Dear Diary,
I haven’t forgotten you! I know that you’re jealous of my computer, but I’ll always be a pen and paper girl at heart. You can count on that! Plus I have to tell you about last night.
It was awful! You know I finally got together with my local SWIBS forum. You know, the Singles with Irritable Bowel Syndrome group I post with online? I wasn’t sure about going in the first place, but I thought it might be cool. So anyway I went, and I was pretty tense about it. Remember how much I agonized about picking the right outfit? Well, the reality of meeting them in person was even worse than I ever could have possibly imagined.
First of all, the whole party was the brainchild of the moderator of our forum – his user name is AchyBreakyBrad. I’ve mentioned him before to you, but I never talked about how he was the one who put this whole holiday party together. He’s been posting about it since Labor Day (I went back and checked the archives to make sure). Well, anyway, he’s said all along that his work had a nice big meeting area that we’d all be really comfortable in. He got us all worked up and excited, talking about holiday decorations, music, a Stingy Santa exchange, and most of all getting to have a meal with other people who have IBS. That’s what finally made me decide to go. I hate going to all the other Christmas parties – work, church, even family – because there’s so much that I just can’t eat. And I never can take a date because they think I’m being stuck up for not eating or they’re stuck with me being in the bathroom all night. That’s not fun for anybody, but you know that already, don’t you, Diary?
Well, anyway, I went, and it was horrible. First of all, this grand meeting place that AchyBreakyBrad had lined up wasn’t close to what I imagined. The address he gave me was an ugly brick building with a big sign that screamed ELOM in green capital letters. I actually called him on the cell he gave out because I thought I had the wrong. It wasn’t though. The great meeting place he had lined up was the conference room at his work! OMG!! What a fantastic place!! Wow!! How did he ever get that reserved with all the holiday rush?!
Hey! Don’t get me wrong! I’m not a snob. If he had worked at a hotel or a country club or even a restaurant, I’d have been cool with meeting there. But turns out that ELOM is some kind of Information Systems Development company – in other words a place where a bunch of computer geeks worked. The “Festivities Room” as AchyBreakyBrad called it was a room with some long conference tables pushed together, and there was computer junk crammed all along the walls. There were charts and computer code mumbo jumbo written on white boards and paper taped to the walls. He thought it was cool because we were an internet group. He kept cracking computer jokes and calling our party a “holiday interface” and telling us to “sync” and “upload” snacks. I thought he was kinda funny online, but in real life? No way, I’d rather drink salsa than spend any more time with him?
So the room sucked. But decorations could have made it work. He said that he was going to take care of the decorations and music if we all brought the food. Cool, I thought, but listen to what he did. Well, he put some tacky little trees on the tables that looked like he’d taken them out of some business’s landscaping. He’d bought some red and green plastic plates and napkins. And the most exciting thing was that he made us wear little holiday hats that he bragged about buying in bulk from some party store online. They were cheap and way too small, probably made for American kids by orphaned kids in some foreign sweatshop.
I wore a snowman hat. It looked ridiculous. I felt like my head was eight sizes too big with that tiny little hat on. Not the best thing to be wearing when you’re meeting a bunch of people for the first time, let me tell you! Not that any of them looked much better. Why can’t any hot single people have IBS? Or maybe they do, but they have better things to do on the Friday before Christmas than meet with a bunch of complaining internet junkies.
Anyway, as if things weren’t bad enough, AchyBreakyBrad pulled out these nametags he’d printed off and made like we were the elves and had to wear them. I really wanted to leave when I saw that he written our user names on the tags. And that’s all! He didn’t put our real names on them! How stupid and lame is that! It’s one thing to type messages back and forth to FuzzySquirrelKiss, but when you find out FuzzySquirrelKiss is a fat middle-aged guy with really hairy arms and bad rosacea, you really would like to be able to call him Tom or Dave or something! He should have at least put our real names on the bottom of the tags or handed out a list or something. I made sure that I said something first when I talked to anybody. I kept sticking my hand out and saying, “I’m Tess!” so that people wouldn’t call me JDeppIsAhottie96. Diary, my user name just doesn’t seem as cool when it’s spoken out loud.
Now, here comes my take on the party music. It stunk! He had all the computers signed on to some music site that played Christmas MIDI’s. Enough said. They weren’t even all in sync. You can imagine how awful that was.
My last hope was for the gift exchange, but that bombed, too. I’ll have to say that this part wasn’t AchyBreakyBrad’s fault. I don’t know what he brought, but too many SWIBS had the same idea I did and brought Tums or Rolaids or Pepto for their gift. Needless to say, I went toward the end and there wasn’t much to pick from when I wanted to trade. So I ended up just bringing home the Nacho Libre poster I opened. I’m not sure if I was one of the lucky ones or not. I’ve never even seen that movie, so I don’t know if it’s funny, but I do know that Jack Black isn’t exactly eye candy in my book. He’s no Johnny Depp, but that’s obvious, right, Diary!!
Back to the party. To top it off and make the whole night even worse, I got deathly sick from the food. How sad is that? You’d think a bunch of people with IBS would be more careful about what they bring to a Christmas potluck meet and greet, but no, not the brainiacs in my SWIBS group. Some idiot even brought sausage balls. She said they were tofu, but I ate a bite of one and bloated almost immediately. I hid the nasty thing under a keyboard on one of the computer tables, but the damage had already been done. I left pretty quick – made up a story about having to meet my sister in Yahoo Group chat to talk about family stuff, pretty smart, huh? And just in time, too, AchyBreakyBrad started doing karaoke to the Christmas MIDI’s with this fat lady who looked a lot like my old bus driver back in elementary school. The lady’s tag said MissyKittenPie – I talked to her a little while while she was loading her plate up with everything people brought. I don’t see how anyone with IBS could eat that much! And I remember MissyKittenPie’s posts online – she always said that she was in her thirties and talked all the time about she could never eat. Yeah right! The only thing about her even remotely close to bein gin the thirties might have been her pants size! LOL! I’m so bad! Sorry, Diary!
Anyway, I left the party ASAP but didn’t even make it home before I had to stop! I felt that bad! I made it to a Krystal’s to use their bathroom – that’s how desperate I was! You know that IBS and Krystal just don’t mix. I’m surprised I even made it out of there, but that’s another story, and it’s getting late.
Bye for now, Diary! Thank your for listening!
P.S. Diary, you’ll be glad to know that I just signed off with SWIBS for the last time. I deleted my posts and everything. Now that some of the people there know what I look like, it’s just too embarrassing to talk about my bowels. Plus, I know what they look like, too. I read one post and got a really gross picture in my head of FuzzySquirrelKiss sitting on the toilet! Ewwww! I had to quit SWIBS right then. I just can’t talk to those people anymore. It’s just too embarrassing. I think I’ll go check out a group called ThePeople_of_SpasticColon_y – it sounds like they might be fun! TTYL!
I haven’t forgotten you! I know that you’re jealous of my computer, but I’ll always be a pen and paper girl at heart. You can count on that! Plus I have to tell you about last night.
It was awful! You know I finally got together with my local SWIBS forum. You know, the Singles with Irritable Bowel Syndrome group I post with online? I wasn’t sure about going in the first place, but I thought it might be cool. So anyway I went, and I was pretty tense about it. Remember how much I agonized about picking the right outfit? Well, the reality of meeting them in person was even worse than I ever could have possibly imagined.
First of all, the whole party was the brainchild of the moderator of our forum – his user name is AchyBreakyBrad. I’ve mentioned him before to you, but I never talked about how he was the one who put this whole holiday party together. He’s been posting about it since Labor Day (I went back and checked the archives to make sure). Well, anyway, he’s said all along that his work had a nice big meeting area that we’d all be really comfortable in. He got us all worked up and excited, talking about holiday decorations, music, a Stingy Santa exchange, and most of all getting to have a meal with other people who have IBS. That’s what finally made me decide to go. I hate going to all the other Christmas parties – work, church, even family – because there’s so much that I just can’t eat. And I never can take a date because they think I’m being stuck up for not eating or they’re stuck with me being in the bathroom all night. That’s not fun for anybody, but you know that already, don’t you, Diary?
Well, anyway, I went, and it was horrible. First of all, this grand meeting place that AchyBreakyBrad had lined up wasn’t close to what I imagined. The address he gave me was an ugly brick building with a big sign that screamed ELOM in green capital letters. I actually called him on the cell he gave out because I thought I had the wrong. It wasn’t though. The great meeting place he had lined up was the conference room at his work! OMG!! What a fantastic place!! Wow!! How did he ever get that reserved with all the holiday rush?!
Hey! Don’t get me wrong! I’m not a snob. If he had worked at a hotel or a country club or even a restaurant, I’d have been cool with meeting there. But turns out that ELOM is some kind of Information Systems Development company – in other words a place where a bunch of computer geeks worked. The “Festivities Room” as AchyBreakyBrad called it was a room with some long conference tables pushed together, and there was computer junk crammed all along the walls. There were charts and computer code mumbo jumbo written on white boards and paper taped to the walls. He thought it was cool because we were an internet group. He kept cracking computer jokes and calling our party a “holiday interface” and telling us to “sync” and “upload” snacks. I thought he was kinda funny online, but in real life? No way, I’d rather drink salsa than spend any more time with him?
So the room sucked. But decorations could have made it work. He said that he was going to take care of the decorations and music if we all brought the food. Cool, I thought, but listen to what he did. Well, he put some tacky little trees on the tables that looked like he’d taken them out of some business’s landscaping. He’d bought some red and green plastic plates and napkins. And the most exciting thing was that he made us wear little holiday hats that he bragged about buying in bulk from some party store online. They were cheap and way too small, probably made for American kids by orphaned kids in some foreign sweatshop.
I wore a snowman hat. It looked ridiculous. I felt like my head was eight sizes too big with that tiny little hat on. Not the best thing to be wearing when you’re meeting a bunch of people for the first time, let me tell you! Not that any of them looked much better. Why can’t any hot single people have IBS? Or maybe they do, but they have better things to do on the Friday before Christmas than meet with a bunch of complaining internet junkies.
Anyway, as if things weren’t bad enough, AchyBreakyBrad pulled out these nametags he’d printed off and made like we were the elves and had to wear them. I really wanted to leave when I saw that he written our user names on the tags. And that’s all! He didn’t put our real names on them! How stupid and lame is that! It’s one thing to type messages back and forth to FuzzySquirrelKiss, but when you find out FuzzySquirrelKiss is a fat middle-aged guy with really hairy arms and bad rosacea, you really would like to be able to call him Tom or Dave or something! He should have at least put our real names on the bottom of the tags or handed out a list or something. I made sure that I said something first when I talked to anybody. I kept sticking my hand out and saying, “I’m Tess!” so that people wouldn’t call me JDeppIsAhottie96. Diary, my user name just doesn’t seem as cool when it’s spoken out loud.
Now, here comes my take on the party music. It stunk! He had all the computers signed on to some music site that played Christmas MIDI’s. Enough said. They weren’t even all in sync. You can imagine how awful that was.
My last hope was for the gift exchange, but that bombed, too. I’ll have to say that this part wasn’t AchyBreakyBrad’s fault. I don’t know what he brought, but too many SWIBS had the same idea I did and brought Tums or Rolaids or Pepto for their gift. Needless to say, I went toward the end and there wasn’t much to pick from when I wanted to trade. So I ended up just bringing home the Nacho Libre poster I opened. I’m not sure if I was one of the lucky ones or not. I’ve never even seen that movie, so I don’t know if it’s funny, but I do know that Jack Black isn’t exactly eye candy in my book. He’s no Johnny Depp, but that’s obvious, right, Diary!!
Back to the party. To top it off and make the whole night even worse, I got deathly sick from the food. How sad is that? You’d think a bunch of people with IBS would be more careful about what they bring to a Christmas potluck meet and greet, but no, not the brainiacs in my SWIBS group. Some idiot even brought sausage balls. She said they were tofu, but I ate a bite of one and bloated almost immediately. I hid the nasty thing under a keyboard on one of the computer tables, but the damage had already been done. I left pretty quick – made up a story about having to meet my sister in Yahoo Group chat to talk about family stuff, pretty smart, huh? And just in time, too, AchyBreakyBrad started doing karaoke to the Christmas MIDI’s with this fat lady who looked a lot like my old bus driver back in elementary school. The lady’s tag said MissyKittenPie – I talked to her a little while while she was loading her plate up with everything people brought. I don’t see how anyone with IBS could eat that much! And I remember MissyKittenPie’s posts online – she always said that she was in her thirties and talked all the time about she could never eat. Yeah right! The only thing about her even remotely close to bein gin the thirties might have been her pants size! LOL! I’m so bad! Sorry, Diary!
Anyway, I left the party ASAP but didn’t even make it home before I had to stop! I felt that bad! I made it to a Krystal’s to use their bathroom – that’s how desperate I was! You know that IBS and Krystal just don’t mix. I’m surprised I even made it out of there, but that’s another story, and it’s getting late.
Bye for now, Diary! Thank your for listening!
P.S. Diary, you’ll be glad to know that I just signed off with SWIBS for the last time. I deleted my posts and everything. Now that some of the people there know what I look like, it’s just too embarrassing to talk about my bowels. Plus, I know what they look like, too. I read one post and got a really gross picture in my head of FuzzySquirrelKiss sitting on the toilet! Ewwww! I had to quit SWIBS right then. I just can’t talk to those people anymore. It’s just too embarrassing. I think I’ll go check out a group called ThePeople_of_SpasticColon_y – it sounds like they might be fun! TTYL!
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