Friday, August 17, 2007

Standing up for myself

I had thought of posting yesterday but everything I thought of just sounded so full of wrath. Because I was annoyed. Yelling and slamming doors annoyed.

Grasshopper started the sofa surfing on Wednesday night. Well, actually I let her take the bedroom because the TV with the DVR is in the living room and I like to view into the wee hours of the night. Wednesday night her boyfriend helped her bring stuff in. He then used my computer to look for a job; he too is currently jobless. He started complaining about a hum. Turns out it was the CPU. And thus started my annoyance.

Yesterday morning he came back to take Grasshopper to work. He returned. I thought to use the computer once more. Nope. He sat down on the end of the futon in the living room and proceeded to go to sleep. And he snores. This was around 10 a.m., about the time I awake from my morning nap. (I get up at 6 a.m. to feed the cats every day. Then I usually watch a little TV and go back to sleep around 8 or so.) So around noon, I loudly asked, "Where did you park your car?" He grumbled something. I figured screw it. If you don't have a resident or visitor sticker in my neighborhood, then it's two hour parking. He got a ticket. Not my problem though because I'm not his mother. Heck. I'm not even his friend. He's the boyfriend of my friend.

And so the annoyance continued to build throughout the day. At one point I stepped outside to call Buzzgirl because I felt like throttling him. Oh, because I had moved from my end of the futon to check email at one point. When I turned back around, he had taken over the entire futon. Huh? What the fuck? So I didn't get my afternoon nap. And without that nap, I can be kind of cranky these days.

When Grasshopper returned, I was in my car once more. This was sometime between 7:30 p.m. and 8. And yes, the slacker was still asleep. When we walked in she asked me what was wrong. I told her to turn around. She woke him up and told him to move to the bedroom. But did he? Noooo. Instead, I hear from the kitchen, "You can't change the channel when it's recording?" Men are not allowed to touch the remote control in my home. Not at any time. That's part of what pissed me off about Retail Boy that time. Well, besides his begging for food. Finally around 8:30 he moved. And that's when I discovered that the DVR was not recording what I had wanted, "Big Brother 8." That was the point at which I completely lost it. I screamed something about how I would have had the opportunity to catch that mistake earlier if the futon had not been occupied for so damn long. And I happened to be on the phone with BWB at the time. So I grabbed my cigarettes and continued the conversation from the comfort of my car. I know. Sad. (Fortunately, Hilly reminded me that I could see the episode online. But still...)

When I finally returned, I explained to Grasshopper that I was highly annoyed and felt like my boundaries had been violated. I told her that I haven't had to live with another person in quite some time, especially one whom I barely know. I told her that it was imperative that in the day I have time that is completely mine -- no other people around. I told her that she was welcome to stay but I needed to have my space respected. She said she would talk to him. I hope to hell that she does.

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