(Aside: When I wrote Liz’s charmed life, installment #73, I plucked the number out of thin air, but since this post is following so closely on the heels of that one, I feel compelled to proceed chronologically. In case you’re concerned, YES, I know I’m weird.)
So today was a GREAT day… it started off great (my second-favorite way), and kept getting better. Sure, I sat through a stats class (for fun, mind you) wherein I was exposed to nothing new, but to be honest, my goal in sitting in on the stats class this spring is to find that I already know all of the material. (My fear, however, is that I do not. Hence the reason I’m sitting in on it!) I spent a couple of GREAT hours at Panera Bread in Brentwood (selected over the Vandy location for the simple reason that I wanted to give the noontime rush a chance to dissipate, and I felt like a change of scenery), where I read some Schumpeter (not my favorite political theorist, not by a long stretch). But even reading Schumpeter was fun, both because I was at Panera Bread (which I love) and because I intertwined the Schumpeter with intermittent distractions of the best kind. Yeah. I’m being vague. Deal with it.
I came home and proceeded immediately to the complex’s fitness facility next door, where I had a better-than-usual workout (30 minutes on the elliptical plus a rotation around the shoulder/lat weight machines), complete with my recently resurrected/relocated heart rate monitor (I love it when I have data!!!), which told me I burned approximately 400 calories in my 40 minutes there. Not too shabby, I say!!
Finally, I ended the evening at Logan’s Roadhouse. Here’s the “charmed life” story. I selected Logan’s primarily on the basis of the fact that I didn’t leave the apartment to seek sustenance until just past 9 p.m., and Logan’s is *ridiculously* close to my apartment. That, and I was in the mood to wait a little bit for dinner so as to read some more… I wanted to finish off Schumpeter and make some headway into the absolutely awesome first chapter of Louis Hartz‘s book on liberalism in America.
As it turned out, Logan’s tonight was THE PERFECT place for me to do this. I got there and sat down around 9:15, and the sweet and attentive waitress took my drink order pronto. She brought out my salad similarly quickly. Then, I waited. And waited. And waited. I finished Schumpeter. I made it another 10-15 pages through Hartz. I sent a couple of text messages. Checked my e-mail. Saw some bits of the OU-Texas basketball game. Finally, my food came, and the waitress was all apologies for how long I had to wait… she said the kitchen had lost my ticket, and that she’d had to yell at them.
At the end of the meal, everything I ordered was comped. I was given a bill for $0. Seriously.
SO… to recap: Not only did I get a TON of reading done, and eat great food (damn those rolls!! erg!!), but it was all free.
Suffice it to say, I left her a very good tip!! 🙂
I’m ending the day with a blog, a quick check of Facebook, and a couple of listens to my new favorite song, whose lyrics, which I am still in love with, include this line: “I want to use my mouth to open up your eyes” (the song is “Begin to Cry,” by Christopher Jak). This line in particular — somewhat inexplicably — reminds me of my favorite quote from Cyrano de Bergerac: “un baiser … [c’est] un secret qui prend la bouche pour oreille.” Gorgeous stuff, my friends!