Day 60:

Had coffee in our pajamas at George's house. Abby came over, too-- she and George had planned to go to the mall-- and brought her sister's bulldog puppy with her. (I miss how pets draw positive attention out of people. With no pets and no TV, our apartment has no easy place to fix your eyes. I both enjoy the unpredictability of it, and am saddened by how challenging it is to make human conversation for a lot of people.) Charlie really belongs to Abby's older sister, who she lives with, is pregnant, and is a local minister. For this reason Abby will not come over next week when I have promised to make pancakes. "Breakfast is my religion," I told her.

We went down to New York one more time this month. As always, perfect food, perfect company. Lots of new people. Today is my two month anniversary of leaving the Bronx. Everyone asks how Connecticut is, and it's getting harder and harder to describe. How about this: now, the Bronx is the place where new people overwhelm me, and Hartford is the place where new people are potential friends. Or: the Bronx is the big event, Hartford is where I have coffee and sit on the floor with a puppy. Or: Hartford must be home now.

Day 59: The Mall

The mall is the most depressing place on earth. Notice how it's always referred to as "THE" mall, as if they were all clones scattered about the country.

Greg and I had a rental car today, and I had the night off (after five hours of standing at the host stand watching people run to their cars in the below-freezing weather), so we decided to do some things we can't in Hartford. First we headed down to Manchester to eat grinders at Bill and Joanna's. The second we hit that city the old feelings of mall-related frustration came on. I try to like a lot of places, but strip-mall cities are just terrible. After our grinders we went to Target-- I had to get a lampshade and Greg had to get some canned air and power strips (He's always buying abstract things, like "power" and "air"). Christmas crap was in full bloom and I was momentarily tempted by some penguin salt-and-pepper shakers, so we had to get out of there. That's when we hit the mall. Main activities: waiting in line for Fribbles, figuring out the difference between "abercrombie" and "Abercrombie and Fitch" (two separate stores!), and generally being incredulous about people who go to malls for a hot Saturday night, self-loathing included. Had a momentary flashback of my father's deep concern that I was becoming a mall rat about twelve years ago. Then had a crisis: was I a mall rat in middle school? Unsure. It was New Jersey in the mid-nineties. Mallrats was a popular movie at the time.

We were in the mall to kill an hour before the pinnacle of our night-in-Connecticut-with-a-car: blockbuster film on the big screen. I have an above-average love of being in a crowded movie theater. Even better, this was the opening weekend of an insanely popular movie about teen love between a vampire and a surly non-vampire, so the place was packed with energy. The kids in the theater were plenty rowdy and lusty. They had probably just come from the mall, too, but now their energy was centered around a story, instead of the deadening experience of shopping. Somehow, it was so much better. Greg wasn't even too mad at me for making him see a terrible teen vampire movie.

The whole night was, in retrospect, a suburban teenage date. I'm glad we did it once, but I definitely do not want a car.

Day 56: Cold Night, Warm Food

Went to Black Eyed Sally's and healed myself from the cold with live blues in a roomful of musicians from out of town. Everybody was eating cornbread with honey butter and making little videos on their cameras. I was reading James Wood and slabbing on the honey butter. This is the restaurant where George has gotten a second host job, so I was there to visit. We talked about how, now that he's decided to drop out of school, he might move to Hawaii and become a Scuba instructor. We agreed upon the scariness of wreck diving, but as we talked about it I could feel myself mixing my fear with the desire to do it myself.

Greg came to walk me home, but really to have five warm minutes before we both got back to work. We lingered for a song. When we needed to hear each other speak, we left and walked up Asylum towards home, planning Thanksgiving and happy to have remembered our coats.

Day 55: Ownership

Two of the three owners of the brewery were there tonight. They got drunk and asked me about New Jersey. A guy from Minneapolis asked how long of a drive it was to the beach. I found myself telling him about the Jersey shore instead. He wanted so badly to know what there was to do around here, not knowing that for a Tuesday night, pool and local beer was nothing to complain about. The owners left for another bar-- "For Scotch!"-- and I said, "Come back with all your clothes on, it's cold out there," which solidified their love for me. One of them returned in five minutes with a young woman and they took over the Minneapolis guy's pool game. As my night was ending, a woman called to make a Comedy reservation and had a Jersey area code. New Jersey, stop contacting me! I'll be home soon enough.

The host stand is starting to feel like my own place, especially when the restaurant is nearly empty and I end up watching the reflections of television in the windows and talking to servers I thought I didn't really like, but do.