Evil hands of fate

A few years back, J & I decided to spend the day watching TV, eating and catching up. We had it all planned, I called in sick and it was going to be great!!! Around 11, the phone rang and it was McG's preschool, telling me she had thrown up & I had to come and get her. At that time, I began to suspect that the universe did not approve of my taking time strictly for myself. Time to be selfish. I felt sabotaged by fate, somehow.
Tonight is my first date with E & my first date in TWELVE YEARS. Clinton was winding down his first term the last time I ventured out on a date. We're going to a concert (Allison Moorer, my favorite singer!) and dinner first. I have a sitter picking McG up from school and bringing her home and M will be home by 7 to take over. I will leave work, stop somewhere to change in a bathroom and try to look amazing and proceed.
M's car broke down yesterday. Why? Something about a serpentine belt and the fact that the Universe is trying to screw me! So now, it is 8 hours & 40 minutes until my date. I'm waiting for a tow truck. I dropped M off at the Metrolink train stop, and am trying to convey, in a very casual way, that I HAVE to leave the house (the house I had no intention of coming to before the concert!!!) by 5:30 and I have to pray that with traffic, that gives me enough time to get to E's, so we can eat and talk and I can be charming and clever before the concert, because that's what people do on dates!!
They don't rush around, hoping they can get where they need to go on time, because Party #1's husband's stupid car broke down!!! And for anyone reading, of course I know how bizarre the entire phrase sounds! Delving into that whole mess...much longer blog later.
I just want tonight to go perfect. And it won't. B always tells me, in relation to speaking in front of crowds, there are 3 kinds of speeches. The one you're going to give, the one you give and the one you wish you gave. Maybe the same applies to dates. The one I want, the one I'll have and the one I'll wish I had. It's not going to be perfect and stressing out (and eating!) isn't going to change that. If E is there & I am there, then it's going to be fine. And if it isn't, then we'll have something to laugh about down the road, when we're reminiscing about our first date and how it would have been so nice to have a second, but the first went so horribly awry, we decided not to tempt fate (fate that HATES ME!) with a second. I am in full-on drama queen mode today, so watch out!
These last few days, I've been acting like an idiot . I am smiling a lot. I get a text and my heart leaps a little. Not a lot. Just a little. Like it's supposed to when you realize that you might like someone as a little more than a friend. E called me sweetness in an email about nothing in particular. Could be that this is like "Honey" which everyone and there mother uses to friends, relatives, enemies and strangers. I use "sweetie" to lots of people, McG's friends, sometimes my friends, it doesn't mean anything more that a nicer way of saying "Hey you!" and that could be all it means. But it made me almost giggle. GIGGLE!!! So I am possibly reading things into this that aren't there. And I said almost made me giggle, so I'm not into lobotomy territory YET!
I am going slow, I am going steady, I have a moderate and acceptable amount of butterflies in my stomach anticipating this. If I could just sacrifice something to the Gods of Fate, I might feel a little more confident. Oh well, it's too late at this point to get a live chicken, so I guess I'll just have to wing it.