The Ninth Inning

Sometimes things just don't go as you had hoped they would. Friday had been progressing pretty much as expected. Unfortunately, as expected, I was still waiting on a call from HP about our laptop (yeah, that's still unresolved, but that's a long story, as you may know).

We had planned on leaving the house at 6pm to get to the married night out thing at church. It was obvious that HP would not call before they closed at 6, so shortly before that I called one of their numbers to try to have them transfer me to the line I couldn't otherwise get through to. After about 10 minutes of talking to two different people, I got the infamous "There is nothing I can do".

[Strike one! I am getting so tired of HPs garbage that it immediately downgraded my mood a couple points]

It was then 6:07pm and by the time we got out of the house, it was 6:12.

[Strike two! I had been on the cell phone and assumed we would just jump in the car when everyone else was ready, but now we were running behind. One thing I really hate is being late. No matter where we are going and no matter how many other people are also going to be late, I hate it. I have a saying that I like to live by "Better never than late.", but I knew I could make up some time on freeway - mood teetering on another edge.]

Of course traffic was a little heavier than normal, but we eventually made it to the freeway on ramp. I was behind a bunch of cars putzing along.

[Strike three! You're Out. Another thing I really dislike is idiot drivers! Harsh? Yes, but you know as well as I do that they exist and they exist in large quantities. Now, some of these people are probably 'nice' and some of them are probably gainfully employed, some may even have friends, but let's be honest here: They can't drive worth a darn! I don't know why so many people are oblivious to the fact that on-ramps are lengthy and gently enter the freeway for a reason: so you can pick up enough speed to merge in with existing traffic! Otherwise there would just be stop signs. Now some of you are thinking (or maybe not) "Yeah, but in some bigger cities I've seen those stoplights on the on-ramp that let only one car through at a time. Yes, but when do they use those? During rush hour when the traffic is going like 2mph anyway. It really irritates me when people are going 40mph when we hit the freeway lanes.]

So as we rode our brakes onto the freeway, other traffic was passing us at a faster speed so it was nearly impossible to change lanes. I was finally able to momentarily get to the second lane on my way to the third lane to have some breathing room. As I cut across the second lane, the van in front of me tapped his brakes (going 60 must have shaken him up a bit). I continued on to the third lane, smoothly and what I considered safely. However, there was a differing opinion throughout the car and I was instructed to slow down.

[Strike four! Now we were definitely going to be late! I thought about just returning home (see saying-to-live-by above), but I couldn't get over to the exit; the slow lane was full of people going 40.]

So as I got comfortable in my slow ride down the freeway, I was instructed to go faster.

[Strike five! Nobody likes to be told how to drive, least wise me.]

I set the cruise at 65mph. About 3 seconds later I had to hit the brakes so as not to hit one of those people going 60 in the fast lane. Such was the drive to church.

We had been planning on saving seats for someone, let's call them 'Couple A', but it became apparent that they would be there before we were so we called them and asked them to save us seats instead.

We arrived about 5 minutes late, others were pulling in also, but as previously mentioned, that's beside the point.

Standing at the doorway of a very full room with the live music already going, we scanned for Couple A. I spotted them at a table; in the FRONT!

[Strike six! Two outs. Yes, right in front of the stage. I have always been a back row kind of guy. Just trying to blend into the background. From the back I can stretch, nod off, or even pick my nose and nobody knows. But in the front, I break out into a slight sweat, I am afraid to move so by the time the event is over, I usually have stiff joints and aching muscles.]

We didn't have much choice at that time and we could see three empty chairs beside Couple A. So after getting up the nerve to walk through a room full of crowded people up to the front, bobbing and weaving around the circular tables, I planted my self into the center empty seat. I was already feeling my body temperature rise (inversely proportional to the drop in my mood) as I just knew everyone in the room was now aware that we were late.

Then we were hit with the fact that the seats were actually already taken! I tried to move the next chair, but that was taken also. So there I was standing in front of everybody with no place to go.

[Strike seven! How embarrassing! Now what? Everyone was already watching every move we made, would we have to leave, regroup and then try again? ]

As luck (what little we had) would have it, the person who had been saving the seat (not Couple A, I might add), came by and insisted that we take the seats; who am I to argue. By that time my lovely wife was seated in the center seat so I sat in the one directly facing the back wall.

[Strike eight! Not only was I at the very front table, but I had my back to the stage. This was shaping up to be quite the evening of fun and laughter.]

Sitting sideways in my chair watching the entertainment, I tried to process what had just happened, it went something like this:

-I walked into a crowded room LATE.
-I walked to the front of the room as everyone watched.
-I sat in not one, not two, but three different chairs, all of which were taken.
-I ended up facing backward two feet from the stage.

Needless to say (well, not really, or else I wouldn't be saying it) I wasn't in the greatest of moods. But I knew that things should begin to improve and I was just trying to settle in and give my mood time to slowly get back to normal.

But wait, there's more. Let me give you a little background. I very very rarely ever, actually bordering on never, raise my hand. I didn't raise it in school (from the back row) even if I was the only one who knew the answer. I don't raise it when some random Pastor asks for a show of hands (most of which are for rhetorical questions anyway). I don't even raise it when I make a right hand turn on my bike.

So when the dude on stage came out and asked a question in which every person listening should have raised their hand, I didn't. I wasn't in the mood, and even if I was, I wouldn't have raised my hand. I, being in the front, knew what he was going to do as he walked over to me squinting through the lights and asked me to come up on stage.

[Strike nine!]

OK, a little more background. I don't do public speaking, I don't do stages. But just as quirky, I try not to act surprised, even if I don't know what's coming, but especially if I do know. So in an attempt to show that 1) I knew what was coming and 2) I wasn't going to raise my hand anyway (you can't make me), I stood up and went on stage.

But there is no way, under the circumstances, that he was going to get me to say what he wanted me to, and I didn't (that's my small victory for the night).

At that point I had 3 outs and the inning was over, finally.