A Ridiculous Proposal

Yes, after a mere 8 months since my last update, I've decided it's time for a new blog post. I know, I'm too productive. So I'll just blame the long delay on Girlfriend. That seems to work out just fine. It really is her fault. If she hadn't made me want to marry her so danged much... ...oh, what's that? You didn't know I was getting married? Psssh.... where've you been for the past 7 months? So it went something like this:

I was actually wanting to put up something suspicious here on the blog, and then pop the question, but I figured she would see through that. So, the weeks leading up to the actual proposal were spent with scheming and planning. First step? Buy 500 feet of red ribbon. Do you have any idea the looks you get when carrying an armload of red ribbon around Hobby Lobby? I dunno if it was just the fact I was a guy buying ribbon, or if it was the 50+ rolls of ribbon in my arms, but something got me several strange, "That doesn't look like a reasonable hobby" looks from other patrons and employees of the craft store. It was fun enough I didn't attempt an explanation.

So I had all my supplies about a week before the intended Date Of Proposal (DOP). The original DOP was supposed to be August 23rd, which was the two-and-a-half year anniversary of our relationship. I have been told repeatedly by various individuals that I respect that I have no business counting 6-month "anniversaries" in a dating relationship, at least none after the first one. That combined with the fact that we technically hadn't dated, since I originally asked her out when I had no money, no car, and we never actually got to go anywhere besides on-campus events. But she had spent the majority of 2 and a half years putting up with, and making me feel like I was the only man on planet earth, and knowing that chicks dig mushy crap like that, I decided I'd ask on that day.

So we're one week away from the DOP, and I start trying to figure out how to get up there and perpetrate the proposal, which I'd actually had planned out for about a year. However, in hinged on being able to predict where she would be, so as to surprise her. And by surprise, I don't mean, "Oh gee, how sweet, there's a ring in my champagne glass, he wants to marry me!"

I was shooting more along the lines of, "Holy crap, how much does it even cost to do skywriting over the Whitehouse lawn during the inauguration of the president?" So I began trying to find out where she would be. For those of you in the audience that don't know, she lives an hour away from me, and I worked 'til 9:00 p.m. every day. So I'd have to figure out where she was going to be, and drive up there after work to execute The Plan.

So over the course of a few days, I asked what her Tuesday afternoons looked like, and tried asking a few of her friends if they ever "go together" on Tuesdays. I was hoping to track her down either right before, or immediately after, the Worship service she attended on Tuesday nights at 7:15. Well, we got to the day for the DOP, and her former roomate starts saying how they'd figured out that, since I'd been asking so many weird quesitons, and the next day was our anniversary, that I must have been planning something.

I told Ex-Roomate to leave it alone, that I was trying to surprise her. Instead of trying to convey the exact conversation, I will simply insert here exerpts from the actual IM conversation...

[17:02] ME: So what is she expecting for tomorrow?
[17:02] ME: I mean, if I just came up and went to Christ on Campus, do you think that would make her happy?
[17:02] ER: she's not expecting anything really. she's pretty convinced that you're not coming. but she sort of suspects it.
[17:02] ME: but something afterwards? I get off work @9:00, so mabe we could hang out afterwards.
[17:03] ER: i dunno. i'm sure she'd like it.
[17:17] ME: Yeah, but then I have to be @ work @ 8:00 Wednesday, hmmmmm
[17:17] ME: Well, I get to see her this weekend, I had some kind of neat stuff planned for then.
[17:18] ER: i'm just saying a tiiiiiiiiiny part of her suspects something........but she doesn't have her hopes up and she is convinced you're not coming.
[17:24] ER: and i'm not in the least convinced you're not coming.
[17:27] ME: lol, too many negatives in that sentence
[17:28] ME: but I guess you'll just have to wait and see if my absence tomorrow convinces you I'm not there
[17:29] ER: boys are only good at two things: being cute (and that is only sometimes) and lying.
[17:29] ER: and that is all the time.
[17:29] ME: :'( That makes me so sad.
[17:30] ME: You do realize what you've just done, don't you?
[17:30] ME: If, and that's a big IF I'm neither confirming nor denying, I was planning on coming tomorrow, you just pretty much guaranteed that I can't...
[17:31] ME: b/c if (again big IF), I showed up, I simply be confirming that all boys are liars.
[17:31] ME: So, now I CAN'T come tomorrow.
[17:31] ER: yay!
[17:32] ME: good job, You just allowed your bitterness against this half of the human race to (potentially) affect me, her, and whoever else may or may not have known about what was, or was not, going to happen tomorrow night.
[17:33] ER: i rock.
[17:34] ER: and it's not bitterness so much as the truth.

[insert phone call here, I reveal The Plan to Ex-Roomate, then decide not to come on Tuesday night since they know about it, and ER threatens to shoot me in the face with a bazooka. end phone call]

[18:02] ME: AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!
[18:02] ME: It's final.
[18:02] ER: JORDAN SOMETHING SALLIS!
[18:02] ME: I'm not coming tomorrow night
[18:03] ER: NOTHING IS GOING TO BE BETTER THAN THAT. NOW YOU JUST HAVE TO GIVE HER A SECOND RATE PROPOSAL.
[18:03] ME: No I don't.
[18:03] ER: AND I WILL TELL HER THAT IT WAS GOING TO BE CUTER.
[18:03] ME: you would be lying
[18:03] ER: and that i broke it.
[18:03] ME: you can tell her that
[18:04] ER: your 2.5 year anniversary is perfect. and i don't matter. so what if i sort of but not really saw it coming?
[18:04] ME: lol, If ANYONE saw it coming, it wasn't original enough.
[18:05] ME: I just have to find something more *creative* and unexpected
[18:05] ME: I could see how much the jumbotron at the football stadium costs :-)
[18:06] ER: THAT WOULD BE AWESOME!
[18:06] ME: but now you know about it, so I can't do it :-D
[18:06] ME: besides, I hate athletics, I'm not gonna share that moment with the freakin' footbal team
[18:07] ER: THEN QUIT TELLING ME STUFF!! AND WHY DOES IT EVEN MATTER??? I WON'T BE ABLE TO SAY, OH I KNEW. I'LL BE LIKE, THAT'S THE CUTEST THING EVER! IF I WAS GOING TO GET MARRIED, I'D WANT TO BE PROPOSED TO LIKE THAT.
[18:07] ME: rofl, you left your caps lock key on :-)
[18:20] ER: i might actually hate you.
[18:22] ME: Don't get mad at ME just becuase YOU feel guilty for ruining a perfectly good surprise. ;-)
[18:22] ER: I DIDN'T RUIN IT. I JUST SORT OF KNEW ABOUT IT.
[18:22] ME: ROFL, at least you'll know not ALL boys are liars :-)
[18:24] ER: all boys are not liars.
[18:24] ME: :-) especially me, but it's okay if you hate me
[18:24] ME: You're not the important one ;-)
[18:26] ER: especially you. you are a very nice boy. She is very lucky to have you. (and you are EXTREMELY lucky to have her.)
[18:26] ER: and not so much lucky as blessed.
[18:35] ME: The funny thing, her dad has NEVER told me I didn't deserve her, which is supposed to be fairly universal among fathers.
[18:37] ER: SHE LOVES YOU. YOU TWO BELONG TOGETHER.
[18:38] ME: I sure hope so. :-)
[18:38] ME: Because that would make me very happy. :-)

So that all occurred on Monday night, and I decided if ER knew what I was planning for Tuesday night, and Girlfriend was suspicious I was going to show up, I just scrapped it. I wasn't going to do something EXPECTED. So what was I going to do?....


...TO BE CONTINUED....