Month: November 2005

Some of us blog about politics and there is always something going on in that world to blog about. Some of us blog about our daily lives, rants and such, and since our lives are in constant motion, there is always something to blog about. Some of us blog about a topic such as my own ~ Dating & Men. While I ensure you that I do my berrie breast to put myself in all sorts of places to meet men, I’m officially out of material, uh, men. I don’t expect the dry spell to last long, mostly because I so enjoy the torture, but for now, I will resort to a flashback post.

Since I’ve been somewhat bitter and jaded as of late, it’s going to be a happy blog.

Dating hasn’t always been this much work with this little reward. My friend Holly and I were talking recently about how easy it was when we were in our early 20’s and living in Connecticut. We both had regular “I-went-to-college-for-this?” day jobs and waited tables at a sports bar at night to supplement our paltry income. Men were everywhere, and they were nice men. Holly thinks that it was better because we saw the same people come through week after week. The town had about 100,000 residents, so it wasn’t exactly a small town. You knew about a third of the people in the bar by name, and another third by face.

Regardless, I’ve had some very good experiences in the man department – back in the days when they didn’t, as a collective gender, consistently let me down. Some stories of note follow.

1) In the more recent past, MotorcycleInstructor, despite his flaws, was incredibly giving when he wanted to be. Yeah yeah yeah, scoff if you will, but he did blow off an afternoon of work to pick up my Harley in Gaithersburg and drive it back to Dupont Circle. He did come back later that night to lock the bike up for me in the public garage. He did also come back to my apartment at 5 a.m. the next morning to drive it to inspections for me since I was too chicken to drive it there myself. Ok. Enough said.

2) My first true love, AlwaysDrunk, went on to date many many women after me. One of them was a girl named Tammy, who I went to high school with and who worked at the IT Help Desk when I worked for Nine West after college in 95-98. I had a special shoe catalog design program installed on my computer at Nine West that she had to constantly help me with. One weekend, I bumped into AlwaysDrunk and he said, “You know I’m dating Tammy, right? She said she sees you practically every day.” I said that she had never said anything. (She hadn’t.) But the next day I saw her and told her what he said and she just rolled her eyes. I said, “What? Sore subject?” And she said, “He never stops talking about you.”

3) I’m not so sure this falls in the category of “good” but it illustrates the lengths a man will go to for a woman. When TheCop and I broke up for the 157th time before my Senior Year of College in the Summer of 1994, he suspected that I broke up with him for someone else. He needed to know if I was home, alone. He climbed on to the roof of my parents house by way of a ladder and sat outside my bedroom window watching me sleep. That relationship should have ended with a restraining order.

4) Billy K. My second love. Sometime in 1996. By far the man who set all standards for how all men should behave when they really like someone. On our first date in N.Y.C., we met at a bar in Hell’s Kitchen. We both had our cars with us. He stopped on the way out of the city and filled up my car with gas and he gave me his cell phone in case I needed it. On other dates, he would drive from Queens to Connecticut to pick me up, we would go out in the city, he would take me back to CT and go back home to Queens. This is the suicidal equivalent of driving from Annapolis to Baltimore to get someone, take them out in D.C., then back to Baltimore to drop them off, finally retiring back in Annapolis. Wow.

5) Billy again. He really deserves a category, uh, entry, uh, blog of his own. Did I mention he was Greek and one of the only ones my parents let beyond the threshold of their front door? Anyway, I went to Mardi Gras in February of 1996 and he dropped me off and picked me up from LaGuardia. On my flight home, Elle MacPherson was a few rows in front of me in first class. They don’t call this woman “The Body” for nothing. So I get off the plane, barrel in front of her, find Billy at bag claim and jump in his arms. Then I say, “Look! Elle MacPherson!” And Billy says, “Who fucking cares? You’re BACK!” And I said, “Just look! You have to look. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity.” And he said, “I don’t care about her. So what? How was your trip?” That man did not take his eyes off me the entire time. Who does that?

Ok, look. I was 23 and he was 33 and he thought the age difference was too much and eventually went back to his old girlfriend. I wonder how that worked out. Sometimes I think about looking him up. Damn he was hot.

All right. I’m done with these stories. I’m depressed now. Though, I wonder if there’s a theory to be had here. Most of this intense wooing by these men happened when I was much younger and much more naive. Is it possible that men don’t expend this kind of effort on a woman in her 30’s because she’s supposed to be more independent or is it because he’s tired from having spent all his 20’s doing the things for other women that were done for me by other men?

I’m having a very strange feeling. It’s another deep one, so stop reading now if you are going to accuse me of boring you to death.

I feel like the rest of me has arrived. Not “arrived” in the financial or social sense, but arrived at the place in my life that I’m supposed to be. This isn’t related to anything with my career – it’s relationship stuff. I have this feeling like I’m finally at the party, so to speak, that I finally “get it,” am finally in the club. And in feeling this, it seems as if the half of me just got here (uh, Velvet1?) and was greeted by the other half (we’ll call her Velvet2) who has been here all along. Velvet2 says, “Thank goodness you made it. We were all so worried.”

For my entire dating and relationship career, I have found it very easy to fall in love. In the past, I allowed myself to be courted, I participated in the chase, had that feeling of missing him, wondering when he would call, debating on calling him. I played all the games. I’ve had all the games played with me. But with all those broken hearts and near misses on relationships, I’ve lost all of those feelings of excitement. With Date Eight from last Friday night – it seemed like I could like him. It took three full days, until last Monday, to realize that I hadn’t heard from him. Then it took another three minutes to realize that I don’t care.

So this begs the question. Do I not care because I really don’t like him? Or do I not care because again, sigh, the touchy feely emotional part of me is dead?

Through the years, when a guy I liked didn’t call, or didn’t call back, it took a toll on me. I slowly became like an anxious, nervous mess, wondering if I would ever hear back. In my earlier dating years, I would make excuses for him. In my later dating years I would try to put it out of my head until I heard back from him. In any case, I always called friends and pontificated on what he could be thinking, analyzing everything he had said to me at our last encounter. Mostly my friends just backed me up and reinforced that yes, he likes me but must be stuck under a bus. Of course, after “the book,” some of those friends would tell me, “You have to read ‘He’s Just Not That Into You.'” While the heart was breaking, I always wished I could be “more like a guy” and just not care.

Be careful what you wish for. I’m at the party and I’m not so sure this is the party where I want to be. My emotions no longer control me. But the odd realization is that I don’t control them either. They are seemingly absent, and I can’t turn on the excitement and rush that goes with meeting someone new. I wonder if I have the capacity to love, or even the ability to fall into “like” with someone and date for a few months. Is the ability to get excited about someone new, to nervously anticipate a phone call, to care enough to censor what I’m saying now gone? Or am I just oversaturated in the dating and relationship stuff (it has been a busy six months) and temporarily worn down?

For those of you who have emailed me or commented about wishing you could turn off your emotions, I’m on the fence. I really don’t know which way is better. I hated that feeling of the unrequited like or love; but I hate this non-emotion as well. It’s a tough call on which is the preferred method.

Let’s flashback to the Velvet family Thanksgiving of 2003. I was living in Rockville. The family lives in Connecticut. It was my plan to wake up early Thanksgiving morning and drive home. That plan, like any other I could have come up with, was foiled by insane traffic. I spent 7 miserable stop-and-go hours in the car to get “home” for a trip that should have taken no more than 4 and 1/2 hours.

I arrived and started unloading my car, filled mostly with old blankets and such that my mother asked me to bring for the church donation to the homeless. Since I had recently broken up with my ex, I was drowning in extra blankets that he never came to retrieve. I ring the doorbell, there’s no answer. I call the house phone, no answer. I call my parent’s cell phone. I hear, “Oh, Hi honey.” I say, “Mom, where ARE you? I’m standing outside the house.” She says, “We’re at CVS because your father wanted to buy (she diverges into a whole list I care nothing about) and we’ll be home in a few minutes.”

As I sit there, outside, I’m stewing. Every minute that goes by I get more and more pissed off. Sammy (the love of my life) is running wild in the neighborhood and craps on someone’s well-manicured hoity toity front lawn. Now, I am that dog owner who ALWAYS picks it up. I crawl into bushes, use holey bags if I have to, grab it when there’s a blizzard – I ALWAYS pick up. (I hate litterers.) But there I am, steaming like Sammy’s poop, standing in my parent’s driveway, and I have no intention of picking up his crap.

So they finally pull around the corner, go into the driveway, right into the garage and my mom, dad and brother get out, look at me, say hi, and all walk into the house. I seriously thought I must be on Candid Camera. I grab one load of my stuff and walk into the house. My mother is at the kitchen sink washing something, my brother is stuffing a candy bar in his mouth and my father says in passing, “Hey, why didn’t you just use your key?” Then I say what no one has admitted out loud in my house for years: “BECAUSE MY KEY MYSTERIOUSLY STOPPED WORKING WHEN I MOVED IN WITH MY EX-BOYFRIEND AND I CAN ONLY ASSUME YOU CHANGED THE LOCKS IN YOUR PETTY WAY OF GETTING BACK AT ME.” They are all looking at each other, but no one can even bother to answer me.

I ask my brother to help me unload. He says ok, then promptly goes upstairs to his room. (I’m part of a very selfish family.) Finally the princess reappears from his room and helps with the last of the blankets. He grumbles that I have a lot of stuff. I retort, “Most of this is for Mom so she can show up at the church with all these blankets for the homeless donation.”

We sit down to dinner. Mom has scaled back the normal 7-10 various dishes down to four this particular year. The turkey, obviously. Stuffing (which is normally brown rice with apples, raisins and chunks of link sausage,) peas, and cranberry sauce. I am a vegetarian. There is nothing for me to eat. I’m not so psycho that I couldn’t pick around the sausage in the stuffing, but this year, the first in my 30 years of Thanksgiving with this family, the sausage is mysteriously ground and pulverized throughout the stuffing.

When I inquire about this sudden change, as it seems like a lot of work to ground sausage for a woman who barely likes to cook anyway, my mother says, “I put it in the microwave, it must have gotten ground up. Besides, who knows what you’re eating. You always change your mind, I can’t keep track.” Have you ever heard anything so fucking ridiculous? Yes, sausage links that have been cut up in to three or four pieces in years past are now subject to being smashed and ground by spending some time in the microwave. I’m no expert cook, and I don’t cook meat at all, obviously, but even I know this could never, in thousands of years, be possible. And I’ve not eaten meat since I was a little kid and they used to force me to eat it. Granted it was maybe 8 years ago that I gave up chicken and turkey, but I’ve never eaten beef or pork. The fact that my mother acts like this is all new to her is one of her games – I swear that sausage was pulverized in the rice on purpose. They all kept insisting that I just “have some and a little sausage won’t hurt me.” Duh. I know this. But it’s a lifestyle choice and a health choice. (Thank goodness I am not a lesbian. Could you imagine? “Velvet, can you not be a rugmuncher this weekend? It just doesn’t work in my schedule.”)

I ask what else there is to eat. At my parent’s house, it’s always the same: a bunch of unrecognizable things in the freezer that may or may not be older than I am, and chocolate in the pantry. They never have any food there. My brother tells me there might be a frozen pizza in the refrigerator. Great. Seven hours of driving to be locked out of a house I no longer have a key to, to spend time with a family who could care less that I even came home. And with that I said, “I’m never coming home for Thanksgiving again.”

Last year, I went to Italy. This year, I had a plan in the works to go back to Europe. But then I had to go and read my stupid horoscope in Bazaar (arguably the best Fashion Mag on the market,) and it said “Don’t ask for any time off at the holidays or your co-workers will resent it.” Who am I to argue with that? And frankly, it’s true. I’ve really milked the vacation bandwagon this year. It’s time to behave.

So, dear readers. I will be here this Thanksgiving. If anyone wants to go out and get some drinky-poos, I will be happy to oblige. Unless I don’t know you. Then, I don’t want to go out with you.

Online dating is almost over. Well, the Yahoo part. I can’t guarantee that I won’t dive onto another site, but for now, Yahoo is canceled as of 12/2/05 and I’m out baby! I’ll probably just dump my profile into the trash in the next few days anyway.

I’ve grown so bored with it that I have barely made an effort to check my messages or write back to anyone. If I do write back, it’s usually a one liner. Most people get the hint, but not all. So, let’s take a closer look at what you all have missed over the past few weeks since the last commentary.

1) A man whose title is “Can I Pay My Visa Bill With My Mastercard?” Where do I start with this? I pay my Visa bill in full, in cash, every month. There is no such thing as robbing Peter to pay Paul in my world. I no longer live (nor do I want to live) paycheck to paycheck. This is why I won’t date younger men who are not established. If I have to pay all the time, well then, what the hell do I need you for? Because we all know I already own a vibrator. Don’t even get me started on how he has written to me three times in a row despite the fact that I am not answering.

2) An email from someone who lives in Dumfries. Where the hell is that? Here’s what it said, without any editing:

“I promise you won’t have to run away from me unless you want to do it for sport im surprised that you lasted as long as you did its just to bad that some people dont know how to treat people when on a date I can definately improve upon your experiencewith that date. if your interested and want to talk let me know.”

Have you ever heard of Punctuation? I’ll give you a hint, it’s these things: , : ; ! . ? –

3) Someone who substituted something similar to “War and Peace” in their profile sent me an email telling me to check them out. I am so out of energy. Here’s what I wrote: “Whoa. Your profile is way too long. Can you make me a top five list or something? Just the bullet points.” Uh, I haven’t heard back from him. He was sort of cute too. Damn.

4) Here’s a good email from a fake man who doesn’t even have the balls to post a profile. So there’s nothing to write back to.

“In a nutshell, you description of your last date had me crying. Crying in a good way. Laughing/crying. Laughing to the point of tears. Yes, I feel bad for you, but it cracked me up. If there was a prize for originality, you win. Hands down. In fact, you’d be the only winnner and the award would be retired.

More nutshell: I forked over the $20 to rejoin just to tell you that. I guess that’s what you’d call inspiration. Here’s hoping you never have to go through that hell again!”

Great. That man is probably my husband and now I can’t find him.

As I looked through all these messages, I’m hit by the distinct reality that many of these men who contact me are in no way close to what I have specified that I would like. But yet, they try anyway. Why is it that women constantly settle for less and men constantly strive to achieve better? You never really see an incredibly hot man with brains, great job, money, with a piss poor woman who is just average in the looks department. But you will often see the opposite.

There are so many versions of men trying to talk me into dating them, despite the fact that they are not even close to my age, close to D.C., or that they have a bunch of kids with another woman. I think it’s time to retire this profile. Perhaps there will be better men on another site. Does anyone have any suggestions?

Another date tonight. This one was set up by the shitheads at It’s Just Lunch. (8 down, 6 to go.) Except again, it wasn’t lunch. It was drinks. (On a Friday? Come on!) We went to Panache between Connecticut and 17th on Desales. For anyone who doesn’t know where that little street is, it’s between L and M.

I got there and the bar was packed. I’m hoping Date Eight is not mixed in the mess of Eurotrash at the bar, but then I remember the lunch people told me they made reservations for us under both our names. This waiter asks me if I need help as there really isn’t a host. I say, “I’m meeting someone here and I believe we have a reservation.” He goes to look. I can see that they only have a whopping 3 reservations on the screen. I give him my name. He shakes his head. So I give Date Eight’s name. Shakes his head no again. Surprise – no reservation. Like I’m shocked at this point that they’ve slaughtered yet another detail.

The waiter says, “Well is he here?” At this point, ANYONE could have played it cooler than I. On the other occasions I have been asked this question, I always screw it up. Immediately I stick my foot in my mouth up to my knee and start blabbering about how I’m being set up and I don’t know what he looks like. The waiter is laughing and says, “Blind date! Fun!” I said, “For you maybe.” Once this line of questioning starts, they inevitably ask about the “friend” who set us up. It’s too complicated to explain that I’ve entrusted my dating life to a bunch of sorority girls with double digit IQ’s. I decided to just take a table, half to get my foot out of my mouth and half to make sure I didn’t push my foot in any further.

He arrived shortly after I did, and the same waiter (who ends up not even being our waiter) brought him to the table. I felt instantly comfortable. I don’t know exactly what it was or how to put my finger on it. Last night with Steve1, when I saw him I wasn’t attracted to him and knew I would never be attracted to him. He put his hand on my knee or touched my elbow and I almost cringed. But tonight with Date Eight, it was more like, “Ok, I could see myself maybe dating this guy.” I think I’m at the point where I’m now conscious of that first 10 second impression rule. Alas, he didn’t touch my elbow or knee so that I could test my theory.

Again, there aren’t a lot of details. We have a lot of odd similarities. We are both the youngest of three, he grew up two towns away from me, just over the N.Y. border, parents still married. Although, his parents seem relatively sane compared to Jekyl and Hyde over there at the Velvet Family Compound. We drank, ate, had good conversation all the way through and that was that. He was going to meet friends, I was going home so I could go to bed. I’m planning a day of Christmas shopping tomorrow. I must buy all sorts of cute clothes for little baby.

On the way out of the restaurant, the waiter shook both our hands and said, “Bye Velvet!” I was surprised he remembered my name so I said, “Wow, you’re good.” And he said, “So are you.” What? What has he heard?

Dating recommences! I shouldn’t use that exclamation point. It’s not that exciting. I’ll make it quick. Try not to fall into a coma while reading.

I bounced my ass (and seven eighths of my face) back into the middle of the dating scene. Tonight was the first of a few dates I have lined up.

I met Steve1 at Cafe Citron. That place was packed. And it was so ridiculously loud that we ended up leaving after a couple drinks and wandered up to Kramerbooks. (Am I getting old? It was too loud?) We ate at Kramer, did some book shopping, and parted ways on Connecticut Avenue with a hug. There are no details. I tried to imagine myself kissing him and I didn’t feel it.

Do you know that scene in one of my all time favorite Christmas stories, The Grinch, where they show his heart and it’s the size of a pea? That’s me.

I talked to my brother yesterday and I was telling him how I’ve lost my ability to have emotion about anything. He said, “Oh no.” I said, “What, will this go away?” And he said, “You’re ready….you’re ready to meet someone and be serious.” I, of course, don’t think so. I love dating and then recanting the stories – both good and bad. I know that it can’t go on forever because eventually I will just give up entirely and stay home. I’ll be forever destined to blog about my dogs…the only true loves of my life. Well, them and that other guy from my damn dreams.

My dog has officially become as narcissistic as a good majority of the men I have dated.

I wonder what he’s thinking about. Maybe he was about to french kiss the mirror when I walked in.

I had another dream about you last night.

I was walking around parts of England that to me were unknown. You were walking down a side street. You were alone. I was alone. We decided to be alone together. We walked in the rain, but then I abruptly said I had to go. I left you there in the street.

I ran through the wet streets to return to my dark little flat. I began to take off my clothes and get ready for bed. But then I heard my front door open. I walked out into the living room and saw you standing there, holding two suitcases. You wanted to stay. I said that was ok. I went back into the bedroom. You followed.

But, you didn’t stay. You never stayed. The suitcases were a prop, intended to get me to think this was permanent. It wasn’t. A script according to your rules. You were gone by the morning, taking with you, my heart.

No one is a bigger asshole than me. No one.

I was walking the dogs tonight and I bumped into The Bartender. It was awkward for a minute, but only because I made it awkward. We talked about things and he came back to my place and we watched Will & Grace and Sex & The City. It’s very easy to see your life and yourself in a very one sided manner. But the man never got to say his part and I do feel that I owed him that much. I just wasn’t ready for what I was going to see of myself.

I found myself genuinely feeling bad for how I ended things (on a blog – what the hell is wrong with me) and apologizing for it. He said it was fine and there were no hard feelings. He went on just talking about what happened. As I was listening to him tell it, it didn’t seem possible that the “other person” in his scenario was me. Not because he was lying – he wasn’t, but because, well, who am I and how could I behave like that to another human being? He went on to further explain that he wishes he could be like me and just turn feelings on and off, but that he can’t and that’s why his ex is still in his life.

Then I said, “No! Don’t wish that you could be like me! At least when you have feelings about something you know you’re still alive. I’m not even sure that I’m alive and breathing anymore. Very little moves me.”

It’s true. The anticipation of a first date used to make me so excited. Now, it’s just ho hum. An argument with a friend would upset me. Now, I’m unmoved. The meltdowns in my family used to charge me up, wanting to get everyone to work it out. Now, I don’t give a shit. In fact, no one in my family really talks to me anymore about, well, anything important. Fine with me. In fact, in the one conversation my oldest brother and I had last week about our aging and increasingly psychotic parents, he was so pissed at them. When he posed questions or comments that should incite that same emotion from me, all I could say was, “They’ve all made their beds and they can fucking lay in them now. I don’t care. Watching them be the martyrs for the past 20 years has drained me.” You can really only take so much. See the grandbaby, don’t see the grandbaby, be mad at older brother for calling, not calling, forgetting to call, living in Michigan instead of New York, working on Christmas Day in 1998, not wanting to work for ESPN, fuck off. Do whatever you want. Life doesn’t revolve around you anymore, and will actually go on without you. If you aren’t going to see your first and only grandchild then you may as well go get in your coffin because you are missing out on one of the biggest joys you will ever have in your lives. Assholes.

So back to my life at hand. I don’t like being like this. I really don’t. My neighbors just got engaged and they are so in sync and so in love with each other and it’s great. But I look at them and wonder if I would ever find that with someone. Not because there’s no one good enough out there, but because I just can’t wrap my brain around the idea of being “one” with another human being. I can’t imagine having that heart pounding crush on someone that lasts to the point where I could say to myself, “Yup, this is worth packing it all in for and settling down.”

Almost everyone I know is in a relationship. Even my girlfriends who were going to remain steadfastly single have paired up. Some of you have done so more for convenience than for having “found your soulmate.” No, I’ll never own up to which of you I think may be faking it and it shouldn’t matter anyway. So the business of being single is really just down to, well, me. I feel as though I should be mildly bothered that all my girlfriends (with one exception – my college roommate) are now officially living with a significant other. But I don’t care. For some reason, I honestly don’t care. I am emotionally dead. Me getting Bell’s Palsy was really just poetic justice – someone, who devoid of all emotion, loses the ability to form her face into any discernable expression.

I have a date Thursday and a date Friday and in both cases I’m either sadistically hoping it goes wrong so I can stab one of them with my fork and then come back and blog about it or I’m hoping it goes no where. Because when it all comes down to it, I am not convinced that I would make a happy, functioning “other half” in a relationship. I like sleeping in the middle of the bed. I like eating right out of the peanut butter jar. I like that I am the only one to discipline my dogs. I like that my shoes take up three closets. I don’t want to get rid of any of my clothes. I don’t want to move to a bigger place. And I don’t want to compromise. I like my life how it is, and I wonder if I like it so much that I am secretly sabotaging every new relationship on purpose?

The Bartender said he never had a chance. He’s right. I’m afraid that no one else really has either.

Dear Bloggers,

Today, Mommy took us down to the National Mall to take our picture in front of the Capitol. We have no idea why that bitch had to have this picture, but she loaded us up in the car and off we went. We thought the “mall” was the place Mommy goes to for hours, then comes back with thousands of bags and proclaims, “Well fuckers, you can’t eat for a few weeks, Mommy really did it this time.” But the mall is this great place with all this grass and we just wanted to run and run. There were so many tourists and so little time and they loved us! Their kids were taking pictures of us, they were asking Mommy questions about D.C., and she loves it here, so she loves to talk about it. We even overheard her tell some lady from New York that D.C. is the only other place besides New York that she will call “home.”

Mommy kept trying to get the picture of us and we kept wandering off to investigate the new smells and see people who were talking to us. Mommy screamed at us to sit down for the better part of an hour. Do you have any idea what idiots we looked like? And may we add, she is turning into her mother. If we had a Milkbone for every time she said, “Just pose for this picture and try not to ruin Mommy’s day,” well, we’d have a lot of Milkbones.

It’s really no surprise that she doesn’t have, nor can she keep a man.

Love,
SuperDogs

Last night, Sara and I met for dinner at Zaytinya. We had a lot of catching up to do, and damn was that place packed. I don’t go to the Chinatown / MCI Center ‘hood often, so I was sort of surprised to see it teeming with singles. We waited 45 minutes for a table, then proceeded to order a bevy of entrees that were smaller than my pinky nail but more expensive than a haircut. Okay, it wasn’t that bad. But it was close.

We were trying to get a read on what was up at the bar. Usually when I end up at a place downtown, it’s filled with tourists and therefore not a good sampling of who would really be here. But I think in this case, they were D.C. locals. A lot of guys in suits and girls with fake boobs. Now, Sara and I are pretty damn personable, even if I do say so myself, but I could swear there was an air of stuffiness in there. I’m not married to that idea yet, still have to mull it over, but it seemed like the kind of crowd where you could bump into someone by accident and end up getting a bunch of dirty looks.

At one point in the evening, I received a call from my college roommate who said she was in town just for the night. I called her when I dropped Sara off and she said she was at the Hyatt in Bethesda. This isn’t very far from me at all, but it was 11:00 and Sara and I had just finished a bottle of wine and then some, so I wasn’t sure this was the best idea. But my college roommate was only in town for one night, then she unleashed the big guns on me.

“Look. They messed up my reservation and they gave me the Presidential Suite. You have got to come up here just to see it.” And with that, I was in the car.

When I got in the elevator at the hotel, I was making faces in the mirror to see how my Bell’s Palsy was doing. (Coming along, thanks for asking.) Then I realized of course that the elevators were all glass and the whole lobby could see me. Granted there were only three people in the lobby, but still. As the floors clicked away, bringing me higher and higher, I felt like the biggest fraud – like the brakes were going to come on and say, “Get out here, we don’t take your type past the 3rd floor.”

This room of hers was ridiculous. She had her own patio (bigger than my condo) that overlooked downtown Bethesda. The hotel staff told her that “only Presidents stay in the Presidential suite” so we felt pretty important. Truth be told, once you close your eyes, it could just as soon have been a Motel 6, but it was still nice to see.

It was night of phony locations. That’s all I have. Sorry. A little boring today.

Hello friends! I am launching the first of hopefully many installments of the “In Search Of Single Men & Interesting People” Pub Crawl. Yesterday evening, your host boozed it up at two venues across this beautiful city of ours. I plan on reporting my findings, however dull or exciting they may be.*

Last night I started at the much hyped EyeBar. I was there from 8:00 until about 9:30 and except for a few other patrons, it was basically dead. Despite the fact that the bartender said it really gets started around 11, I decided to move on in search of something a little more lively. My compatriot suggested the Hawk & Dove in Capitol Hill, as she said that there are usually some pompous men there in need of an ego-deflate. We were there from about 10:00 until 11:30. While one of the neighborhood drunks tried to join our conversation (unsuccessfully I might add,) the Hawk & Dove was relatively quiet as well.

We are planning on working our way through a list obtained online of 4 star drinking establishments in the city. Stay tuned.

*Velvet is a selfish dating bitch. Any recommendations, positive or otherwise, of certain establishments may be a hoax to divert competition out of the playing field. The preferred dating odds of Velvet are a room full of 98% single, eligible men and 2% women. The women comprised in the 2% must be in Velvet’s party or must be cool enough to hang out with.

I had a dream about you again last night.

I used my spare key to sneak into your house while you slept, and went into the guest room so I wouldn’t wake you. I managed this with ease, slipping in at night after you were asleep and slipping back out before you awoke. I would lay there, bubbling over with excitement, knowing that even though I was not laying next to you, we were breathing the same air.

It was the closest I could get to you.

One night, you were in your bed with your girlfriend. I listened through the wall as you spoke sweet words to her, with you still never knowing I was there. I thought about just creeping back out, but then I exited dreamland and woke up for real. Back in my own bed, the scent of you is so palpable, and the first thought of the day comes to my mind.

I am still in love with you.

Since I haven’t been returning his messages, I haven’t given The Bartender a chance to respond to my post on Saturday. I fully respect everyone’s First Amendment Rights, and it is only fair to let him speak, which he will now do via an email I received. Hopefully he doesn’t mind.

It’s been a few days since I’ve seen the blog but that is by choice. The BLOG was interesting and I enjoyed my time on it but I stopped reading it a week ago. Truth be told, it was a little bad for me cuz it provided fuel for my vanity. I have ALSO spent my 20’s in relationships (your tagline) and from those relationships I HAVE FRIENDS. Throwing out what has PAST is unhealthy and COLD and not MY style. Thanks for the chances we did hang out and give Sammy and Thora a kiss goodbye.

Don’t boycott my bar cuz YOU have a problem with ME. I have NO hostilities and pretty much expected that I would be on my way out before I could settle in. Men seem to have a VERY short shelf life in your life, as they should. I am making NO judgments or allegations so PLEASE do not take it as that.

The Bartender

Hmm. My comments:

First, I wouldn’t ever boycott a bar. That would be a sin. As childish as I can be at times, I don’t feel the need to avoid him.

Second, I appreciate the nod to Sammy and Thora. I do love those dogs more than anything else in this world.

Third, I just don’t agree with maintaining relationships with people from your past if those people can hijack any chance of happiness from your future. This happened in our case.

Finally, I have mixed emotions about the comment I have placed in bold. He expected to be on his way out before he could settle in? Men have a short shelflife with me? I’m stunned. It’s sort of funny at first, but then, it really just makes me sad.

I have no idea what comprises the vortex that steals my day.

I need some different men as I have realized something incredibly moronic:

The three men I have lined up on Yahoo to go out with all have the same name. While this could be highly convenient, I will never be able to keep the details of their lives straight. They are all one and the same to me now. I officially need a personal assistant or an agent or something to ensure these things don’t happen to me anymore.

You know, I’ve had that line on my list as a possible title, and I thought I would never get to use it. Whouda thunk I would end up with a crooked smile?

First, a disclaimer. The “resignation letter” was supposed to be “tongue-in-cheek.” AH HA HA HA! I kill myself. Tongue in cheek. So funny. Well, funny to me. But we all know, I have no intention of resigning from the dating world. It’s just too comical.

Now, let’s zip up some old business. The Bartender is no more. It was foolish of me to shit where I eat, so to speak, however, I was willing to – in the name of fun. But it isn’t fun anymore. The Bartender, for his young age, has baggage. I hate baggage.

I received a text message Friday morning sent by The Bartender but clearly not intended for me. While I care absolutely zero of the content of said message, it basically illustrates that this ex girlfriend drama is a two-way street, as much instigated by him as it is her. So I’m staring at my phone realizing this isn’t meant for my eyes. Here we have come full circle. Finally I get to see something he feels that I’m not supposed to know.

Then he called me, not realizing what had just happened. I read him the text message. We had a conversation about mostly unimportant details but he said things about his ex and how she found my blog by some information he gave her and how she reads it. (When they were handing out “lives” she must have forgotten to get in line.) Now, hold that thought for a minute as I must tell you that hours after all this happened, I got a copy of the Post Express and read, among other things, my horoscope:

• You’ll get a tell tale sign from a friend early in the day that will give you all the information you need to know right now.

I was eating lunch with a friend and spit out my sandwich. Well, okay, that wasn’t hard to do since half my mouth doesn’t work anyway. So I tell my friend about my morning, then read the horoscope out loud. In shock. It’s like it was written for me. Then I said, “I’m done.”

Why am I done? I refuse to be in the middle of some teenage drama. I’m not here to help some girl keep tabs on her old boyfriend. I’m not here to listen to sob stories from The Bartender and how he can’t shake this leech of an ex. I’ve said above, and to so many of you in comments on your own blogs that “When it isn’t fun anymore, it isn’t worth it.” And this, my friends, just passed the last stop of fun, heading to a place I don’t want to go.

I don’t get harassed by my ex-boyfriends because I move, change my number, become invisible, stop returning phone calls – whatever it takes to get them out of my life. I so systematically removed myself from a long-term relationship that it took his entire family months to realize they had no way to get in contact with me. It’s clear that The Bartender thrives on this drama, and I’m just not in 7th Grade anymore. If one of my ex-boyfriends current girlfriends was writing a blog, I would log into it exactly ZERO times. Why? Because I DON’T FUCKING CARE WHAT MY EX-BOYFRIENDS ARE DOING! That’s why they have the “ex” in front of their prior label of “boyfriend.”

To the ex-girlfriends who can’t get over the boy and pine away for him, grasping for what little they can find out about him, get a life.

To the ex-boyfriends who love this attention, pretend they don’t invite it, but still entertain it anyway, grow up.

My “mistake” in all of this is, well, that I have not told The Bartender that we’re through. Maybe his ex-girlfriend can call him and tell him.

Soon, I’ll have to move, because I will have officially dated (and been hated by) every man in Washington D.C. and the suburbs.

Dear Dating World and All Men Who I Will Never Date,

Please accept this as my (hopefully temporary) resignation from the dating world. I apologize for being unable to give notice, but my face is frozen and I am unable to work out the industry standard of two weeks.

This frozen face disease has really got me on edge. I witnessed via the mirror, what I look like while eating. It isn’t pretty – think 10 month old meets Corky from Life Goes On. This rules out all dates with eating or drinking. My eye won’t stay closed either, so I have to wear an eye patch to keep it closed. Unless I could find a date with a pirate theme, I’m really out of luck. Also, on my dates, there is usually an event such as, date farts and blames it on someone else, which require from me, some sort of expression of disgust. I have tested out what sort of expressions I could muster, and they look more inquisitive than appropriate for the scene that is destined to take place. I just don’t think a half smile or single raised eyebrow will serve me well for dating.

After the above consideration, I have realized this is not a huge loss as I am not a good dater anyway. This blog serves as evidence that I clearly have no idea what I’m doing. I know that there are so many wonderful dates that I will never get a chance to experience and subsequently write about – running from potential date rape, having drugs slipped into my drink, possibly being stabbed, killed, cloned, kidnapped or stranded in a ghetto. I feel that I can take my chances on bailing out now.

I will forever be in your gratitude for the experience that you have allowed me dating here. I feel honored to know what it is like to have a date stand me up, stare at me awkwardly without speaking, pack up their food in a doggie bag and run back to the restaurant to obtain that doggie bag, start a political fight with other patrons in a restaurant where we are dining, lie incessantly, turn into an octopus with no warning, steal my Vicodin, talk only about strippers and lap dances, get BBQ sauce smeared all over their face, and actually take money from me that clearly amounts to more than half the bill on a first date. I also feel somewhat selfish for hogging these fine quality men and experiences to myself, so maybe it’s good that my face is frozen. Please – hire some other women and allow them to also learn what I have.

If you need to contact me, I will be residing somewhere between the neighborhoods of La-La Land and Celibacy, balancing several medications, waiting on blood test results, scheduling visits with a neurologist and in general, fine-tuning other skills.

Love and Half-Kisses,
Velvet in Dupont

P.S. When you lose your sense of humor, you may as well be dead.

Only a matter of time. You just cannot be as mean as I am to people and not have some sort of repercussion.

The strep throat was moving along quite nicely. I know that I did get some sort of little cold on top of it all so I was battling the sore throat thing and the chest congestion and the head cold and the fever. Whatever. Give me my bed, a t.v., and my computer, and I can do it. Yesterday I was out of bed and full of beans. Sort of. I made it to Baltimore for a meeting. Thought I was well on the road to recovery. And then, this happens.

I wake up and half my face is frozen. I can’t close my left eye and the left side of my mouth is, well, dead. I’m freaking out. I call the doctor and they were like, “You better come in right away.” So I did. Let’s switch to conversation mode now.

Dr Hot-but-gay: “You have Bell’s Palsy.”
Velvet: (Swearing I Heard Pot Belly.) “Uh, what?”
Dr. HBG: “It’s not bad – it’s going to go away. 98% of all cases disappear. You seem to not have it completely, so we’ll put you on steroids and an anti-viral medicine and go from there.”
Velvet: “Great, but I’m still on antibiotics. Can I take all that together?”
Dr. HBG: “Yes, finish the antibiotics. This is like a virus, and it’s causes are unknown, but stems from a virus that will remind you of having the chicken pox again.”
Velvet: (getting ready to confess Velvet family secret.) “Uh, I never had the pox.”
Dr. HBG (unfazed) “Ok, well, it’s sort of like that. Now, let’s talk about causes. One would be Lyme disease. Two would be HIV.”
Velvet: “Holy shit.”
Dr. HBG: Uh, ok, is there something to worry about?”
Velvet: “Isn’t there always? Anyway, I definitely don’t have Lyme disease, so, by process of elimination I have HIV?”
Dr. HBG: “We should test you. This test is pretty accurate with about a 4 week window. We’ll also send out a more rapid test that basically has zero window.”
Velvet: “Great.”

So, I’m in the waiting room sweating. What if I have HIV? Who would I make my first call to? Who would be the lucky person on the receiving end of “You know how I’ve been so bad all these years???” Well, there you go. I called Holly.

Holly: “Velvet, if I don’t have HIV, then you definitely don’t have it.”
Velvet: “It really doesn’t work that way.”
Holly: “Look, I’m just saying, I don’t know why he told you that – I can’t find any evidence of this online.”
Velvet: “Well they said 15 minutes. I’m sweating over here.”
Holly: “It’s ok. You are going to be fine.

At that point the Lab Tech came in and said the words those of us who live oh so recklessly are ecstatic to hear: “Your test is negative. Definitely negative.”

So I’m waltzing over to CVS in a daze, playing with my face, trying to contort it into some of the expressions you see on the homeless people, and my phone rings. I don’t recognize the number, but I pick it up. Back to convo-mode.

Girl: “Hi, this is Tanya and I found your number in my boyfriend’s phone.”

Ding Ding Ding Ding Ding. What do we have here? I have NEVER received a call like this, although I have heard of them being made.

Velvet: “Uh, what is your boyfriend’s name?”
Tanya: “Mike.”
Velvet: “Okaaaaaay….”
I’m racking my brain, but in all my dating, I don’t know of a Mike. I mean, not a relevant one who would have my number in his phone.
Tanya: “Maybe he dialed a wrong number. You’re not part of a motorcycle group, are you?”
Velvet: “Well, this is interesting, I did just get my license. But no, I don’t know anyone named Mike. What’s his last name?”
Tanya: “Jones.”
Velvet: “What?”
Tanya: (laughing) “Well, he’s not THE Mike Jones.”
(I don’t even know who the REAL MIKE JONES is to whom she is referring.)
Tanya: “Well, I’m sorry I bothered you. Maybe he called a wrong number.”
Velvet: “Look, I appreciate what you are doing, and I would probably do the same thing if I was trying to catch someone in a big fat lie.” (No I wouldn’t. Who am I kidding? I could not care less.)
Tanya: “Thank you for understanding.”
Velvet: “Good luck.”

How odd was that? She also gave me his phone number and I don’t have a number like that in my phone. Has my dating finally come full circle and someone’s girlfriend is now after me? Okay, but I can’t fight with the left side of my face though!!