I got a little sunburn from yesterday’s beach trip. Apparently the sunscreen I used is waterproof, but not salt waterproof. The back of Amanda’s legs were nicely reddened as well.
Amanda and I got to church just on time today, but as soon as we parked it started raining pretty hard. Fortunately there was an umbrella in the car, so I held it for Amanda and let myself get wet. I felt chivalrous.
Church was a little exciting today. The fire alarm went off during the first song, so they stopped after a minute and told everyone to go ahead and file on out. It turned out that there was some work being done on the roof of Roland-Greise, the middle school where Port City Community Church meets, and a sensor had been hit or something. I think most everyone was able to fit under the breezeways and the rain had subsided a little anyway, so I don’t think many people got wet. I wondered how many people left when that happened.
When we got back inside someone had taken the seats Ben and Jessica Lambeth and Amanda and I had been sitting in. No big deal; we just moved back a couple rows.
After the service we all went to the Atlanta Bread Company over at Mayfaire for breakfast. This was the first time in quite a while that we ate inside. After we left we swung by Anna and Barry Frazelle’s to pick up Amanda’s car keys, which I had set down yesterday after we came in from the beach. They were gone, so we were in and out real quick.
On the way to the Frazelle house a guy in a convertible silver Mustang (one of the new ones) pulled out right in front of us to go probably a quarter mile down the road to a different hotel. He pissed me off because he exuded arrogance. That wasn’t the end though. On the way off the island, we got caught behind the hourly bridge-raising, and if you’re heading off the island you need to be in the left lane. Well, everybody knows this, so the left lane is really long, while opportunistic people try to get ahead in the right lane. I’ll only do something like that if there are only one or two people in the ending lane, and usually not in cases like this one. Anyway, one of the cars I saw in the right lane passing everyone was the guy in the Mustang, so he pissed me off a little more.
Long and pointless story short, he hovered just a few cars ahead of us for a while, but I was determined to part ways ahead of him. I got the chance at MLK and Market, where a third lane opens up and for some reason, nobody was in that lane at the stoplight. I figured that was my chance so I took it and was therein able to exact myself some indignant vindication.
Of course, the guy in the silver Mustang had absolutely no clue as to what I was about, but I dusted him.
Amanda’s mom, Karen Mercer, called to say she was at our house about the time we were first crossing over the bridge to get to Wrightsville Beach. She had come to drop off an iron bed for the Orange room that Michael is going to use, as well as a cabinet Amanda’s dad, Phil, had made for our downstairs bathroom and a real nice piece of pottery that she and Aunt Joanne had picked up as a housewarming gift. We knew she was coming but we thought it’d take her a while longer.
We got there and unloaded the Karenmobile (a big squat white brick of a van, but very useful for its roominess). Amanda was busy getting ready to go to a baby shower for her boss (and high school friend of mine) Chris Mowbray. Karen and I went by Lowes to get a few things, namely a darker orange for the Orange room along with a few other supplies. Once we got back she helped me redo the Orange room; she did the trim and I did the roller. It was really nice of her to do that, since she had planned on dropping off the stuff and going on home. Amanda had moved everything out of the Orange room, which we’ve been using as a bit of a junk/storage room, while we were gone. She left for the baby shower right as we were getting back from Lowes.
Anyway, the new orange is exactly what we were expecting the previous one to be. The previous one, for those of you who don’t remember, ended up being a sort of pumpkin orange. Everytime we showed it to a friend, they would say, “It’s… orange.” But yeah, we like it now. When Amanda called to tell us she was on her way back I told her that we’d knocked over the can and had a big spot on the carpet. When she did get home I think she was irritated with me. She said she’d driven back in a daze.
We set the bed up and gave my mother-in-law some food before she left. Amanda and I then watched a news show, Nightline or something, about a guy who was thought dead on a Mount Everest excursion but happened to live. Apparently it’s common up there for people to be left for dead, even when they are obviously alive. This guy, people had tried to help but they actually thought he was dead, then he was found the next morning by another expedition. He had his gloves and hat off, no oxygen, and his coat was open. He deliriously thought he was on a boat. While this guys were working on saving him another group came by and claimed not to speak English. They felt the need to make it to the top, about two hours away, over trying to help save another human being’s life. I don’t know how such people could live with themselves. I don’t care how dedicated you are to something, being able to brag about doing something can never justify the flaucinaucinihilipilification of a person’s life.
That’s the first time I’ve been able to use that word without reaching. If you want to know what it means, look it up. That’s how I learned it.
Zach Dotsey