In which Will can’t seem to do right…

…for doing wrong.

So, this would be about Monday night then.

I had an interesting day on Monday. I finally got the solution to not one but two technical problems I’ve been having recently (which I’ll write about later), and life was pretty good.

Then I got a phone call from my friend Nikki. Now, the two of us used to do the quiz at the union every other week when we had the money. She’s started French classes so we can’t anymore.

Anyhoo, she wasn’t going to class this week as she had been away to visit fer fiance’s mother. So she asked if I wanted to do the quiz as we hadn’t done so this academic year and she didn’t know when the next time we would be able to do so is. I said sure and met her in the union.

Everything was going fine and we had been joined by another friend Stuart. Then Daphne phoned me and told me about her huge phone bill. We got into a bit of an argument about that and I pointed out that I was out with Nikki as I probably wouldn’t see her again until Daphne came over here. (Me and Nikki get ‘paid’ on the same day and usually go out for a few drinks then. The next time we get paid is the week before Daphne gets here, so I won’t be going out then so I can save my money.) This resulted in me hanging up on Daphne.

Then Stuart dragged me to one side to talk to me about Jemma, a mutual friend. Jemma was feeling down at the weekend and did something stupid. I found out when she texted me and tild me. Daphne found out cos I was speaking to her on MSN at the time and I told her (Jemma and Daphne met when Daphne was over in August). Stuart found out through Jemma. He was pissed that she didn’t text him herself. But, not being able to be too angry at her, he took it out on me. Which I can understand.

The thing that was depressing Jemma was something she needed some advice from a female about. Her only friends (as far as she is concerned anyway) in Boro is me and Stuart. So I decided to ask Nikki if she could get closer to Jemma. That upset Nikki as she already thought that her and Jemma were close. I then told Nikki about what happened at the weekend, and she was then upset that I asked her for a specific reason. (Which, in truth, I did. Just not the one that Nikki thinks it is. Both her and Jemma have a lot of male friends but not many female friends. I thought it would be good for both of them.)

Then Stuart kept asking why Jemma didn’t tell him. Little backstory here: Stuart fancies Jemma. Even Stevie Wonder could see that Stuart fancies Jemma. This scared her to the point that I kept being asked to meet up with them to help her out. So I point out that he is scaring her a bit and needs to back off. He then wondered how she would know how he feels about her (he’s only young and has little experience with women). I pointed out that she knows but it’s never going to happen if he keeps up like this and to just be a friend to her.

(Little postscript to this story: I’ve just got a text from Jemma saying that her and Stu are going to make a go of it.)

So now Stuart is pissed off with me again for telling him this. Then Daphne phones back and I manage to calm her down about what happened before. Then she phones back again to tell me she’s thinking about going out for a few drinks with someone and do I mind? I say no and then have to cut the call short as I’m literally about to be thrown out the building.

So, during the night, I manage to piss of Daphne at least once, upset Nikki twice, upset Stuart twice and possibly upset Jemma (I’m not entirely sure). All in the process of trying to be a good friend. It’s times like this that I wish I never bothered.

Then, just to cap everything off, I manage to break my terracotta warrior at some point during the night.

Will