Before anything, I need to start off with a little TMI: I have a small bladder. Basically, if I’ve just downed any amount of liquid whatsoever (unless I’ve been exercising heavily, which rarely happens), then you can pretty much guarantee that I will need to hit the bathroom within the half hour.
And we’re talking MINISCULE amounts of liquid, people—if I down 4 ounces, about 4 ounces will need to come out pretty much immediately (it’s for this reason that I don’t drink hardly anything during the school day when I’m teaching).
Now, you might be asking me why I felt so inspired to just HAVE TO share this information with the entire world at large via the Internet. Well, I’ll tell you–
It’s because my husband forgot his wallet on our date last Saturday.
Let me paint the scene for you:
The air smelled thickly of greased beans and cheddar cheese steam, and I’d just shoveled yet another forkful of fajita chicken salad into my mouth, despite my having filled up on the complimentary chips and salsa at the beginning of the meal. We had just finished talking about what going to grad school in Alaska would be like, and my eyes were subtly scanning the perimeter of the restaurant to flag down our waitress so we could get some boxes.
Cue husband looking down and putting both hands in his pockets.
His face comes up sheepishly.
“Hey honey, I forgot the wallet. We’ll have to use your card.”
And, with sickening realization, it hits us both:
I hadn’t brought my purse with me to the restaurant (I’d instead chosen to bring our bulky new camera case so that we could try out the new lens in a new little section of town after the meal).
“Guess you’d better run home fast and get it, then,” I say. “I’ll just have to wait here.”
Matt hurries out the door, and I try to convince myself that the whole situation is not awkward as I scoop all of our leftovers into two boxes, stack our dishes neatly, wipe the table up with napkins, and then settle down to wait.
Cue the small bladder problem.
See, apparently when I’m nervous and have no one to talk to and have a drink in front of me, I just start sipping away like crazy. I’d already put down one full glass of Diet Dr. Pepper with my meal, and the waitress had brought me a fresh one mere minutes before Matt had fled the building.
It was like some sick nightmare where all you have to do is go to the bathroom SO BAD, but you can’t because you know that if you do, you’ll really wake up and discover you’ve peed the bed (or, in this case, the restaurant booth). So there I sat, nervously jiggling my leg and STILL sipping down DDP just because I didn’t know what else to do.
I started doing calculations in my head: If Matt has between 2.5 and 3 miles to drive and 7 stoplights and is averaging between 20-35 MPH and Torrie has downed approximately 70 ounces of liquid in the past 43 minutes, how long until either Matt arrives or Torrie explodes?
And more importantly, WHICH HAPPENS FIRST?!
It was an excruciatingly long 16-minute wait, and it didn’t help that Matt came bouncing in saying, “Man, I made great time!!” (To which I gave him the stink-eye, flagged down the waitress, asked where the bathroom was, then took the walk of shame to the bathroom that just HAD to be smack in the middle of their kitchen area, basically. All the cooks seemed to give each other knowing little grins.)
But, after relieving myself and laughing over the forgotten wallet, we walked hand-in-hand around the back of the buildings, admiring a flag-painted van and a grassy park and taking pictures and enjoying the summer air.
And then we went to our favorite bookstore, discovered that all used books were only $2.99, and proceeded to spend over $50 on yet more books for our house.
Now that’s what I call a good date.
Has your date ever forgotten his wallet?
