Friday was supposed to be a good day. My boss was out of town, which is usually a good thing. It was Ryan’s birthday, and we were going to the hockey game, and then probably out drinking (and looking for chicks, of course). I had the whole day and evening planned out. That was mistake #1. My boss was in and out of meetings all day. For some reason, not only did this mean that he needed to talk to me repeatedly, but also that he was incapable of calling the office phone. He must have called my cell phone a dozen times, in a single day, even though I kept asking him to call the office phone instead. Blarg #1. Right before I was going to leave I was informed that … well I can’t go into details, but basically I got a huge project dumped on me that needed to be done for Monday. Blarg #2, but not the end of the world. It’s not like I have a life, so working over the weekend isn’t all that bad (or out of the ordinary).

Went to the RIT Hockey game with Ryan. Wow did they suck. It looked like we were an intramural team, not Division 1. RIT played like absolute crap, AND the Refs called the entire game in favor of the other team. Oh, and my favorite part was the goalie constantly kicking the net off as soon as we got in a position to score. He most have kicked it off a dozen times, and never got called for it. Blarg. Luckily, I decided to go home and get some work done while Ryan hit his first bar (or 2). Got home, already pissed about working, and hockey, and needing to miss Ryan’s birthday, only to get a call from my mother to tell me that my Grandfather had died. Perfect timing.

Now, not only did I have to finish a huge project by Monday, but I had to be in Birmingham, AL on Monday, and I had to figure out how to get there and back. The only plausible tickets I could find were $1300, so I ended up burning 37,500 Frequent Flyer miles instead. I wont even get into traveling, except to say that of my 4 flights, 1 of them left on time. Blarg some more. I was in Birmingham for about 2 blinks of an eye. The funeral was sad, as expected. Worse when we all realized we were literally standing on, or next to, my grandmother Evelyn’s grave, who I never met, and my Uncle Rick’s gave, who we just buried last December. Mindblowingly depressing.

Almost everyone in my family told me how much they liked me with hair. Oh, for those of you who don’t know, I’m growing my hair out. I don’t know how long yet, and I don’t know if I’ll keep it long, or if it’s just an experiment. Right now I’m hating every minute of it. Getting to the point, one of my cousins, instead of keeping quiet or lying to me and telling me he liked it, decided to say, “You couldn’t get a haircut?” At the funeral. Right before we were about to carry my grandfather out of the hearse.

Although Papa’spassing was sad, I think we all knew it was beyond his time. He’d been suffering for months, and in the hospital on life support for weeks. It wasn’t a surprise to anyone. I won’t speak for the rest of the family, but I personally am happy that he’s not suffering any more. Again, speaking only for myself, I was lead to believe that Papa was broke, since he hadn’t worked in years, and was simply living off of his second wife’s fortune. Essie owns Dale’s stake sauce. For those of you don’t know what Dale’s is, it’s basically more popular than A-1, everywhere except the northeast. Apparently I was wrong, because Papa left behind a pretty big estate. Big by my standards, not by most peoples. But, a hell of a lot more than I was expecting (nothing).

His will dictated how the money be split up, but my father (clearly) doesn’t need his portion, so he’s splitting it between my sister and myself. So, I’m getting a pretty decent amount of money, out of the blue. Thank you Papa. It’s basically going to put me through school, clear all my debt, and uh .. a bunch more. I’m still trying to wrap my head around this. Found out just before I left to come back to 7 degree Rochester.