I have a date tonight with Bird and we’re really excited about it. We’re going out for dinner and a show. Classic.
After work, we’re going to this little Mexican joint, which she loves but I’ve never been to. The best part about dinner is that I have a $25 gift certificate that I got for $2 from Restaurant.com when they were running a special promotion.
After dinner, we’ll be heading downtown to see Wicked! Basically, I don’t know anything about it other than the fact that it is sort of tied to the Wizard of Oz. Bird once went to see it in Chicago with her mom and I know she really loves it. In fact, she’s the one that bought tickets for this show way back in May. She’s been waiting a long time and it’s finally here. So I don’t know what to expect, I’m really excited because she’s so excited! Have any of you seen it? Thoughts?
Also, while I was sick all weekend, Bird came down to my house each day and took care of me and made me soup, etc. So to thank her for that and to surprise her today before our date, I’ve sent some flowers to her work. But here’s my ethical dilemma. I always search for coupon codes on Google when I’m making a purchase online. In this particular instance, the best coupon code was a corporate code. 20% off just by entering the name of a corporation in the coupon code box, but of course, I don’t work for that corporation. I entered the code anyway, but I feel a little guilty. Thoughts on that?
Tomorrow, I’ll try to write up my impressions of Wicked and how much everything cost me. It shouldn’t be too bad because of my gift certificate and Bird having paid for the tickets. I’ll try to cover parking downtown and any part of dinner not covered by the gift card.
Tonight after work, Bird and I will be heading over to downtown St. Paul to meet up with our friends M and D at a restaurant called Pop! Sort of like a double-date. After dinner we’ll wander over to the Fitzgerald Theater (home of A Prairie Home Companion) and take in the wonderful music of Martin Sexton. After that, I’ll be rushing over to meet my friends at a local church for some floor hockey fun!
You have no idea how excited I am for tonight, though I’m trying to tell you! Dinner should be fine or whatever. I like trying new restaurants, but I don’t really care too much about food. I do care about music and I love Martin Sexton. This will be my 4th or 5th time seeing him and he’s one of my favorites because he always seems so HAPPY! Plus, it will be my first time going to the Fitzgerald Theater so I’m excited to see that, too.
Did I mention that M is paying for dinner because I bought the tickets. It’s not exactly a fair trade, unless we eat A LOT of food, but I don’t care at all.
Then floor hockey. The puck drops at 10:10, so after the concert I’ll drop Bird off at her place and race over there, hoping I’m not too late to take part in most of the action. It’s just a group of guys from college that I don’t get to hang out with very often but I love it when I do. Outrageous costumes/outfits are encouraged. (I’ll be coming from the concert, so I won’t be participating in that part). We’re going to have so much fun.
I can’t wait for this work day to be over so that we can get on with the evening. Not even the cold rainy weather is going to put a damper on tonight.
We’re having a little get together tonight with a few friends and I’m going dressed as a panda and might I add, I’m pretty proud of my costume. It’s awesome.
I’m going to see Sigur Ros in Minneapolis tonight with Bird and a few of our friends. Everyone is really excited for the show and it’ll be hard to sit through work today. I love live music, but concerts can be expensive and I consider them a real treat.
I’ve never seen Sigur Ros before but I’m a pretty big fan of their music and I think it should be pretty awesome. I’ve been reading other blogs and reviews and it’s just getting me more and more excited! So I’ll be listening to the band on my ipod all day at work and I’m hoping that helps the day move by.
As far as finances go, this concert isn’t cheap. (Thanks, Ticketmaster! Woof.) Tickets with the extra fees come to $54 a piece and I’m paying for mine and Bird’s. Fortunately, the night shouldn’t cost me much more than the $108. We are having dinner at Bird’s beforehand (she’s making chicken enchiladas. Yum!). We will all carpool downtown, so parking fees should be minimal when split amongst the four of us. I’m not planning on buying anything at the concert. Lastly, Bird and I are sort of on this kick about getting to bed earlier so I don’t think there are any plans to go out after the show.
So while the tickets were expensive, it could be worse. And really, every once in a while it’s nice to spend some money on something that you think is really going to be worth it.
Bird’s birthday was on Tuesday. Tonight we’re going out for a pseudo-fancy dinner and it should be a really good time. I’ve spent this week shopping for a really great gift for her in the very little free time I’ve had. It was a bit rushed and I missed her actual birthday, but I finally picked something up last night and I can’t wait to give it to her tonight. I’ll try to tell you more later, for now, it’s back to work.
Why do Fridays at work go so slow? The office is dead today. I don’t know if I’ve said more than 10 words all day. I can’t wait to get out of here. One hour to go.
In other news, my brother took me out to dinner last night and tried to pitch a business idea to me. He has no money, I have a little bit. He wants me to be his angel investor. I’m going to think about it.
I went camping last weekend. Friday night we stopped at a restaurant for dinner on the way to the campground. That cost me about $16. We split the camping fees among the four of us and so that cost me about $11. My share of the food for the weekend was about $12. Once we were at the campground, I spent $12 on firewood. Firewood is such a ripoff at a campground, but we’re not allowed to bring our own and so you’re kind of forced to buy it. And since I’m a little pyro, or I just really like having campfires, I bought lots of wood!! And we had a great time. The weekend cost me around $50 but it was well worth it.
As for the non-PF aspects of the weekend: Friday night there was a huge storm, so we took shelter in the campground bathrooms as they were the only solid structures around. After the storm blew through, we returned to our site to find a thoroughly soaked tent. I basically slept in a puddle. Saturday consisted of hiking, reading (I read Man Walks Into a Room - anyone out there read it?), eating, napping, and enjoying conversation around the fire. Sunday was much the same as Saturday except we packed up and headed home around 1 pm. Pretty much a great weekend.
Thinking back over the weekend, I did more than just work on the house. Here’s a brief recap:
Friday Night: A friend of mine is a rockstar and his band recently got their first record deal. So Friday night we all went out to their cd release concert. The show was supposed to start at 9, but the first band didn’t begin to play until 10:30. By the time the second band began to play, I was getting sleepy. My friend’s band didn’t go on until 12:30 and by this time I was barely awake. One of the guys that rode with me needed to be at work at 7 the next morning and so we ended up only staying for three songs. Yeah, I know….but seriously, I was exhausted. I’m old! Expenses:$5 cover charge, $5 for the band’s EP, $3 for photobooth photos with a friend.
Saturday: We met with the realtor Saturday morning and then spent most of the day cleaning the garage and moving stuff out there. We ordered pizza for lunch. Saturday night a friend came over to take me out to dinner for my birthday. We had some great Thai food and ended up renting a movie from the Redbox (I love it) and she made me cupcakes. Expenses: $12 for pizza.
Sunday: More moving and cleaning. While cleaning the house, I heard my friend’s band on the radio. It was a surreal experience. I had leftover Thai for dinner. Expenses: $0
Monday: Monday was my birthday and I woke up feeling even older than I did on Friday night — stiff and sore from moving stuff all weekend. Monday involved more cleaning (best birthday ever! j/k). You would think that my house was just an absolute pigsty, but that’s not the case. We had some demolition work to do (taking down a wall we built) and the resulting clean-up took a long time, not to mention all the other general cleaning that had to be done. That night I went out for birthday dinner with family and it was a lot of fun. As for gifts, I received some money from my parents along with a gas gift card* (very handy!) and a Chipotle gift card* (very tasty!). One brother got me a Cub Foods gift card* (this will help when I begin my old grocery routine) and the other brother got me a membership to the Sovereign Society (check it out, it’s weird!). This was actually a hilarious gift; it was totally back-handed because I know he wanted to join but didn’t have a good excuse to, so he got me a membership and told me to share my password with him. To be honest, I haven’t even had time to explore their website yet. After dinner, I stopped to fill up on gas (goodbye, gift card) and then stopped at Target and ended up buying a few groceries and decorations for staging the house. Expenses: $64 at Target, $35 for gas Income: $225 in birthday gifts!
All in all, it was a nice long weekend, I would have rather spent more of it outside, but you can’t always get what you want. Plus, with birthday money and free meals…I came out ahead.
*For accounting purposes, I treat gift cards as cash.
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