Yesterday was a pretty busy day. My father was in town, I had several errands to run, and I had some admin work to do on the blog.
My father came down to go to a Capitals hockey game with my brother on Thursday evening. So Friday morning we met up around 10:30. I arrived at Ryan’s house and was presented with a gift. My birthday is January 22nd, however, my dad gave me my gift early as he thought it could help with the blog. He got me a Flip Mino HD handheld video camera. It’s idiot proof and shoots excellent quality from what I have seen so far. I will try to start adding some video to the blog.
So last night I ended up at the Russia House in DC. I hadn’t given away my $10 yet and I decided that perhaps I would meet someone interesting there to give to. I was talking to Mike, DC’s greatest bartender, when I met Kent and Jessica. The engaged couple have known each other since middle school.
Jessica starts telling me the entire story of their lives, and let me tell you, she didn’t leave out any details. My goal is to keep this blog PG or PG-13 at the most…so I have had to exercise some editorial privileges. Best friends since about 12 or 13, they used to dream that they would end up together. That didn’t happen though when Kent dated one of Jessica’s friends in high school. But they remained close friends up through the beginning of college when she went to George Mason and he went to James Madison.
That’s when they lost touch.
After college Jessica had spent some time in Puerto Rico (where her mother is from) and Ft. Lauderdale. Fast forward about 8 years and Jessica decided to search for Kent on Facebook and found him. Kent proudly informed me, “She found me around noon on a Wednesday. I bought my ticket to Ft. Lauderdale by 7pm and flew there two days later to see her!” Kent is the type of guy that you don’t want to dare to do something…I gotta feeling he’s got a healthy amount of craziness in him.
They got engaged and plan to get married later this year.
So, I ask Kent if he will accept my $10. Being the gentleman that he is, he said he would have to pass and let his fiancée receive it. She said she was going to give it to someone else. The time came for the young couple to leave. They left the $10 sitting in front of them for Mike the bartender. That was only the second time I have actually seen a recipient using the $10. The other time, on Day 8, was when James gave me the money back!
Year of Giving 