Valentine

It is positively vile outside but I do not care, because I finally got to use the new umbrella. And what luck! I got to try the new boots at the same time. Both = success! I am warm, dry, and cute.

We've been wishing for snow and when we finally get it, it instantly turns to brown slush. Luckily we got to witness a bit of it last night before the weather turned ghastly.

Last night's "let's just stay for an hour" morphed into 5 hours of complete drunkenness. I choked up when I said "good-bye" to him (seeing his face was enough to reduce all of we girls to blubbering idiots) and choked up even more when I considered saying good-bye to everyone. It's never the job itself that you miss. People have been leaving at an alarming rate, we have one of these a week it seems, and they're always shared. Mine will be soon, shared, and messy. I'll only be a few hours away but it won't be the same. There will be no mass debauchery. I know I'm not important enough to merit a Friday night gathering when I announce "I'm going to be in NYC! Everyone come play!"

Things change, and I have to remind myself that they are changing for the better and this sort of thing is normal. I don't miss non-work friends, because those friends stay in your life. Work-friends are work-friends, and when work is removed from the equation sometimes it sometimes doesn't work. It's a natural progression, but still sad.

Last night was so very fun. One of the most fun nights I've had in NYC. We've all been under too much stress, and we needed to all be together and be insane. We ordered pizzas and devoured them within seconds. We gossipped about the people who weren't there. We learned new things about people who were. We gushed with affection and brought certain things to an end. I wonder if he knows how his leaving affects so many things.

The girls were greeted by Valentine candies this morning. We couldn't solve the mystery because normally we'd assume that he left them.

It feels good to be hung over (I would give a limb right now for scrambled eggs). I feel like this whole saving-money-thing has prevented me from having fun. As someone said last night, one should celebrate constantly during one's birthday month and with this I agree!

D and I were going to go out tonight. In the past D has been anti-Valentine's Day. Well, not anti-Valentine's Day but anti-going-out-when-everyone's-going-out. We'd made no plans and agreed not to do anything, but yesterday he called and said "There are all these things going on tomorrow night - do you want to go to any of them?"

This resulted in a weird conversation where I was like "Well, do you?" and he'd be like "I just want you to be happy - when you're happy, I'm happy" and I was like "Well, I don't really want to do any of those things but if you're asking me out on a date because you want to do them, I totally want to go, because if going would make you happy, then that's what I want." We're such idiots. It's not that I didn't want to go to any of them - I just knew I'd be feeling a little woozy from the night before and wouldn't necessarily want to be out late, spending money, drinking again, etc. I said "Well, if you want me to be happy, then I would like you to come to see Dreamgirls with me and maybe we can go out for dinner beforehand." He got very excited (!) and made plans. It was adorable. I think he must secretly like Valentine's Day, because all previous attempts to get him to see Dreamgirls with me have failed miserably.

Now, however, I am tired and the weather is grotesque and I didn't do laundry last night, and I need to clean the apartment and probably get much sleep tonight in preparation for the weekend's festivities - party at the apartment on Friday, karaoke, tapas and hopefully vegetarian cheesecake and dancing on Saturday - and we can go to Dreamgirls whenever we want. I think he's disappointed. I mentioned today that I can finally take a normal length lunch (lately I've been doing ten minute lunches because I've been so busy), and he was like "Oh! Do you want to go somewhere? What about this? What about that?" He didn't realize that by normal I meant I would be eating for a half hour (most people here lunch for hours), but how cute is he? He's adorable. I can't stand it.

I guess that's what Valentine's Day is about. It's not candy or flowers or poems. It's seeing your boyrfiend, who you live with, want to spend time with you and make you happy. And wanting to make him happy.

I'm so lucky.

Oh. And pretend I'm sending cute cyber-Valentine's to you. Thanks for reading, if anyone's still out there.