By "long-distance", I mean one of approximately 35 miles -- the distance between Lebanon (where I still lived) and Harrisburg (where he had his house). I was still working the overnight night auditor shift at what was then known as the Quality Inn in my hometown ... and he was a unionized server at what was then known as the Circular Dining Room at the Hotel Hershey. I would often sneak away to his place for a visit, and he made the required trip to Lebanon in order to meet the og pit bull named Demon, where he joined us on our walk and learned the hard way that Demon needed to always be in the lead (via a quick nip when Chris tried to walk first in line). I think that was also the trip where he took one look at our batchelor pad kitchen -- and started cleaning. Together, we snuck away to Philly for a weekend of fun (details of which I'll save for the eventual actual auto-biography).
My favorite story from this time frame, though was how we would talk on the phone for hours after he got off of work, and during the slow slow time when I was at the desk of the hotel. As per my instructions, and seeing as how this was in the days before ubiquitous cell phones, I would always call him back on the special 1-800 line to save money -- and we'd talk about everything and nothing until he would start to fall asleep on the other end of the line. You can imagine my surprise when my employer contacted me weeks later to inform me that there was well over $100 in charges from outbound calls on that line, as a 1-800 number is only "free" to the people calling IN and not those calling OUT. Sheepishly, I came up with a plan to pay those costs ... and strategically, we came up with a plan to consider living in the exact same town (to be continued) ...
