Jesse's Unemployment 2008: UE-Day and UE-Day+1.

After I was fired, I went home, took a shower, then went and picked Andy Masengarb up from work. We went down to Bluecat and Kristin, Mandie, and Craig met up with us down there. Dan and Jillian were thinking about joining us too, but realized it would be extremely late before they could make it, so we decided that the three of us would get together the next day. At Bluecat, we ate and drank and talked, and sometime around 2:00 we left and Andy and I went along with Kristin to see her new house.

Now, supposedly this house is haunted. People have a tendency to get locked in the bathroom upstairs and the landlord has reportedly changed the bathroom doorknob multiple times but it keeps happening. While at Kristin's, the three of us sat around and talked and watched TV, and while all of this was going on, some bells in the room next to us rang just once, with no one touching them and none of us moving around or doing anything to set them off. Don't really know what was up with that, but it was funny as when we first got there and I had seen the bells, I had said "If those bells make noise on their own, I'll believe this place is haunted." I can't say 100% that the bells rang by themselves, but at this point, I don't really know what made them ring either. And keep in mind: we were pretty sober and awake when it happened. Andy and I had only had a couple of beers at Bluecat, Kristin had only had a couple of drinks there. When this happened, Andy was only halfway through his fourth beer in about six hours (which really isn't much when you know Andy's alcohol tolerance), I don't think I was even drinking, and Kristin was halfway through a Mike's Hard Lemonade. So, we really don't know what was going on with the bells.

Anyhoo...Around 7 am we all took naps for about 40 minutes, then we ended up grabbing breakfast at 14th Ave Cafe in Rock Island. I tell you what: it may be a haunt for the elderly, but damn, they do a good breakfast. My biscuits and gravy were about the best I've ever had.

After that, I dropped Andy off at home, Kristin went to work, then I came home and took a nap from 10:00 am until 1:00 PM when my mom got home and woke me up to ask why I was sleeping. Here's a thought: if you want to know why someone is sleeping, ask them when they wake up. There's probably a reason for them sleeping and they'll be PISSED if you interrupt that.

So, I got up, showered, fiddled around on the internet for awhile, then went and met up with Dan and Jillian for some disc golf. Aimee and David showed up too, and I didn't play too bad. Keep in mind that I've only ever shot better than a 21 at Prospect once. And that was a 15 in a bizarre stream of luck (also, that was my best score for any course ever). So, I can say with all honesty, that having not played Prospect in over a year, and having not played a real game of disc golf in awhile, I did pretty decent (for me). I shot a 21.

Afterwards, we all went to the Genghis Grill in Davenport and that was some good eatin'. I made my food spicy by throwing dragon salt, cayanne pepper, dragon sauce, and garlic chili sauce on it. Mmmm.

David and Aimee left us then, and Dan, Jillian, and myself went over to Border's for awhile. While there, Dan and I decided that we're going to do our own nerd book club and we'll send message back and forth on Facebook discussing the book we're reading. Book number one for us: "Elantris" by Brandon Sanderson. He's the guy that's writing the final "Wheel of Time" book after the untimely death of Robert Jordan. "Elantris" was his first novel and it was highly praised by Orson Scott Card ("Ender's Game"). Since Dan and I are both "Wheel of Time" fans and I'm a first time novelist myself, it made a lot of sense to pick up this one and both of us now have a copy. After we finish it, I believe we're on to the "Dragon King" trilogy.

After Borders, I parted ways with my New York bound friends (who had stayed an extra day in town to spend more time with me - as I had only seen them once and had otherwise been working every day of their visit to the Quad Cities). I came home, found my internet being wonky, read the first chapter of Elantris, then watched the final episode of season three of Babylon 5 and went to bed around midnight.