Today, my friends, is a day that will live in infamy. Did I say infamy? I meant idiocy. I had to decline a lunch date on the steps of the Art Institute of Chicago with a pretty girl because I was obligated to be at my apartment between 11:30 AM and 3:30 PM so that I could let the person from the gas company in to read my meter.

This meter reading had already been rescheduled from one week before, and had I known about the possibility of the lunch date, I would not have chosen this particular day for it to be rescheduled. However, the appointment was set, and I was forced to decline the lunch date, with an eye towards possible lunch dates in the future.

At about noon, the guy from the gas company came. I had fallen asleep on the couch the night before, and therefore was utterly unprepared to let the gas guy in. Fortunately, the gas guy (who turned out to be a gal) merely wanted to get into my basement. I told her that I would meet her around at the back gate. I put on some pants and went to exit my apartment through the back door. However, I was unsuccessful because, in what was to be a harbinger of the stupid day ahead, the doorknob popped right off the door into my hand. It is to this moment resting on my kitchen counter.

So I had to exit through the front door and run around to the back of the building. I did so, and then opened the basement door for the gas gal. We entered and I pointed her in the direction of a wall filled up with meter-y looking fixtures.

“Those are electricity meters,” she said.

We looked around, and seeing no other meters nearby, peered through a locked gate into another section of the basement, presumably used for storage and janitorial purposes, and sure enough, there was another wall of meters.

“I can tell which one is yours,” she said. “It’s the only one there that hasn’t been upgraded.”

“Really?” I asked.

“Yeah, it doesn’t make sense… I can’t figure out why they all weren’t just upgraded at the same time.”

With the meter inaccessible, I walked over to the super’s back door and knocked, to see if perhaps he could get the gas gal at the meter. Alas, there was no answer.

“I guess I’ll have to reschedule,” I told the gas gal.

So, to sum up: declined a date with pretty girl for stupid reason; had stupid encounter with gas company, which was more stupid than was anticipated; must reschedule another stupid encounter for later date which will likely result in declining another date with a pretty girl for what will turn out to be stupid reason.

Gah!