Thursday, December 06, 2007

The View From Alpha Centauri

This morning I went in for my eye exam. It wasn’t too thorough, as I’m not getting no contacts or glasses, but am instead opting to do the whole Gentle Molding thing to improve my vision and eliminate the need for contacts or glasses.
After doing a quick, standard check, I had my eyes scanned for the corneal topography dealie that will be used to make the lenses that will be used to reshape my eyes.
It was my understanding that the process cost about $3,000, so I had that much set aside in my flexible spending account. Turns out that, thanks to how bad my eyes are, it’s going to cost over $5,200. I signed up for some sort of no-interest medical credit card thing to cover the rest, which, after I’m actually working – wherever that may be – I’ll probably just pay off immediately.
So the next step is to go in whenever my lenses arrive, and the begin the process of wearing them while I sleep so that they can reshape my eyes.
Given what it ended up costing, it probably would have been less hassle to do the whole Lasik thing, but Gentle Molding has been around a lot longer, and it doesn’t actually remove anything from your eyes.
And this way I don’t have to bother anyone to get a ride to and from the Lasik place or mess around with the cream to prevent crustiness and etc.
After the eye appointment I headed to Target to pick up a shovel, as we actually did get a fair amount of snow yesterday, so I needed to clear off my sidewalk and walkway. While I was at it, I cleared off my neighbors’ sidewalk and walkway as well.
I have to go in to the recruiter’s office on Monday to sign the paperwork for the job that I don’t want. I’m hoping that I’ll hear from the job I do want before that, but so far that hasn’t happened.
Scott couldn’t make it to the comic shop yesterday, so we were supposed to go today, but something else came up. He actually has the day off tomorrow, so we’re going to hit the comic shop and also take in a movie (The Golden Compass) while we’re at it.
Technically, yesterday’s Made of Fail post was also a Red Wing memory, and I’d said that I wouldn’t be revisiting those here, but it was kind of unavoidable, as that is probably the best (worst?) example of me being dense – or in that case, superhumanly obtuse – when it comes to women and picking up on any signals they may be giving out.
The whole thing actually reminds me of a cartoon I once saw in Playboy or Penthouse in which two guys are sitting at a bar, and one of the men has a woman who has parked herself on his shoulders, wrapping her legs around his head, and burying his face in her crotch, and the other man is saying, “I think she likes you.”
Now that I think I could probably pick up on, but it’s still not a 100% certainty.
In fairness to me and my obtuseness when it comes to that sort of thing in general – and the Kayla incident in particular – is that in order to pick up on signals, I would first have to believe that it’s conceivable that woman would actually be giving me signals. That’s a difficult obstacle to overcome, especially in the situation with Kayla, given that, as a stripper, the odds were that she didn’t really even view me as a person so much as an ATM with a pulse. When you’re dealing with someone whose job it is to be nice to you and to pretend to have some interest in you sexually, the one thing that’s going to keep you out of trouble is realizing that she doesn’t really like you, she’s just doing her job.
It’s natural to forget that and think, “Maybe I’m the exception,” but I always did my best to avoid falling into that trap, despite the fact that my friends often insisted that, in Kayla’s case, I was that exception.
So even though I was trying to hook up with her, I didn’t really believe that this was possible, so, when you also factor in my level of drunkenness at the time, you get me being totally oblivious to the fact that she was giving me signals that a dead man should have been able to pick up on.
And honestly, and, again, in fairness to me, who knows what her actual intentions were? Maybe she was looking to do a little side business, and at some point there would have come the unpleasant moment in which I was presented with a bill.
So I can’t lament my obliviousness too much, because I don’t really know for certain what would have happened.
Anyway, the thing is that it’s not like I have Asperger’s or something and am totally oblivious to non-verbal cues and subtle (or not-so subtle) verbal hints. I can pick up on them quite clearly – when they’re being directed at someone else.
If/when they’re directed at me, I think I’m just too distracted by my own overactive brain to notice them, or am unwilling to believe that they actually are signals, per my earlier mention of the obstacle I have to overcome.
When I see a woman flirting with someone else, though, all of the cues stand out bright as day.
I remember becoming infuriated once when I saw someone I liked talking to a guy, as she was constantly touching her hair and standing on her tiptoes and drawing attention to her mouth and just generally broadcasting signals that have probably reached Alpha Centauri by now and are being studied by aliens who, not knowing anything about our culture, are still able to say, “Glbnor glilifax,” the English translation of which would be “She’s totally into that guy.”
In the case of that particular person, I was constantly on the lookout for any sort of signals directed towards me, so even with my normal handicap when it comes to that sort of thing, it’s unlikely that I would have ever missed seeing them. So seeing her put on the full display for some other guy was not fun to watch.
(Alpha Centaurians have no doubt also watched my interactions with her and concluded, “Glddink glpxzym,” or “She’s so not into that dork.”)

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