Well my new coworker quit already so I am running the show solo. Again. I am not complaining. Running the station alone is peaceful. And it is less work than training someone who is checked out and would rather be elsewhere. Today I had a guy come through just buzzing with dad jokes. Why didn't the lifeguard rescue the hippie? He was too far out, man. He also demanded to know about the origin of my accent and it turns out his son was stationed in my hometown briefly. I have had a few people come through before from my state and a few from towns near my area. They are always super excited to make the connection and want to know how I ended up where I am now. In fact, it turns out that my neighbor 3 doors down is also from my hometown which is across the country. My family thinks I should avoid him unless I want to end up dead in a ditch. Gee thanks fam. Sometimes you see weird shit online about connections made unknowingly. Like a picture of you as a kid at Disney with your future spouse in the background of the picture. Focus: unlikely connections. Bump into your highschool BFF at a bar in Thailand while on vacation with your family? Your coworker in NYC from the same Midwest down of population 250? Alt focus: your favorite craigslist missed connections posting. It's the weekend! You know what to do.
Once crashed at an apt on the far side of a drug deal (weed, so not really). Our host's roommate comes home with a friend and a couple girls. One of the girls turns out to be from my small hometown 3,000 miles away. She's now dating one of the founders of Reddit I think.
Celebration day for me for a few reasons. 12 years from my brain tumor surgery. 11 years ago I met my wife, to the day 1 year from my brain tumor m (I hit on her friend who was our waitress when I was 2 weeks out of surgery and heavily drugged at a restaurant). I immediately recognized my wife as the waitress who one spilled an entire plate of margaritas into my sister’s brand new coach purse. Also 8 months sober, but that’s not a huge deal difficult. Still a thing though.
When I was in college, there was an optional fee for $6 a semester that provided legal services for certain situations. Some of my friends called me stupid for paying it, but I ended up using it when I got a DUI my senior year. It probably ended up saving me several thousand dollars. Fast forward to a decade later in a different city, and I'm meeting my new nextdoor neighbor, who happens to be the person who created that program at my alma mater.
In your friends' defense, you could have saved both the several thousand dollars and the $6 by not driving drunk like a moron.
I'm not at all a tv or movie person. Other than documentaries and live sports, I rarely watch it. But Big Brother is one of the few my wife and I religiously watch together. A year or two ago, one of the girls on it was from my home town. Specifically, we were in high school together, with a graduating class of less than 60 people. She was the class slut. As a conservative estimate, at least half of the guys in my grade banged her. The number would have been higher, but it was risky since it was a double wrap situation where her number of STDs was higher than her GPA. No, I didn't bang her, but she was about the only thing that made it through the offensive line that year. And the memories of hearing her still-drunk obnoxious fatass chirping in class about something that started with "omg like..." almost ruined one of the few shows I actually enjoy.
When I was in high school I moved about 400 miles from my hometown to the coast of Washington. I didn't know a soul in the damn town, but one day I wandered into a traveling carnival that had set up shop in town for the weekend. I was standing there looking bewildered and someone yelled "toytoy!" I didn't even look, obviously they must be yelling for some other toytoy. They yelled again and I finally looked their direction...it was someone I knew from my hometown who was shocked to see me. More recently, my last job attracted folks from all over the world. One girl came up to me and I saw she was from my hometown, we got talking and she gave me her maiden name...I knew exactly who she was, she was the first girlfriend (Like 7th grade or so) of one of my closest friends who passed away in an accident when he was 21. My name and face didn't ring any bells with her, which was probably for the best...it meant I hadn't left a lasting bad impression on her during my younger years. I'm pretty sure there are folks back home that still frown if they hear anything that even sounds like my name.