I was in Houston last weekend. Brady had a ton of work to do so he didn’t come with and this kind of sounds bad, but it was a relief to have a break from him for a little while. I’m sure he felt the same way. And Tucker too. Taking care of a needy dog 24/7 is tough. Obviously by the end of the weekend I was ready to come home to them though.

I didn’t want to decide whether to stay at my mom or my dad’s so I just got a hotel downtown and Brittany insisted on staying with me for the weekend. She doesn’t live too far from the hotel, but I think she’s finally starting to realize that she doesn’t have any friends. So she’s clinging on to me. Funny.

I got dinner with my mom on Friday when I landed.

“Y’all are really serious about getting married,” was one of the first things she said. “Good thing you finally found someone. I was a little worried for a while.”

She tried to make it sound like a compliment, but it totally wasn’t. Before I got a boyfriend, she was constantly badger me about finding one and warning me that I’d be single forever. That’s how southern moms are. Life is not complete until you find a husband and start having babies. So then she’d try to hook me up with any and every single guy she came across. Thanks, mama.

The rest of dinner she just wanted to discuss my dad. She wanted to know if I’d talked to him, what he had said, where he was, who he was with, etc. My mom thinks he’s dating someone. That would be a shitty thing to do and my dad is actually a really, really good person. My mom seemed pretty adamant though so I decided to do my own investigation later.

On Saturday, Brittany had plans for us to go to a rooftop party during the day. I wore a tank top bodysuit, One Teaspoon shorts and wedges so I’d fit in with all the other basic bitches at the party. Texas is so tacky and I love and hate that about it.

As soon as we arrived at the party, Brittany introduced me to a guy named Christian. He was tall with an athletic build – similar to my ex – with a neat beard. He was dressed like Kanye West though. Longline t-shirt, ripped up skinny jeans, a Houston Astros hat, and high top sneakers. I was intrigued. One thing I wish about Brady is that he’d be more edgy and daring. The most daring thing he does is sometimes wear crew socks with his sneakers. So that’s why I shop for him sometimes.

This guy Christian is really into the arts. And after talking to him, I realized that I am too. I used to paint. Not anything serious or great, but talking to Christian made me realize how much I miss it. I feel like I don’t really have any hobbies or passions and that makes me feel unfulfilled. Does anyone else feel that way? Christian paints too and also produces music so it was nice to talk about that and I was actually surprised about how much I could attribute to our conversation. I normally talk a lot, but I just couldn’t stop talking. Usually I don’t have that much to talk about unless it’s about Kim Kardashian’s outfits or my favorite things to mix with tequila.

While I was talking to Christian, Brittany sent me two texts. One of them was a winking emoji and the other said, “I knew you would like him.”

She’d walked away at the beginning of our conversation and I hadn’t seen her since. I put my phone away and hung out with my new friend for the rest of the party. He’s really popular with the girls (he’s beautiful to look at so I’m not surprised) so everyone stopped him to talk.

We spent the majority of the day together and when it was time to leave, he invited me and Brittany back to his studio. I was going to say no, but Brittany said, “Yeah, come on. Let’s go.”

So I figured I could hang out for a little while longer. We all hopped in Brittany’s Mercedes SUV and headed over there. Christian poured sangria and we sat around his concrete island talking. I realized that I hadn’t mentioned Brady at all and I didn’t want Christian to get the wrong idea. So I started talking all about my boyfriend.

Brittany scrunched up her nose. “But y’all aren’t that serious, right?” She turned to Christian and shrugged.

“Uh, yes,” I said back. “He’s proposing soon.”

She smirked at me. “No he isn’t.”

“How would you know?” I shot back.

She took a sip of her sangria and looked at me over the glass. “I just know.”

She’s so annoying. She got a call and Christian suggested we paint. I agreed. It was actually really fun and therapeutic and random, but it didn’t seem random. It seemed so normal to be sitting there painting in my bodysuit and wedges.

Uninspired, I painted the scene from Christian’s windows which was buildings, a park, a pool and the night sky. I didn’t quite finish, but it turned out really nice and he insisted on keeping it. I hope I get famous from it.

Christian and I had already exchanged numbers earlier in the day so we didn’t have to deal with that when it was time to leave. He did say, “Hit me up, beautiful.”

Ugh. I thought we established that I had a boyfriend who was about to propose. But then I thought about what Kendra once told me, that just because a guy is being nice and complimenting you, it doesn’t mean he’s hitting on you. And I think that’s probably true, although guys would never ever turn down sex if the opportunity presented itself. But that’s another conversation.

Brittany wanted to go out that night, but I was just not feeling it. Nights out with Brittany are always a shitshow and I didn’t want to get that crazy without Brady around to babysit me.

So instead, I met up with my dad for food at around midnight. He’s so sweet. He swung by and picked me up from the hotel and then we headed to the restaurant.

“So how does it feel to live completely alone?” I asked.

“I haven’t spent much time at home, to be honest with you-” he began.

“Where have you been spending all your time?” I cut him off.

“I’ve been working, Reese. I can invest a lot more time into work now so that’s what I’ve been doing.”

“Oh,” I nodded. “Are you dating?”

My dad looked at me like I was crazy. “Dating? No.” And then he kind of chuckled. “Did your mother tell you that?”

I shrugged. “Maybe.”

“Perhaps ask her if she’s dating anyone. I think that’s the better question,” my dad said.

Do you see how petty and ridiculous my parents have become? So after leaving on Sunday, I realized I don’t want to go back while they’re like this.

Scott has been driving me absolute nuts. I had a couple more dreams about him (ugh), but have been mostly keeping my distance. He’s been giving me stupid bitch work to do and basically doing my job for me. It’s frustrating. He will have me do something stupid like alphabetize files and then he give me obviously tips like, “Put them in order before writing the names. That way if you make a mistake, it’s easy to fix.” Like duh, Scott. I’m smarter than I look. And obviously I don’t respond well to that. Then when we leave work for the day he will text me saying, “Good job today. You always amaze me.”

I want to strangle him. The other day, Mike stopped by my office on his way out and just kind of chatted with me. He was asking about my weekend, where I’m from and even about my hair. It was cute. As soon as Mike’s foot stepped off my office carpet, Scott texted me.

“Were you just talking to Mike?”

Stalker much?

I replied, “Yes,” and Scott said, “What did he want?”

I can’t tell if Scott is obsessed with me or obsessed with Mike, but leave me alone. I didn’t text back and Scott stopped by my office, of course.

“Hey,” he said, looking all nonchalant with his hands in his pockets. “What did Mike say?”

I didn’t even look up. “He just wanted to say hi. He’s a real human being, you know. Sometimes he just wants to be nice.”

Scott caught my drift and left me alone. I just can’t deal with him. I feel like soon, I’m just going to let him have it and it won’t be pretty.

Y’all will be happy to know that I haven’t gone out much in the last couple of weeks (there’s a reason why) and honestly, it’s nice. I’ve saved so much money.

Brady went out on Saturday night with some guy friends and I stayed home with Tucker and watched the Food Network. Brady and I had gone grocery shopping earlier in the day so I had a ton of snacks and I really can’t think of a better way to spend Saturday night.

Brady came stumbling in at 3:00 am and it pissed me off because he woke me up.

“I missed you, baby,” he said after he’d taken off his shirt and tried to get in bed with his jeans on.

“Ugh, get off me,” I said, shoving him. “Take off your clothes first.”

Brady laughed and got undressed and then we fell asleep.

His phone started ringing at 6:30 am. First, he got the three calls back to back and then a bunch of texts. His phone was just sitting on the nightstand so naturally I picked it up. Who would be blowing up his phone at 6:30 in the morning?

Apparently some girl named Aubrey. Are you kidding me? I was cranky from being woken up twice so I shook Brady so hard that he probably thought he was waking up to an earthquake.

“What?” he groaned, turning away from me.

“Who is Aubrey and why is she calling you right now?” I demanded.

“I don’t know,” he said.

And since he didn’t know, I decided to find out.

Aubrey’s texts said:

“Hey, where are you?”

“Are you still out?”

“Where can we meet? My phone is about to go dead.”

This is me, so I was thinking the worst. Like that Brady was meeting up with this broad for sex or a blowjob for money. I mean, I didn’t know.

So I texted back, “Brady’s sleeping and he’s not meeting you anywhere. Probably delete this number too. Thanks for your cooperation, Aubrey.”

Immediately, Aubrey responded, “He has my keys. I can’t get into my apartment.”

“Why does he have your keys?”

“Because I couldn’t bring my purse into the bar and I asked him to hold them for me. Where exactly are you? I’ll come get them. My phone is on 4%.”

And I don’t know what’s happened to me, but I actually felt bad for the girl so after I went through Brady’s pockets and found her keys, I told her she could come by and get them. I even ignored the fact that she was a hot, leggy mixed girl with big lips that were natural unlike Tia’s. Where is Brady finding all these hot girls?

Anyway, I have things to paint and conference calls to get on so ciao!