I have been awfully busy lately with work, Him #2, and interviewing for new jobs.  Job interviews are an awful lot like first dates, which for me means that I try to limit my awkward levels to a socially acceptable degree and generally leave feeling it went ok, only to be ghosted or rejected by impersonal electronic communication.    OH WELL!   I’m in the process of setting up another one this week, so fingers crossed!

Anyways, I unexpectedly met the parents of Him #2 this weekend, but in order to set the scene properly, we have to go way back in time to high school.  I promise this is relevant.

In high school, I would get a ride from either a friend’s parent (who once set me up on a VERY awkward first date with my friend’s brother–it involved mini-golf and other people standing in the way of my golf ball that  must have been an airplane part in its prior life) or one of my brother’s friends.  Anyways, it was not uncommon that I would forget my house keys.    Since no one was home and we lived in a quiet suburb, I generally found a window on the first floor that was open and would climb in to access the house.

Fast forward to today and I forget my keys about once every other month.  My landlord lives on the first floor, so it’s generally not a big deal.  However, there have been times where he’s not home and I’ve had to climb in the front porch through a window that doesn’t lock.  After having to do this in snow and in dresses enough time, I had a key made and I hide it near the door.  It has worked out perfect because I enter the first floor and go up to my apartment.  Now, you may notice in this story that I don’t lock my apartment door.  Accurate.  You see.  The front door is secured and the only other person in the house is my landlord, who has a key anyways.  I just figure one door is enough so I typically don’t lock separately lock my unit.  If I do, I lock the deadbolt with the key so I can’t ever lock myself out.  The doorknob has a lock, but I NEVER use it so I can’t lock myself out.  Oddly, when I’m home, I always have the deadbolt locked because it’s how I know the door is completely secured so the cats don’t open it to run down the stairs and let all the heat out.

Fast forward to this weekend.  It bothers Him #2 that I don’t lock my door, which I kinda understand, but don’t really care to change for the reasons set forth above.  Unbeknownst to me and his conscious self, out of habit, when he left my house Sunday, he turned the lock.

I proceeded to my lazy Sunday–which was augmented by a muscle relaxant to attempt to address a pesky knot in my shoulder that refuses to completely go away.   In the evening, Him #2 suggested that we go get a low key dinner and I figured why not.  I got myself together quickly and left.  Now I realized that I probably didn’t have my house keys very soon after closing the door, but I figured I would just use my emergency key and call it a day.

We had a nice dinner and I went home to finish up some food prep for the week and go to bed early.

I look through my bag to confirm that I don’t have my keys, grab the emergency key, open the door and head on my merry way up the stairs to home.  I grab the knob and I instantly realize that it’s locked.

To make matters more fun, my landlord is on a cruise so I have to call his brother, who is a police officer.  He is on duty and, while we try to come up with a solution, after about 30 minutes, it becomes clear that I have two options: wait until midnight for my landlord’s brother to get out of work and open the house or call a locksmith.  I call a locksmith and I’m smugly happy that I’ll be inside soon.  Then Him #2 calls to apologize again.  I tell him it’s ok and that I have called a locksmith so I’ll be in soon.  He laughs and says the following accurate and terrible words: “Do you really think that a locksmith is going to come quickly on a Sunday night when the Super Bowl is on?”

DAMN YOU SPORTS BALL!

So he says that since I probably have to wait until midnight and it’s mainly his fault, he’ll come get me and take me to a good ice cream spot that happens to be open until midnight.

I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned it before, but Him #2 had some rough career times due to his industry dying off and had to move home a few years ago.  He is now back on his feet and planning to move out, but he lIves in his parent’s basement.  So… We haven’t hung out at his place, for fairly obvious reasons.  Back to the story.

So he picks me up and we get ice cream.  Around 10, I’m sice of sitting in an ice cream parlor and suggest we go back to his place to relax.  After all, his parents should be asleep and he can sneak me into the basement so we can feel like we’re young again.  It’s a great plan.

We get to his place and he can tell that someone is up, but he assumes that it’s his dad and we can easily just say hi and move along.  He doesn’t want to sneak around so he says to just come in.  I can do this. Yes. I have skillz.

We walk in and there is his mother, wide awake and watching the Super Bowl, in the kitchen.  DAMN YOU SPORTS BALL!

She had her back turned to the door and he went in and hugged her and said I was with him.  She  has been asking him for a while about when she can meet me, so I was not surprised that she was very excited and she ran over to give me a hug.  We then stood around for a bit talking about random things.  It turns out his dad was in another room watching so he quickly came to join us.

And that’s how I met the parents.  Awkwardly in a kitchen at 10:30 at night.  I got the mild interrogation:

Where did you grow up?   Do you have siblings? You have very long fingers.  Do you play piano?  Where did you go to school?  Where do your parents live now?

But I passed–they’ve both told him that they like me. (I mean how could they NOT?? Amiright?)  And his mom liked my cats’ names so I think she may be ok.