THE READING/LONDON ROUND-UP, ONE YEAR LATER (Part Two)

Erstwhile housemate Rob found this prime specimen at Jackson's Corner in Reading when returning from London on March 6th.

My pal Parker and I somehow became blood-giving buddies at the beginning of last year, when we realized we had a mutual love for platelet donation and the inevitably subsequent tea and prepackaged cookies. On March 8th, Parker informed me that a blood drive was once again taking place in the Reading SportsPark (i.e. BG Mecca), so I gladly accompanied him. Upon our arrival, however, the blood-people told us that the drive was fully booked, so we walked dejectedly back to the middle of campus... but not before I saw yet another weary soul nearing the end of its pilgrimage.

The next day, Daniel's brother (who'd been in London helping him with his exhibition) came to Reading. I'd been in the library, and I met them outside the Palmer building so we could go to my house together and make a truckload of spaghetti. (Said spaghetti leftovers overstayed their welcome in my fridge after I forgot about them, and even thinking about them now, all slick and turquoise and oily, makes me feel a little queasy.) Outside the union building, they pounced on a glove.

EDIT: I miss this.

I don't seem to have found any more gloves until April 10th, which is odd, but I'll trawl my phone to see if there've been any pictures I forgot about. On the 10th, Daniel and I were at the Reading Homebase trying to find a suitable houseplant. He finally settled on a maidenhair fern that he named Ferris (Ferris died about a month later). The BG and "BG" (it was too fortuitous to pass up) that I found were both right outside, near the Bel and Dragon pub:

EDIT: I miss this too.

Nobody's really going to read this, are they? It's scary and all that I'm about to catapult my angst into cyberspace and onto the screens of whomever might be muddling through this at some point in the far future, but what hasn't been said by a bajillion other people already? Breakups suck. They truly do. It's like making a grilled cheese sandwich and then being forced to peel apart the two pieces of bread that have been so carefully toasted, and then there are crumbs and stringy strands of melted cheddar (or gouda, or feta*, or Muenster or what have you) scattered all over the place and it's just so damned messy and unappetizing.

*I KNOW you'd never make a grilled cheese with feta. I know my cheese. It was just a dumb analogy.