The Kindness of Strangers

I'm interrupting this radio silence to tell you about the crazy-wonderful thing that happend on this crazy-less-then-wonderful day.

As you know Sundays are the only day Chris and I have off together. So we have a regular routine. We go to Babystacks for breakfast and we go have puppy therapy at Petsmart. Every single Sunday.

Well today was different. Today, I cooked breakfast.  ( But we still went to puppy therapy.)

Then we went on a search for a mini fridge.

You see, my first shipment of "MS Therapy" aka Meds arrives on Tuesday. I'm taking Copaxone, a daily injection, and it has to be refridgerated. The fridge that came with our apartment freezes everything and we don't trust that the fridge won't freeze my meds. Plus, our apartment fridge is tiny and there isn't enough room for all our food let alone a 30 supply of auto injectors.

Well we headed to Walmart.( I know, I know.... We are Walmart haters too. But when I was pricing the mini fridges in the area they had the best price. And my meds are EXPENSIVE. So I'm all about saving the $10.)

But the Walmart in our neighborhood doesn't carry mini fridges. So we headed to the Super Walmart across town where I had actually seen said mini fridge.

Also, Chris and I had decided to cash in our change jar today. Our change jar is affectionatly known as the JC Penney Jar because we don't actually save it because we need it. We save it up, and when it gets full we dump in the coinstar for a gift certificate. If you get cash, they charge 9.8% fee. But you can get a gift cert to lots of different places for free. We usually get a JC Penney cert and treat ourselves. Remember back in December when I cashed in my jar and got two pairs of boots, a dress, and a necklace for what felt like FREE to me?

So here's the scene:

Chris and I are standing in line at the Coinstar at the Super Walmart. A hispanic family and a single man with a plastic sack of change are ahead of us. The hispanic family finishes and leaves and the single man deposits his coins.

Chris: Wow. That man stood in this line to get $3.51. Oh wait, he's at $3.62 now.
Me: He probably has to use it to buy bread or baby formula too. I know we complain about our situation but we are far better off than most people.
Chris: Oh I know.
Me: Serious. Our biggest complaint is that we aren't earning enough to save as much as we'd like. I mean we have a few thousand dollars in the bank and sometimes it's not good enough for us.

Then it was our turn. We looked at the gift card options and only restuarants were available. We don't want Olive Garden or Red Lobster gift cards so we put the mug back in my purse and went shopping for the fridge. ( We have some first world problems right?)

Well that Walmart was sold out. Damn.

So rather then drive all over town we headed to Target. Damn the $10 difference, I need my fridge.

Target was out as well.

So I quite literally stood in the middle of the aisle at Target and said " Okay universe, you win. I concede and am going home."

So we headed home. And we stopped at our neighborhood Albertsons to deposit the coins.

Albertsons doesn't have a Coinstar. Damn again.

But we knew Von's did and as we walked back to the car we discussed how today was going all wrong because we skipped going to Babystacks. This is why routines are so important and we fucked ours up so the universe was having it's way with us.

... and we headed across Lake Mead Blvd to the Vons.

We looked through the certificate options: iTunes, Amazon, JC Penney, The Gap, Carraba's. We selected Amazon because we figured we could order the mini fridge and have it delivered.

Chris drops in the coins.

I stand there with my hands on my hips.

As we are watching the total rack up I feel something poke me in the palm of my left hand.

I look down.

There is a $20 bill in it.

And an older lady shuffling past us.

I was so stunned. And because when I felt the palm poke I said "What the Fuck?" loudly Chris is looking too and he sees that the lady slipped a $20 in my palm as she was leaving the store.



Okay. This kind of thing never happens to us.

Chris and I are the kind of people who do this kind of thing to other people, but it never happens to us. I mean in the last month that I haven't been blogging we spent Easter delivering Easter baskets we made to nurses and paramedics who had to work on Easter Sunday.

We donated 8 soccer balls to a local elementary school because their PE program was down to 2 basketballs for the rest of the year.

We tried to buy a round of drinks for 3 servicemen who were dining in uniform at the same restaurant we were at but they weren't drinking and there check was taking care of.

... but this never happens to us.

And we were both pretty speechless and felt a little awkward. The same pity we had toward the man at Walmart, she had towards us.

Before we even left the coinstar we agreed to pay it forward, even though we know we already do.

$20 plus the $54.76 Amazon certificate pays for the cost of the fridge for my medication. So even though we aren't desperate for cash like she perhaps thought we were, her $20 is going towards an essential purchase.

And we both are still a little speechless about it but we thank her.

Being on the other side of the kind stranger situation is new to us, but makes us want to continue to be kind strangers to others.

And we will be paying it forward.

30's the New 20

Holy Moly I'm 30 years old today.

I sit here drinking my morning smoothie made of flax seed oil, coconut water, yogurt, strawberries and pineapple, using it to wash down my vitamin D supplements, and thinking about how I got so old.

I don't feel old. Unless I'm trying to get out of a chair.

Or get into bed and set the alarm only to realize it's 8 o'clock.

Which I should do tonight because I have a doctors appointment at 7:20 am.

Because only old people go to the doctors at 7:20 am.

But I'm not depressed by turning 30. I really look forward to the next 10 years. When I think about the last 10 years and how much living I packed in.... it's a little overwhelming.

I don't remember what I did for my 20th birthday. I was probably drunk. I remember 19 because it was the day I finished my alcohol awareness class at CWU. I got busted drinking in the dorms and I had attend a little class about why underage drinking is bad. I got on a bus the very next day with my dormmates and headed to Vancouver where the legal drinking age is 19. We stayed in a hostel and partied all weekend. Abby and I pierced our belly buttons and I told this guy named Justin I was in love with him and he said thank you and never spoke to me again.

My 21st birthday was spent very drunk in Bellingham. I only really remember this night because Claire took photos and showed me photographic evidence of the crazy night. I remember going to a bubble party at some bar and at one point there were pictures of me forgetting why my pants are wet and just taking them off. Oh to be young and uninhibited again....

... and then Chris came into the picture. And we started travelling. Our birthday's are only a week apart so we would travel somewhere together as a co-birthday celebration. Las Vegas one year, New York City the next.

And even though I'm not where I thought I would be at 30, ( let's face it, I'm not where I thought I would be 6 months ago) I did finally move out of Kitsap County.  So I can check "Move to Big City" off the life list.

So here is my 30th Birthday Progress Report.  You may not care but I feel like I should make a list of my notable life moments over the last 10 years. I'm setting the bar so my 30's can be even better :)

• At 20 I was a college drop out. At 30 I have 2 college degrees.
• I met the love of my life. He has amazingly put up with me everyday for the last 9 years.
• I watched my sister give birth to my nephew Ryan.
• I went from twirling batons in high school to twirling myself around a stage in front of 600 people.
• I have seen countless concerts from Brad Paisley to Korn to Huey Lewis.
• I have seen dozens of live musicals and plays from Seattle to Broadway.
• I took Chris to the Washington coast for the first time. We also went to the sunny beaches of Florida together for the first time.
• I moved to a big city :)
• I have changed the lives of children.
• I helped organize a Pride Festival in Kitsap County.
• I took classes with Miss Indigo Blue and learned to twirl nipple tassels :)
• I started an online book club that has amazingly reunited lots of old friends.
• I had the funnest wedding in history. We had sno-cones.
• I sold all my belongings and started over.

And I started this blog. Which had been incredibly cathartic. It helps me feel connected to all of you who I live so far from.

Mega Millions

Last week was a Mega Millions frenzy.

...and I must admit that I didn't even know until Tuesday when nobody won. Then I paid attention to the headlines.

...and mystery money showed up.

I'll start there. Last Tuesday $7 was magically deposited on the counter at my work. I say magically deposited because no one knows how it go there. I was the only employee in the place and after my last customer picked up his bouquet I went back in to the bakery, went to the bathroom, and stayed in the bakery to finish decorating. We have a bell on the door so we know when someone walks in and it didn't go off for the rest of the day. When I went to grab the till before closing there was a $7 sitting on the counter. None of the cookies were missing from the displays and I called the cashier from earlier to see if she dropped cash on the way out. Nope, she said, it's all yours. I couldn't get over how strange it was. Our best guess was that after the customer put his bouquet in the car, he came back to give me a tip. But $7 is a really large tip. On the rare occasion someone does tip, it's a buck or two. So since all of had a hand in that order, I decided to invest in Mega Millions tickets for the 4 of us :)

Thursday was Chris's 31st birthday and he wanted to do something low-key. Since Nevada doesn't participate in the lottery system ( Can I just point out this is part of the reason schools are so under funded here?) we had to drive to the state line or into California to buy tickets. Arizona was another option but they take 6% of your winnings, (I have no problem sharing 6% of my lottery winnings with the state, as long as that state isn't Arizona. Fuck Arizona.) And on Wednesday we had heard that the lines out in Primm, the state line here, were 2-3 hours long. We expected that and were prepared to hang out. Going to California was what Chris wanted to do for his birthday and we like hanging out together. We decided to skip the lines in Primm and head strait to Baker California. If this was going to be a 5 hour adventure, we would rather spend the bulk of the hours in the car chatting than standing in line in the desert. There is only one lottery store in Primm and in Baker there would be more gas stations, so we figured the lines wouldn't be as long.

We had no idea what we were in for.

The lines in Primm were insane. So insane that there were police making sure everything stayed orderly. We asked some people walking to their cars how long they waited in line for: 7 hours!!!

We cruised through  these people saying "May the odds be ever in your favor!" and peaced out.

We got back on the road and headed to Baker. On the way we saw a little Shell off the freeway. We didn't see any crowd so we assumed they didn't have lottery but thought we would double check.

Wrong again.

So we headed strait to Baker...

I was starving by then. We cruised through the gas station strip until we found the one with the shortest seeming line. Chris got in line and I went to Bob's Big Boy Burgers to get some food. I was so excited! Having only seen Bob's Big Boy on Television I was pretty excited to eat at one.

This specific Bob's is home to the Worlds Tallest Thermometer :)

( Not pictured: Worlds Tallest Thermometer)

My classic Bob's Big Boy Burger was delicious. Hands down kicks In and Out's ass.  Everyone talks about how awesome and In and Out burger is and I tried it, animal style and everything. I just don't get it. It wasn't anything special and the fries are wimpy.

Anyway, the Bob's was packed. There were only two servers and one manager and I felt terrible for them. The female looked like she was going to cry. And the guests were being so mean. I waited in line for a table for 10 minutes and the other guests waiting were talking crap about the wait and the restaurant. One guy said "When I am a millionaire on Friday, I'm going to buy this place and fire all of them."

Seriously? Grow the fuck up.

I was really nice to the manager when he came to seat me. I said I would just sit at the rail and he came over and took my order right away. It pays to be nice to food servers people! I was in and out before the other family sitting at the rail even had their food. And all they did was loudly say mean things the whole time. I on the other hand was kind and patient. When the female server brought me an iced tea, I asked if she had another apron because I could help her run food. She looked at me like I was crazy. But when I paid, I told the manager my offer and he said he would have let me do it. He got there at 4am and it was busy all day. Because of the lottery, more people were in Baker. They all dropped someone off in a line and went and sat at Bob's for hours. He said some people sat there for 3 to 4 hours drinking a $3 coffee while he had people piling up at the door complaining about the wait.

Oh and this creepy little shake was next to Bob's. There is a Bun Boy cafe too.

Afterwards I joined Chris in line. We waited a total of 3 hours but we had a great experience. When I arrived back I shared with our line compatriots the gossip I overheard at Bob's. There had been a small riot back in Primm because the lottery store closes at 8pm. People were furious they had waited for hours and didn't get a ticket. We all felt vindicated in choosing to drive to Baker.

In the end we didn't win anything. Not even $2. But it was a fun experience. We met some really great people while we waited in line. I told them about writing a blog and they made me take pictures of everything so I could blog it. Ha ha. Some how when I was at Bob's I missed the very entertaining crack whore, but I was able to share that I had seen a homeless lady with no pants on earlier in the day (true story). We told them about the circumstances in which we moved to Vegas and they all had the best horrified looks on their faces when we said we lived on Rancho and Washington! We even posed for a group photo...

And if we hadn't driven to Baker we would have never found the best drink of life. Are you ready for this? CUCUMBER LIME GATORADE. It's real. It was delicious. Our new friend Mandi wouldn't drink it but she was missing out! And we haven't seen one since. But here is proof that the cucumber lime Gatorade is real!

And they made to take a photo of this little juju or hex bag or whatever supernatural new agey thing you want to call it that was hanging over the door when we finally made it into the store. Some sort of crystal? While it was weird, I've seen stranger. I mean, I really did see a homeless lady with no pants on gyrating on the street corner that morning.

The below picture is not our total! It was a running total but we thought someone was buying over $6000 in tickets at first. They were just printing out quick picks in random denominations and handing them out to speed up the process.

Did you this lottery madness in Washington? I think it was amplified here because we had to drive out of state to get tickets. But my sister said she waited for almost an hour in Georgia.

So maybe next time. Chris and I have always played the hypothetical lottery plans game but we were so serious this time! LOL. I guess as we get older the more we realize what we really want and not just think about all the things we could do just because we have a ton of money. Truthfully, most of you would never see us again. Our big plan this time was to buy a few hundred acres in northern California and disappear. We would adopt 2 children and I would home school them. Then we decided that our BF's Ryan and Amanda need to live there too. Amanda is used to living on a farm so she can help with the animals and Ryan can home school their kids. Then we decided Megan and Ian needed to move there too and Ian can run a brewery and distillery with Chris while Megan can raise chickens and vegetables. Then we realized that we just want to start a commune with our fellow hippie friends and we would probably end up drinking the kool-aid in the end.

But we can dream can't we?