Almost caught red handed
So today I took the day off work and went to my parents house to work on the sign for Laura to read as she is plummeting through the sky. Making 4 foot high letters out of ductape is harder than it sounds.
The room was not big enough to unfold the tarp, but I could at least get it half way. So I did. I finished the left half of the sign today, and am now over half way through. Tomorrow I go back to finish it. I am going to be sooooo dead on Sunday. The first two letters I did took an hour. Then I got smart and did the next row (4 letters) all at the same time, tracing out all four, then filling them in with the tape. That took an hour and a half for four letters, but they were mostly easy letters. (A WILL, the ILL was really easy, the W not so bad.)
Next row was a pain. MARR, with the Rs one of the more difficult letters to do. The two came out slightly different, and are right next to each other. I hope it doesn't look bad from 1000 feet.
Other than that it is working pretty well. My wrists and fingers are very sore, and my back and knees as well, but less so now that I've had a nice bath. Pulling the tape off the roll is difficult, and pressing it down isn't easy either. On the bright side, I seem to be spot on for how much tape I need. I'm half way through the letters, and half way through the ductape. I may pick up a small roll just in case. I suppose I could always drop the ? if it comes down to it.
While I was there I talked to my parents a bit about relationships. Asked how they decided to wed, found out my mom was disappointed she didn't get an engagement ring for a Christmas present (Which explains why she hinted at me that I could have gotten Laura one for Christmas, and also why she suggested my valentines day plans might be a disappointment when Laura didn't get a ring after all that) and talked about my plans for the 6th. Also, I mentioned that nearly everything I've told Laura is factually accurate, just misleading. I'm trying not to lie to her. Though I did slip up and start to say I would be going to work tomorrow instead of just going to finish up what I did today like I had planned on saying. I've told her I'm busy today (I was) and that I would be getting home late (I did) and that it was a long day so I am tired (I was) and that my wrists were sore (they were).
Actually, my wrists, my arms, my knees, my legs, and my fingers are killing me. I don't know how I am going to do this again tomorrow, but I need to get it finished. I think I am going to take a few Advil with me to help me get through it. I've been downplaying how sore I am because if I were just at work like Laura thinks, I would not be nearly so sore, and not in so many places. So I took painkillers. She saw and asked if I had a headache. I said yes, because on top of all that, I did. (Though it had mostly gone away by then, it was mainly when I was driving.)
And now a fun story of sorts. I aimed to go home late for two reasons. To avoid traffic, obviously, and since my route home goes right by her work and comes from nearly the opposite direction I'd normally come from, to reduce the risk of her seeing me on the freeway. So I'm on my way home, I figure I will call her when I get close to the bridge, or possibly after the toll booth. She calls me when I am not even to the city she works in. I ignore it because for when I get home, there is not a chance I would be on the road yet. But I figure it is a good sign, and that she is on the way home, if not home, so will be there far ahead of me.
So, 20 minutes later when I am closer to home I call her back. She doesn't answer, but ends up calling me back. I suggest she is going to beat me home, she says no she just left. So I ask her where she is. She never gave a straight answer to it, but from the sounds of what she did say, it was about two miles behind me.
This is a bad thing. She tends to drive fast. There is a toll booth ahead where I have to stop to pay cash and she can just zoom through with her fastrack transponder. Then there are stop lights after that, which can close a 2 minute gap in no time. (Well, in 2 minutes anyway.) This is all bad. So I speed up a little, paranoid that she will see me. At the same time, I have a strong gut feeling that I will see a cop on the way home, and I've learned to trust my instincts, so I am also worried about being pulled over for speeding, and having to explain away why so coincidentally she saw someone pulled over ahead of her at the same time I got a ticket for speeding.
I bet you can see where this is going. Well, you're wrong. The car behind me seems to be staying with me. Even as I start heading towards the left turn lane where I will be home free, because it is the intersection I meet up with my normal route home. Suddenly, red and blue lights flare up a few cars back. My mind of course tells me my worst fears must have happened, I'll get a ticket, and have to explain to Laura what an amazing coincidence it was, or worse, she would recognize my car and know that wasn't where I should be.
But it turns out he was pulling over the car next to me. (Whew!) Probably because he had made an illegal u-turn right in front of me (And just past the police station to boot.) I'm still nervous about the car behind me being Laura though. But the car turns into the strip mall. Finally, the last light. Another car pulls up behind me. This one looks more like Laura's car. I make the last few turns onto residential streets, the car stays behind me. As I approach the house, the garage door starts to open. So I pull aside to let her in, then back myself in.
In the end, she was far enough behind me that she didn't spot me until the final stop light, where there was no reason I shouldn't be there on the way home from work. So to her, it just looked like good timing. She has NO CLUE how close she came to spoiling the surprise. I don't know if I could have come up with a believable excuse without a flat out lie. (I could have said I took a side street because the freeway was stopped, but I don't know that it was. I would probably have said I was taking a different route, but she would have pushed more to find out why.)
That was just way too close. I'm glad I won't have that worry tomorrow, as she is not likely to want to go out. And aside from picking up the ring, that is the last I will need to go out in preparation. Just two weeks more of keeping this a surprise.
The room was not big enough to unfold the tarp, but I could at least get it half way. So I did. I finished the left half of the sign today, and am now over half way through. Tomorrow I go back to finish it. I am going to be sooooo dead on Sunday. The first two letters I did took an hour. Then I got smart and did the next row (4 letters) all at the same time, tracing out all four, then filling them in with the tape. That took an hour and a half for four letters, but they were mostly easy letters. (A WILL, the ILL was really easy, the W not so bad.)
Next row was a pain. MARR, with the Rs one of the more difficult letters to do. The two came out slightly different, and are right next to each other. I hope it doesn't look bad from 1000 feet.
Other than that it is working pretty well. My wrists and fingers are very sore, and my back and knees as well, but less so now that I've had a nice bath. Pulling the tape off the roll is difficult, and pressing it down isn't easy either. On the bright side, I seem to be spot on for how much tape I need. I'm half way through the letters, and half way through the ductape. I may pick up a small roll just in case. I suppose I could always drop the ? if it comes down to it.
While I was there I talked to my parents a bit about relationships. Asked how they decided to wed, found out my mom was disappointed she didn't get an engagement ring for a Christmas present (Which explains why she hinted at me that I could have gotten Laura one for Christmas, and also why she suggested my valentines day plans might be a disappointment when Laura didn't get a ring after all that) and talked about my plans for the 6th. Also, I mentioned that nearly everything I've told Laura is factually accurate, just misleading. I'm trying not to lie to her. Though I did slip up and start to say I would be going to work tomorrow instead of just going to finish up what I did today like I had planned on saying. I've told her I'm busy today (I was) and that I would be getting home late (I did) and that it was a long day so I am tired (I was) and that my wrists were sore (they were).
Actually, my wrists, my arms, my knees, my legs, and my fingers are killing me. I don't know how I am going to do this again tomorrow, but I need to get it finished. I think I am going to take a few Advil with me to help me get through it. I've been downplaying how sore I am because if I were just at work like Laura thinks, I would not be nearly so sore, and not in so many places. So I took painkillers. She saw and asked if I had a headache. I said yes, because on top of all that, I did. (Though it had mostly gone away by then, it was mainly when I was driving.)
And now a fun story of sorts. I aimed to go home late for two reasons. To avoid traffic, obviously, and since my route home goes right by her work and comes from nearly the opposite direction I'd normally come from, to reduce the risk of her seeing me on the freeway. So I'm on my way home, I figure I will call her when I get close to the bridge, or possibly after the toll booth. She calls me when I am not even to the city she works in. I ignore it because for when I get home, there is not a chance I would be on the road yet. But I figure it is a good sign, and that she is on the way home, if not home, so will be there far ahead of me.
So, 20 minutes later when I am closer to home I call her back. She doesn't answer, but ends up calling me back. I suggest she is going to beat me home, she says no she just left. So I ask her where she is. She never gave a straight answer to it, but from the sounds of what she did say, it was about two miles behind me.
This is a bad thing. She tends to drive fast. There is a toll booth ahead where I have to stop to pay cash and she can just zoom through with her fastrack transponder. Then there are stop lights after that, which can close a 2 minute gap in no time. (Well, in 2 minutes anyway.) This is all bad. So I speed up a little, paranoid that she will see me. At the same time, I have a strong gut feeling that I will see a cop on the way home, and I've learned to trust my instincts, so I am also worried about being pulled over for speeding, and having to explain away why so coincidentally she saw someone pulled over ahead of her at the same time I got a ticket for speeding.
I bet you can see where this is going. Well, you're wrong. The car behind me seems to be staying with me. Even as I start heading towards the left turn lane where I will be home free, because it is the intersection I meet up with my normal route home. Suddenly, red and blue lights flare up a few cars back. My mind of course tells me my worst fears must have happened, I'll get a ticket, and have to explain to Laura what an amazing coincidence it was, or worse, she would recognize my car and know that wasn't where I should be.
But it turns out he was pulling over the car next to me. (Whew!) Probably because he had made an illegal u-turn right in front of me (And just past the police station to boot.) I'm still nervous about the car behind me being Laura though. But the car turns into the strip mall. Finally, the last light. Another car pulls up behind me. This one looks more like Laura's car. I make the last few turns onto residential streets, the car stays behind me. As I approach the house, the garage door starts to open. So I pull aside to let her in, then back myself in.
In the end, she was far enough behind me that she didn't spot me until the final stop light, where there was no reason I shouldn't be there on the way home from work. So to her, it just looked like good timing. She has NO CLUE how close she came to spoiling the surprise. I don't know if I could have come up with a believable excuse without a flat out lie. (I could have said I took a side street because the freeway was stopped, but I don't know that it was. I would probably have said I was taking a different route, but she would have pushed more to find out why.)
That was just way too close. I'm glad I won't have that worry tomorrow, as she is not likely to want to go out. And aside from picking up the ring, that is the last I will need to go out in preparation. Just two weeks more of keeping this a surprise.