Words….Witticisms…Whimsy…Whatever!

Archive for the ‘Just W’ Category

Friday Night Bliss

 

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

That is the sound of me, sitting on the couch. Ruby Dogwonkafonka is at the other end of the couch. We just ate a delicious cupcake (ok, I ate it, she licked the plate). “Catch Me If You Can” is starting on TBS. I have had my jammies on since 6 pm. Snuggled up with the laptop. It is Friday night. And this is perfect.

There was a time when I would have been mortified by this scenario. Home, alone, on a Friday night??? What’s wrong with me??? Lately, though, Friday evenings have become a cherished opportunity for ME time. I can work a little later (which I like – tonight I was in my office till almost 7) and still have plenty of time to make dinner (ha ha), relax, watch a movie, read, blog, whatever I want, without the tick tock of the clock hanging over my head on a “school night” when I feel pressure to go to bed at a semi-reasonable time. (Run-on sentence much, Wonkafonka?) (Yeah, I just made “run-on sentence” into a verb. Cuz I’m talented like that. And I now think I have more parentheticals in this post than, um…..non-parentheticals?)

I originally had plans tonight with Sunshine and Mourtney, but one of them is under the weather so we rescheduled. And even though I was disappointed, not having seen their lovely faces in far too long other than at the gym, part of me was secretly delighted. It has been seven weeks since I spent Friday night on the couch by myself, and I was starting to get twitchy. Everything I’ve been doing has been fun and wonderful and something I wanted to do, but I didn’t realize how much I’d come to depend on having Friday nights to recharge and just chill the eff out.

My favorite Friday-night guilty pleasure is “Say Yes to the Dress”. If you’re not familiar with it, it’s a TLC show about women shopping for their wedding dress. The original is at an expensive boutique in NYC, the spin-off at an expensive boutique in Atlanta. And tonight’s spin-off of the spin-off, shopping for bridesmaid dresses at the Atlanta store.  It’s ridiculous how much I love this show. I think I like it because it makes me feel sane; the kinds of crazy this show exposes are plentiful. Here’s a sampling from tonight. A bride was having her seven-year-old sister as her maid of honor, and another sister, age 25, as a bridesmaid. The 25-year-old was being a total wench because she wanted to wear a strapless dress, even though, hi, a 7-year-old doesn’t have anything to hold up a freakin’ strapless dress. Another bride had eight million bridesmaids who had all agreed they wanted a dress <$200. The bride identified the dress she loved, and the maids pitched a fit because it was SIX DOLLARS over budget.  Six. Dollars. Maybe two coffees at Starbucks. And for that, you’re going to be pissy to someone you’re close enough to that you agreed to stand up in her wedding, and you’re going to throw this tantrum in front of a TV camera no less? Yeah, you make me feel pretty balanced. 🙂  I never want to admit that I watch it (until now, apparently) but inevitably something so cuckoo happens that I can’t keep it to myself and I have to text Mourtney to rant about it. Which makes her question why I don’t change the channel. But it’s Train Wreck Syndrome – can’t look away!

Fortunately, about as many episodes as they air in one sitting is about as much brainless time that I need before I can move onto something more engaged, like blogging. Or sleeping.   Which I will be doing shortly.

 

Category:

Humor, Just W, Pets

Tagged with:

W & Mourtney’s Online Dating Tips

For anyone who hasn’t been paying attention thus far, I am an Online Dating Survivor…

A while back, Mourtney (another ODS) & I read an article somewhere about tips for online dating profiles. It was lame, so we came up with our own, with some general dos and don’ts thrown in as a bonus. All of this is based on our actual experiences.

  1. Don’t use a picture taken of yourself in the mirror with a cell phone. This says “I have no friends and have never had my photo taken on a trip, at a wedding, out with friends, at a sporting event…I AM A LOSER.”
  2. Don’t include naked photos and/or photos of your tattoos. Tacky. Tacky, tacky, tacky. ‘Nuf said.
  3. Don’t wear a neckerchief in your picture.
  4. Shave. Your freakin’. Pornstache. I mean it.
  5. Don’t use photos that are out of focus, where you are too far away for us to tell anything other than that you are humanoid, or where you look like a serial killer. Have you considered using one where you’re actually smiling?
  6. While we’re on this subject, we don’t really need to see pics of your motorcycle, truck, boat, car, or other motor vehicles to decide if you’re datable. Your fascination with those objects, however, might deem you undatable.
  7. Use spell check. Girls are attracted to brains as well as brawn so…show us you have some. We make mistakes, too, but your profile is a fairly static document; sell yourself! Also, it’s hard to take your profile seriously when you describe yourself as an intellectual, yet misspell “intellectual”.
  8. In your profile and/or introductory email, please use complete sentences. Punctuation is your friend. Really? I need to explain this? Refer to #7.
  9. Always include a photo with your profile. Don’t give some BS about how you don’t want a girl who is vain. Show you have the balls to look at yourself in the mirror every morning by posting a pic otherwise we will assume the worst and hit delete before even reading what is surely an Oscar-winning email. And while we appreciate not judging a book by its cover, let’s be real – physical attraction is an important component of dating.
  10. Do not include comments about how you don’t want baggage or drama. DUH. No one does. Also, please don’t confuse life experience with baggage.
  11. Definitely do not include comments about how the girl must be “foxy” or worse – a weight range. How demoralizing and downright icky. If you feel these things, fine, but don’t commit to paper. Use your inside voice here – and by that I mean keep it inside your head.
  12. Try to show an interest in something other than hunting, fishing, camping, golf, “mudding” (the absolute worst!), etc. It is fine if these are your interests but don’t expect us to want to do these things with you. Remember you are looking for a girlfriend, not a buddy. I assume you would like your girlfriend to be even remotely feminine? Then chew dip on your four-wheeler with your dudes, not your girl.
  13. Walk the line when it comes to sensitivity. Number 12 cuts both ways. We are looking for a MAN, not someone to cry at sad movies with and bond over shopping and painting our nails.
  14. Don’t tell a woman you haven’t met yet that you have four cats.
  15. DO tell your date prior to dinner what your actual gender is. (I feel compelled to share that this isn’t my story; someone relayed it to me on a date. His prior date had “man hands”.)
  16. Don’t spell my name wrong. Ever. (Also, my name is not hun, sweetheart, or princess.)
  17. Don’t send a LinkedIn request to someone you had a one-night stand with several months ago.
  18. Do have some content on your profile. If you can’t be bothered to tell me anything about you, why should I bother to find out more?
  19. Do not say “tell you later” to fundamental profile questions such as whether or not you have kids or if you smoke.
  20. Don’t rant on your profile. We’ve all had bad experiences; no need to detail them here. Again, you’re selling yourself! Be positive! Fake it if you have to.

This public service announcement has been brought to you by Women for a Better Online Dating experience. You can learn more about W-BOD at http://www.nodouchebags.com. We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.

Category:

Humor, Just W, Online dating, Relationships

Tagged with:

Save for future reference

That was the subject line of an email I got last week from a friend. The message is below. My friend struggles with bipolar disorder. It’s so hard to watch, because sometimes she is in such despair, and there is nothing I can do to help make it better, make her safer, make it go away. And it’s so unfair that anybody has to suffer like she does, and suffer alone. There is still such a stigma with mental illness, as if you should just be able to shake it off or get over it already. And we don’t talk about it enough. I’m forever encouraging my friend to share her stories more, to educate the people around her, both for the good of the world, and to broaden her support base. Of course, it’s very easy for me to say; I’m not the one having to expose myself.

She sent this message asking me to save it for sometime in the future when she needs to see it again. When things are dark, and hopefully this will help, at least a little. I have encouraged her to start her own blog, anonymously if that’s more comfortable, because she has good stuff to say. In the meantime, I offered mine, so she could feel protected but still share.  Because I think it’s important.

If you think you recognize my friend, maybe you do. Maybe someone around you has similar struggles. But, and perhaps this goes without saying, please don’t say anything to her, based on this post. Cuz, you know, that’s just awkward.

So here’s her message, which I’m saving for later.

__________________________________________________

Almost everything feels good. Or well. Emotionally well, physically well, and maybe even spiritually well, although I don’t favor that word because I think it means something different to everybody.

But the point is, suicide is the furthest thing from my mind right now. And how does that happen?! Can you imagine if I could figure that one out? Why one day (or for several weeks at a time, more accurately) I can think about nothing aside from slicing through my wrists with any available sharp object, and another day, I have future plans and lists of things I want to accomplish in this life? It is the most fucked up thing I’ve ever dealt with or come across in my life that I’ve personally experienced; a hell that I wouldn’t wish on anyone. Sometimes, though, when it’s dark in my head, I wish that hell on EVERYONE because I allow myself to wallow in my pity and want it to not be me. I want people to understand, and sometimes it feels like that could only happen if they had my experience.

It is not that way, today, though. Shorts, tank top, sun, 80 degrees, breeze. But it’s not just the weather. No. There is nothing that can touch my mood today. I don’t even consider whether or not I want to live; I just AM living. And it’s great. I accidentally slipped this morning and allowed myself to think, ‘I am happy.’ It’s like if I allow that, then the darkness that is the suicidal desire will remember that it has forgotten about me, and come looking.

I want to tell that profoundly depressed and suicidal me that there ARE times like these, and thus far, these times have ALWAYS cycled back around. When I’m in that bad place, it never seems like it will ever end, and yet it always does. I can never make myself believe that it will end. I want to die more than anything in the world, and that would be such a waste. My kids need me. My friends and family need and love me, and my death would be such a tragic loss.

I don’t even have advice to those who are unlucky enough to have to support me in this. Personally, I wouldn’t know what to say to me when I’m way out there. I just know that I have to figure out a way to not kill myself when the need arises. This life has too much potential.

Category:

Friendship, Just W

Tagged with:

She was the best dog in the whole world.

I know. Everyone probably thinks that about his or her dog. But mine really was. And if you ever spent any time with her, she might have convinced you.

I have always loved dogs. And I think they like me too – most of them, anyway. When I was growing up we had an Irish Setter, Kelly.  She adored my father, knew my mother was the one who really took care of her, and seemed ok with my sister and me. We got her when I was four, and she died when I was 17, doing a nice job filling the house with dog the entire time we were growing up.

College and the years immediately after weren’t the time to have a dog. Too transient. Apartment living and frequent moving. But when I returned to my hometown to settle down, I was on the prowl for a dog. A dog, not a puppy. I had moved in with my mom, and started a new job, and training a puppy wasn’t in the master plan. Thus began Wendy’s Dog Quest. I read the classified ads. Visited the animal shelters. I wasn’t in a hurry. I wanted to find my dog, who I knew was out there.

One day in December 1996, I picked up Peddler’s Post.

“Collie – female, 2 years old, spayed. 260.555.1212”

That was it, that was all it said. But I swear, when I read that ad, I thought to myself “this is it, that’s my dog”. Two years old was perfect. I’ve always liked collies. Good size, nice & fluffy. Who wouldn’t want someone like Lassie around to save the day?  I called the number and spoke to the man (Cleo) who was running the ad. He wasn’t around much to take care of her. He wanted to find a better situation for her.

My dad and boyfriend (now ex-husband) and I drove out to the town where he lived to check things out. The dog that greeted us as we got out of the car was nice enough, but where was the collie? This dog looked like maybe someone in her family tree lived next door to a collie at one point, but calling her a collie was a stretch. But apparently this was the dog we had come to meet: Sylvia. She lived outdoors; I wanted an inside dog. Hmm…wonder how that would fly. She was filthy. A little…not skittish, exactly. Uncertain, maybe. Wary. We gave her a dog biscuit and she took it, but she simply held it in her mouth and kept an eye on things. Was this my dog? “She has friendly eyes,” my dad said.

Cleo told me I could take her, and if it didn’t work out I could bring her back. He’d rather keep looking for the right home for her. Seemed pretty risk free. What the hell, let’s give it a try. I was about to leave town for the holidays, so I arranged to come get her when I returned on New Year’s Eve.

Cleo cried when I came to take her away. I felt horrible. But the truth was, he was saving her life. (We’ll get to that.) And he gave me a bag of kibble. Told me she didn’t really like it, but that what she did like was a little hamburger fried up with some garlic salt. Well sure! No wonder she wasn’t eating the kibble – the dog’s not stupid! (A statement repeated often over the next 11+ years.)

I took her home to Mom’s, but she was a mess. Beyond dirty. Incredibly thick coat of fur since she’d been living outside. And I had no idea what she would do when I took her in the house. So for the first couple of nights we confined her to the garage or the kitchen, until I could get her groomed, and determine if she was housebroken. Mom was a total sport. She never said a word about this previously outdoor dog moving into her house. And you know what? She didn’t have to worry about a thing. We used to joke that when Sylvia came into the house she checked it out and thought to herself, “Heat? Carpet? Hey, I’m doing whatever it takes to keep this gig going.”  And in the blink of an eye, she became an indoor dog. The end.

Some friends came over a day or two later for a game day, and were among the first to fall under Sylvia’s charms. They didn’t object to the shocking pink lipstick in her fur (still hadn’t been to the groomer). And Miss Sylvia Dog was making herself right at home. We loaded our plates with pizza and returned to the living room. A few minutes later, Sylvia strutted in with a slice of pizza dangling from her teeth. You could almost hear her saying, “Hey guys! I’m having some too!” I don’t actually know how she got it since she wasn’t the tallest of dogs, but that was the first and last time she ever took food that wasn’t hers. She didn’t need to be told things twice; smart as a whip, she learned lessons the first time.

A trip to the groomer transformed her. My friend Joe B., who was one of the only people to see her in the “before” state, commented that he never knew a bath could make such a difference. She was beautiful. And soft as all get-out.

About that Cleo saving Sylvia’s life by finding a new home for her thing. I was devastated to discover from the vet that Sylvia had heartworm. This little creature had already stolen my heart and she was going to die. I was relieved to learn that it’s not fatal, but the treatment is difficult, similar to doggie chemo.  Our first three months together were stressful, and Sylvia was terrified of the vet her entire life. But other than scary vet visits, what followed were 11+ years of love and happiness.

Syl in her chair.

Syl-beast was crafty, wily, and stubborn. She was gun-shy, which translated to fear of any loud bang (like, say, a car door slamming), having had firecrackers thrown at her as a puppy (according to Cleo). (Two parentheticals in one sentence. Sometimes I amaze even myself.) She had adorably expressive eyebrows. She was an excellent judge of character. She was skittish about having her tail touched, because it had been broken. She didn’t stick her head out the car window, but liked to just rest the tip of her nose at the edge of the glass. Take in more smells, maybe? She was a finicky eater, and sometimes refused to eat until you sat on the floor and fed her by hand. She peed like a boy dog, lifting her leg to mark trees. She loved to play “chase”, and had awesome fake-out moves. She left dog fur tumbleweeds all over the wood floors. She loved her people, including her extended family of dog-sitting friends. She loved water, not in a jump in and swim way, but in a wade in up to her belly way. She would chomp her teeth in your face in the weirdest, non-aggressive, just making noise kind of way. She loved getting into teeny, tiny spaces, like under or behind a piece of furniture. She loved ice cream. She wouldn’t eat pretzels.  During thunderstorms, she tried to sleep on my head.

And she was soft. The softest dog ever. Seriously. People told me that All The Time. A stranger asked one day if she could pet her, then immediately turned to her husband and said, “You have to pet this dog, I can’t believe how soft she is.”

Later in life Sylvia would come to work with me on a fairly regular basis, and she worked her magic there, too. The landlord turned a blind eye to my flagrant lease violation. Jerry the Mailman would get down on the floor to play and hug when she was in the office. Even Mark the FedEx Guy, who was afraid of dogs, would inquire about Sylvia’s welfare. Sales reps from vendors asked about her if she wasn’t present the day they came to call.

And though she lived a long, happy, mostly healthy life, the day came when we lost her: March 25, 2008. It was awful and one of the worst days ever, and I spent two years grieving heavily, but we’re not going to talk about that. Because today is a celebration of Syl-beast. I declared that for all time March 25 shall be Sylvia Day, when we remember the sweet, funny dog who wrapped all who met her around her paw. I was blown away by the number of kind, loving emails and cards I received from friends and family when she died. I reread them all this week, and selected two of my favorite comments to share.

“She was such a sweet dog and a great friend. I’ll miss her too.”

“We all miss her and know if there is a doggie heaven (where the streets are paved with steak and small animals run in slow motion), she’s there.”

I also found a thank you from Animal Care and Control. I had forgotten this, but apparently I donated all her toys that were in good condition. As fate would have it, I received a donation request in the mail last week from Animal Care & Control, the shelter where I found Ruby, my current loving companion and best dog in the world. It seemed appropriate to send them a gift in honor of the Sylvie Girl, so I did.

Happy Sylvia Day. Go hug your fur babies.

Category:

Just W, Pets

Tagged with:

Online Dating Preamble

Ok, so preamble suggests this would have come first. Oops, my bad.

After some of the reactions to last weekend’s post, I feel like I need to back up and defend online dating as not being only for suckers (and freaks and douchebags). I truly believe it’s a legitimate vehicle to meet people. I do know people who have met if not their soul mates online, some good, worthwhile, highly datable people that they’ve had significant relationships with. It’s just so much more concentrated than the rest of the world that you encounter a denser pool of freaks. Pun intended with “denser”. 🙂

Dating is a total crapshoot, no matter the method. Most of us spend a lot of time looking for the right partner, online, offline, whatever. Online dating just magnifies it all, good, bad, and crazy. Did I get approached by a lot of nut jobs? Yes. Did I, through the very act of creating profiles, put myself in a position to get approached by a lot of nut jobs? Yes.

In some ways, online dating simplifies everything, and takes away some of that possible sting of rejection, in that we’re all there for the same reason: to meet someone. Theoretically, that should make it easier to strike up a conversation with someone you might be interested in. In a bar, I might be looking to meet someone, but I might be playing wingman for my girlfriend, or I might be there to listen to the band, or I might just be there to have a drink. I might be there for a ton of reasons. Dating website = clear cut. And theoretically you can cut through all the bullshit: I’m looking for a long-term relationship. I’m looking for something casual. I’m creepy and I just want sex.  If you have rigid rules, you can eliminate everyone who smokes, or has blue eyes, or doesn’t want kids.

The problem is people think it’s a silver bullet. There is no secret stable filled with mythical creatures such as unicorns and single, age-appropriate men who are charming and funny and intelligent and have good grammar and are also looking for us. It’s just like the rest of the world, with a bajillion people who are all-wrong for you or might make good friends, and maybe, hopefully, one who you dig and who digs you back. Just like the real world, but within the confines of a dating microcosm. EVERYTHING is magnified, hence the feeling that it’s overrun with crazies.  It’s like setting yourself up on blind dates: chances are, it’s just going to be a good story for your friends, but you never know. 

Online dating does require a lot of time and attention if you’re really in the game. It’s exhausting, which is one reason I took a break. You definitely have to have the right attitude about it: it’s for fun, one vehicle among many in the world, and definitely not magical. 

Not to worry, I’m going to keep on sharing the funny stuff.  But I wanted to make it clear that I think online dating is totally legitimate, safe (if you use common sense), and possibly something I’ll return to someday.  And then will immediately question why. I kid! If you’re participating in the online scene right now, good on ya; you have my empathy. 

We now return you to your regularly scheduled crazy.

Category:

Just W, Online dating, Relationships

Tagged with:

The end of an era….or maybe just intermission…

Recently I hid my last remaining “active” online dating profile, marking the end of not quite three years of what can only be described as hilarity (among other things). In fact, there was so much material gathered that I can’t possibly contain it to one post. Additional stories await you.  [Note: I am completely inept, because I continue to get notifications from that last site. I can NOT figure out how to disable/hide/delete my account. WTF?]

I dabbled with four different sites, two free (Plenty of Fish, OKCupid), two pay (Match, Zoosk – which is quasi free). Plenty of Fish was first, so I began referring to all “suitors” as fish. (You’ll see.) I realized the time had come to take a break because I had developed a very bad attitude about the whole thing. I was most successful when I viewed it as a lark. Keep in mind, “success” can only be defined here as loading up on lots and lots and lots (and lots and lots and lots) of ridiculous, crazy, unbelievable, stories for my friends. One pal I think is still mad at me for no longer having absurd adventures to share over lunches. Another told me no one will believe my stories were true. This I promise you: I’m not making any of this up. Everything in this and any future posts happened to me or someone I know. Mostly me. Unless it makes me sound bad. And every grammatically incorrect or incoherent message is verbatim. Believe me, it hurts me more than it hurts you.

Three years, four websites, 192 million emails received, 92 million emails responded to, 86 million emails of my own sent, eleventeen bajillion first dates, and maybe 4 second dates. Two people I might sort of refer to as friends and/or be willing to have a conversation with today. (No offense, fish who might be reading this.) Mostly what I have is a collection of people whose real names I can’t even remember. Fortunately, we have nicknames! When you’re playing the game, you interact with a lot of people, so you have to give them monikers to help keep them straight. Nicknames including, but not limited to:

  •  Fish Tacos
  •  Tad (whose real name I could never remember, and I actually called him this to his face)
  •  Nickelodeon
  •  The Happy Camper (ooh, wait, I didn’t meet him online….)
  •  The Bad Speller
  •  Captain Pea Hater, Esquire
  •  Applebeef
  •  Johio
  •  Dave the Racist (The only person I’ve ever blocked on a dating site or Facebook.)

People had lots of opinions when I ventured into online dating; the most memorable advice I got was from a friend who urged me to “make him kill me in the parking lot”. Um….what now? He elaborated further: if a dude ended up being crazy, do not get in a car and think I could ride around and talk said crazy dude out of harming me – make him kill me right there, in the parking lot. I got it. I prefer not to be murdered, but so noted. I did enjoy this follow up tidbit: leave lots of DNA evidence. Touch things. Maybe lick them. (Don’t be perverted, I’m talking about things like tables in restaurants and windows of cars.) Of course, this did cross my mind when I was on a date with a fish who kept making jokes about where he would hide my body. Cuz that’s funny to joke about with a woman you just met online. He was a real catch, anyway; he said awesome things like, “That’s a big word for a girl to use.”  Go fish.

You would think common sense would take a front seat in this crazy online scene, that perhaps men would go out of their way to make women feel safe and comfortable, given the sometimes scary world we live in. Thus I was astonished to encounter not just one, but two separate fellas who got angry with me because I wouldn’t go to their respective homes for a first meeting. They each assured me they were completely trustworthy. Um. Pass.

Of course, a certain amount of trust and honesty has to play into this. You can be anyone you want to be on the internet, but if the intention is truly to develop a relationship, it’s gotta be real at some point. Hence, I will never understand why people lie in their profiles. The most pervasive distortion of the truth that I found among men’s profiles? Their freakin’ height. As if I won’t notice that I’m actually taller than you are when I meet you? I don’t care how tall you are nearly as much as I care that you’re either lying or delusional. For future reference, any man under 6’ tall is actually 2” shorter than he says he is. At least 2”.

And then there’s the flip side of honesty: Over sharing. Now, I get it, when IS the right time to tell someone you have a foot fetish? Maybe putting it in your profile is appropriate, if you include other worthwhile information about yourself. But I guarantee you, this is not a strong opening email:

“hi, you’re very hot!
do you like your feet massaged and kissed? what size are your feet?
i have a foot fetish. i hope thats ok. Lol”

(LOL. LOL seems to be the thing guys say in an email to make whatever jackass thing they just said, what….a joke in case it’s inappropriate or stupid? If you feel the need to do that, you probably shouldn’t have said it.)

This brings us to a story about my favorite over-sharer, a guy named Jarrod from South Bend. (Amazingly, I remember his actual name, as well as several other players in this story.) We had been emailing back and forth a little, talking about benign topics like music and movies and books. He was engaging and articulate, but something was a little curious. He kept making reference to his “situation” and his “current circumstances”.  Finally I asked what exactly that meant. I got back a very long missive with many details about the prior two years of his life, surrounding a chick he’d met on MySpace named Tonya, a guy she met named Thomas, time spent crashing on his ex-wife Kim’s couch, and on and on, culminating with the revelation that his “current circumstances” were that he was living in a homeless shelter.  A HOMELESS SHELTER. A. Homeless. Shelter. Now, I have to give the guy snaps for having the balls to pursue women given his “situation”. But dude. Perhaps there are more pressing matters to tend to than dating. Bye-bye, Jarrod.

All right, this is starting to feel like The Modern Girl’s Guide to Internet Dating, so we should get into the really crazy. I dug through emails I kept to and from my girlies. Are you ready? Remember, it’s all true.

File under Boys Are Stupid
Email from me to H about a fish I’d been texting with and was considering meeting:
“Seriously…is it too much to ask to meet someone who is sort of normal and sort of attractive and has some personality? Oh yeah, and would also maybe take me to dinner before sending me pictures of his dick? AKA Monday. “

I mean – what? Who thinks it’s a good idea to do that? Send a picture of THAT before we’ve even met? Maybe he should’ve said “LOL” in that message.

File under You Can’t Make This Shit Up
Message from me to H: “I don’t know what on earth caused me to write him back – I think because I am fascinated by glass blowing [which he had listed as his occupation]. Plus, he openly says he does drugs – who says that? So I wrote back and asked him to tell me more about the glass blowing. Here’s his response:”

“I make pipes and sex toys. Please dont judge. It pays well.”

Never Gonna Happen:
“I went to Meijer earlier and ran into a guy I went out with one time last summer. He might be the world’s worst kisser. Of course I crossed paths with him 4 or 5 times while I was in the store. He suggested I call him sometime. Um, yeah. The reason I still have his number in my phone is so I know not to answer if HE ever calls ME.”

Now I’ve Heard Everything

“I’m debbie my S.O. are looking for a friend! someone to fill our lives with. please read the profile. and you like what you read then send a message!if ther are no hang ups about it. let us know if you like to chat. and by your pic i see you have a dog like we do a shellty”

Now I’ve Really Heard Everything
“Dude emailed me on OKCupid. Says he has aspergers, has never had a date, and that there is a form of therapy that would let me get paid for him to feel me up.”
I wish I could find the picture this was in response to
Message from a A-Yo:  “Sha. Zam. Wish I was single. Dude has some nice taste in shoes tho. And, uh, bedding.”
No need to see the actual picture
Um, hi, the KISS tribute band called, they want their singer back.
An example of a thoroughly typical introductory email

“whats up hun how r u today”

Hun, Princess, Dear – these are not appropriate ways to address a woman you have never met and are attempting to woo. Stop it.
The Creepiest Opening Email Ever
I got an email from someone I hadn’t had any communication with previously – no winking, messaging, IMing, etc – first contact:

“Hi,
Were you are at Baan Thai on Friday :)?”

Why yes….I had been at Baan Thai on Friday. I had NEVER interacted with this fish before. How the hell did he know who I was? Gah! Creeper!!! And after I told him yes and asked how/why/what the hell, he said he’d recognized me, and that was the end – never heard from him again – wha???

Honorable Mention, Most Persistent and/or Clueless
Dear Brian6345,
You have now emailed me on two, possibly three or four, different dating websites. Multiple times on most of them. Sometimes twice within the same day. I have never responded, not once. I give you snaps for persistence, but sometimes I question whether you realize you’ve emailed me so many times before.
Please stop or I will be forced to actually send you this. (It bothers me that I split my infinitive there, but seeing as you don’t use punctuation, I doubt you’ll notice.)
Always read the profile closely before responding
I had been emailing with a fish, casually, but he seemed ok. I was in one of my feisty phases, so I asked him if he was a douchebag (I mean, why waste my time?), after which he just stopped writing back. Whatever. So a little over a month later, I got another message from him. I responded, then went back to his profile to refresh my memory.  OMG. It said something that definitely hadn’t been there before. Kind of wish I’d seen it before I wrote him back:

“I have an epic girlfriend, ChestieLaRoux, with whom I am madly in love. She is teaching me the ways of polyamory. She is, in everyway, my match.”

The Wink Phenomenon
On most (maybe all) sites you can “wink” at someone. It’s a semi-lame way to let someone know you’re interested, without putting out too much (or any) effort. Of course, if the person responds by winking, then what? At some point someone has to strike up an actual conversation. Occasionally someone would wink who maybe had potential, and I would respond with a friendly email. I was amazed how many times someone would wink at me and then not respond to my message. After a while, I got a little pissy about it, causing me to draft this message which I never sent to anyone other than Mourtney, my most faithful partner in online dating crime:

Dear Douchebags,
When you wink at me and I follow up by sending you an email, why the fuck don’t you respond? I don’t even really care because I’m sure you’re a douchebag anyway (this just confirms it), but I truly don’t understand. Couldn’t you at least send a quick note saying, “Now that I see you’re intelligent and witty, I can tell you’re way out of my league”?
Must Love….Goats???
Excerpt from a guy I emailed with briefly on Match…..he was articulate, used punctuation, all kinds of good stuff. But um….well, see for yourself. Here’s an excerpt from one of our final messages.

“…on top of THAT, my renter brought her goat over and made the mistake of letting her in the house, now she only wants to be there…not smart on my part but i’m a sucker for animals!!”

I love animals, too. But goat? In house? Dude.
There’s more. Believe me, plenty more. But I’m tired, so let’s take a break for now. 🙂
ps….oh holy crap….spell-check is having a field day with all the horrific fish emails pasted above….

pps….Apparently I say “douchebag” a lot.  Pretty sure I didn’t say it at all before online dating.

Category:

Humor, Just W, Online dating, Relationships

Tagged with:

Hold, please……

Omigod, I miss you! I have been too used up to get thoughts out of my fingertips in a coherent fashion and I need to rectify that. In the interim, I’m going to recycle, with apologies to those who have read this previously. Here’s a story that absolutely would have been on the blog had it existed when it happened. It’s an email I sent last summer at 3:27 a.m. to a select group of friends and family, then posted on Facebook later in the day. The subject line was “So much for sleeping…”

———————————————

Oh. My. God.

So much for sleeping.

I woke up….not quite an hour ago. I heard a noise in my window, like a bug bouncing off the screen, but enough to wake me up. It seemed odd, and Ruby was awake, so I petted her for a few minutes, then settled in to go back to sleep. For some reason, my eyes were open, and I saw the BAT fly through. The bat that had been trying to get out the window, apparently.

Oh. My. God.

I behaved like any normal person would. I pulled up all the covers and wondered if it was possible to ignore it until it went away.

It was not.

I could tell it was flying around in the room outside mine. Every few minutes, it would fly into my room and I would react like a sane person in control of the situation. I yelled and flailed and pulled the covers over my head. I also freaked the hell out of my dog. All bark, indeed.

After a while, I decided I had to get DOWNSTAIRS. I have no idea why. It just seemed like a good idea to regroup, because I was sweating (shocking, I know) and shaking like a leaf and could not think. (I also couldn’t remember if light would attract or repel a bat, and I wanted to look it up on the internet, and I couldn’t do that from my bed, apparently, because I only had my phone and iPad available. Oh wait….) And in my head, for some reason, the bat would stay upstairs until I figured out how to deal with it.

I decided I needed protective gear. At this point, I had on just a tank top. Not having on pants was a great concern to me. My yoga pants were on the floor next to the bed, but I couldn’t reach them without getting OUT of the bed; apparently being IN the bed was some kind of safe zone (although no one told this to the bat, who flew in from time to time). I entertained the idea of pulling the king-size down comforter off the bed for said protective gear. Because that would allow me to run easily, right? OMG. Fortunately I remembered I had a small throw at the foot of the bed. Protective gear. I grabbed my phone, put the “protective gear” over my head, yelled at Ruby to go downstairs (she did) and ran. We immediately ran into the back yard.

Upon reentering the house and determining the downstairs still to be bat-free, Ruby camped out on the couch and I hid in the bathroom for a while. I left the light on in the bathroom, and went out to the living room to join the dog and see what was going on on Facebook. (I turned on the light in the living room at some point.)

For those playing along at home, the answer is ATTRACT. Light will ATTRACT a bat. (Which doesn’t make sense, because they’re fucking NOCTURNAL and come out when it’s dark.) I know this, because he decided to join us in the living room, the sneaky bastard. So not fair to invade my safe zone. I flailed and yelled. Hoping none of my neighbors heard the crazy yelling tonight. OMG. He flew away for a while. Lather, rinse, repeat. He came back at least twice. And I’m pretty sure he got bigger every time.

Then it occurred to me, perhaps if the light attracted him, and the lamp is next to the door, I could have the door open and he could just show himself out. With my protective gear on, I opened the front door and the screen door. Then I moved back to Ruby, who had retreated to the far end of the couch.

Nothing happened.

No bat.

Grr.

Moths, though, felt free to come IN.

Closed the front door, went back to checking Facebook. Cute pics, Becca.

Notice the bat has reentered the living room. In amongst my normal screaming and flailing (now holding my iPad as a weapon, because I have shed my protective gear due to excessive sweating and the fact that wearing a blanket over my head now seems ridiculous) I try to explain the plan to the bat.

He retreats.

Open the door.

Retreat to couch with Ruby.

Bat enters the room, and thankfully, EXITS THE HOUSE.

Slam door.

Sit on couch.

Shake.

A lot.

Curse all of you for being asleep.

Decide out of the goodness of my heart NOT to wake any of you (Dad), and to send you my long story instead.

Pretty sure I’m bat-free again, because during the entire time it’s taken me to type this, no one else has entered the room. Am I going to go upstairs and check? No. Am I going to sit upright on the couch and watch a movie (with the lights on) and hope I doze off? Sources say yes.

My crazy, mixed up verb tenses should indicate just how rattled I am. Gah.

Anyone wanna come over and drink?

———————————————

Postscript: I did, in fact, put on my pants before fleeing the house. Also, as I was writing this, a loud thunk on the front porch made me jump out of my skin just when I was finally settling down. Newspaper’s here. Gah.

Category:

Humor, Just W

Tagged with:

A love letter to my house

My house and I just celebrated two years together. The traditional and modern gifts for the 2nd anniversary are cotton and china, respectively, but we decided not to get each other anything. Instead I thought I’d write it a little blog post to tell it how much I love it. Him. Her. I’m not really sure. I think my house might be gender-neutral. Nope. I think maybe she’s female, now that I’m thinking about her. We’re close like sisters or best friends or an aunt/niece relationship. (OMG. I’m really weird, aren’t I? But I digress.)  Ok, we’ll call her “her”. We also call her “Wendy’s Fun House” on occasion.

Until moving into Wendy’s Fun House at age 38, I had never lived alone. Childhood, college, roommates, boyfriend/fiancé/husband. When my husband and I split, I moved in with my dad until I could get my feet under me. (For which I am eternally grateful.) My dad rocks and the first year or so (yes, I said “year”) was great. We generally get along really well, and he didn’t go all parental on me – no “When are you going to be home” or “Isn’t it a little late to be going out” or “That is what you’re eating for dinner?” And he made sure we always had grapes, because grapes are my one essential food.

Then the walls started closing in on me. I was still waiting for money from my divorce settlement that I needed for a down payment (not his fault). Dad & I had moved our office into his house, so the two of us were together 24/7. I was having chronic back pain due to the most uncomfortable little bed in the entire world. (No offense, Dad.) I was seriously starting to wig out.

Finally, finally the day came that all the pieces in my life fell into place and I was ready to start house hunting. My realtor Rena is also my aunt (and my good friend), so she understood the desperation of the situation, and promptly rounded up a batch of homes all in my target area on the south side. I had no idea what was on the market that I would be able to afford, and all my wish list items were negotiable; all I needed was four walls and a roof.  The very first house we looked at was a craftsman-style bungalow that was vacant and had been on the market for months. As we walked through it, I asked Rena to pretend like it was normal should I burst into tears. The relief I felt knowing there was just one affordable house that wasn’t a total crapsack overwhelmed me. There was nothing showy about her, and it’s not the most fashionable neighborhood, but it had all the minimum requirements and was in a solid block.

We looked at a bajillion other houses. Or maybe 10. Some that were very lovely. But at the end of the day we went back to look at the first one again, because I couldn’t get her out of my head.  Being vacant made it convenient to see. Minimum requirements? What was I thinking! She had the whole wish list: porch, wood-burning fireplace, a/c, fenced yard, garage (two stalls!), good space for my home office. Wood floors. Built ins. And the previous owners had nicely updated her: newer roof and furnace, rewired, updated kitchen, most windows replaced. A lot of the other houses I looked at were lovely, but none had all the things she had to offer, and most were significantly more expensive given their more desirable addresses. And after a few more visits, some negotiations, and a long closing process where I gave up both my ovaries because I don’t have a first-born to give to the bank (I kid), she was mine.

Home Sweet Home

 I was nervous. Maybe I had made a knee-jerk reaction and rushed into a decision in my panic to get out of my dad’s place. Maybe I had bitten off more than I could chew with a 91-year-old house. Maybe my neighborhood wasn’t safe. Maybe there was something wrong with the house – it had been for sale for so long – why didn’t anyone want it? Maybe I would hate living alone. Maybe weird noises would scare me. Maybe maybe maybe maybe maybe.

I moved in at the end of January 2010. Everything in the house was beige. Everything. Figuring it was easier to paint empty rooms, I enlisted the help of a tremendous friend and we painted the shit out of things prior to the move date. Yellow & purple kitchen. Soft green bedroom. Bluish gray living and dining room. Bye-bye beige (mostly). A whirlwind of moving and unpacking ensued. And suddenly, there I was, truly alone, my first night in my new house. I curled up in a little ball in bed whispering to myself, “This is mine. This is mine. This is mine.” I was so happy to have my gigantic, comfortable bed back. I woke up sideways across it. Smiling.

All those maybes – none of them came to fruition. I have loved living alone,

Our yard

especially with the addition of sweet Ruby Tuesday early that first summer. I have never been scared being alone in the house or startled by weird noises, not once (this does not include the bat episode – shut up). I have discovered I’ve slept with my doors unlocked, come home to find I left the back door open, and awoken to find I neglected to close my garage overnight. (Jesus. I sound like an idiot. I’m really a safety girl, I promise. Don’t tell my mom.) None of those user errors resulted in anything bad or scary. I adore my historic neighborhood. And the house. Oh, the house. I love her so much. The longer I’m here, the more I realize there was nothing knee-jerk in my decision to buy her. I don’t know why she was on the market for so long, but I can only surmise it was because she was waiting for me. We were meant to be together. She has all the charm and character I love in older homes, and yet somehow she has large closets. She has all my favorites growing in her lovely landscaping. She has a variety of hooks and pegs on the front porch for my growing collection of wind chimes and sparkly dangly things. She has something like 24 windows. (By comparison, the first house my ex-husband and I lived in out in Aboite had 7.)  My bedroom is light and airy and feels like a safe, comfortable haven. My office is cozy and bright, especially now that it features sparkly purple paint on the walls. And every night for the first month, I said, out loud, “Good night, house. I love you.”  I feel like we have an unspoken vow to take care of each other.

I know plenty of people think my ‘hood is sketchy. There is a liquor store two blocks away that is heavily armed due to frequent robberies. Two blocks and a world away. Members from the association welcome committee brought me homemade cookies. The first spring day that I was out on my porch, numerous neighbors came over to introduce themselves. Jim & Phyllis next door share vegetables from their garden. Jim shovels my sidewalk and sneaks my dog treats. I didn’t move into a sketchy neighborhood, I moved into the 1950s. And I love it. Much like I still tell the house on occasion how much I love her, I revel in the neighborhood almost every time I drive home from somewhere. I cannot imagine being happier anywhere than I am right now.

Happy anniversary, house. I love you so much. Here’s to many more years together.

Category:

Home, Just W

Tagged with:

Why Being Single is Awesome

(AKA, why someone who I used to be married to may have been correct when he called me The Most Selfish Person In The World.)

  • If you don’t feel like taking out the trash, or “forget”, not only is it ok, but no one will ever know. Except the garbage man, who maybe just thinks you’re really green because let’s get real, you only put the trash out about once a month. But mostly, he probably doesn’t give a shit. Or notice.
  • You can leave fuzzy socks all over the house in ridiculous, random places. So that when your feet get cold, they’re right there, waiting for you. And then you can take them off and leave them wherever you want. Same thing with shoes – the taking off and the leaving.
  • You get to decide what the thermostat is set at. (So not caring that there’s a preposition at the end of that sentence.)
  • You can sleep with the TV on.
  • You can eat weird meals, like cereal for dinner or cupcakes for breakfast or nothing but peanut butter sandwiches for a week.
  • You can plan ALL of your vacations around only what YOU want. For example, if you love to ski, you can go skiing without wondering if anyone else wants to spend all that money on a ski trip.
  • You can stay up stupidly late at night without feeling unspoken (and probably imaginary) judgment.
  • You get to decide if the dog is allowed to sleep on the bed. (Duh, of course she is.)
  • You learn that you can deal with spiders & bats. (Shudder. Maybe the bat story should move over to the blog one of these days….)
  • You develop many rich and special friendships with strong, funny women who make you say things like, “Why can’t we be lesbians?” or “I’ll rock/paper/scissors you to see which one of us will have a sex change.”
  • You can have a fake boyfriend (no, NOT THAT) who helps with house projects and goes places with you but you can cancel without feeling guilty. And if he doesn’t call when he says he will, you don’t get neurotic about it.
  • You get to sleep in the middle of the bed. Or sideways across it. And you get all the pillows and all the covers. Unless you have a dog, in which case somehow she gets a lot of all of those.
  • You can hang eleventeen paint chips in the bathroom for six months without anyone giving you grief about painting it already. And when you do paint it (say, in another month or two), you can paint it eleventeen colors, should you so choose.
  • You get ALL THE CLOSET SPACE!!!!
  • You can buy tools with flowered handles.
  • You can hit snooze as many times as you like without annoying anyone.
  • No in-laws.
  • You never have to listen to music you don’t like (ahem, Madonna). Well, at home anyway. Or on road trips. Unless you go on road trips with friends who have bad taste in music.
  • You can spend your money however you please.
  • You get to control the remote.
  • You can do whatever you want, whenever you want. Whatever. Whenever.

It’s totally awesome. J

Category:

Just W, Relationships

Tagged with:

Holy. Crap.

I should complain about not getting flowers more often.

These just arrived – how is that even possible??

Happy Saturday!! 🙂

Category:

Just W