So Many Appointments, So Little Time

I was up at 8am.

The builder is coming between 8am and 10am. The carpet guy is coming at 10am.

First of all, the carpet guy called to say he couldn’t make it until 12-1pm. I told him I had to be in South Yarra at 1pm. Fuck him. He replied he’d be here by midday. Then he asked me if I was out for a couple of hours for lunch, or if it was going to be an all afternoon affair. When I said that it should just be a couple of hours, he asked me to call him when I was on my way home and he’d head over here then.

What? He doesn't have other booked appointments that he has to see first. He will just come when I am ready? What is he doing, playing pool in the local pool hall while he waits?

The builder was late. At 10.30 I called to see where he was. Apparently, he was already on X Street. He said he didn’t think there was any damage to the floors.

Lauri

I just watched the footage of the announcement in your parliament? What a funny old House of parliament, you have. It looks like something out of a Brotherhood shop. And that accent, it always makes me laugh. Then they sang fucking Kumbayah... I wanted to shit... really. christian

I text Guido for LouLou’s sleepover on Friday night. It seemed only fair that I get a little something for her, as she so often provides the smoke for me. I text at 11am, just in case it turned in to a 2 day acquirement, as it has the last few times. I had given up smoking for 2 days and I really didn’t want to ruin that, but again, if it was going to take a couple of days to get it, I’d better start early none the less. It is no good saying to LouLou on a Friday night sleep over that the smoke wasn’t coming until the next morning. It kind of defeats the purpose. Guido text back almost immediately and said he’d meet me in half an hour. Half an hour? Well, that is good. I hadn’t showered and I only had limited time to get to the car, get to the bank and get to the meeting place, with time to have a couple of smokes and then get to South Yarra… and then get home again for the carpet man. Phew, I was exhausted just thinking about it. I text Rachel and asked if we could reschedule to tomorrow, as I drove down to Collingwood. My old only-one-appointment-a-day kicked in big time, as I tested who I could ditch. Rachel text back and said she was already booked for tomorrow lunch and that she was only available today. But she was okay if I cancelled, if the tradesmen were being difficult.

I text back saying I’d see her at 1pm. Just get you friggin act together and don't get distracted, I told myself

I was home by 12. I rolled 2 j's and turned Facebook back on and smoked them. Still got an hour, I told myself.

Anthony posted a poster about people who cared for disabled children, and one was to like to send them support. I quickly wrote a response.

I'm all for aborting defective foetus'... however... if they ever discover the "gay" gene, there are those amongst us who would declare a foetus with the "gay" gene defective, so we have a problem, then, don't we?

I was in the shower by 12.15 with my head spinning.

I was dressed by 12.30, deciding not to smoke the 2nd half of the joint, which I’d, left in the ashtray. I deleted my response to Anthony, as I thought in the shower that it wasn’t in the spirit of what Anthony meant, and there is nothing worse than someone climbing onto their soapbox uninvited. I didn't want to be that person. I only post photos on Facebook now, people find any sort of opinion confronting. I don't really want to be explaining myself to total strangers, who get their face out of joint with one, meant to be humours, remark.

I was on the road by 12.35.

I was parked, in an almost impossible place to park, and walking up Selwyn Street by 12.50. I bought the half joint from the ashtray and smoked it standing outside the school.  There was major high rise construction going on in the street. It was beginning to take on the feel of the CBD and not a suburb at all. I kind of liked it, it felt sophisticated, as long as I didn’t dwell on what had been demolished. I asked a construction worker if he knew where Daltons was, as that was the only real clue that I had, opposite Daltons. He shrugged and said he didn’t know. I was outside the restaurant by 12.55, on the phone to Rachel, with the construction worked pointing and gesticulating to Dalton’s across the road.

I said hello to Anton and then took a seat in the window and waited for my coffee. Anton brought the coffee over, with a bit of a chat and an enquiry into my health. He is impossibly handsome, all dressed in black, with his black hair and his black stubble and his black glasses and his peaked black cap. But then again, he was always that angelic kid, sweet-faced and interested in everything you had to say. He has always had a certain aura, that Anton. 

Rachel arrived in due course.

Rachel had to go and move her car, as she only scored a 1 hour park. She asked me to order her a three quarter latte, as she left. She seemed to drive around and around and around. Anton came and sat with me and we chatted. I had to keep censoring what I was going to say, reminding myself that this was the child of a friend, and not a friend, as such. Still, I told him some stories about his mum and dad. The one about meeting his dad for the first time, when Andre was carried down 2 flights of stairs and deposited into the back of his BMW and driven away, to pissed and stoned he couldn't make it himself, made Anton laugh nervously.

Rachel came back half an hour later, complaining. I met Anton’s girlfriend, she has a French name and is gorgeous, as you would expect. They make a cute couple, I watched them chatting to each other over the café server. He's sweet, he kisses his mum as he goes back to work.

I couldn’t help but notice the bulge in Anton's jeans, as we all stood up to go, not so impressive.

I was home by 3pm. I’d smoked a few more joints before the carpet guy got there at 4pm. I paid the carpet man directly, as the total cost of the repairs was $385, well under my $500 excess.

I even managed to recode a whole bunch of my photos.

I paid my mobile bill a day late, stupid me.

Sam got home at 5.30.

I vacuumed and washed the tiled atrium floors and reconstructed the house, when Sam told me that I should finish what I started cleaning. I don't think he believed the carpet man had just been.

We had pizza delivered for dinner.