that moment (at least his song New Light was).
You see, it was late February or early March. I was at the Wexford Giant Eagle resetting the eight-foot gourmet chocolate section, when New Light came on the satellite radio. It was a common occurrence, but whenever it did, it always brought a smile to my face–mainly because I could picture this video in my head (John Mayer is also one funny mofo).
You might be wondering why the aforementioned moment was the one I chose as my favorite. Unfortunately, there weren’t very many “special” moments in 2019. This isn’t to say it was a horrible year (as a healthy person who actually has a place to sleep every night, I’m well aware that it could always be worse), but it was just one huge pain in the ass.
The part that really hurt my backside was the “promotion” I accepted with my old company right after New Year’s. My previous job within the company was as a center store merchandiser, where I traveled from store to store to perform duties that, quite frankly, didn’t seem all the necessary now that I look back on it. I actually enjoyed this position, which I held for all of 2018. But I enjoyed it because it provided a great balance of independence and just enough responsibility and experience that I felt like it could lead somewhere. But, deep down, I knew it wouldn’t, and when my old manager, who had left the center store team to take a similar position on the reset team shortly after my old company won the contract to do the resets for Giant Eagle, called me late in 2018 and offered me a promotion as a Home Store Reset Specialist for two Giant Eagle stores, I jumped at the chance.
While I enjoy independence and not having a boss looking over my shoulder at all times, I’m a worker at heart. I work hard, and that kind of energy is just something that’s always been in me. Anyway, I liked the idea of doing something more tangible and far more productive.
But it wasn’t too long into the new position–the day of orientation on January 2, in fact–that I had a bad feeling that things just weren’t going to work out. Everything felt disorganized and just thrown together. The vibe also seemed quite unprofessional. Sitting there with dozens of other Home Store Reps, I also felt over-qualified.
I knew I was over-qualified, because I’ve always been “too good” for jobs like that. But for someone like me, my career has always been like my dating life, where I don’t have quite the education to date the “professional” women I’m usually attracted to (I can normally get away with it for a while, before they realize I can’t afford that trip to anywhere), but I’m far too sophisticated for the woman at the Sunoco who’s always telling me about the restraining order she has on her ex.
Basically, I’m intelligent and hard-working, but I just don’t have a sexy enough resume to land the jobs I truly want.
So I figured I’d give this whole reset thing a try. I’m not going to lie, it was really overwhelming at first, so overwhelming, I almost quit right away. But I stuck it out and eventually got slightly more comfortable. Unfortunately, I never got truly comfortable, and the job never stopped being totally overwhelming. However, much like every other job I’ve had in my life, the overwhelming and stressful part would have been fine had I been paid a decent wage. In fact, a reset specialist wouldn’t be a bad gig if the money was right. It’s an important job, something Giant Eagle wants done constantly, and one that even their territorial employees want no part of. You pay a person the right kind of money, you could get higher quality people to do it. But, much like a lot of companies, my old one wasn’t interested in paying acceptable wages.
I knew I was a higher quality person, one who simply wouldn’t accept the low wage I was receiving for work that was stressful and backbreaking, so I gave my notice in late February.
I figured I’d handle things in a professional manner, which I did. I worked just as hard over my final two weeks as I did over the first two months.
Which brings me to my favorite moment of 2019.
It was a Thursday (my Friday, since I worked four 10-hour days) and a week before my last day. After doing an extensive reset on the flavored water section early in the morning, I figured I’d close out the day by doing the eight-foot gourmet chocolate section.
Like most other resets, it was extensive and time-consuming. It was also quite fun and peaceful. To reiterate, they played the John Mayer song, which made me smile, and that just added to the joy I was experiencing. How fun was that reset? Even a random, attractive female customer came over and flirted with me (I couldn’t blame her. I was 170 pounds and dressed in all black–my signature sexy color). I remember thinking, “If all the resets were this easy and fun, I would stick around.”
But they weren’t. Most resets that I had to perform in both stores were basically impossible, and that’s why I went into business for myself as an Uber driver.
Yes, I had to leave my old job early in 2019, but before I did, it somehow provided me my best moment of the year.
Is it normal to be sick of going out all the time? Is it normal to actually be irritated with being invited out all the time?
I don’t know if those things are normal or not, but I got those symptoms, baby. I guess going out just doesn’t have the same appeal that it used to. And this isn’t because I’m getting older. I think the whole going out all the time deal has just gotten old.
Perhaps if I had just found my pretty cool network of friends two or three years ago, the idea of going out all the time would still be fresh and new. But this network is a continuous thread that started some 15 years ago, when I first discovered the Pittsburgh Sports League.
To pepper in some backstory, I was about two years removed from my days as a Pitt research specialist, a job that included my first group of friends that I did a bunch of things with. But as you may know, despite the fact that you spend so much time with your work friends (both in and out of work), the second you quit your job and move on to something else, you work friends forget about you completely (this almost never happens with high school friends and college roommates, who, for some reason, often become life-long friends).
Anyway, my new job as a store manager meant that I had absolutely no peers (everyone was either 16 or 65). This led to a lot of lonely nights as an early-30s something dude.
But then I decided to sign up for the PSL’s flag football league in the fall of 2005, and that changed everything.
The past 15 years have been great. I’ve met a ton of really great friends through flag football, volleyball, bowling and running. I still want those great times to continue….I just want to take it down a notch.
I’ve often joked that if you have friends with small children, you’ll never hear from them, save for the occasional birthday party invite. I don’t have that problem, since the vast-majority of my friends don’t have children. This means they like to go out and socialize more than your average grown up (for the sake of this article, a grown up is someone over, say, the age of 35).
Now, I’m not saying that I want to become a hermit. No, not at all. In fact, I want to keep my regular activities that same–running group twice a week, bowling once or twice a week depending on the week and gym activities two or three days a week.
I’d say that’s a pretty active social life, one that gets you out of the house enough times. I just want to tone down the other stuff like, well, going out the nights I don’t do my regular activities.
I think that’s fair.
I think my biggest current issue is that I drive Uber full-time. That means I don’t feel the need to decompress as much as a person with a normal job. I don’t look forward to the weekend because I don’t feel like I have to. Driving is relatively stress-free.
When you don’t walk around with a stress ball in your stomach thanks to work, you don’t feel the need to fill all of your free hours with social events–at least I don’t.
Maybe it’s not a balance issue. Maybe going out all the time simply isn’t cutting it anymore Maybe I’m missing something else in my life like a new job–I do respond really well to structure and routine. Maybe I need the love of a good woman–that would do me some good. Maybe I need a new passion/hobby. Maybe my passion needs to be my job.
All I know is, the only reason I go out anymore (save for my aforementioned regularly scheduled social activities that, to be clear, I really, really love) is either so I won’t miss something or out of a sense of obligation.
Those aren’t reasons to go out more than you actually want to.
In fact, if you don’t want to go out more, that’s as good a reason as any not to.
And that’s why one of my New Year’s resolutions is to stop going out so much.
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