Social grace

I recently received a bunch of long, complicated questions from a work colleague and rather than responding the email with an equally long email (or drawn out phone call), I emailed this person back and suggested we "meet for lunch to discuss her questions", as I only know her by name an it would be good to meet her in person. (note the language used as it is important)

We work in different facilities so we decided to meet in the middle - and picked a relatively cheap and fast sit-down Mexican restaurant. We ate, I answered all of her questions, gave her LOTS of paperwork/examples to help solve her problems, offered my services to help edit/review a big project she is tackling, and then stood to leave. (note the language here again that I received absolutely no benefit from this lunch.....this is likewise important)

When we reached the cash register to pay, I gave the woman the ticket and it was about $23. I certainly didn't intend for this gal to buy my lunch, but I watched in awe as she didn't even reach for her purse and just patiently waited for me to pay for both of us. I paused for a second longer to give her the chance to demonstrate social grace and when she again disappointed me, I paid the $30 for lunch.

As we walked to our cars, I was so stunned by her lack of social grace - no, her outright rudeness - that it was all I could do to be civil. I don't care about the actual money itself, as the lunch was inexpensive, but I couldn't imagine that she had the audacity to pretend like I should pay for her lunch.

While driving back to my office I thought about the fact that I didn't receive content or value from the lunch, however, I still ended up paying her to dine with me. Why on earth would she assume that I was going to pay for her? Indicating that we should "meet for lunch" doesn't mean, "hey, I am so excited to DO YOU A FAVOR that I will help and pay you for the time it takes to ask". Hmmm, not so much gal. In total it took 2.5 hours out of my day from the time I left the office until the time that I walked back in the door, and while I knew I wouldn't benefit from the lunch, I thought it was a nice mitzvah to assist her with these questions (and the project) that were stumping her.

Needless to say, I didn't have warm fuzzies about her lack of social grace. By the time I got back to my office, I made up stories in my minds about exactly what kind of people her parents were and how they must have raised her - all based on my awesome and vivid imagination, so they were particularly troll-like.

What a silly girl.

Oh, and it's officially day 11 of this cold. Seriously. Day 11. I'm crossing my fingers for a miraculous recovery tomorrow....it could happen....maybe....