and fighting the grumpies

wow, my stress levels hit the roof this evening, and I am not quite sure why. The day had relaxed me more than I expected, spending the time with my mom and reading kindergarten books, but as soon as I got home I realized how edgy I was. I called Artur, who I had expected to call hours earlier, to discover that he was sitting in his new apartment having a beer with his new roommate. This should have made me happy, but instead I felt a mixture of hurt and jealously, that he hadnt called earlier if he was home and relaxing and that he was having fun. I wasnt having that much fun, was I? I guaged my irrational female reaction, and hung up with a promise of a return phone call at six and a giant lump in my throat. I was supposed to be heading to happy hour to drink frozen cosmopolitans with my mother and I knew it would go one way or the other: relax me and cheer me up or drown my sorrow and make me all the more irritable.

But I got downstairs to ensuing chaos as my brother and dad struggled to make Quiche Lorraine with recently purchased farm fresh eggs in our boiling hot kitchen, and my mother got herself embroiled in the debate about how much bacon they should use. I could feel my grumpiness boiling over like a cloud, and fussed that we should be going soon, then felt guilty and offered my help, and when refused due to the small size of the kitched, slumped on the couch in a sweaty grumpy teary lump mood. What was wrong with me? Theres nothing to complain about, I am sitting at home on vacation and whining because my boyfriend is so busy moving out of his apartment that he only calls twice a day. Not really much to complain about. But I knew my grumpiness wasnt bound to pass until I talked to him, cause I knew what was really wrong was that I missed him, rational or not, and didnt feel like whiling away the 2 more days till his arrival.

At any rate, my mother and I finally made it out of the house, probably to short circuit an oncoming grumpiness blowout on my part, and ordered our drinks: lovely vodka cranberry slushies. And then hummus, with lime. And then another slushie. Things were looking better, and then the phone rang. Oh hooray, that must be Artur. But no, it was dad. Andrew had spilled the eggs. Could he talk to mom, he needed to know how to get the stain out of the carpet. Blech. Oh, and Artur had called, and they had given him the cell number but he couldnt seem to get it right. Damn. Now I wasnt going to get to talk to him, the one thing I knew might shake me out of my funk. I glowered through the evening, through an espresso, a gelato, and what should have been some wonderful mother daughter bonding time. My mother tried her best to comfort me, but to no avvail. The only slight comfort was the apology email from Artur when I got home, saying he tried the number but it wasnt working. Well, better than nothing.

The best comfort of the evening was taking my scratched cds to the grindstone literally, using a bizarre but functional device of my brothers to buff away the blemishes and burn off some of my nervous energy. Then there were push ups and crunches, part of my new "responsible" fitness routine. Laundry folding, face washing, body lotioning..who was I? Some weird German version of myself, I guess, who didnt seem so weird back in Germany. I have to say, I always thought that dealing with difficult strangers was hard...try it when the foreigner is yourself!