I am, among my numerous other quirks, exceptionally phone shy. I don't know why, but it freaks me out to talk to people I don't know. Once I get started, it's not too bad, but the really hard part is making myself do it in the first place. So when my boss wanted me to call the Boise Towne Square mall and every jewelry store in it (there are 9 or 10), I honestly began panicking.

See, I'm probably going to take this business with me when I move back up to Boise. But my boss needs to know if anyone else in the mall buys gold too. Competition in this business is freakishly fierce. When we opened a store in Tampa, Florida, we had to compete with at least 5 other businesses in the general area and even more beyond a few mile radius. Not fun at all.

So, back to the problem at hand. I had to call the mall and all of these jewelry stores. Finally, I convinced myself to pry my phone open and shakily dial the mall. It was a quick conversation. I asked her if they had a cash for gold place, she said no, I said thank you, and she hung up.

I told my boss, but lucky me, he still wanted to know about EVERY jewelry store. After another maybe 15-20 minutes psyching myself up for it, I pulled up the list of jewelers. It looked soooooo daunting, so I decided I would do it in reverse order: first up, Zales.

After three rings, I heard the rapid response of something like: "Thank you for calling Zales Diamonds and Jewelry. This is Jeremy, how many I help you today?"

I blinked. Once or twice. His voice was pretty familiar, so I tentatively asked, "Jeremy? Like Jeremy BUSACK?"

"Uh, yes. . ."

"JEREMY!!!!!!!!!!!!! OH MY GOSH, IT'S RACHEL! HOW THE HELL ARE YOU DOING, KID??? WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN UP TO?????!!!!"

(For those who might be confused, Jeremy Busack was one of my favorite people in high school. I've known him since 8th grade and we were in choir together our junior and senior year.)

We laughed about it for a second, I asked him my question, told him I would come see him as soon as I was back in town, and then let him get back to work. Phone shyness for the rest of the calls completely disappeared.

I can't wait to get back to Boise where I actually know people