Not really a moron, but...

Well, that's okay, cause by the time I finish writing this it won't even be Monday when you get to read it.

I used to go out with my friends about three times a month. That was on a normal month, when there was nothing special going on and it wasn't Halloween or Christmas or New Year's Eve or someone's birthday ending in zero, etc.... So sometimes I used to go out with my friends more than three times a month. But there were three regularly scheduled things every month, and I used to go to all of them. One of them was a dinner on a Sunday night for just anyone who could make it that month, and that would be at a different restaurant, just depending on what was suggested. One of them was a club meeting, and after that ended several of us would go to dinner afterward at a certain restaurant, and maybe we would still go someplace else after that. Then the third thing was a meetup at a bookstore, usually followed by going to dinner at a certain other restaurant. The thing at the bookstore was kind of dull, and I sometimes wonder why we bother with it. We should just find out who is going and head straight to the restaurant. Or we should only stay at the bookstore for half an hour or so, and get to the restaurant sooner, before we have to wait in line.

Due to the price of gas and other money problems and such, I decided that I didn't have to go out with my friends that often. I would still like to see them, but I wouldn't treat it as an obligation, just something that I would try to do if I had the money and the time and such. I still tried to make the main meeting and dinner afterward, but I did not think that I needed to be at every single Sunday night dinner, just the ones that were at a restaurant that I wanted to go to and when I knew that I had enough money for it not to be a problem. The thing at the bookstore was a bit of a drive, and the fun part was dinner afterward, and dinner requires money and often a long wait to get into the restaurant. So I wouldn't miss the thing at the bookstore that much if I stopped going.

One of my friends never goes to the Sunday dinner thing anyway. For one thing, she has allergies and such, and usually just doesn't want to go wherever we are going anyway. The other thing is that she refuses to go anywhere on a Sunday night, unless it is a long weekend and she doesn't have to go into work on Monday morning. I don't quite get that. I understand not wanting to stay out late Sunday night, because most of us have to get up in the morning, so the Sunday night dinner rarely goes past eight or nine, depending on what time of year it is. But regardless of what time the evening is scheduled to end, she just refuses to leave her apartment. It's like she's already feeling sorry for herself for the bad day at work she assumes that she will have on Monday.

Okay, so I had stopped going to at least half of the Sunday night dinner things, and then I was going to stop going to the thing at the bookstore. It was a longer drive than I liked, and then the price of gas really went up. I think that I said something along the lines of I had planned to stop going, and I mentioned that I really shouldn't spend the money to go to dinner afterwards, and it really wasn't as much fun if I skipped the dinner.

Knowing that I was short on money, one of my friends got me a gift card to the restaurant we normally went to after the bookstore. So that was a nice thought, and I figured that I could at least go two more times so that I could use the gift card. Only the next time that we got together, the wait at the restaurant was really long, and the group decided to go to a steak place down the road instead. I don't really like steak, and it usually costs more money than I want to spend. They serve a few other things, but most of the other things cost just as much as a steak, so if I'm going I usually end up buying the steak. And the smell of the steak is wonderful, and the first few bites are pretty good, and then I sort of remember that I don't really like steak that much. But I figured that once in a while it was no big deal.

And then the next time that we were at the bookstore, someone who isn't really one of my close friends but more of a friend of a friend jumped up and said that we should go to the steak place again. And I explained that I didn't have much money, but I could go to the regular place because I had the gift card. But this guy really wanted the steak place, and I got talked into going with them and buying a hamburger. Hamburgers are not my favorite thing either, especially when they cost seven dollars or more.

After we went to the steak place a third time, I decided I didn't need to go back to the bookstore thing for a while. And so I've had this gift card for the restaurant a whole year, and I've resisted the urge to just go to the place some other night and just have dinner with my husband.

So I've just been going to the regular meeting and the dinner afterwards. The restaurant has changed three times over the years, because my friend with the food allergies will only go to certain places, and a couple of those places have closed. She has a few really serious allergies, and if she has those foods she might have to go to the hospital. And then there is a ton of other stuff that she won't eat, because it might give her an upset stomach later. So no spicy foods, and most of the time she has to make a special order, and she'll only go to restaurants she thinks will let her make special orders. So we never go to a barbecue place, because barbecue is prepared for several hours before the customer even gets to the restaurant, and you can't special order barbecue with no spices. And we can't go to a Mexican restaurant because of the spicy food, and we can't go to a Cajun place because of the spicy food, etc.... And even though some stuff on the Chinese buffet is very bland she just doesn't like the idea of buffets anyway, and so we can't go there either.

After our first two restaurants closed, we are now regulars at Outback Steakhouse. Only I still really don't like steak, but that is the closest place that will let her special order stuff and everyone else in the group seems to like it okay. I have decided that I have had enough of steak, and from now on I am going to just order the clam chowder, even if that does make me look cheap. My friend with the food allergies doesn't seem to like steak that much either, and she special orders the chicken.

So after all of this time, the price of gas has gone down, and I decide to go to this bookstore thing and go to dinner with them afterwards, assuming that they are going to the regular restaurant and not the other steak place. After the Christmas shopping, I really have no money left, and most of my friends know that. But I've still got that gift card, so I can still go to dinner with them if they go to that restaurant. And I am relieved when the friend's friend who really likes steak doesn't show.

So after some time at the bookstore and getting distracted with conversations on subjects I care nothing about, like TV shows about dance competitions, it is time to decide what if any purchases we are going to make and then head over to the restaurant.

Only my friend with the food allergies jumps up and says that she is dying for a steak.

Since when does she like steak? We go to Outback Steakhouse every month, and she always orders the chicken.

So I said something about going to the other restaurant, cause I had this gift card, but I only had about ten dollars of cash left and I didn't want to spend it.

Instead of saying something like she didn't realize that going to the steak place was a problem for me, my friend then tries to talk me into going to the steak place and buying a seven dollar hamburger.

No, I don't think so. If we're not going to the regular restaurant I'll just go home. I don't want to spend the last of my cash on a hamburger that I don't even want.

So she is fine with going to the steak place without me. And they didn't vote or anything, she just decided that was where they were going. And my other friends came back from buying their books and asked which place we were going to, and I said that I was going home because the other girl had to have a steak. One of my friends just shrugged. If they had been there when she decided where we were going, they would have seen my problem and suggested going to the other restaurant. But if we tried to talk her out of it now, after it had been decided, even though she was the only one who decided, it would get ugly.

My friend with the allergies kept talking about getting a steak and how hungry she was, etc.... This was on a Saturday night, but somehow having a steak on Saturday night would help her feel better at work on Monday morning. Besides how stupid this statement sounds, if having steak on a Saturday night helps her have a better day at work on Monday morning, why doesn't she have steak every month when we go to Outback Steakhouse? The friend who bought me the gift card is looking from me to my friend with the allergies, like she doesn't know what to say without one of us getting upset. I say that I don't have much cash money left, and I can't use my gift card at the steak place, and I might as well just go home rather than spend the last of my money on something I really don't want.

The friend with the allergies says that's a good idea, and she doesn't blame me a bit for not going.
One of my friends tries one last time to get me to go, saying that I can just use her credit card to buy dinner. But I don't want to owe her money, so I say no thanks and go home.

I really don't think that I need to go to this bookstore thing anymore.