The day couldn't have gotten off any worse. After 6 hours of sleep fraught with nightmares, I woke up with a splitting headache and the leftovers of food poisoning from last night's dinner. I trudged off to work, where I was informed that I was in the negative as far as vacation time goes and that I wouldn't be able to take any more days off until at least February. When I looked at the date to see how far away February really was, I realized that tomorrow is my mom's 55th birthday and since I'd totally lost track of time, I hadn't gotten her a present.

At the end of a long day, I trudged off to the gym. As Sir Edmund Hillary said regarding Mount Everest, "Because it's there." And I made up my mind. The day was going to suck no longer. I wanted to be like Mikey.

There's a girl at the gym who I've seen there for a long while, and I knew I recognized her from someplace. It clicked in a couple of weeks ago -- we used to work out at the same gym in Boston. I just never had the balls to go up and talk to her. I mean, it's a gym, and she probably gets hit on all the time. And if I was wrong, I'd come off looking like a schmuck. But I sucked it up tonight and went and talked to her. And I was right, we used to work out at the same gym back East. And as she was leaving the gym, she got a pen and paper from the front desk and left me her number. Score.

Because it's there, people. Because it's there. I should've done it sooner.