Reboot: The Geoff and Brianna Story

Six years ago I went on a very bad first date. Or rather, I stood outside of a bar for 30 minutes before deciding that the date I thought I was going on was not happening. I had been stood up.

Luckily this is exactly the sort of thing romantic comedies are made of.



After a few weeks of exchanging witty messages over an online dating site, Geoff and I had finally decided to see if our real world selves were anywhere as compatible as our online personas. The afternoon of our date my mystery man (That’s Geoff) had emailed to say that due to troubles at the office he’d be about 15 minutes late to our 7pm meeting. “No problem,” I said. So when I arrived at the prescribed drinking hole at 10 to 7 (ever the early bird) I had no reason to expect to be anything but alone at the bar. I quickly glanced inside and didn’t spot anyone matching the pictures I’d seen of Geoff so I decided to wait on the curb. At the time I told myself that this was because a classy lady such as myself would not sit by herself in a bar but really I just hated the awkwardness of being alone in a place where people are usually together. I waited and waited and waited until 7:30, until 7:45 and then I called a friend to bemoan the pain of being stood up.

If someone had told me on that day that the stander upper guy would go on to become my husband I would have believed them -- I was a big believer that “the one” could be ANYONE. Even some jerk who didn’t see fit to actually show up for our first date. I was the type of annoying romantic comedy ingenue who underneath her cynical exterior was just so ready to believe in love! If only the right guy would show up and buff out her hard exterior! If only she would stop making off color jokes long enough to put on a little eye make up! If only she could let her inner lovey-dovey girly-girl SHINE!!!!!!

Geoff would tell this story differently. He was so excited about our date that he thought “screw work” and left in time to arrive at the bar early. He sat at the bar nursing a drink alone. He thought he had been stood up. (He thinks my waiting outside is the stupidest thing he’s ever heard). But even if he is totally wrong about how date #1 didn’t go down he still deserve credit for being brave and calling me up to find out what happened and arrange a replacement date. He is the type of romantic comedy romeo who might seem a little clueless on the outside but in the end comes through as the nice guy that the audience wants me to fall in love with as soon as possible.

I’d like to say that after we finally got around to a Hollywood perfect first date  (a stroll in Central Park followed by dinner followed by chaste handholding (classy lady, remember?)) we rode off into the sunset together -- but what kind of romantic comedy would that be? Before the happy ending someone has to spill their drink on the other person, someone else has to overhear part of a phone conversation and take it the wrong way, someone’s ex has to show up and say ridiculously inappropriate things, both people have to yell and shed buckets of tears and probably get drunk in some horrible dance club with friends who encourage them to let random strangers grind their private parts against theirs (Thanks guys!). Geoff and I would do it all.

We would fumble around in the relationship that is now known as “1.0” for almost a year before months of refusal by each of us to let down our guard and actually talk about feelings (eww.) resulted in the break up. I did what any recently dumped romantic comedy star would do -- I cried a lot, went to therapy and I made “dating other guys” my full time, get over him, job. Clearly that was a huge failure because here we are in our 2.0 relationship headed to the 3.0 of wedded bliss.

Breaking up was the best thing we ever did. It gave us both the opportunity to look around at the other goods on offer in New York City and decide there is no way we could do better than each other. It made us admit that our relationship was worth being vulnerable and embarrassed. It made us fight for our future.

I’ve really struggled with writing this essay. I want The Story of Geoff and Brianna to be so many things. I want it to be sweet and romantic -- I want everyone who reads this to feel how much my love overwhelms me with joy. I want it to be witty and funny -- perhaps the best thing about our relationship is its silliness. I want it to be smart and snappy. I want all of you to like us.

Despite the huge smile that I’m predictably wearing at the end of this movie I am still cynical enough to be just a little embarrassed about writing the next sentence. Most mornings I wake up and can’t believe how happy I am, how lucky I am to be sharing my life with someone this great. I follow that up with a brief internal freak-out about the possibility of Geoff dying in his sleep and then I fill my cereal bowl with raisin bran and get on with the day. Somehow he keeps waking up alive. I am blessed.

This Just In: Pants on Fire all Over the Internet

I basically have a PHD in online dating. I’ve been on crazyblinddates (and TV). I’ve been on actual crazy blind dates. I’ve met winners and losers and lots of blog fodder. I met guys on IRC (old school!), on Spark Match, on craigslist, on Nerve, on OkCupid, on Facebook, etc (and never on eHarmony or Match because I am a cheap snob). And now I’ve gone and shacked up with a dude I met online and we don’t even bother to lie about how we met (Go ahead. Judge us! We’ll be over here making googly eyes so we probably won’t even notice.). I am a big fan of online dating mostly because it takes an activity (meeting people) that once required one to put on pants and be nice and makes it happily catty and pantsless! If online dating were a charity I would donate money every year. If it were a presidential candidate I would volunteer to work on its campaign and then pretend to be the father of its love child. If there were an "easy A" graduate class on it I would teach it. I know what I’m talking about. So trust me when I say that you’re doing it wrong.

Or if you don’t trust me; trust the data. I absolutely love the OkTrends pieces where the OkCupid people analyze their tons of online dating data to find out exactly how we are all screwing ourselves (instead of the people we could be meeting on their site!). The latest and greatest of these pieces is about the lies that people tell in their online profiles. All of the expected transgressions are there -- I’m taller! I’m richer! I’m bisexual-er! (?!?) Now, obviously we should stop lying because that is exactly how one ends up burning in hell but maybe also because one will get caught and then one will probably not get laid. In the article, the author muses a bit about how exactly the liars expect to get away with their lies once a relationship moves from screen to real life but I would contend that no one needs to get away with anything.

Most people have no idea what it is they want.

I am constantly hearing girls say stupid shit about how they would not ever ever never ever date a boy who is under 6 feet tall. Similarly, many boys seem to have an arbitrary body weight that they fear no date should be allowed to exceed. Some of these folks are just assholes. But I think most of them are ok people who suffer from two much more common problems:

• Belief that physical appearance matters way more than it actually does.
• Belief that they know what “tall” and “not fat” look like in number form.

I’m not saying that being physically attracted to someone is unimportant. You need to want to bang your significant other -- but (lucky for the future of the human race and evidenced by over population problem) I think most of us are actually willing to bang a lot more people then we’d like to admit. (Sluts!) And more importantly, I don’t think most of us have any idea what 6 feet or 135 pounds looks like on a real life body. Allowing yourself to draw a hard line between 5’11” and 6’0” means not going out on dates with a lot of guys that might be just right for you. You can continue pretending that there is no way you could ever want to have sex with a body that weighs 140 or measures 5'11” but don’t expect sympathy when you die alone. In the end, there is only one person responsible for your self-imposed limits. (And if you really can’t find someone in the 5’11” category attractive no matter what, then perhaps you really are an asshole! You can stop reading now!).

When you slowly get to know someone (through work or mutual friends or anywhere but the internet) you often learn to like them long before you think about if you like them like them. But online dating takes away this opportunity, instead you’re supposed to decide if you could ever fall in love with a collection of extremely self-edited snippets (most of which often aren't even the right snippets!). A smart boy won’t admit in his profile a love for Frito pie, old broken down trains and the smell of the top your head but its often exactly those quirks that make you want to bed him on date 3 or 35 or 310.

We’d all do well to accept these facts: You will never be given enough online dating factoids to determine if you could fall in love with someone. You might not fully understand just how flexible most of your deal-breakers really are.

But most people won’t admit either of these things (even to themselves) and so it pays to lie. It's very possible that claiming you’re 2 inches taller or 10 pounds lighter or 20K wealthier is going to get you on an actual date where you get the opportunity to prove that your jokes and astute observations and ability to order wine without embarrassing yourself can more than make up for stature and bank account. Just hope when you show up at the bar your date isn’t holding a copy of your profile in one hand and a measuring tape in the other. The lucky thing about love (or even about a really hard crush) is that it forgives a lot of transgressions.

Maybe I’m not cynical enough (this is the first time in all history that this possibility has ever been considered). I’m assuming that most people engaged in online dating would like to meet someone and fall in love and live happily ever after until they have a baby and realize that evolution totally tricked them into a life of green oozing feces and 3am screaming. (Surprise!). Obviously some people are trolling the Internet for amusement or a quick lay and probably some even larger number of people aren't ready to do much more then casually flirt (be it over a barstool or a computer monitor). But for the lovey-dovey mushheads out there (Put your hearts on your sleeve! Holla!) maybe go out with a shortie or a poor guy now and then. And go ahead and keep lying; it doesn’t matter.

The Winner Parade Entry 6: Behind the Scenes on My Crazy Blind Date

So remember back when I was famous for being perpetually single and so frustrated with the ridiculous system that we call courtship (and by "we" I mean old people like myself; I believe the kidz call it "Laying the Jezzy on Some Hos")? Good times. Oh wait, actually... BAD TIMES.

For those of you who were not here a year ago and who have not spent your weekends memorizing my archives: Firstly: FOR SHAME. Secondly: A refresher. So I discovered Crazy Blind Date back when I needed two things: 1. Some lovin' and 2. Some blog fodder. I went on one date that was, in the end, neither Blind (since he read my blog predate) nor Crazy (since he was a pretty normal dude) and then I wrote a brillant blog post about it. This post was soon found by the owners of the dating service which is how I became the one woman spokesperson for dating random dudes. Shortly thereafter I got an email from the site founder asking me to go on another date which would be filmed by The Mike and Juliet Morning Show. More chances at free loving and blogging: SWEET. This post is the public face of that little adventure and THIS POST (the one you're reading right now) is the behind the scenes sweet juicey meat of the same experience.

So for the sake of faux anonymity let's call my copilot in Crazy Blind Dating for TV Mr. Slick because even though I'm 98% sure he does not read this blog (and 53% sure that he cannot read at all) and 100% sure that you could go back to the first post about our date and get his name I'd like to keep pretending that I am not a horrible person willing to publically throw former paramores under the bus in exchange for a brief respite from my writter's block.

Ok, so I went on the filmed date with Mr. Slick and it was fine I guess. He was cute, much cuter than many of the guys I date BUT I don't even like cute. Or, not that kind of cute. I like floppy hair over lots of gel, I like ironic tshirts over starched collars, I like eye rolling over googly eyes. Slick was The Bachelor and I was looking for... someone who would not be considered muscle-y enough for reality TV. He was also very eager, so much so that he managed to insert himself into my post date plans by tagging along to the Roller Derby even though it meant posing as press to get around the sold out tickets situation. When I mentioned to a friend the possibility of getting together for a board game night he again tried to force his way in, even insisting that we should play games TOMORROW. On face value this seems like it should be flattering he must really like me to be trying so hard to hang out but really how could he like me so much after 2 hours of hanging out half of which was on camera and therefore totally not real? And even if he *did* like me that much shouldn't he know better than to be so obvious about it -- have some damn shame/pride. Anyway I managed to not see him again until we were both sequestered in the Green Room with Mike and Juliet (this was a feat, the boy texted me AND called me multiple times -- keep in mind that the time between date and TV appearance was about 36 hours.).

And now a brief pause for a moral lesson, listen up kiddies. I have often in dating made the "oh give him another chance" mistake. I mostly blame my friends (oh, and my self esteem issues). you see when you're single and not so thrilled with it and friends with a lot of married ladies who want nothing more then to live vicariously through your (theoretically) exciting single life it goes something like this:

Friend Who is Sick of My Whining: How was your date?
Me: ehhhh ok i guess.
FWiSoMW: Was he cute?
Me: Sure
FWiSoMW: Did he do anything weird?
Me: Well... I dunno, I guess not.
FWiSoMW: Give him another chance!
Me: But... not funny... and.... kind of boring....
FWiSoMW: He was nervous! And shy! ANOTHER CHANCE!

And so a second date, and sometimes a third and I never get any more into it and the dumping is even more painful than it might have been. I'm not usually one to argue for intuition over facts but dating is a unique little beastie and one should probably just go with her gut. Lesson over.

But back to Slick and our date #2 which I agreed to because "but you were on TV! That didn't count! He's cute!" We went to a wine bar which is how I ended up at his apartment at 3am. Well, that and the promise of meeting his dog -- I'm a sucker for dogs. The dog was nowhere near the coolest thing in his apartment. He lived in a small studio in the East Village which would have been ho hum if it weren't for the HANGING BED. He (or, I suspect, one of his smarter friends) had rigged up a pulley system for the bed that allowed you to push the entire thing up flush with the ceiling or pull it down to dangle in the middle of the living room for sleeping. He even had counter weight book shelves! Frankly, this changed everything. I mean, sure, he was kind of boring and weirdly eager and not too bright but when would I get another chance to experience the wonder of a hanging bed? And wasn't the existence of the hanging bed a sign that deep down under the sweater vest and all of that hair gel he was probably a totally cool guy? I managed to resist slutting it out for the bed that night but things got even worse when I started telling people about the bed. My Settlers of Catan buddies at work put it best, "Well, you pretty much have to go out with this guy like 12 more times cause after 5 dates you can probably bring your girl friends by his place but you'd have to be pretty serious to get away with inviting over a bunch of random nerdy dudes from your office and WE TOTALLY NEED TO SEE THIS BED."

And so... a third date. We met for coffee, mostly because I couldn't imagine spending more than an hour with this dude without falling asleep. Mid coffee drinking he started to tell me a story about his recent bar tending gig. Apparently one of his coworkers was kind of annoying and so one day during the time when the supposed jerk was in charge of the till Slick took a bunch of money out of the cash register and put it into his pocket. And then jerk guy got fired for losing/stealing the money! and Slick got to keep the cash! HILARIOUS, right? No. Who shares stories about that funny time when they stole some money? Crazy, boring, not so smart guys who looks ok on the outside but turn out to be not worthy of a date 4 no matter how cool their bed might be. And so me and the swinging bed were never to meet again because while I might sacrifice my virtue for the sake of playing Jane and Tarzan in a swinging boudoir I could not ignore the fact that Tarzan was a baboon.

Winner Parade Entry 5: Fight! Fight! Fight!

After some initial eye rolling I have come to love Facebook -- this is mostly due to the iphone application which allows me to while away the minutes I spend waiting for late trains stalking my friends. The great thing to hate about facebook is not how easy it makes for other to stalk me since I generally encourage all citizens of the internet to embrace the fascinating reality that is Brianna but how difficult it is to avoid people whose 5 times a day updates on their latest crush, sandwich topping or bowel movement has you threatening to swear off the internet all together. So I am coy when it comes to approving friend requests because I hate being left with a news feed full of minutia about people I didn't like in person, much less in digital. I am also coy when it comes to hitting "Ignore" because I am a huge wimp who hates to digitally offend people even when they're people I don't much care for. However there are some for whom ignoring is all too sweet.

I received a friend request this morning from someone I was hoping I did not know. In his profile picture he is wearing a prison uniform. I am going to give him the benefit of the doubt that this is a Halloween costume and not his mandated wardrobe. His chosen hair style seems a bit harder to explain away. His head is shaved and the part of it that is not disfigured with an unsightly mole (one imagines he was surprised to pull the razor away and find that little genetic gift) is covered with a huge (likely fake) tribal tattoo. I have to admit that were any of my friends to go the extra Halloween mile and pull out the Bic I would think they were awesome. But the difference between all of my friends and this guy is that my friends actually are awesome.

Sadly, I do know this boy -- much more intimately than I care to admit. Be glad I sometimes think of this blog as a confessional. This is a boy I once had the mental retardation to agree to making out with during my senior year of college. This is probably the single most embarrassing hook up in a somewhat lengthy 800 car pile-up of bad dating decisions. I met him at a Frat party (I know.). Obviously I was drunk-ish. Later that night, in a the most poorly executed attempt to get in my pants ever, he told me how he and his brothers were really into "fighting." Not boxing or even "ultimate fighting" which might even be a real sport but just, "fighting". This was listed as a sort of hobby like "ya, my bros and I like to get together on Sundays for a rowdy game of monopoly followed by baking bread and gossiping all night!" Except with fewer descriptive words, "I like to fight." At this point I knew two things 1. I would have to devote the rest of the year to avoiding eye contact in the lunch line and 2. We better do some more kissing before he starts jabbering again and makes things even worse. Luckily, this young man seemed to sense that we just weren't made for each other ("Yeah, I met this girl last night, she mentioned that she likes to eat ice cream. Like that's hobby! I told her to check out fighting. Anyway, total loser.") until one night at least 2 months later when he called me at 3am to see if I wanted to "hang out." I'm not sure why one would even bother with a euphemism for "get it on" during such an obvious booty call -- unless he was actually calling looking for some hard core fightin' action. Either way I giggled and hung up.

While its tempting to approve his friend request in hopes of receiving hilarious status updates about fighting ("Kick to the groin! I am HE MAN!!!") I cannot risk this dude tracking me down for kissing. Or fighting, "Ignore."

Step Off Ho

So it turns out my (ok, G's) Wii Fit is a huge bitch who may or may not be making a play for my man.

Exhibit A:



Now it is true that I have been.... less than strict with my diet and *ahem* work out plan (read: walking lots of places...) since oh, say... May. And it's also true that I have not hung out with Wii Fit since September but I still think the behavior that is being exhibited here is cruel in the extreme and I fear that soon the Wii will declare war. How far could we be from the following:

• Does Brii get up in the morning and make you coffee? A) Occasionally, B) No, she mostly lies in bed whining about me making coffee, C) Ha! She's too busy complainging that the coffee I make her isn't good enough, D) She doesn't let me have caffine, or happiness.
• Brii sure is a bitch about waking you up when you snore, do you think a perfect girlfriend would do that? (note: machine's don't need sleep and therefore would not even consider disturbing the slumber of their significant other): A) Probably not...., B) No, never, C) Real woman are turned on by a little manly snoring, D) Wii Fit, You're looking mighty sexy this morning
• My oh my, you're looking awfully handsome today, did Brii mention that? A) She says looks don't matter to her..., B) No, but she said my outfit choice was iiiiinteresting, that's good, right? C) She said something about me not looking enough like some dude named Riggins, C)Oh Wii Fit, your'e so sweet, let's run away together!
  

The Music of the Night

As a child I remember a camping trip where every night the kids tent that housed myself, my younger brother and my friend Jennifer filled with the sounds of fake snoring. This little rebellion of "honk-shoe-me-me-me" was our way of saying "you can banish us to bed but you can't make the party stop!" and we found it hilarious. We could barely get through a refrain before the me-me-mes were broken by peals of laughter.

Real snoring is nowhere near as funny.

G snores. Not every night. Not all night. But, when he does, it sounds not like the pleasant sing song snore of my childhood but more like this, "HRGURMPHGRRRHAAAAEEEEN" and my response is not a girly giggle muffled by my pillow but a high pitched wailing noise that translates to "oh my god I think I woke up in Guantanamo Bay." When the whining doesn't work I sometimes hit him. I also sometimes get out of bed, stomp out of the room and cry on the couch about how now we have to break up because I like sleep way too much for this bullshit to continue. I am not exactly rational at 4am.

We are about to embark on the first long term vacation of our relationship (Belize and Guatemala!) and while other more serious folks would worry about if 13 straight days together will lead to petty arguments, after the past 2 nights of Snore-a-Palooza, I mostly just worry that I'll die of sleep deprivation. I purchased a set of earplugs but I'm not confident that I'll be able to sleep while wearing them not because they might be uncomfortable but because I fear a disaster like an errant howler monkey entering our cabana to attack me with a coconut in the middle of the night and with the earplugs in I'll be totally vulnerable!

I also bought G a box of Breathe Right Strips even though I doubt they actually work (the enjoyment I will get from laughing at how ridiculous he looks sleeping with a mini band aide across his nose will likely be cold comfort). Snoring remedies seem to fall into the same infomercial territory as baldness and ED relief. Why is it that male ailments are so often met with outlandish mock medical solutions? You don't see 3am infomercials on vibrating belts that sooth cramps or laser beams that let you birth a child painlessly.

After 5 minutes of skulking around the drugstore looking for the snoring relief section I eventually was reduced to asking the pharmacist to point me in the direction of "aids to help you resist murdering him in his sleep." Breathe Rights come in two sizes "small/medium" and "large" which means you have to sit in the drugstore thinking about the size of your boyfriend's nose or you could do what I did and rely solely on the old wives tale connection between nose size and nose size *nudgenudgewinkwink* if you know what I mean*.

G likes to claim that the drop in my blog posting can be directly attributed to him -- certainly no girl lucky enough to date G (and the sunshiny goodness of his amazing man tool*) could continue to support a blog dedicated to snark. So now, while he is not exactly thrilled to have the details of his nocturnal concert performances broadcast for the entire internet, G is trying to lay claim to this post as if his snoring were a sacrifice he made to free me from the prison of writer's block. If this is the case I have to hope that he'll have the good sense to give himself and his gargley, fitful, midnight wheezing a rest in honor of our vacation since snoring or not this blog will for sure not be updated for 2 weeks. It is also possible that I won't update again ever, you know, if the sleep deprivation or the monkeys get me.

* Note that certain members of the snoring population may have only permitted the advertisement of their annoying night time habits in exchange for suggestive claims that imply that said member of the Proud Snorers of America (PSA) is in possession of a HUGE penis.

Finding the Land of the Lost

Last Thursday I went on the best date ever. Assuming that your idea of best date ever involves puppets and growling and big hunks of meat, but really if it doesn't you're lame and might as well stop reading now. The date activity and location were a surprise. I was just told to meet in front of the the Manhattan Mall at 6:30. While being guided out of the hubbub of Herald square I was told we'd be seeing "a little theater" right as we approached "Peep World" so my eyes were all prepped for the rolling when out of the Taxi clogged lanes of 7th avenue emerged Madison Square Garden's huge blinking sign announcing "Walking with Dinosaurs Live."

Walking with Dinosaurs, for those of you who manage to keep your Tivo off of the Discovery Channel (for shame!), is a BBC program staring Computer Generated dinosaurs engaging in everyday dinosaur things like snacking on the flesh of other dinosaurs and fleeing forest fires all while being fucking huge. The live version replaces CG with robots and puppets and the TV with 6000 screaming 6 year old boys.

It was very romantic.

My boyfriend may be a dinosaur loving fool, but he's not crazy enough to spend $100 for top shelf viewing, especially since he knows I'll give it up for midrange. Luckily our not-quite-nosebleeds were located directly behind the sound board so we were instantly upgraded to seats only a few rows back from the stage where the kids whose parents really love them get to sit. Pursuing the program preshow, I learned that the puppets were made with "muscles bags" and "voodoo kits." How could this be anything other than awesome?

The show started with a huge raptor-like beast chowing down on some cute widdle baby dinosaurs -- way to pave the road for the chorus of bawling children to come! Actually, for a show about creatures who regularly sucked the marrow out of eachother's bones, there was surprisingly little violence on stage. The dinos mostly meander around sniffing each other's butts and grunting. Save the hatchlings, there is no blood shed and the one meal of the 90 minute program shows up already dead and half eaten at the opening of Act 2. They never even charge the annoying guy playing the paleontologist time traveler even though everyone in the audience, even those under 5, spend the whole show dreaming of seeing him decapitated before he can utter another inane joke. This level of peace amongst giant lizards seems like a dangerous precedent to set. I can't help but think about what will happen when a time machine goes wacky sending a bus load of elementary school kids into the Jurassic where, based on the lessons learned in this play (and from Barney), the kids will stream from the bus hoping for some big friendly dinosaur hugs only to be greeted as tasty hor'dourves. As a society we should work harder at teaching all kids to cower in fear.


Sometimes the boyfriend refers to me as an amateur botanist because I'm constantly making him stop on street corners to ooh and ahh over foilage. The plants of Walking With Dinosaurs were each individual little windsocks that popped up proudly out of the edge of the stage and when a volcano spewed ash into the air withered up in a way that was vaguely reminiscent of a penis. While Variety's review of the show specifically mentioned being disappointed in the plants I loved them and am hugely grateful to the poor little stagehand who has to slump around stuffing each and every one back into it's little condom like holder between the acts.

Overall, the dinosaur puppets were amazing. Most were a robot/puppet hybrid. All were GIGANTIC. You're sitting there thinking, "yeah, i know, big, whatever," but seriously they were BIG -- their necks stretched out over the audience, their teeth were roughly 7 feet long, I believe the head of at least one creature extended well outside of the earth's orbit. The puppets were also impressively realistic, however many of the large motorized beasts looked like they were perpetually standing in a presquat crouch that seemed like it could lead to a dinosaur sized number 2 at any moment. The show eventually made the dreams of the entire audience come true when a stegosaurus rumbled and growled and shook until a compact and surprisingly clean looking 1 foot in diameter poo rolled out onto the stage. The six year olds went wild -- nothing pleases the savage elementary schooler like a good poo joke.

I give the dinosaurs, the penis plants, the poo and even the paleontologist at big thumbs up, even though AM New York (the trashy free daily for those you not living the NYC) found it lacking (2 stars? Am I to assume we're rating in binary these days?). My boyfriend is a lucky man to have found the only girl in New York who puts out for dinosaur puppets.

Our date ended at Dinosaur BBQ, because I appreciate nothing more than a good theme. And meat. All in all way better than dating a TRex.


This post is cross posted at Burt Reynold's Mustache

The Rock Stars Have Left The Building

I have a friend named Jill who in college used to swoon over the idea of a rock star boyfriend and we would all mock her because Jill is beautiful and silly and totally the kind of girl that boys fall head over heels in love for, but none of those boys are rock stars. They play trombone in the marching band. They love Final Fantasy. They contribute the requisite $20 a month to NPR. They do not rock. And it's just as well, Jill would hate the pretension of a real rock star boyfriend. She'd hate the wife beaters and the muscle cars and the nonchalance. And most of all she'd probably hate his music.

It's easy to see why we all deep down want a rock star boyfriend. Someone to write moony songs about how the sunlight catching in our hair makes them want to rip our panties off. Someone so passionate about life that it oozes out of him into song. Someone who looks good in leather pants. Friday night while at The Hold Steady concert I gave my friend Jason 60/40 odds on me being willing to sleep with any of the guys in the band despite having no idea what they looked like. I already half love them for their crazy ranting rock and roll so I figured they'd have to reach new heights of fug to turn me off. They were, as Jason had warned, oldish (defined as "even older than us."). One of them looked remarkably like Chuck Klosterman who we all know I'd sleep with, but not because he's hot. Yet after a few rounds of bopping around the stage and screaming into the mikes I was sold. Panties? dropped.

I didn't sleep with the band which is probably fortuitous since last night between sets Jason and I stumbled upon a disturbing truth. If you date a rock star you have to love his music. Ok, maybe not if he's just "jamming" with friends on the weekends, everyone knows that dudes who use the term "jamming" don't deserve love. But if he's in a real band that plays gigs and shit? You have to be into it. You have to go to all of his 1am Tuesday night shows at Arlene's Grocery. You have to think his fedora looks hot. You have to smile sweetly when he spends a grand of your vacation fund on a new set of bongo drums. You're thinking, no problem! Surely your boyfriend is sexy and brilliant and totally rocks, right? Unfortunately probably not, I suspect that 95% of bands suck. On top of that there are lots of good bands who I don't love regardless of their talent. In fact there are whole musical genres that I doubt I could get behind even if their most talented and sexy front man were to proposition me.

No other occupation demands so strongly that its practitioners find significant others willing to be swear devotion to their craft. If you're a lawyer you do not expect your boyfriend to sit in the courtroom swooning at your every objection. Professor's girlfriends are never asked to listen attentively to recorded lectures. None of my former boyfriends have been caught beating off to my project plans.

After thinking this through I'm shocked that rock star boys have any luck at all when it comes to matters of the heart. Since it is well documented that only 5% of bands are legitimately worth listening to (See paragraph 3) one has to assume that most girlfriends of rockers are either delusional or liars and since I am neither I now happily lay down the dream of the rock star boyfriend.

He Just Needs an Understanding Girlfriend To Teach Him How to Read.

My new boyfriend, Tim Riggins, is everything I look for in a paramour. Firstly, he’s 17 years old. And he has a severe alcohol problem. Also he’s a huge asshole. Also #2 he’s fictional. What more could a girl want? But what you can’t immediately see during a cursory viewing of Friday Night Lights is that when you really get to know Tim (which, believe me, I have because we are in a very serious relationship) you find that under the hot hot muscles and the stench of cheap beer he is a tortured soul. Tim loves Lila but she can’t get over being a pretentious stuck up bitch and see his true self. Tim is secretly super smart but his daddy never loved him enough and so he hides his smarts behind the pain! Tim has layers. Tim needs an older woman with an acute appreciation for pouty lips to show him what love is. Obviously I am his perfect match.

Those of you who see me as a smart mature young woman with a future might be shocked by my love for a juvenile hall bound high school football player but it's really quite predictable. Sure, outside of my couch potato fantasies I date nice boys. They may not regularly brush their hair and they might often have to cancel dates due to the demands of their guild but they have respectable jobs and button down shirts and 401K plans. They hardly ever do keg stands. But when snuggled up in front of the flickering TV light I turn into one of those girl who can see the good in the drunkard, the promise in the idiot and mostly, the hot ass hidden beneath the layers of clothing the FCC insists my dreams be draped in.

My TV boy trouble started with My So-Called Life. Brian was acing calculus; Jordan (literally) couldn’t read. Brian valiantly helped Angela pass math class; Jordan helped her to appreciate the romance of losing one’s virginity on a stained mattress inside of an abandoned house to a boy who most likely does not know your last name. Brian wrote Angela a heartfelt moving love letter (granted he signed it, “Jordan” because Brian has no self esteem); Jordan (after overcoming illiteracy – see? He has so much promise!) wrote a song for his car. Were this story unfolding in reality I’d have spent Saturday nights playing Risk with Brian (cause one look at that boy's mop and you could smell the love in the air) but since the tale is confined to inside of the cathode tube I was ordering a big plate full of Catalano (extra sauce!).

There have been exceptions to the bad boy rule. I was never a Dylan McKay girl, choosing instead to swoon over Brandon though I mostly blame this on the fact that when I took an honest look at my life in 1992 I had no choice but to recognize that in the 90210 universe I was obviously Andrea Zuckerman (Even if I wasn’t 45 years old.) and part of accepting the nerdy, not rich enough, fashion challenged part of myself was having a crush on the midwestern boy newspaper editor instead of the tortured surfer. (Though seriously that picture on the left is making me wonder if Brandon wasn't actually a girl, which would make sense -- that Emily chick always had a little lesbian vibe going on). Maybe my love for the geeky boys is isolated to California fantasy dramas since I also own a pair of underwear baring the message, “I’m a Seth Girl.” And I am. The comic book geek from the O.C. might be my perfect man. He makes wry comments about pop culture. He generally can’t hold a conversation with a female. He has somewhat ridiculous hair.

Brandon and Seth aside TV generally inspires the unhealthy Jerry Springer ready white trash in me. I was the only watcher in the Buffyverse to cheer on the Spike years. I mean sure he was a little rough around the edges with the drugs and the living in a crypt and the being a blood sucking killer but he LOVED Buffy! He loved her in a pathetic doe eyed sort of way (when he wasn’t loving her in a tossing her around, pulling her hair, sexing up The Slayer sort of way). He had spent 500 some years as a villain and Buffy turned him into a puppy! Post college I devoted Tuesday nights to Gilmore Girls where I was a Jess fan from way back and was never happier than when practical proper boring Rory cheated on nice floppy haired Dean with my favorite high school drop out.

Does this all mean that somewhere deep down I want to trade in my be-cowlicked video game playing nice boys for an illiterate hunk in a leather jacket and beer goggles? Maybe. But real world bad boys never seems to have any substance. They’re genuinely screwed up, not just using screwed up as a cover for sensitive. And since I rarely find myself attracted to high school boys in real life I’m left with 30 year old losers who are, lucky for me, much less tolerable.

How I Spent My 15 Minutes

On Friday I received a curious email from the founders of CrazyBlindDate.com. Apparently they had been tricked into going on the Fox morning show and after reading my blog entry about their service wanted nothing more than to drag me down with them. I was totally in. The deal was this – go on a Crazy Blind Date with some random dude and let Fox film it and then show up on Monday’s episode of The Morning Show with Mike and Juliet for an interview. They did not specifically ask me to make a fool out of myself but I’m pretty sure it was implied (never let it be said that I don't deliver on my commitments). Remember long long ago (last week) when I bemoaned just how awful I am at dating? Well everyone knows that if you think you’re not very good at something a sure fire way to overcome your insecurities is to do that activity on national television.

In order to be cleared for TV I had to submit to a very upbeat phone screen with one of the producers of Fox’s Morning Show with Mike and Juliet. During the phone screen that producer worked very hard to get me to agree that my ultimate goal for my crazy bind date was L-O-V-E and most certainly not “I needed something to blog about.” Luckily I’m an atheist and therefore have no moral scruples so I had no problem telling the roughly 500 white lies required to get on national TV. (“random blind dates are a sure fire path to love!” “Oh yeah, my house is totally clean already.” “Of course I know how to do my own make up!”). Despite my flagrant disregard for the truth after the phone screen I felt certain that Fox was running a background check on my voting record and would be banning me from the show. I can only assume that at 5:30pm on Friday the network was desperate enough for a single girl that they were willing to overlook my love for organic vegetables, evolution and the gays.

So I thought everything was set – I meet at the date site early to do an interview and then they film the date and then I get drunk and wonder what the fuck I was thinking. Then, latish on Friday night the producer calls to ask if they can do some pre show filming at my house – as a red blooded television worshiping American I had no choice but to say yes. So I spent all of Saturday morning obsessively cleaning least my family see the show and determine that the main reason why I’m not married is that my entire house is covered in chinchilla dust. (They’d be wrong, the boys love the dust, they think it’s mysterious and sexy).

The crew arrived at 3pm and filmed roughly 15 hours of me poking at my computer and putting on my earrings (strangely they filmed only a few minutes of “Brianna walking” footage but obviously decided to put ALL of it on the show – I walk good.). The camera and PA for the show were both hot. I wondered if there was some easy way to hit on both of them while being filmed on a date with another dude. Since as usual I failed at the flirting I can only hope that they read this and are totally into sharing a girlfriend (I have two hands boys!).

I used to think that if I were to go on reality TV I would be able to resist falling into a one dimensional stereotype but now I know that I was wrong. Put in front of cameras I become the perky sweet girl immediately (like Bridget from The Girls Next Door but with better taste in men and more clothing). Given a few weeks living in a mansion I’d kill off about 40% of the viewing audience with my saccharine sweetness. The hair and make up people did everything possible to help me fit this reality TV archetype with super straight hair and a ton of make-up I pull off boring pretty quite well. If only I had some huge fake boobs perhaps I could jump start a career as a C list celebrity.

As you can see from the date footage I looked adorable. Also I was hilariously witty. Also it’s shocking to believe that I am single. I have been contacted by no less than 780 scientists interested in studying this phenomenon (most studies seem centered around exploring the phenomenon in the nude). Bret was cute too. He was notably much cuter than the picture he used on CrazyBlindDate which I saw the next day -- because I am a huge huge huge lover of the geeks I thought, “oh he’s way hotter than that picture, I kind of wish he looked like that, that guy looks like a totally dork!” I said as much on the show – I also said the following on my official Crazy Blind Date feedback form, “Brett was great but I usually only date guys who know at least one programming language.”

Despite the fact that holding a conversation with some guy you just met while three people hover over you with cameras and mics and notepads is virtually impossible I think we both managed to avoid looking like schmoes. While the date did have some awkward moments the clip that Fox uses to make us look like dorks (frankly I’m surprised they didn’t edit some cricket chirping into the soundtrack) was likely the result of both of us trying very hard to think of TV friendly things to talk about on a “date.” At one point we got onto the topic of my job and I had to continue speaking over the “Brianna do not get your ass fired” alarms going off in my head. Sadly the Mike and Juliet site only shows the first half of our segment but that might be for the best since all I remember of the interview portion is offering to make out on the show. But the interview does reveal that Brett and I extended our 20 minute agreed upon date for a few hours when he asked to tag along with me to the Roller Derby (where the girls were hot enough to almost turn me into a dyke). This allowed us to actually talk to each other like normal people rather than “The Perky Girl” and “The Responsible Gentleman” – it turned out I had more in common with Brett than I thought, he likes cooking and eating and travel and technology – again the robots do me right. There’s a reason why I love computers so much. While on our post-date date Brett and I also came up with the most awesome idea for Monday – A little faked proposal action, thankfully for the Crazy Blind Date dude our idea was all talk and no commitment (clearly we’re not ready for marriage).

So yet again Crazy Blind Date is awesome – everyone reading this should break up with the significant others just to go out on random dates. The only snafu of the evening was that the car that Fox sent to take me to the date was ridiculously expensive and I had to pay for it. At first I blamed Fox for being cheap “no new taxes” bastards but in retrospect I now just think that the cabbie scammed me since the same limo service drove me to Fox and to work today and didn’t charge me either time. Luckily the drinks were comped… though not by Fox – the bar manager paid for them.

The live TV experience this morning was surreal. I arrived make up free and with my frizzy hair in a ponytail (as Amy observed I’m not the kind of person to clean before the maid arrives) and was sent straight to hair and make-up (“Get thee to the chair before your hideousness ruins television for all!”). The hair lady took one look at me and reached for the straightening iron – curly hair is for communists. While being straightened the beauticians inquired about my day job and upon hearing the words “Software Project Manager” launched immediately into a chorus of “why is my computer so slow.” I threw out some “reboot” and “disk defragmenter” recommendations to appease them least they choose to send me onto the show with a beehive and orange lipstick (though that might have been awesome). From there on everything moved at lightening speed; the producers quizzed me and seemed convinced that I would not clam up or bare any body parts that could get Fox sued (tempting, believe me), Bret tried to get me to take some sort of crazy herbal supplement for nerves, the CrazyBlindDate dude seemed completely freak out (though he also resisted the herbal supplement), and then we were standing at the edge of the stage trying not to giggle as they showed our dating footage.

When I got to work and hour later I had to resist the impulse to wash my face figuring that without some serious cleanser I wasn’t going to be able to even break through the make-up top soil. There was a mixed office reaction to my new heavily made up look – half shock (“oh my god you’re a girl!”) and half awe (“you should hire a make-up and hair crew every morning”) – obviously this is disturbing since a) I think I looked like a freak and b) there is no way in hell I’m going to spend this much time, energy and money on my looks on any sort of regular basis. This also presumes that I have the skills to make myself up but instead choose sleep over beauty every morning. The truth is that laziness is the least of my problems. Predate (when I had to do my own make-up) I had a moment of panic when I called two friends (neither of which responded – thanks for nothing Amy and Gillian) in a panic when I remembered 30 minutes before the camera crew arrived that I have no idea how to put on eye shadow or tie a scarf. I mean I can swipe on some Burt’s Bees lip tint and run a brush through the mop but other than that I’m as inept as an accountant on a stripper pole (no offense to all the sexy accountants out there).

So... to quote Fox’s obsessed producers, “WAS IT A LOVE MATCH? HMMMM? HMMM? WAS IT?!?” I don’t know. The whole experience was so much more like being in a play than like being on a date that it’s hard to tell where reality TV Brianna stops and reality life Brianna begins. So – I would certainly go out with Bret without any cameras around to find out if we’re real life compatible – and if we are I intend to get Fox to pay for our wedding. Bret, I know you subscribed to my blog, say hi to the folks in the comments and give me a call.

Even if there isn’t a date #2 (though one could argue that hanging out on tv this morning was technically a date #2) I feel I spent my 15 minutes wisely – I looked cute, I didn't try to convert people to some crazy cult and I kept my underwear on which is much more than most real celebrities seem capable of.

Update: Date footage from YouTube where they let you fast forward straight to the hot Brianna action (Thanks Adam!). I'm going to try to pull the full segment complete with interview from my tivo tonight... wish me luck.

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Third Party Resources

Looking through all the New York singles to find love is not nearly as easy as it looks. After looking through all the dating sites and going on dozens of blind dates, hopefully you can find at least one person like you.

Love is a Battlefield

Oh my god I suck at dating.

… Perhaps suck is not the best word to use in this context.

Oh my god I am very bad at dating.

Very bad as in my grandparents might think I'm a lesbian. Very bad as in there has been no noticeable improvement since sixth grade when boys routinely asked me out as a joke. Very bad as in I have repeatedly googled the phrase "human pheromone deficiency."

I would like to be able to write about my abysmal dating record with a certain amount of flair. I would like to trot out flippant comments about how fickle some boys are and how ridiculously stupid others seems to be and ultimately how my perpetual singleness is a sign of how incredibly awesome I am. I would like for this post to result in hoards of adoring attractive male fans competing to woo me (wish list here). I would like to draw some provocative conclusion preferably comparing my life to a popular 80s movie. I would like to seem cool and funny and not at ALL like I have EVER moped or lost sleep or cried like a big baby as a result of this record and certainly have not even thought of doing any of these in at least 10 years. I doubt I will accomplish these goals.

If I have a date it is safe to assume that I met the (alleged) gentleman online because I am completely incapable of meeting men in person. This is likely because I have very little patience for bars and I find dance clubs vile (have you been to one of these places? They put on loud music and expect you to move your body in rhythm; the whole concept seems rather far fetched.). I like doing stuff. I like joining clubs and attending classes. I like wandering and wining and dining. I like going to readings and concerts. It turns out that boys hate doing stuff. Don’t believe me? Well how do you feel about believing the New York Times? I’m not even going to get into how lame this makes men sound (cause seriously guys, LAME). For now let’s just say that I don’t meet guys on food tours of chinatown.

But thanks to the internet I go on a lot of dates -- mostly because I try very hard to go on a lot of dates. While the phrase "glutton for punishment" does come to mind about once ever 5 minutes my theory is that dating is like voting -- if you're not out there casting a ballot you don't get to complain when things turn out badly. I have earned the right to complain and I intend to exercise it here and now. So I should warn you that there may be some whining. And likely I will have to eat some ice cream. But as long as it doesn't end with me screaming "Why don't you like me?!?!?!" I plan on declaring success.

I suppose I need to address exactly what is happening on these dates -- this is the hard part of the post. I feel that to do this I'd have to have an inkling of exactly what is going wrong and I’m mostly at a loss. I admit that I am a huge geek and that I am making no effort at all to hide this fact while out on dates. I keep thinking that being a huge geek is a plus –it's 2007, the nerds have won, right? Personally I LOVE geeks so my general approach to dating has been, “I'M A HUGE GEEK, COME AND GET IT.” Perhaps this is part of the problem but I doubt it. I’m a great date. I’m witty and articulate and prompt. Most of the time I even pull off cute. Typically the date ends with me thinking, “Oh, this one is in the bag! I am an awesome dating machine!” And then I get bored with waiting for him to call. And then I call. And then he announces his general dissatisfaction with the idea of a second date. And then? The ice cream.

This current state of affairs is bullshit since I was all but promised that the little bug in my "make boys like me" plug-in was going to right itself in due time. Remember how I was going to be a heart breaker right after I got out of junior high and boys realized that girls weren't icky? Or right after high school when boys realized that smart girls are awesome? Or right after college when boys took off their beer goggles and noticed that funny girls are much cooler than pretty girls? I'm waiting....

My frustration is further complicated by the fact that girlfriend-wise I am a really good deal. I invest a decent chunk of money in my 401K. I buy cute underwear. My dentist has all but promised that I will not need dentures. And also I am crazy only in the really attractive good ways (obsessive about being on time, incapable of falling asleep without playing a rousing game of Scattergories in my head, etc) rather than the annoying bad ways that are most commonly seen on reality TV programs (tendency to scream at people, belief that men should always pay, inability to conceal naughty bits underneath clothing). And yet the girls on reality TV have men competing in ill conceived contests to win dates with them and I am babysitting a friend's 3 year old on Friday night (admittedly he's cuter than most TV bachelors).

I suspect that my melancholia over the dating experience as a whole stems from the fact that I am completely unable to view each experience in a vacuum choosing instead to believe that every boy who doesn't call is symptomatic of the one eternal truth -- not that you can't eat just one potato chip, or that naughty girls need love too, or that skinny jeans don't look good on anyone but that all boys hate Brianna. Or perhaps less dramatically: No boys click with Brianna

To be honest the problem is not always with the boys clicking with me. Occasionally, I don't click with the boys. Always these are nice boys who I seriously wish I could like but the issue is chemistry. It seems likely that this has been my problem all along. I don't understand chemistry at all and I'd like to just outright deny it's existence since trying to please powers that we don't understand inspires magical thinking. This path leads directly to disaster. Maybe if I click my heels three times the fickle god of chemistry will smile on this date. Maybe if I chop the leg off of this cute little bunny it will bring me luck. Maybe if I forget to wear a shirt he won't even notice the lack of chemistry!

Bring on the Crazy!

You know what I hate? Fruit cream filled chocolates hiding in a box that I thought was all caramels, shaving my knees and having to climb out my bedroom window and down the fire escape to take out the trash. But more than all of that I hate dating. I find the whole act painfully tiring ("oh you mean I have to be cute *again*?!?! Wasn't I cute just yesterday?") and trying to attract men and get them into a tizzy over buying me drinks seems like a poor investment of my time (especially in light of my track record). But this doesn't mean that I don't want to make googly eyes at a brooding stranger while drinking glass after glass of wine. I just don't want to put energy into getting to the boy and the bar and the glass.

On Thursday night I did the best thing ever. I went on a Crazy Blind Date. Every single person on in major urban areas should be doing this constantly. Especially if you are too lazy to bother with finding and scheduling your own dates.

Crazy Blind Date is an off shoot of the Okcupid online dating site and it is the best idea to hit the internet since Urban Fetch (RIP). The web site matches up singles and schedules blind mystery dates. I was super excited to receive the announcement about the launch not just because it seemed like someone was finally automating a severely broken system but because it felt like mid NaBloPoMo someone was handing me a blog post on a silver platter. A random date with a potentially crazy dude set up by a web site? How could this not be hilarious and/or tragic? Thank you God.

Like all examples of good design in 2007 the date started not with me having to interact with a human (that's so 1993) but with filling out a form online – I was a fan from the get go. I specified time and age range and choose not to specify a height requirement because I am not a crazy bitch. My god women are freaky about height! This is a “date” with a random guy that you do not know, you can’t possibly expect this to result in a crazy love match and you’re *still* concerned about inches (dirty.)? “Yo girl, I’m fine going out with some stupid potentially crazy stranger but he damn well better be tall!” I hate when my gender embarrasses me.

I was also asked the following questions

What is your ideal scenario for this date?

You’re funny. You’re cute. We suffer a minor tragedy and overcome it together thus providing the ideal story arc for the blog post that I’ll be writing about this date.

What do you look like?

I’m really cute. On the off chance that there is more than one cute girl at the bar I’ll be the blond carrying a laptop bag with a big red poppy on it.

What are you good at talking about?

video games, food, pop culture, indie pop bands

The web site also has a cool little widget that allows you to specify neighborhoods that you’re willing to go on dates in. Because I am incredibly lazy when it comes to dating, blogging AND walking I limited my selections to neighborhoods that I already had to pass through on my way home from work.

Oh and they let you choose a coffee date or a bar date. But would it really be a Crazy Blind Date without booze?

I have not been this excited about an event since the rodeo came to Madison Square Garden. I spent all of Wednesday and Thursday telling everyone I talked to about my crazy blind date plans. “Guys! I either go on a hilariously bad date OR I end up locked in some psychopath’s basement! Either way the blog is getting super famous!” By Thursday evening all of my friends and coworkers were wishing they were single and I had mapped out at least 3 new best case date scenarios

1. Guy is super into Dianetics. Tries to convert me to Scientology. Calls Tom Cruise who offers to set me up with any one of line up of gay Hollywood actors if I agree to having Xenu’s second baby. I duck into the bathroom to prep for my auditing and sneak out the window
2. Guy has uncontrollable fear of the color red, runs screaming from the room when I order a glass of pinot noir.
3. Guy brings his wife and girlfriend with him on date. We hit it off and spend the end of the date trying on matching dresses at Anthropologie.
   

This was going to be AWESOME.

The fun began Thursday morning when I received an email notification that the web site had found a match for my date! I logged on was able to review Dan’s profile and his heavily pixilated picture – I hardly bothered to review his basics before agreeing to an 8:30pm date at the west village's Bar 6. Thirty minutes before the date was set to begin I received a code to text message Dan – all text messages were forwarded through an intermediary to prevent me from stalking my date just in case I happen to be crazier than he bargained for.

What are the chances that the guy I get set up with is compos mentis? The only proof I need that God is fucking with me is that when I’m hoping for a tragic failing of the entire dating system I get handed a big scoop of normal. My date, Dan, was not crazy NOR blind! The dude was good enough, smart enough and probably liked by people all over the place. His only failing was that he totally cheated on the mystery date by reading half of my blog before our date started (Dan, if you're out there say hi in the comments!), the fact that he choose to show up anyway might actually be the one sign that he was in fact a little crazy. Thankfully he was at least as excited as myself about the ridiculous prospects that crazy blind dating seemed to promise and we had plenty to talk about (the shared joy of hippy parents, toy design, video games, the pleasures of being a huge nerd, exactly how awesome technology was). He didn't seem at all upset that our date was disappointingly sane which probably means that the loony member of the date was me…

Despite the normalcy of my date I highly recommend CrazyBlindDate.com. Next time (hopefully Wednesday) I’m shooting for a double date on the hopes that 3 strangers equals 3 times the crazy.

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Third Party Resources

Going out on a blind date might not end up with an engagement ring, but it's worth a try. You'll never know if you'll be one day exchanging gold wedding bands with someone you took out on a blind date! If you hit it off, diamond rings may be in your future.

Now Accepting Applications for the Position of Wife

Being single is a pain in the ass. I suspect that other people have not noticed this mostly because they are too busy beating their spouses. Now sure, I’d like to fall in love, find my soul mate, feel my heart jump out of my chest and runaway with his heart so that both of us are left as empty heartless shells who must cling to one another for body heat for all eternity. But mostly I need help with the house work.

You couples probably don’t know how much of a chore being single is, let me paint the picture for you. Picture it – you pull a late night at the office, you’re trudging home at 9:30pm thinking about the laundry you were going to do, the gourmet meal you were going to cook for dinner, the online shopping for your mother’s birthday that you won’t be getting to. If you are half of a couple you can probably entertain the thought that *maybe* one or more of these chores was done in your absence, maybe you’ll come home to a cleaned shower and a pot of bubbling beef stew – it totally could happen! Now sure, we both know that your significant other is a lazy good for nothing who spent the evening lounging on the couch watching “What not to Wear” and starting yet another craft project that she will never finish. (Hi Joe!) But this could be your night! Maybe the Tivo broke down!

But for us singletons the dream was dead at the get go. The cleaning, the cooking, the hooking up of electrical equitment, the killing of bugs, the decorating, the social planning, the wearing of the pants (and the lying on the couch with my hand down them), the bringing home of the bacon? ALL ME. (except when my mom visits). When I get home at 9:30 I’m lucky to get through one chore before I want to curl up with a pint of premium ice cream. Of course, as a single girl I also can’t buy ice cream. If I had a live in boyfriend I could pretend that he was going to eat most of the ice cream and thus justify purchasing it in large quantities because he has a really big appetite. This same logic would also allow me to buy bratwurst and bourbon by the case. If Hagen-daz and Maker’s Mark go out of business this year you can blame my dry spell (and my amazing self control).

Next time you look at your significant other and say, “It’s your turn to clean the refrigerator and tweeze my eyebrows!” try to remember that I am having that conversation with a chinchilla and his reply is always the same, “Shut up and get me another banana chip you tired old maid.”

What I Did on my Summer Vacation

I am not good at being bad at things. I whine and cry and quickly deem myself a failure at life in general simply because I cannot sew a straight seam or ace a tennis opponent or convince some nice boy to fall in love with me. Awful though these failures may feel I am sometimes able to turn one or two into enjoyable blog fodder, which on a good day serve as a comforting salve for my many emotional bruises. This tragedy to tall tale factory I've built is occasionally so successful as to inspire friends to wish disaster upon me "for the good of the blog." And so, I am sad to report that learning to surf in Costa Rica was not a tragedy (many scrapes and physical bruises notwithstanding). I stood on day one (nay HOUR 1) and got up twice on day two. Don’t get be wrong – I sucked (and days 3 and 4 brought nothing but pain as each wave picked me up and slammed me into the sand as if to say, “silly, pale, unathletic girl go back to your crafts and bloging and leave the xgames to the professionals.” ) but I didn’t end up beaten against the jagged rocks until I passed out and drown. It turns out that with surfing, as with so many other things, the key to success is setting a low bar. I did, however, make very good friends with one very special (and sharp) rock who will be featured in an upcoming winner parade post – he loved me so much that he chased me all over the ocean begging me to never leave him again, it was sweet for a while but eventually I felt smothered and had to end things and surfing was the unfortunate casualty of this doomed relationship – it’s so sad when the kids have to suffer.

But this is all drivel. You don’t come here for stories about surfing do you? So, while we’re on the topic of things that I am not good at let’s talk about boys. During week one in Costa Rica due to the pleasantly impermanent state of all decisions made while on vacation I was able to fully regress back to the teenagerhood I never had (it was not pretty, but was, of course, totally rad). There were many tequila shots and a bilingual game of “I Never” (“I never thought I’d be getting drunk with college boys at 29.”) and there was a hot Colombian boy named David (and here I must pause to mention that Colombia also brings us the awesome yumminess of arapeas, that plus hot boys makes it my new favorite country). The boy was very concerned with getting out the word that not all Colombians are drug mules. So here it is, The Word: Not all Colombians are coke pushers or warlords. Not even all of the 25 year old boys. Especially not the hot ones. Of course, cocaine isn’t my drug of choice anyway. I choose kissing to be hopelessly addicted to and the hot 25 year old Colombian boys seem to be pushing that commodity all over Latin America. The mere suggestion of kissing transforms me into a pathetic junkie willing to sink to the basest acts in pursuit of some sweet lip locking action. My friends, these are my sins:

• I did willingly pretend to enjoy cheap watery Costa Rica beer.

• Of my own volition I let slide more than one comment about how women need to be taken care of.

• Without coercion I went to reggae bars TWO NIGHTS IN A ROW.

I am very sorry, but in my defense, have I mentioned the hotness? What about the K-I-S-S-I-N-G ? In the end, though I am embarrassed, it was all so very very worth it.

By the end of our first evening together (or early the next morning) David was charmed enough by my bad Spanish (and perhaps a little bit by the tequila) to be all “Hi, I’m a former Olympic level swimming with an insanely hot body and a very cute smile, shall we make out?” Of course I responded, “Yes! Please! Preferably for the next 3 days straight!” Sadly, this is where we differed. For despite a blissful morning of relatively innocent drunken kissing when I saw Mr. David the next night I was forced to endure FOUR games of Rummikub with his boring stoner friends rather than get on with the awesome making out. Desperate, I even stooped so low as to suggest “going on a walk” which, EVERYONE knows is international code for “Let’s go make out!” Having this obvious bait summarily rejected (“Nah, let’s hang out and play some more Rummyikub, it’s like 5 million times better than kissing.”) I tried not to sulk – a difficult task when stoner boys are kicking your ass at a children’s game. Thankfully, even half drunk boys with poor prioritization skills eventually get bored making runs and sets of plastic tiles so off to the bar we went (“What? Oh Yeah, Reggae is great. CAN’T GET ENOUGH!!!”). Perhaps I should be kinder to Reggae, since once ensconced in its loud garbled embrace David ditched his friend and devoted all of his attention to the hot blonde girl (hi, me, overHERE) but for some reason rather than kissing we were discussing Colombian politics. At length. Ok, I like politics, and I like learning new things and David had tons of interesting things to say about the war and how much it sucks that he pretty much can’t travel to any other country since everyone from Colombia is obviously a drug lord but umm… don’t we have kissing to do?!?! It took at least another 30mins of Reggae soundtracked chit chat for the boy to work up to revealing the reason why we were still free of the lip lock: A crisis of conscious in the form of a girlfriend. Ok, I know I should care about his poor girlfriend and be suitably impressed with his (albeit slightly late) guilt but… REALLY? I’m only around for 3 days, we can’t just IGNORE the girlfriend? Come on, this is vacation, have a heart! Actually, as it turns out, we could ignore her; my offer to “not kiss you or anything” was quickly met with a big smooch – boys are weird, the world over.

Sadly, the weirdness didn’t go away on day 3. We spent the entire day together (with stoner friends in tow) on a mini tour of Toruga Island where there was hand holding and flirting and a lot of secret hidden touching (which sounds much more exciting then it actually was) but for reasons I have no ability to discern there was NO KISSING. That evening I endured yet another Reggae bar at the demands of my addiction but it was all to no avail. I don’t know what was wrong with the boy – this was no strings kissing I was offering, one night only, free, complication free – YOU ARE MISSING OUT ON THE DEAL OF A LIFETIME! Alas. I figured the story was over but when 3am rolled around and I drove the boy and his posse home God revealed his latest great joke at Brianna’s expense. As I got half way to their home the term “rainy season” was fully defined for me as a deluge poured from the sky onto the few miles of dirt road separating me from my mountain home. I waited and waited for the rain to end and in the meantime David passed out in his bed, eventually his cousin said that he didn’t think I should drive home in the downpour. The hilarity began anew when I asked where I should sleep, “With David.” Oh, right, with the guy who hasn’t kissed me all day because he’s having girlfriend guilt, I bet he’d LOVE it if I crawled into his bed. “Well, you can sleep with me I guess but you really should sleep with David.” And so I was forced to sleep (sleep only, who ever said chivalry was dead (or a good thing…))? with the hot swimmer – nice work if you can trick a boy into it.

Despite the boy weirdness week one in Costa Rica was not a tragedy. In my opinion there is no better way to spend a vacation than kissing a cute boy even if the boy in question refuses to get with the “all kissing all the time” program, even the promise of no strings kissing is enough for me to declare success (at one point on vacation I mused that fancy resorts should offer guests the chance to hook up with cute locals… then I realized we have that already, and it’s illegal.). And really, who can complain about a vacation in this house (which my travel companion’s friend at playacarmen.net hooked us up with for a song)? My regression to teenagerhood was all the things that my actual past was not (fun, not at all angsty, completely devoid of homework) and I can’t imagine that 10 years from now I’ll be on a therapist’s couch obsessing over any of any of it. However, it is comical to note that even while on vacation (even when in the throws of an ugly addiction) I am laughably predictable. I pick the boy who wants to talk politics and help with dinner. The boy who seems slightly lost among his stoner friends. The boy who can spend a whole night in bed with my hot ass and not once touch me (the boy who might be gay?). And, despite my bravado here regarding no strings vacation hook ups a little piece of my teenage heart (perhaps the last piece left in this wizened old 29 year old) crumpled when I said goodbye to David and he grinned and said, “It was a pleasure to sleep with you… in the other way.”

The Winner Parade: Entry 4

A few months after moving to the bay area when I was a bit lonely living on my own for the first time and spending all of my time either at my job programming graphics for slot machines in an office where no one turned on the lights or visiting the all women hippy dippy gym where I attended water aerobics at least three times a week. One of my few friends in the area was Monica, the evening receptionist at the gym who had occasionally invited me out with a few of her friends. It was on one of these outings (I believe at Halloween when I was dressed as Raggedy Anne and so, obviously looking super hot) that I met The Boy With Awful Taste. He seemed like a nice enough guy, not really my type but fun to hang out with. We hadn’t flirted or even talked much so I was surprised when a few days later Monica asked if I’d consider going out on a date with TBWAT. Having very few friends or plans I figured what the hell and told her to have him call me.

In my memory of the date that followed I do not recall knowing exactly what show I was being taken to see but I admit that this is likely due to some postdate self esteem survival instinct. I certainly knew the show’s venue and date and time and I knew how to use the internet so I must have known that at 22 on my first post-college date I was being taken to Disney on Ice. Now maybe lots of young girls are wooed by the dewy reflection beaming off of Micky’s skates, maybe the magic of fog machines and pirouettes has sparked many a romance but my feelings about ice dancing caricatures of cartoon characters were more gag-y than swoon-y. Selective amnesia aside it is obvious that my gag reflex has been so tamed that when faced with the decision between another Saturday night curled up with the internet and an actual date I was fully convinced that I could keep my lunch down through a 2 hour skating spectacular.

The date started its skydive into a ravine filled with barbed wire when we arrived at the San Jose HP Pavilion and TBWAT had to stop at the ticket booth, not to pick up our tickets to ice skating cartoonary, but to grab his tickets for a future event…. WWF wrestling. He was super excited about seeing some live action man on man sparring and I have to applaud anyone with a strong enough sense of self to resist backpedaling when his date is so clearly unable to hide her general disgust whiling thinking, “Who knew that there was a Disney/WWF combo demographic?”

The show finally began and the hordes of tots that surrounded me were lulled into silence by the jazz hands and figure eights of Woody and Buzz Light Year (note #1 to single guys: if you wanna get laid avoid date venues where the child to adult ratio is greater than 1:2). At intermission TBWAT offered to procure us some Disney themed snakage and beverages (note #2 to single guys: dates, like all things, are always better with booze so do not take your date to a place that refuses to serve cocktails). He returned with all he promised and more… while foraging for sustenance TBWAT had bought me a gift: a pink wand that when shaken lit up and played twinkling sound. Despite my now ample experience with Toy Story (is this a sign?) I cannot identify which character was likely to carry the wand. I also cannot provide a picture because I regifted the thing to an 8 year old neighbor girl within 1 month of receiving it, but for that night I had to put on my best 22 year old princess face and ohh and aww over this very generous gift, thank god for my secret BA in Theatre Arts. And so, wand in hand, I spent act two trying in vein to cast spell after spell, “Bippity! Toy Story On Ice, become a Ryan Adams concert!” “Boppity! Diet Coke become a margarita!”, “Boo! TBWAT, turn into Jack White!”

Post kiddie ice capades TBWAT proposed we grab some real food and, because it is impossible to say no to a guy who bought you a wand, I agreed. On our way to his second venue of choice (a diner with some sort of dimly lit lounge/strip club hiding behind a curtain near the bathrooms) his phone rang and at the end of his 10 minute conversation he invited the caller to join us for diner (note #3 for single guys: do not invite your friends to join you on your date). I was mostly ok with this plan (not that I was asked) since the addition of a third party seemed a sure sign that he was not planning on romancing up the evening. I figured the drive from the ice spectacular to the diner would serve as the necessary transition between “possible couple” and “just friends.” When we arrived at the diner I was doubly glad to be a single woman because our dinner companion was hot! That’s right folks – Winner Parade Four is a twofer!

Hot Friend(HF) and I spent most of dinner inappropriately making eyes at one another and (for my part at least) wondering if there was any way to finagle going home together without making both of us horrible people. Unable to reconcile that or come up with a way to surreptitiously jump his bones in the diner I was forced to get a ride home from TBWAT but not before HF asked for my number. I’ll admit to a small amount of shame at picking up a Guy #2 before my date with Guy #1 was officially over but I mostly figure that this is the kind of disaster #1 should expect when he invites another guy along on his date. I told TBWAT as much a couple of weeks later when he implied that my behavior made me a huge bitch.

HF called me a few days later and, since we worked within a few miles of one another he picked me up from the casino gaming empire for a quick lunch which lead to another date and another until we were sitting on the edge of relationshipdom staring into the abyss. Once I get past date three I’m usually a jumper and HF was no exception, he was cute, lived near by, worked at a tech company and… did I mention cute? Did I mention that I was 22? Unfortunately, HF was stuck on the edge of the cliff paralyzed with fear. He hemmed and hawed and sited being much much too busy for girlfriend but stopped short of actually breaking up with me until one day when he called to tell me that he had signed up to coach volleyball to high school girls. I am a lot of things: witty, cute, gifted with the internet, an expert on trashy tv, a great chef, a decent writer. None of these attributes can compete with 15 year old girls in short shorts jumping up and down and encouraging you to get behind them and show them exactly how to serve ("But I'm not very good and it might take a few tries! I Hope you’re patient!"). Needless to say I was broken up with over the phone just before the second night of practice.

While I’m sure many of my readers are dreaming of the chance to hook up with TBWAT or HF I cannot tell you the whereabouts of either. I honestly cannot remember the name of TBWAT so he is ungoogle-able but I suspect that he has yet to discover the internet anyway (and thus he is seriously missing out on the chance to relive our date but all of you lucky people can do so here – feel the ROMANCE.) . I do remember the name of HF (typical, right?) but unfortunately he shares a name with a famous race car driver so I can't properly stalk him -- it probably doesn’t matter, I don’t think they let pedophiles access the internet.

The One Where I Talk to a Boy and Things Go Down Hill From There

I embrace the “Random” in Random Access Babble so I don’t like when this blog veers too much towards one topic. Lately this threatens to become “that blog where the funny girl mocks all the losers she’s had the bad luck of dating (And oh yeah once she wrote that really long post about United – she seems bitter).” I’m trying very hard not to let this happen, I’m even sitting on Winner Parade 4 in an effort to seem well rounded. I could have sat on this post as well but I’m at a loss for other topics and I have no ability to resist writing about my personal tragedies, especially when, unlike much of this blog, they’re happening in the now. And so… another post about dating. Don’t get too used to it, I’m reading Letter to a Christian Nation so I’m bound to break out the political wailing any day now.

Much to the disappointment of many of my friends (most vocally, Kajal) I very rarely talk to boys in bars/clubs/concert venues/life unless I’m asking them when they plan on hitting their development milestones. I talk a big game pre outing in the huddle but when it comes to hiking, running and most importantly passing I don’t deliver. I have often commented that I have no game and would be very interested in a class offering to teach me exactly how other people pull off things like flirting without melting into a puddle of embarrassment. The fact that I would even think to turn to a class for such things probably says more about the nature of my problems than anything else on this blog. Friday night’s boat trip/Weakerthans concert (which, by the way: awesome idea, why aren’t all concerts on boats?) was shaping up to be more of the same. Gillian, Lisa and I spent a good 15mins surveying the audience members, nitpicking on girl’s outfits (seriously, blue linen overalls with a belt? Who does that?) and admiring the cute indie boys from afar. Gillian quickly started in on the “why aren’t you actually talking to any guys?” game.

G: Look, boy in Fly shirt, totally cute!

B: yeah.

G: Go tell him you like his shirt!

B: not happening.

G: Come ooooooon, he’s cute.

B: That’s awkward. Also: he’s now doing a weird dance so… perhaps not so cute.

Boy in Fly shirt was actually pretty cute so I started in on my way too subtle game of, “look at him occasionally and send psychic messages that he should totally talk to me.” Typically this results in much disappointment due to the pathetically bad mind reading skills of most of the male population (Dudes: work on that). Perhaps for the first time ever, with Fly Boy the plan totally works!

So we chat, it’s good times, mostly… I should have been more concerned when he wasn’t interested in either of my proposed communication topics (“what do you think the Canadian to nonCanadian ratio is here?” “What do you think the mean age in the room is?"). Fly boy is nice enough but comes on way too strong with the “can I have a kiss?” like 10 minutes into meeting me. I’m trying to go with the flow on this one and not be my normal analytical, crazy, life plan oriented self so I focus on getting into the whole kissing random guy in public thing. While this totally makes Lisa and Gillian’s night (they begin photographing the event and texting Kajal to let her know just what she’s missing out on while attending yet another wedding in the south.) it makes my night somewhat uncomfortable. I don’t really love kissing in front of other people. Especially when the kissing is happening with someone who I just met and who, though totally cute, I cannot really imagine myself ever actually dating. So I’m thinking about this (so much for dropping analytical off at the sitter’s for the evening) and kind of deciding that this kissing Fly Boy thing is no longer happening, which I totally stick with except that then he gets all “fine I’ll just kiss your neck/back/arm (cause arm kissing is hot). And he’s super insistent that I go out with him and his friends post concert. I’m a paranoid girl so the thought of going out all alone (G and L were bailing) with some strange dude and his bros was setting off all sorts of “Girl, you are asking to be raped” alarm bells in my head. So jokingly I say…

B: How many friends do you have? Cause I’m a vulnerable sweet young thing and I can just see this going the roofies route.

J: I *WISH* I had some roofies so I could rape you!

Wow. Yeah, that’s just the kind of joke you wanna be making. The conversation was kind of downhill from here, let me give you a few highlights.

B: These are my friends Gillian and List

J: Hi, I’m Jeff

G: Is that with a J or a G? I’m Gillian with a G

J: A J

.

.

(The band plays on, we sail by the statue of liberty, 45 minutes pass)

.

.

J: Hi, I don’t think I met you ladies, I’m Jeff

(General cracking up)

G: Gillian

J: With a G?

(Brianna mouthing to Lisa “-10 points” between additional cracking up)

I’d like to think he was kidding or drunk or had been involved in a tragic accident that resulted in short term memory lost… but unfortunately all of those would be wishful thinking.

And then there was this….

J: Yeah, I was really into Physics, I snuck into Columbia to take some classes but they were all lame, I knew so much more than the professors and I would argue with them and they totally could not defend themselves, it was sad. Anyway, I figured that college was a waste of time, I wasn’t getting any opportunity to contribute to the psychics world so I left.

B: How are you contributing to the physics world as a cabinet maker?

Oh poor misguided boy, do not diss scientists to me.

I bailed on the going out.