Another day, another stock story.

Jeff and Amy are two really good friends of mine, but the story of how I met them is really quite amusing.

I had read domesticat.net for a while before ever contacting Amy; I knew her as a friend of the Wondergeek girls [Jessica, Heather, and Kat]. When Heather’s dad had a bout with diverticulitis, Heather was flung in a bit of a panic to have someone be able to take her mom to the Nashville airport to fly to where he was [I think D.C.]. Heather originally asked Amy, but Amy’d just gotten off of being sick herself and didn’t have much in the way of slack time at work.

Heather then called me; at the time, I was finishing up my co-op experience and was really, really underutilized at work. I agreed to meet Heather at her apartment, ride with her to meet her mom, and then take her car back to her apartment. Since Heather had been through my wonderful parking infraction with Jessica’s car—a story for another day, to be sure—I was surprised she’d let me drive her car.

Anyway, the deed done, I remembered something Heather had asked me to do, “Let Amy know that I got taken care of.” I pulled up domesticat.net, did a little digging, got an ICQ UIN, and introduced myself. We talked—regularly. We became friends, of a sort—as well as you can know someone in the town in which you live without having ever met them. I learned that Jeff was a grad student at UAH, although as a EE/CPE type I’d never seen him. This was actually surprising to many: among my friends, I’m known as a person who knows people. I’m still batting 1.000 for going out in public with my friend Stephen and running into someone else that I know, a record which amuses him greatly.

Later that spring, right before Jeff was to graduate, I was asked to participate as a greeter for Senior Salute, the new “get everyone you need to graduate in one room and move the graduates through like cattle” event that Josten’s had helped set up for us. Since I’d been on the committee to select Josten’s as our new ring/graduation materials provider—sitting on those committees was common-place in my collegiate career—I knew I’d be asked, and I was happy to be involved.

About an hour into my shift, a familiar face showed up. Is that Amy’s husband, Jeff? I asked myself. I offered him my hand and said, “Hi, I’m Geof Morris, and welcome to Senior Salute.” He shook my hand and said, “Hi, I’m Jeff McClure.” I think I said something like, “I knew it! I know your wife, and I thought I’d recognized you from her photos!” In any event, we had a good laugh about it—thankfully, Jeff didn’t think me a psycho Internet stalker boy, which was a good option—and when I got to a computer, I IM’d Amy and told her about it. We had a good laugh.

I finally met Amy the day that we went to go destroy flowerbeds at her house. That story leads me to another story: the day I met Sean for the first time. Another day, perhaps.

What Amy and I both found so amusing was that I met Jeff—whom I had little reason to know—before I ever met her. I think that speaks to Amy’s [now-waning] reclusivity, my outgoing nature, and the fact that, well, I know lots of people at UAH. In any event, I love this story.