Ugh, it's Quiznos Day

One day out of every week, Deborah and I go to Quiznos for lunch. It would have been yesterday, but I forgot my iPod, so I ran home so I'd have it for my workout. Quizno's sandwiches fail to compensate for lousy company. Yet I go because it somehow became tradition and I'm far too passive-aggressive to put a stop to it. Topics that will be covered during lunch:

1. Bugs.
It's humid outside today, but Deborah has this insane fear of bugs (among a long list of others) so she refuses to open her car window. In the past, she had a car with no air conditioning, yet she drove around during the summer, sweating buckets for fear a bug will enter her vehicle through the window.

2. Working out/Bally's.
Running is hard work. She thinks all her problems will be solved by liposuction. She'll bitch about not wanting to work out today. I receive a daily report on the spinning bikes at Bally's. Today I was told "only eight of the sixteen bikes work. The rest are broke."

3. Bad Drivers.
She's constantly paranoid on the road:
"Where's this guy going?"
"Does he see me in this lane?"
"Don't I have the right of way?"
Quizno's is only a few miles away, but it's a tortuous journey.

Yesterday when I arrived at work, a thank-you card with a Target gift card enclosed inside was on my desk. Seriously. Stop. Deborah. It's common with her. She buys me candy and pretzels and gum and random shit during her Target shopping sprees. On the one hand, yes, it's a nice gesture. But it's excessive to the point where she tries to buy my friendship!!

I remember when I first started with her, she told me she almost bought me a white down coat I'd been admiring. At the time, I'd only worked with her a few months. Now that would have totally freaked me out. Had she done that, I'd have requested a restraining order! Apparently, this is what she does for others in her desperate attempt for friends. Many years ago, Deborah told me she bought a gift for a female co-worker. The woman felt so uncomfortable, she severed their friendship from that day forward. Deborah's theory is the woman thought Deborah was a lesbian.

She's sad and pathetic and I feel consumed with guilt, but I just can't handle her. I do not have the patience or tolerance for desperate, needy people. This single, 50-year-old woman has no friends and no family, really. She only speaks to two of her nine of siblings, but it's not very often when she does. She spends weekends alone, holed up in her studio condo, flipping through bad T.V. between bouts of eating and sleeping. That's her life.

To me, the worst feeling in the world is self-pity. I personally hate myself when I feel that way. It's one thing to vent about your misery to your close friends and family, but it's quite another to essentially demand and/or guilt someone into feeling sorry for you. That is what she does. Time and time again, I hear, "don't you feel sorry for me? Nobody never feels sorry for me." At this point in the conversation, I am ready to hurl my stapler across the room.

Another frequent line is, "I don't have nobody to hang out with." For the last week, all she's done is talk about how she wants to go bowling, but doesn't have anyone to go with. She was supposed to go with her nephew over the weekend, but at the last minute, he expressed interest in seeing Spiderman 3, probably so he didn't have to engage her in conversation for three hours! The first thing I heard when I walked into work on Monday was, "Waaah, I didn't get to bowling. I'm going to have to go by myself 'cause nobody will go with me." In the last eighteen hours, she's repeated that several times. Obviously, she wants me to volunteer to go when I'd rather shove a pencil through my eye.