Annotation of the Best Vacation Ever.

Okay. This is draft number two of this entry, because I had a very, very rare full system crash while writing the first one. I always write in notepad, and me being a little daft, didn’t save as I went. Hello, this is going to take me a few hours to write out, I SHOULD SAVE AS I GO! :: saves :: OKAY. Now then. Bring up WinAmp (version 2.81, yo), put some music on, try not to multitask or get distracted….

Friday, August 5th: Went to the gym after arriving home from seeing mom and grandma in upstate New York. Checked Jessica Emsley’s flight status, and was able to inform her that her flight was running 1.5 hours late. Directed her to the nearest Wells Fargo in her location (in Seattle). That’s right, she outsourced her GPS to Jersey. I cleaned my bathroom. Cleaner than it’s been in years. The breaking point was when I trimmed my head the other day. Little hairs EVERYWHERE. I usually make fun of people who clean for a visiting person. My room’s still pretty messy, but you have to draw the line SOMEWHERE.

Saturday, August 6th: Got up around 6 AM. Showered. Amazing what having a female visit does for personal hygiene. Arrived at airport around 8:15. Thought I might have been late. I know if I were in an airport and waiting for someone to show up, I’d have that pang of, “Is this person going to show?” I was perfectly on time, she was still making her way out. So I circled around. I saw her, but had to initially pass her to find a decent place to stop. Put her stuff in my car, and got a nice hug.

I’m used to first meetings by at a neutral site, typically a place of eating. This causes immediately eye contact. Now, I like eye contact, but it forced initial eye contact can be a little uncomfortable and unnerving. Instead, talking to her while I was driving felt… very natural. It felt like all the phone calls we’ve had over the years. Like a solemn reminder, this is Jessica Emsley.

She said she required coffee, which would turn into a pattern. Took her to a Dunkin` Donuts. Joked that Northen Jersey has a zoning ordinance which requires x number of Dunkin Donuts per square mile. South Jersey is a little different, being the Land of Wawas.

Felt the need to entertain her at first. Took a couple hours before I relaxed. Yeah, I know exactly when I relaxed. When we got back to my condo, we fished through my box`o`DVDs. I know they’re an archaic format, but I don’t own a lot. Most I own are either A. heartfelt or B. FUCKING HILARIOUS. I went with the later, picking Fired Up. Just as funny as the first time Candi and I watched it together in the theatre. I asked her how she was feeling, and we got in some cuddles.

Thought of how whenever I’m out and about, the natives try to feed me a local specialty that I can’t get elsewhere. With that in mind, I took her to Don José’s over On The Border. Tasty. Came home.. And I believe somewhere in there she crawled onto my bed, noting how fucking comfortable it is. I asked her if she was tired. She said no. Cue me spooning behind her, and us having a nice two hour nap. I love naps.

I thought we’d go out again, but she reminded me that I don’t need to entertain her. Right, I relaxed after we napped together. We watched She’s The Man. Amusing, but I forgot the awkward quotient. It was better the first time I saw it, I could have picked a better movie. She took some smoke breaks in there. Something in me completely resisted all desire to be a wise-ass. I normally give people a really hard time about smoking. Amazing what I’ll do when I like a girl.

We weren’t that hungry, so for dinner.. I made spiral mac and cheese and corn. Oh yes. I can cook if I feel like it. I really wanted to make her a full meal sometime during the trip, but that was the closest I got. It felt nice sharing something so.. monotonous. She got dressed for bed. When she first arrived, I pointed out that I had a spare bed, but .. would like her to sleep with me in my full-bed. No pressure. She said she’d decide later. She slept next to me. CAN HAS GIRL. Went to bed relatively early, sometime after ten.

Sunday, August 7th: I woke up around 7 or 8ish. She looked so adorable snuggled up, so I let her rest. I ate breakfast and showered. I actually logged into Everquest2 and quietly crafted to kill time. When she got up.. we fetched her coffee then proceeded to Angie’s residence. She lives over in Paterson. We went to a little Peruvian restaurant whose name escapes me at this moment. I ate something large, steakish, and delicious. I let the girls bond, as they were friends before I met either of them. They’ve been friends for ten years without meeting! Gotta love the internets. I’ve met Angie previously, last November. We walked a bit, Miss Emsley desired a “cheap and revealing” bikini. Not something most people would think of in terms of a vacation to Jersey, but she wanted to get some sun.

Girls wanted some Wild Blue. Came back to the condo, started drinking. Good times. I spotted myself 2.5 shots and waited a half hour or so before having a third shot. There’s a lot of things that happened in there. Somewhere in there, Miss Emsley had a conversation where I asked her why she was holding back. She said something to the effect that she tends to hook up with boys when she meets up with them, and then things change. We started a promise that when she left, she’d go back to her life, I’d go back to mine, and everything would be cool.

Walked to a liquor store to get tequila at Angie’s request. I was being.. very custodial. Didn’t want anything to happen to the girls. Also had to remind them to be cool when there were people around. I was mostly sober by the time we got back. WHICH MEANT IT WAS TIME TO DRINK MORE! Want to say I had a buzz from about 4 PM to almost midnight. Good times. Took Angie home, but not before finding an open gas station. Let them be silly in the back seat. On the way back, Miss Emsley mentioned being hungry. Stopped a local diner. I was reminded of my affinity for pizza bagels. She had a french dip. Exhausted, we got some coitus on, cuddled, and passed out.

Monday, August 8th: Woke up late. I still got up before her. Ate, showered. Fetching her coffee, she got a bagel with cream cheese. Reminded her of her desire to soak in sun. Changed into appropriate attire. Went to the communal pool. It’s as I say, it’s never, ever about where you are, it’s about who you’re with. I’ve gone to that pool by myself, but it wasn’t nearly as fun as when I had a companion. Aside from typical goofing off in a pool, there was this adorable five year old girl swimming around with floaties. She swam up to Miss Emsley and said, “My name’s Eva, what’s yours?” I couldn’t help but think, shit, even at five years old I didn’t have that kind of confidence. We laid in the sun. I snagged some SPF that I had in my car, but it was slightly after-the-fact. We laid out just long enough to get a tint but not get a serious burn. Miss Emsley is a pale white chick, but I kind of like that. We went in the water once more to cool off, then vacated the premises.

Shower, coitus, and cuddles. The joke was that we were late picking up Angie because I needed post-coital cuddles. What? I LIKE POST-COITAL CUDDLES! Went to Clay Oven for dinner. Fucking delicious, I’m so looking forward to dinner. My dad was home from visiting someone in South Jersey, so no drinking tonight. Well, we could have, but we weren’t really in the mood. Angie and I love the movie Amelié, and Miss Emsley hadn’t seen it, so we watched it. Miss Emsley was making fun of the movie, and I tried to let that roll off me as best I could. Took Angie home. Cuddled and went to sleep.

Tuesday, August 9th: Again woke up before her. Knew she’d want coffee, so I suggested IHOP. We got a massive booth all to ourselves. Came back here. She made me watch Dr. Horrible, which was absolutely hilarious. It made me feel like I was completely out of the loop in terms of funny things, or internet things. Or both. However, she had never seen “Do You Take It In The Ass?”, so I had my revenge by getting that song in her head.

Wasn’t planning coitus, but it was just as enjoyable as the previous day’s. Really just love her tummy and wanted to cover it in kisses. In post-coital cuddle, glanced at clock. Time was short, so she gathered her things.

Drive to the airport felt like something out of a movie. She made me a .. well, not a mix. She introduced me to some music which is ENTIRELY up my alley. The moment I stopped the stereo as we approached the arrival area is etched into memory. The final squeeze and affections. I know I’ve said I wanted to write my next nano about work. There are a lot of stories there. But this.. tweak it a little, change some names and situations, could make for a very awesome primary romantic thread. I mentioned this to her, and I completely forgot that I based the character of Tina partly off of Miss Emsley’s mannerisms. Go figure. If I know what’s good for me, I’ll brainstorm basic personality threads for main characters. Somewhere between the characters, I will find a story.

All through this, it’s hard to ever recount all the awesome conversation we had. Some small, some big and meaningful. I’ve come away from this vacation feeling completely 100% renewed. I feel like I got a hard kick out of the rut I was in. I have a feeling that in the coming weeks, I’ll be reminded of things that happened in the past four days, and use that wisdom and strength to endure forward.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, it’s after 3 AM on August 10th and I have to return to the world of the living soon. BEST VACATION EVER. Next year, totally taking Angie with me to Seattle.