The Tale of Misery and Woe

I'm just going to preface this story by saying: Yes, it happened. Yes, my life is basically a mishmash of all the mishaps that have happened in every romantic comedy but with none of the romance. Yes, feel free to laugh at my pain. That's what this blog is all about. No, that was not sarcastic. And once again, yes, this actually happened.

Anywho, I got asked out on a date, which is always exciting. All I knew about it before hand was that we were driving up to Heber, which is a pretty cool drive up some windy mountain roads. It was a triple date, so we gathered the troops and then began the drive. Everything was going alright until we started going up those dang curvy roads. I don't get carsick, but this time I was feeling it. Add that to the fact that dates make me magically unable to conjure up witty conversation and we were left with a rather dull forty minute ride and it was probably my fault.

We stopped at a place called the Dairy Keen, which is apparently some famous burger place that everyone loves. We walked in and I was hit with the aroma of greasy diner food, which I was suddenly not in the mood for. I felt so incredibly grossed out by the prospect of hamburgers and fries, but I chalked it up to a recent healthy eating kick and pushed past my ill feelings as I ate. As I was forcing down the burger (which was somehow nauseating and delicious at the same time) I remembered that my roommate had been sick with the stomach flu recently. My chewing slowed.

"Are you ok?" my date looked somewhat concerned, probably because I could see the death of my dating life looming before my eyes. I assured him that I was fine and tried to talk myself down.

What are the chances of being sick on this date?, I thought, Horrible things like that only happen in movies.

Once I had sufficiently calmed myself, we were off again, this time to the bowling alley. And this bowling alley was the cutest thing I have ever seen. It probably hasn't been remodeled since 1950. I'm a sucker for random stuff like that. I kind of geeked out about it for a second. Then, I lost a bunch of games. For the last game, we started playing skittle bowling, which is where you assign each color skittle to a way that you have to bowl. Red means eyes closed, purple means through your legs, etc. So, my game got even worse. But, everyone's was terrible so it was cool. Until I got a purple skittle and tried to throw it through my legs but ended up smacking myself in the back of the thigh with a bowling ball.

If only that had been the most embarrassing thing to happen that night.

When we stood up to go, I was hit with the most terrible wave of nausea and stomach pain. I went into the bathroom, but the two other girls followed me, so I wasn't about to go kneel in front of a toilet with people around me. I was panicking. Should I wait around in the bathroom until they leave and then wait even longer to see if I throw up? I didn't want to disappear into the bathroom and leave him out there thinking who knows what. But then there was the windy mountain road that we had to take home. How was I possibly going to survive that? All I could think of doing was Lamaze breathing, so that's exactly what I did.

We were about to leave when my date asked the guy working there if he could get a picture of us. We all stood up in a line, he raised up the phone to take a picture, and then I threw up. Right there. On the floor. In front of everyone. As the others slowly came to terms with what had happened, I ran for the nearest trash can and went at it for another couple of minutes.

As I was lamenting my existence, I felt a hand rubbing my back. I froze. I looked down in absolute horror and saw my date's shoes. He was standing right next to me as I puked into a trash can in a bowling alley! Not only did I throw up while on a date with him, he is going to have the image of me puking right next to him seared into his brain for all eternity. The only way to get through this crushing sadness was to turn it into rage. If he's going to stand there, he might as well make himself useful and hold my hair!

When I was quite finished, I washed my hands, face, and mouth and we headed to the car. The bowling alley man asked if we wanted to take another picture. I could have punched him. Then I remembered.

I turned to my date and stammered, "Oh my gosh...The picture...Was I...? Did it...?"

"We deleted it," he answered immediately. "We didn't want to know. We didn't you to know. We didn't even look at it."

My friends have pointed out to me that I should have insisted that the picture be posted on the internet. I suppose I could have been a meme, which would have been pretty exciting. I mean, I might as well profit from my misery as much as possible, right? Also, looking on the bright side, I probably don't need to worry about throwing up on a date anymore. That could never happen to the same person twice, right?

Right!?