Wednesday, November 17, 2004

!st Place

I'm supposed to be writing a folktale right now, but I'm procrastinating. Instead I'll write a little entry in my blog for once.
I actually wanted to do my laundary today. About two weeks ago our landlady finally installed a washer and a dryer in the apartment. I've been meaning to do my laundary since then, but I just haven't gotten around to it. I tried to do it today but the stupid door is locked! So many obstacles. All my clothes smell horrible. I can't stand it anymore, it's getting to the point where I don't even want to go out until I have a chance to wash them.
About a month ago I won a thousand dollars from this writing contest this hoity-toity club in Chicago called the Union League holds every year. I got first place, and my story was published in their anthology. Here are the initial, direct repercussions of this:
1. I got really drunk the night I found out and crashed my bike into a parked car because I was staring at the street under my feet while I was riding, thinking to myself, "I'm going to crash." I hit the ground and had to wait until these four other drunk people came by and untangled me from my bike. One of them wanted to take off my shoes, for some reason. I walked the rest of the way home, half crying, half laughing hysterically because I seriously injured my arm. It still hurts, and now every time I straighten it out it pops.
2. I paid both mine and my roomate Jason's rent with the big bucks, with enough left over for me to pay what I owed the gas, electric, and phone companies, plus a little extra.
3. I bought a BB gun with the little extra. This is something that I've always wanted. Nothing has made me feel more like an immature little kid than the experience of aquiring this thing, which I've pretty much been consistently firing since I got it monday. I spent three hours on two different websites looking at all these different air-soft guns until I finally bought one off of ebay for 40 dollars. It took a week to get here. The night before it was supposed to arrive I could barely sleep, and I had all these terrified dreams about being cheated or the thing not showing up or showing up as just a little keychain gun, for instance. I woke up extra early, but kept slipping back into half-sleep with my ears fixed on the front door, anticipating the UPS lady's arrival. Finally at noon she pounded on the door and yelled "UPS!" I was naked so I couldn't answer the door right away, and for a second I was scared I might not find any pants in time and the UPS lady would leave, but Anna knew where my robe was, so I signed for it and got back under the covers and opened the box while it rested on mine and Anna's lap. She was like "Oh, God" and made jokes about me putting together a gun before breakfast. Two words: Laser. Sight. There are little orange BBs all over the apartment now.