Curious Cases

So the new boy and I had some excellent plans for New Year’s–sit by the fire, drink champagne and chow on shrimp cocktail. I was completely content with this option and pleased that he didn’t seem to have any interest in painting the town red. He had to work New Year’s Eve, so I felt obliged to do what I thought to be was most of the leg work–buying the champagne and such.

As I stood in the aisle at the jam packed liquor store, I was starting to feel slightly annoyed. Our festivities were at HIS digs, so why was I starting to feel like I was throwing the “party”? Was I yet again going to end up with another guy who lets me to do ALL the work and was I yet again going to be the primary romance maker???? And boy, all that thinking was starting to p— me off a little!

I called him from the liquor store to ask if he had champagne glasses. I was considering buying two, even if he already had some. I wasn’t keen on sharing the libation with him out of glasses he likely used with his ex-wife. His reply to my call was yet another reassurance. All was well, he had bought some on the drive home from work. I stifled my annoyance and reminded myself that this guy was and is so different from all the rest, and that I just needed to start truly trusting in that.

I trucked all of the party stuff into my car and drove out to his house. As I pulled into the driveway and started unpacking the bags of goodies, annoyance crept in again, “Where WAS he and why wasn’t he helping me with the bags?” I lugged the bags through the snow and up to his front door. I could see his shadow waiting for me at the door as he hid behind it and opened it. What that door opened to was possibly one of the most romantic sights I’ve ever witnessed–the fireplace was blazing, as were nearly two dozen votive candles in delicate glass candle holders…for me.

For ME?

Yeah. For me.

Dumby me was so taken aback, I curtly said something stupid like, “oh wow.” The truth was, if I had said more or even looked at him instead of petting his dog, I would have probably broken down into a bumbling mess of grateful tears.

Before this experience, I didn’t wholeheartedly believe in fate or serendipity . I believed that life certainly had more than a few strange and miraculous unexplainable occurrences…Yet I still found myself thinking that everything and everyone we come in contact with was pretty random…and pure chance. This past year has given me ample evidence to believe in the unbelievable–that maybe, just maybe every random act we take part in can lead us to where we’re “meant to be.” I won’t go into detail, since some things aren’t necessary for others to know or hear, but I will say there are more than a few serendipitous things about Mr. Dreamy that are positively unexplainable… unless you believe in fate.

Probability or serendipity aside, I’m so grateful that I’ve found someone who’s loving me back with an equal fire. Adoration reciprocated tastes so much sweeter than the roller coaster and half-a–ed lovin’ that I willingly accepted in the past.

I realize that the blissful infatuation stage isn’t going to last forever and that somewhere along the line we’re bound to find a few challenges. But man, this euphoria sure is a nice place to start.

On a side note, we saw The Curious Case of Benjamin Button last night. The flick was slow moving (and THREE hours long), but had me in tears during the last few scenes. Here’s a memorable quote:

“For what it’s worth, it’s never too late, or in my case too early, to be whoever you want to be. There’s no time limit… start whenever you want… you can change or stay the same. There are no rules to this thing. We can make the best or the worst of it. I hope you make the best of it. I hope you see things that stop you. I hope you feel things that you never felt before. I hope you meet people with a different point of view. I hope you live a life that you’re proud of and if you find that you’re not, I hope you have the strength to start all over again.”

The bottom line for me: you just don’t KNOW what life has in store for you. And when you think you’ve finally reached the end of your rope, there’s always, always a lifeline; always something unpredictable that can and will change everything.

Here’s to
all the poor choices,
all the triumphs,
all the heart ache,
all the unrequited crushes,
all the bad dates,
all the unreturned calls,
all the rally cries,
all the bottles of Shiraz,
all the efforts to being okay alone,
and all the courage mustered for an unpredictable chance.

Mr. Dreamy is Great and All

…But I may have to qualify Johnny Iuzzini as my fantasy Eff/Get-Out-of-Jail-Free-Cheat Man. A pastry chef with tats? What more could a girl ask for?

He

Hmmmm, what a curious feeling this love thing is.  I mean, I figured it was bound to happen eventually.  No vanity intended, but my karmic dues had long been paid in full for a while.  I think this whiny journal/blog has adequate evidence of that.  But man it’s a little odd being someone’s Someone…Someone I actually ENJOY being around?  What a revolutionary concept!  Maybe I should have tried that idea out years ago–date men I actually LIKE!?  It sure makes life a little less complicated.  The simplicity is refreshing.

It is, however,  a little distracting having someone pop into your thoughts every other hour.  If that’s the only thing I can possibly complain about, I would have to say I’m in a good place….with a good person, who just happens to make me feel like I’m 15.

This whole slightly crazy, yet oh-so-clearly sensible experience has brought my mind back to an old first love.  One winter, in his cold dining room he turned on this song and made me dance with him during a rough patch in my life.  That Freudian conquest left me a little jaded, but filled with the knowledge that, yep, a man did love me.  I would be a liar if I didn’t admit that I’ve been searching for someone to replicate the way he made me feel on occasion.  I guess I just had no idea that I would fall upon someone who surpassed him by leaps and bounds.

In other news:  I only gained 3 pounds over the holiday!  That’s a grand total of 40 pounds gone since August.  I’m just having a slightly difficult time staying focused on the whole life style thing a midst of this love stuff.  Smoking is still on the platter and I’m totally terrified of quitting.  But it’s time.  I guess it was about time for more than a few changes in my life.

Bad Girls Weekend

Wooowheee, I Have a LOT of Catching Up to Do! SO the shake down? The cliffnotes version to my brief respite? It sucked. It sucked big time.

The long version?

Bad Girls Weekend turned into a weekend from Hell. Once hilarious and intellectual women spent hours discussing babies, chapped nipples, breast feeding, babies, diaper duty, babies, good school districts, infant growth spurts, babies, mortgage payments, babies, and yes, more babies. Is this what happens when you have kids? You turn into a boring baby talker?

I keep thinking that I’m totally emotionally ready to have a kid; thinking that the house, the husband, and the 2.5 (rotten) kids seems like a blissful opposite to what my life is right now. By Saturday at 7pm, when everyone was getting ready for (effing) bed, and continuing to discuss my new least favorite topic (that being babies)**, I walked over the the cooler, pulled out the cheap box wine, and poured the biggest baddest plastic cup of chardonnay I could stomach. My best of the friends who joined me on this camping trip from Hell walked over to me and asked if I was okay. I said, oh yeah, I’m fine. I just think I may need to be really drunk to get through 12 more hours of the baby talk.

I think that was my last Bad Girls Weekend, since there’s no way in hell I’ll ever subject myself to 48 more hours of a camping/drinking trip that has progressively turned into a friggin’ play date.

With all my ranting about chapped nipples and baby talk, I completely forgot to whine about the major follies of the weekend.

(the really long part of the story)

Friday–Got lost. Arrived at my friend’s house a little late. Left my keys in the ignition, locked the doors, and ran into friend’s house, excited to see new baby (this was prior to the excessive baby talk). Wanted to cry for a brief moment before friend mentioned that I have AAA. Duh.

Sunday Afternoon–My mom picked up my dog at the kennel. This was the first time I ever approved of a little weekend getaway for him. I was a little nervous and ended up shuttling him off to a family friend’s kennel, thinking that nothing could possibly happen to him THERE.

I came home and immediately notice this big pink mark on his black nose, scratches on his legs, and him scratching his ear excessively. He didn’t seem to care, but I was mortified. I leave the effer for one weekend and come home to what I assume to be the leftovers of a dog fight. I’d like to call the family friend, but I’m currently trying to figure out what I can say without accusing the person of neglecting my dog.

FYI, my dog looks badass with the skin scraped off the top of his nose. I’m thinking of buying him some boxing gloves for Christmas.

Sunday Night–I hang out with the fam. By 9pm I was itching to get back to my own bed and opted to make the late night drive from my families place to my home (which is about a 2 1/2 hour drive if I’m speeding).

I was cruising along route___, listening to NPR, and reflecting on the weekend’s events when from out of nowhere, I see a trooper behind me. Since no one else was on the road late on a Sunday night, I assumed to red flashing lights are for, none other than, ME. I wasn’t really all that nervous, since I KNEW I couldn’t possibly have been doing anything wrong. Trooper Man (who happened to have very nice green eyes and no wedding band) asked if I knew why I was being pulled over. I didn’t bother to act coy and just honestly said, Seriously. I have no idea. Turns out my left headlight AND breaklight were broken…As was my record of never getting a ticket. 31 years without a violation (unless you count the 40 parking tickets). My steak is over.

I ended up with two “fix it tickets” with threats of having my license revoked if I didn’t fix the problem ASAP and/or pay the fine. Take my job, take my money, take my beer, take my harmful tobacco products, but don’t take the license.

Monday Morning–Go to Valvoline to get the stupid lights fixed. End up getting it taken care of for free by possibly the nicest store manager in town. I had to beg the guy to take a twenty for his trouble. And frankly, his kindness pretty much made up for the three day shitshow weekend.

Monday Afternoon–Drive 20 miles, not knowing where else there’s a friggin Trooper barracks. I walked up to the creepy sterile building and discover the door is locked. Posted on the glass window is a large sign that says, “Trooper in Duty in case of emergency use call box.” Immediately I think, great, I’m going to get arrested for using the call box and not having an emergency. So I knock on the door. No one answers, so I knock again. Still no one.

I finally get the courage to click the button on the call box. It dials into the barracks. First a get an automated message and with the cars speeding by behind me, I have no idea what the message actually said. At this point I was kind of grateful that I wasn’t standing there with half my arm chopped off and/or being held captive by an ex boyfriend with a sawed off shotgun. Clearly this isn’t the place you’d want to go during a real emergency.

After a few tries I get a human voice on the callbox, despite still not being able to decipher what in hell she was saying. The phatum voice cuts out. By now I was starting to get annoyed. Really annoyed. So I pressed the button again and yell, “HI. I WAS TOLD TO COME HERE FOR A FIX IT TICKET. CAN SOMEONE COME OUT HERE AND HELP ME FIX IT.” My annoyance suddenly subsides when I realize how absurd I look screaming into an intercom at a Trooper station.

The Solo SeXtion

Being completely hungover, to the point of puking three times today, I started thinking about hangover cures. I once dated a guy who was convinced that sex cured hangovers. Never the type to avoid disproving a theory, I was easily convinced, and even mentioned to him that he really didn’t need to make up an excuse to sleep with me. As I fondly recalled what a freak show that guy turned out to be (which took me almost 2 years to figure out), I suddenly remembered more from last night’s shenanigans…

Our topic predictably veered towards sex. My newly married friend amazed her husband with the well known legend of how she went 4 YEARS without getting laid. It wasn’t that she couldn’t get “it” (since we all know that any walking vagina can get something, if they’re really that desperate for bed creaking entertainment), being the constant overachiever, she just couldn’t find anyone worthy of ditching her vow of celibacy.

Somehow, the conversations lead to a close examination of MY sex life. Now, since these women know more about me than probably anyone on the face of the Earth (including, but not limited to the time I diverted making out with a really fat bouncer–who thought “Slap Shot” was a phenomenal film–by telling him that my roommate, despite her coyness really did have the hots for him), I had no problem divulging the gory details of my sexual exploits. I took a sip of my drink, thought a few seconds, counted out the months on my hand, and confirmed that it’s been ten f—–g months and offered that even that one probably shouldn’t count since I was only Old Shoein’ it with an ex. My only other single friend perked up, “Oh whatever. I’m going on two years.” Is that supposed to be some kind of consolation?! Jesus.

So this got me to thinking, being single isn’t really that bad most days, but being voluntarily sexless is, at times, pure torture.

Excuse me while I go and peruse the solo section at goodvibes.com.

Coffee Companion

I need to preface this with a few background tidbits. I’ve emailed with Mr. Coffee Companion for months on an online dating site. Initially, I wasn’t interested and really wasn’t sure what he was looking for. He mentioned working out in his profile and I try my damnedest not to date men who are in better shape than I am. We emailed consistently about every topic under the sun from dating to death. And for months (and I mean MONTHS), I was totally content with my little email buddy.

This past June I suddenly found myself emailing with several men. Everyday. And as summer quickly approached and my email relationships were starting to take up more time than my actual dating life, I decided it was time to take the bull by the horns. I emailed Mr. Coffee Companion first and basically said, as much as I love this back and forth email thing, it’s not really getting me what I’m looking for. I then typed my phone number and said, if you’d like to do something some time, give me a call.

He didn’t call, but emailed, saying that he would miss the emails. I didn’t reply and within a day, actually had a voicemail from a sexy sounding voice. I was shocked and took three days to call him back, not wanting to appear available, since we all know no man likes an available woman. We played voicemail phone tag for a few days. By the time we finally talked on the phone this Thursday, I felt like it was probably going to take another three months for this guy to ask me out. I was wrong and he suggested meeting up for coffee, since we were both going to be in the same neighborhood. I figured what the hell.

I could be totally off the mark, but I think I just had a decent first date. Not that coffee is a date, but let’s pretend it is. If it is, in fact, a date, then I would be a little pissed that my “date” didn’t pay for my $5 coffee. But coffee isn’t a date. It’s just coffee. And since it was just coffee, the lack of chivalry didn’t offend me. And in all honesty, I’ve never been a huge advocate for chivalry, since I’ve dated plenty of men who regard themselves as chivalrous, then turn out to be complete a-holes.

After sitting on a Starbucks patio for nearly two hours, I mentioned that I really needed to get something to eat. We had met up after he worked a 10 hour shift and I had a night class. He wasn’t hungry (I’m going to go ahead and assume that he’s either not interested and/or cheap, since I can’t really think of any other reason not to eat something after sitting for two hours…).

He created another half hour of chitchat, which kind of confused me, causing me to think, “Okay? No dinner, but you still want to sit here talking?” Eventually, he awkwardly walked me back to my car. Prior to my December dating debacle, where I took the lead, I would have easily given someone a hug as a greeting and/or parting gift. This time I decided no go. If someone’s interested, they’re going to have to put it out there loud and clear.

He stood there, shifting his weight from left foot to right and mumbling something about his weekend. Between his mumbling and my 20% hearing loss from blasting my headphones through 4 years of high school, I really have no idea how the date ended. For all I know he asked me to marry him at Italian Fest this weekend.

Now, the good part:

• He’s tall (I’m tall and always seem to end up in committed relationships with short guys with Napoleon complexes),
• bald (I like no hair. It’s much better than bad hair),
• nice smile,
• sexy ass,
• nice cute little lips that’s caused me to stop a few times and ponder his kissing (and other) skills. This thought process, in my idiosyncratic mind, lead me to confirming that our offspring would have a 100% chance of having a big nose, which would kind of suck for the kids. The compensation would likely come in the brains department, since he appeared to be intelligent and on occasion, I have access to a few brain cells),
• seemed humored by my goofy comments and was quick to offer his own (and blushed every time I laughed at his jokes…God, I love shy men),
• likes not being a workaholic, citing that “quality of life is more important than money” (Bing, Bing, Bing! Good Answer, Mr. Coffee Companion.),
• and at one point, when discussing the dentist, Mr. Coffee Companion complimented my smile.

I really don’t care if he calls for another date (of course I care, but let’s pretend I don’t, since rejection of any kind generally sucks), but am eternally grateful that I now have enough fodder for a few nights of sex dreams.

This one’s for you, Mr. Coffee Companion. I hope you ask me out again. If not, I’ll see you in my Karma Sutra fantasies.

Naked Men

When I was a freshman in college I knew two girls from Long Island. The rest of us kind of thought they were a little rough around the edges and took to calling them “The Guidos.” The Guidos didn’t really like this at first and threatened to kick our asses a few times before we convinced them that it was a compliment.

We, of course, inevitably became part of their little posse. They made up a fake sorority (I think it was Sigma Delta Guido), which we had to (fake) pledge to be part of. One of the dares was to walk to the news stand downtown and purchase a copy of Play Girl.  I, being the chickenshit smartass, took on the dare, then proceeded in paying another (non-pledging) friend to go get it.

For the next week we posted naked men on our dorm room doors with DIY thought bubbles.

Good times.

Chelsea Handler Part Deux

 I finished Are You There Vodka, It’s Me, Chelsea with vim and vigor. Chelsea Handler is, hands down, one of the best comedic writers I know of (other than my brother). Now maybe some of you with, say, CABLE have known her for a while, but I’ve been working with rabbit ears and 5 channels for going on 4 years. I’m just glad I have access to the type of book that would proudly proclaim, “I went out with a guy who once told me I didn’t need to drink to make myself more fun to be around. I told him, ‘I’m drinking so that you’re more fun to be around.’” I can relate. And frankly, reading that book has gotten me back in touch with my mouthier, more cynical side—the one I didn’t think would be useful for enlightenment of my 30’s. I suppose it also helps that I’m not spending 8 hours a day in front of a bunch of teenagers, guarding my words, and biting my tongue when I really want to say, “Hey, little shitweed, go sit your little ass in that chair, shut the f—k up and read chapter 5.” Not that I would ever say that, but the thought has crossed my mind a few times.

I had to shell out the cash to buy a stupid textbook for my little web design class (I think I keep calling it “little” since it’s probably going to do “little” for me and my “little” career search). I was a “little” disturbed when I learned that the class is dedicated to Dreamweaver and Macs. I DON’T OWN A MAC! I HATE MACS! (And I accidentally muttered this, “I hate Macs” when the prof set us off onto a tutorial of Dreamweaver. I kept closing out the pages, in efforts of trying to enlarge. Who knew they didn’t enlarge? And who in hell doesn’t want their entire screen covered with whatever your focus is supposed to be? I know who! Those of us who should probably consider a current eye exam!). I was even more disturbed when the prof let us out an hour early. For the first time in my life (other than that one time in an alley), I was thinking, “HEY! I PAID FOR THAT HOUR! TEACH ME SOMETHING, MOFO!”

I drove off to my local Barnes and Noble, armed with a 20% off coupon. Of course I wandered around the store, collecting a dozen books that I can’t afford before finding Dreamweaver 8. I dropped all 12 items of my little library collection when I spotted My Horizontal Life: A collection of one night stands, by none other than my new personal guru, Chelsea Handler. Now, I’ve never considered having a serious relationship with a woman, let alone a sexual one, but I’m pretty sure I would marry her if I lived in California.

“What do I have to offer a man right now?”

I ventured off to happy hour last night and met up with a few former colleagues. As the conversations whirled around the usual topics: school, politics, and…Without fail, men…a friend casually asked how my dating life was going. I pondered aloud, “What do I have to offer a man right now?” The look of shear shock and sadness on my friend’s face made me pause. “What? It’s TRUE!?”

 

I had had a similar conversation over the phone with a former housemate, where, yes I was a little surprised by their reaction to my comment/question. She, like my former colleague, couldn’t believe I would say such a thing about myself. My defense in both cases was pretty simple: shouldn’t we all be able to come to the dating table with expectations that the other person has their shit together? And if the other person doesn’t, how can they possibly be able to offer up an equitable relationship?