2022 : M8

A client at my little business introduced me to M8 because I need electrical work done, I am becoming paranoid about my dogs & neighbours with the renovation so I bought cameras to put up. While I don’t need an electrician as such, I do have some more heated towel rails which are hard wired to put up so I enlist the skills of a electrician friend of a friend who’s happy to do a cash job for me.

My friend doesn’t give me his contact details, I know he’s a FIFO worker with a girlfriend. But he never comes over the last time he was home, so I post on FB looking for another one but she reminds him, he has now broken up with the girlfriend. Our friend tells me that he’s going to the gym then he’ll be over after work one night. I honestly forget he’s coming because it gets later in the evening (like 8pm – I’m such a grandma) so I’d already changed into my oodie & ugg boots. I looked like a bridge troll to be honest, hair desperately needs washing & I’m not wearing underwear. Such an embarrassing look for a first meeting, now I look back, especially because we had a bit of banter & he was quite cute.

He’s super tall, like over 6ft, quite slim, he’s wearing a hat but he’s got brown hair & wearing glasses. He looks at all the work I want done, draws me a picture of how the cameras will be & where I want them. He looks at the towel rails & says he’ll look in the roof when he’s in there for the cabling to see if he can do them without having to put holes in my bedroom wall. He gives me his number & because it’s close to my birthday, I tell M8 that I may be hungover on the Sunday if he comes over then. I have organised to go out with a bunch of friends on the Saturday afternoon but when I look at the guest list, I realise it’s all couples & one other girlfriend… I do not want to be out with all couples… So I toy with the idea of cancelling saying I’m sick – but then you need a covid test, I could be vomiting or something but praise the weather gods, the weather looks dreadful so I cancel as it’s an outdoor pub… (Ironically the weather was a perfect winter day!)

I message M8 through the week to come over Sunday, he didn’t want to be here when I am not here… He said something about my dogs, but I was like they know who you are now, so it’s all good. But he doesn’t seem to like that idea so I try to organise a time when I am home… I hate being home when tradies are here, because I feel like I should be doing something. He comes over on Sunday & the first thing he says is as he walks in the door & looks at me is “I’ve got that jumper” I laugh & say something like it’s amazing, but I am too busy trying to calm my two year old puppies – which is usually what happens when someone new comes to my house. I genuinely don’t think much of this comment, it’s just a black jumper with a green Zro Fux on it…

He stands in the dining room, going though the boxes of cameras & he starts unravelling all the cables – like for all 6 cameras, so there are cables everywhere, talking to me as I clean up the ants that are running over my kitchen – he says he’ll have a look in the roof for me as to where they are coming from (which he never does!) I also don’t even know how or why but we’re talking about dog hair on my clothes & how bad these dogs shed their fur & so it makes me conscious of the dog hair on the black jumper, that I use my lint roller, in front of him. He also asks about my birthday (he remembered?!), says happy birthday but I tell him I didn’t go out in the end… He asks my age & says that I don’t look 41, which I hear a lot.

Before he starts, I suggest we get the actual cameras synced to my phone & the DVR, so we start connecting it to my TV, it shows up. He remembers my user name & password which makes me uneasy but I don’t think much of it either. We get the cameras connected but then they won’t work when disconnected from the internet. It’s a lot of tooing & froing to get them to connect with my laptop & spare TV but the fuckers won’t connect. We spend about 3 hours trying to connect the stupid thing to my phone but it wouldn’t when we realise that I need a longer ethernet cable. We decide to give up until I get a bigger cord, I say I’ll get one from work tomorrow. So he packs up his stuff but hangs around for about another hour, just chatting & him sending snapchats to fuck knows who, which leads me to understand why it’s called snapchat – you send a snap that’s a chat. Bahahaha, I lose it & he thinks it’s hilarious that I didn’t know that. When he leaves finally – not that it was awkward, but it was a bit weird that he hung around for so long, he narrowly misses my family rocking up for dinner.

I add him on snapchat to send him a joke snapchat, but he doesn’t add me back. I do have a weird user name, so I could look like a bot, I guess… The next day I find a cord at work & send him a text picture of it letting him know I have one… When I get home from work, I connect it up & get all the cameras working on my phone so we solved the problem, I send him some pics of it working. I tell him he can come over this weekend again to install them & he says he’s going out sat night to a car meet “boy things” – his words & he’ll be free Sunday.

This banter lasts all week, we text a lot, more than you should be a random tradie doing work for you & he adds me on snapchat, where we chit chat & joke around, talk about everything non related to my electrical job. I find myself laughing & enjoying the banter with him, considering we’ve only met once… Again when I least expected to be having a connection with a guy, someone comes along… Not thinking much of the late night chats till 1:30am or waking up super early to see a message from him… He keeps the conversation going asking questions, being interested but it doesn’t get dirty cheeky which I like – even when I test the waters on a cheeky chat.

He gest a burger one night this week & it makes me really want a good burger, it becomes a bit of a joke that I never get one due to me trying another fad of Intermittent Fasting, trying to lose more weight, still. He’s not working at the moment so we joke about him driving me places, being that I’ve had to go to the Barossa for work. He seems genuine to want to do that – not that I would make someone drive me somewhere that I barely know, but I feel like there is something more there with this guy than other guys… At one point I even feel like he’s hinting that he’ll housesit for me when I have to go away for work.

We joke about a lot of things… He says things that lead me astray though, like him waiting to see my hair before I straighten it. He also says something about driving when when I say that I have to go pick up my work phone & I’m texting with him so I suggest that he takes me but it never happens for whatever reason – maybe because I wasn’t direct & it got too late & I just went on my own & was home before he said he could do it & probably all for the best, I want my cameras up so I probably shouldn’t push this friendship & just leave him as my electrician.

On Thursday our mutual friend comes to me for her lash appointment & rocks up in a weird car, I ask who’s car & she says a name & I say who’s that? & she laughs replying “Your mate who you’ve been texting all week” oh fuck. What? He’s told her… I was planning on just omitting that from our conversation if I could. I kind of laugh, I’m not pissed, I think it’s super cute & makes me think that he’s genuine & interested in me, if he’s talking about me to her – again I think if you’ve got mutual friends etc then it’s a bit more risky so you tread carefully, well I do at least. Not that Eastwood did, so maybe I’ve got guys all wrong!

She jokes with me about when he’s moving in (multiple times), which I laugh at of course – but it makes me think what else has he said that she hasn’t told me. She tells me that he told her we have the same jumper & also the same sunnies, that I used my lint roller (WTF?! What a highlight!) & that I basically have been the one messaging …. She tells me that this is what he’s like & she believes me. I tell her I can show her the messages that it was a mutual chat & I tell her that I think he’s hilarious. She continues though, to tell me that he has some major 🚩.

#IBD4U