All Star Break: Joyce on Thursday

I was still pissed off when I woke up Thursday morning after I’d walked out on Monica in a restaurant the night before. I went to the computer to find the email telling me where Keaton had hidden my phone for my own good (it was inside the box of soda crackers), and made myself come coffee and Pillsbury biscuits. I ate all of them with plenty of butter and syrup. I felt a little better after that.

Then I checked the phone. There were 13 abusive texts from my crazyass bitch of a girlfriend last night, and 8 texts this morning apologizing for acting like she had. The only thing I could think to do was leave her hanging. I heard Keaton’s voice telling me to hold onto my balls now that I had them back.

Work sucked since there was nothing but chicks working in the store and, if I told them what happened last night, they’d have sided with the crazyass bitch. When I got home I felt like getting sweaty, so I headed out for a run. I think running is the most boringass exercise you can get, but I felt better when I got back. And wore out in a good way.

I took a long cool shower and was fixin to get dressed for my date with Joyce when I realized that the last thing I wanted to do was see the inside of a restaurant. The second last thing I wanted to do was get dressed up. So I texted her to see if we could go somewhere I could go to in a t shirt and shorts.

“Like what?”, she texted back.

“I’ll think of something. Just put on something casual you bought at the store lol.”

So I threw on shorts, a light blue t, flip flips and a backwards Dodgers cap. I hadn’t dressed like that to go out with a chick in a long time…and I was liking it. It was time that Joyce got to see what the real Hunter looks like.

I went to pick her up…and this time I really picked her up. I decided we were going to take the shitbox instead of the Tesla. I reckon I didn’t think I was dressed for an expensive car. Joyce came out the door in capris and a shirt I recognized from the store and sandals that were too expensive for Gap casual. She looked good.

When I came around the car to open the door for her, her eyes went straight to my legs.

And stayed there.

Finally she looked up.

“Oh, sorry Hunter. I’ve just never seen your legs. I mean…in shorts… I mean…standing up…by daylight…like this…”

“Ball player legs,” I said. Have I mentioned to y’all that I blush pretty easily? “A lot of people think the power in your swing comes from your arms. It really comes from your legs. Baseball players usually look good in shorts.”

“That’s an understatement.”

I tried to laugh. It was getting a little awkward. I’m used to being checked out. It’s just weird when they focus on one piece of you.

“I didn’t lock up Mumu and Numnums, so we should go right away.”

Fine with me. She was surprised that we were taking my car. She was even more surprised when she found out where we were going.

The taco truck on Fair Oaks. The second one if you’re headed south. It may sound gross but I’m kinda addicted to their tacos de cabeza.

Believe it or not, Joyce had never been to a taco truck. She’s lived here for over 15 years and she’s never been to a taco truck.

I started her off slow, with two of the asada and two of the chicken. And I told her to be careful with the salsa. She may have gotten me drunk…but I didn’t want to get her sick lol. I went for my usual three cabeza and three al pastor and got us each some of that horchata stuff that I’m not sure what it is lol. But I reckon it goes with tacos…and I wanted Joyce to have the full experience.

She didn’t look too sure about eating messy food standing up…this certainly wasn’t like any of the restaurants we’d been to. But I could afford it and got to wear shorts. And she got into it. I was fixin to get myself a lingua, and she said she wanted to try one too. She said she grew up eating tongue…just not in tacos. I gotta admit that it took me a little while to get used to eating tongue and head when I started going to taco trucks. But now I order them every time. So maybe I’m not a hopeless redneck after all lol.

So we got back into the car with the rest of our horchatas. Since that was the fastest dinner we’d ever had, I drove us to the Stone Company Store. Ok, so it’s more my kind of place than hers. But I wanted someplace we could sit down and hang out and where I could get a beer.

She’d been to the Stone store to get ready for the dinner she cooked me, so I reckoned she wouldn’t feel totally out of place. They had a 3.7% IPA on tap, and she even was willing to try that. (She didn’t finish it, but I wasn’t expecting her to. First horchata and then indian pale ale – I hope she didn’t think I was trying to poison her lol.)

The Stone store’s patio is a nice place to hang out and it was one of those great summer nights that even remind me of back home. Minus the lightnin bugs. And the humidity, which I miss less than the lightnin bugs lol. We hung out long enough for me to have a couple, and, between the beer, the warm night and the tacos in my stomach, I was feeling real good. Like hold Joyce’s hand on the way back to the car good.

I wasn’t sure what she’d do after we ran into that Muffy woman the week before. So I didn’t let go of her hand when she tried to pull it back. I could have done without the sweaty palm on the way back to the car, but I was glad she agreed to hold on.

We drove up to Old Town. Like I said, it was a real nice night, and I was in a mood to walk around. Plus…dessert lol. There’s the grossest ice cream place in the whole fuckin world in Old Town. I mean they put french fries and Doritos in ice cream. In ice fuckin cream. It’s so gross that I’d rather have frozen yogurt at 21 Choices. And if I’d rather have frozen yogurt than ice cream, there’s something seriously wrong with the ice cream.

So we got frozen yogurt and walked around eating it. And we probably looked like a couple. Which I reckon we are. So screw that Muffy bitch. Nobody was giving us any weird looks. We even ran into the Parrots’ 1^st baseman Sloppy Joe and a new hot girlfriend of his.

I could tell Joyce was surprised afterwards that I didn’t get all awkwardass because someone I knew had seen us. Big f-ing deal. I don’t talk about my whole private life with the team, but I reckon they all know I’m seeing someone older. So now Sloppy Joe’s seen her. And it’s not like Joyce looks 50 or anything. If Sloppy Joe wants to be all gayass about it, I guess he can go back and tell the guys that he’s seen the older chick I’m going out with. Joyce is somewhere in there between a 6 and a 7. Given how hot he likes his chicks, Sloppy Joe probably thought more like a 6. You can do a lot worse. See where the 9½ got me the night before.

Joyce even let me hold her hand when we got to the garage on De Lacey.

So I drove her home. She went in to put Mumu and Numnums into their prison, got me a beer and we sat on the couch for a while. I was glad that she’d had a really good time doing fun stuff. Don’t get me wrong: I’ve enjoyed every single steak we went out for. But it was time for something new. Good thing Monica had me so pissed off that I didn’t want to blow another ironed shirt seeing Joyce.

And now I know Joyce can be cool.

So, yeah, we didn’t sit on the couch all night.

I woke up at around 2:30. Nothing was too wrong, but my stomach knows the difference between ice cream and frozen yogurt…and it was letting me know it didn’t appreciate being cheated out of a real dessert. I knew I wasn’t going to get back to sleep without something sweet. And nothing sucks worse than having to lie in some chick’s bed and not be able to sleep. That’s when you get up and go home. It was bad enough that Mumu and Numnums were probably outside the bedroom door waiting to jump me.

I was fixin to go home and pulled on my boxers…while trying not to wake Joyce up.  Then I thought, maybe the stupidass cats were asleep and Joyce had some ice cream in the freezer. I opened the door a crack and then remembered that Joyce hadn’t let the cats out of the guest room when we went in the bedroom. So I used the light on my cell phone to get to the kitchen. The cats noticed it and started throwing themselves against the door, but I thought fuck them. (Really: what is it with chicks and cats? And don’t get me started on dudes who have cats. That’s like gayer than Bryce Harper’s headband.)

I made it to the kitchen and opened the freezer. Joyce had like a dozen containers of Thrifty’s ice cream. There was about a third of a container left of the pistachio, which meant I wasn’t going to need a bowl, just a spoon, and I knew where Joyce kept those.

I finished the container and…there wasn’t much reason to go home after that. So I went back to the bedroom.

And got to drink my morning coffee out of that baseball mug Joyce had gotten for me lol.