Lo and Behold!

So I came home tonight and for no reason at all whatsoever, and with no hope at all that it would actually work, I tried to sign on to the internet. And it connected! I have no idea why it's working now when it didn't work all weekend, especially when the people we called the other day told us that our modem was obviously broken and no one in my family did anything to fix it, but suddenly it's working again. It will probably be broken again tomorrow, but I'll take advantage while I can.

First, the update I owe you:
On the 3rd of July, I went to a 4th of July party at the country club where my parents are members. My dad's business sponsored a table, so the guests were my parents, my brother, my mom's best friend and her husband, and a couple of guys that work with my dad and their dates. Well, one of the guys, DD, has been working with my dad since about 1992 so I've known him since I was a kid. He's notorious for dating inappropriate women (girls that are way too young for him, strippers, strange women he meets on EHarmony.com, and--for quite a while--Possibly The Most Mentally Unstable Woman in the Entire Country, Or At Least the State). His flame of the moment is this girl who is about my age who works as an ad executive for one of the local radio stations. They've only been dating for about two weeks, and already he's tired of everything about her except for the sex, so I give it about another two weeks before he gets bored with that, too.
Anyway, this girl is nice enough. I had a pretty good time talking to her at the party, and the next day we cooked out and swam at DD's house and I had a fine time with her then, too. It helps that I was buzzed on both occasions, though, because this girl is a bit much. Her biggest problem is that she's kind of a know-it-all and because she works for the radio and spends a lot of time out on the town networking, she thinks she's this huge insider on "society" here in my hometown. Which, if you know my hometown (and many of you reading this do), you know isn't much of anything. She's the sort of woman that would be an annoying social climber if we were somewhere like Manhattan that actually has high society to try to claw your way into.
Instead, she has apparently decided that my father is some city VIP. Hence the fact that I HAVE to get married here in my hometown. She was drunk and talking about how DD already loves her (ha) and how she'd want to marry him in Las Vegas, and I guess I must have agreed that getting married in Vegas would be fun, because the next thing I knew she was on a roll. Here are just a few of the more outrageous statements that she made:
"Of COURSE your father wants you to get married. You're part of his image, you know?"
"Do you have any idea who your father is? Your father is Firstname Lastname! You have no idea what his reputation is in this city, do you?" [Uh, no. Clearly not, because the last time I checked, my father was not Donald Trump.]
"One day when you marry someone, you'll have a huge wedding here in town. Come on, you know you will! How could you not? Your dad would LOVE to throw a big event like that!" [This may actually be true, but I am fairly positive that if my dad ever did help me throw a wedding, he'd be doing it because he loves me and my husband and not because he has an egotistical need to show off to the rest of the town]
"Everyone in TownName knows your father. Whenever I tell people that I'm dating your father's best friend, they can't believe it. It's like, really impressive." [My father does seem to know a lot of people, which makes it annoying to go out to dinner with him because we always run into someone he knows, but knowing my father is not impressive. He's a fun guy, but really!]
"Everyone around here at least pretends to know your father, because people in this town flock to money." [There is this huge, HUGE misconception that my dad is loaded. This has been the case since I was in elementary school, when we really didn't have money, and is still the case now, when I will admit that at this exact moment in time my parents are relatively well off for this particular neighborhood in this particular city, but I'd say we're still very, very much middle class by national standards. I think this comes from the fact that my dad does run a few somewhat high profile businesses that--outwardly, to those that don't understand the nature of the business at all--appear as though they would be bringing in vast amounts of money. But they're not, not really. Trust me, if my parents were as wealthy as most of my hometown thinks they are, I wouldn't have been worried about having to live in the ghetto in University Land, now would I? I also don't think I would buy clothes at Target, or be worried about making my 4 year old car last another 4 years, etc., etc. Then again, wealth is a very relative thing, and while I can see how very, very far we are below big wealth or even moderate wealth, I suppose many people look at my parents and go, "They occasionally stay at the Four Seasons and they go to Las Vegas four times a year, therefore they are filthy rich." Fair enough. We all have different perspectives on these things, and I understand that. And I'm certainly not complaining about my lot in life, I fully realize that financially, I have so far managed to be more fortunate than many. I'm very grateful for that, don't get me wrong. I just wish people like this girl would get a broader perspective and quit acting like I'm a freakin' heiress. That's ridiculous.]
Anyway, this girl just went on and on and on, and finally I was like, "Oh, wow, here's another Vegas Bomb for you to drink!" and I changed the subject, but it was ridiculous and even though I found it very funny, it was also kind of awkward and uncomfortable and inappropriate. And it was just plain WEIRD. But DD has always liked the crazies, so I'm not exactly surprised.

Oh look, I've already written about a million words and I still haven't updated you on anything of actual importance in my life that has happened lately.
Like the fact that Phil texted me out of the blue on Thursday night and suddenly we're tentatively communicating again. And there's a lot I could say about that. A whole lot. But I'll just leave it at that.

Or the fact that I went out for dinner with Cake Guy tonight and my overall verdict was that I had a fun enough time that I'll probably go out with him again schedule-permitting. The thing is, I enjoyed our dinner but I just don't see this going anywhere as a relationship. I'm almost fifteen years younger than him (okay, not quite that much, but close). He wants to settle into a relationship, oh, TOMORROW, I don't think I really want a relationship at all right now. He's already talking like we could have some kind of long distance relationship, and I definitely do not want to do that at all whatsoever under any circumstances. Seriously, I don't. He thinks we're very compatible, and I recognize that we are in many ways, but...I don't know. I just don't know if I'm ready for all of this right now. He's head over heels for me, basically. I'm not bragging, he is. Me? Well, I'm not writing him off, but I'm not at all convinced yet, either. He thinks I'm perfect for him, and I very well might be. I just don't know that he's perfect for me. He's very confident that I'm going to fall for him, I'm fairly confident that I'll just have dinner with him once or twice more and call it a summer. We'll see who ends up being right.

Also, when it rains, it pours. First Cake Guy, and now another one of my customers at the bar somehow got ahold of my phone number and now keeps sending me text messages asking me if I want to go out with him. Although he is definitely cute, I can tell just from serving him drinks that he's not my type at all and my answer is "no", so I've been ignoring his texts. Including the ones that say, "You have spectacular legs." Actually, I was already aware of that fact from other sources, but thank you, Random Bar Guy! Ugh.

And hey, speaking of "ugh" things, I think when I got home from dinner earlier I walked in on my parents having sex! I didn't literally walk in on them, thank god, but when I got home the house was dark as if no one was here but my dog was sitting on the couch, so I said, "What are you doing out here? Why did no one put you in your kennel when they left?!" and then I headed down the hallway towards my room and got there just in time to see my parents' door being hurriedly shut. So they were in their bedroom, but the dog wasn't in there with them, which means they probably weren't sleeping. He goes with them when they go to bed if I'm not home. And nobody was like, "Hey, how was your date?!" which was weird considering how much hell they were giving me teasing me about it before I left. So I can only assume that I interrupted at an inopportune moment. Great. In theory I'm happy that my parents still have an active sex life. In practice, tonight reminded me why I'm happy that I no longer live with my parents full time. The teasing about my social life and the near-sex sighting were more than enough for one night.