subtext

On my second visit to Ruby Skye, which I called one of the clubbiest clubs in San Francisco and in which I only lasted 45 minutes the first time I went (to be fair, just after the Love Parade on the most techno-heavy weekend in the City), I was reminded of two things:
1. Regardless of how many drinks I have, I can't turn off my meticulously self-conscious analytical subtext about the music and dancing boys and dresswearing girls, and inevitably feel like what I'm doing is a form of domestic tourism and I am something like an imposter.
2. Even though I totally have a great time going out and dancing, one of my favorite activities at a very clubby dance club is to drink too much and vocalize some of my critical subtext in the form of raving lectures regarding such subjects as Gwen Stefani's image reflecting the decadent consumerism of a nation at war, and these raving lectures are not always appreciated per se by the other members of my party, who at best find them funny in that this-girl-is-crazy kind of way. (The girl in our party turns to her fiance and laughs, in good fun of course, "She's acting crazy!" which more than anything was redundantly stating the obvious, because that was the point, what else are you supposed to do to have a good time at a club when your own private narrative about the club that you can't turn off is so funny?)
She's a very sweet girl, and I'm past expecting most people to relate to me for being a nerd.
What's great is the girl adjacent to me at work likes me precisely because I'm such a nerd, and she thinks I'm just like her except for the fact that I'm a total doormat and she's not, so she's made it a point to teach me the ways of not being a pushover and gently trying to get what I want, which I tell her is probably impossible because of my pathological running self-conscious commentary, but I suppose is worth a shot.

I'm worried that I'm burning out in some way, from working too much too tediously at work during a crazy transitional period of undefined duration.
I crashed out halfway through National Novel Writing Month with about half a novel and the utter inability to write a single word without feeling that it is tedious, redundant, self-indulgent crap. And on Sunday, feeling like getting outdoors but not being able to get ahold of my usual hang-out buddies (on ski trips, moving, with misplaced cell phones out of town), I took a solo trip to some parks I usually have a great time at alone, but somehow it just felt like work to be out there in 40-degree weather by myself. Being as busy as I have been, I can't get over feeling guilty for spending my free time doing something not either productive or highly pleasurable, and I obviously need to get over it the old-fashioned way, by becoming absorbed with some pageturner trash novel in hardcover and blogging a lot until I can write again, at which point I can regularly scold myself for not spending my free time writing brilliant fiction while I'm not at work.

the russian hookup

-Hello, E-?
-Hi!
-Hey, how've you been?
-Good, I've been good. How about you?
-Really good. Listen, I'm calling because - naturally I thought of you - my roommate had this minor eye surgery at SF General, and they didn't prescribe her any painkillers, and she's just dying. So I was wondering -
-Oh, you should get her some Vicoden.
-Yeah, do you know where I can get some drugs for her?
-I could make some calls - is it like a stinging pain, or a throbbing pain, or does it just hurt?

-Is it a stinging pain, a throbbing pain or -
-It just feels like they cut my eye open. Like when you have your wisdom teeth out and it hurts because they've cut you open.

-It just feels like they cut her open.
-Oh. Yeah, you should get some Vicoden or something they give you after oral surgery.
-Do you have any?
-I could make some calls.
-Could you? That'd be great.
-Sure, I'll call you right back.

The phone rings five minutes later.
-Hey.
-Hi.
-I made some calls to my Russian friend - and my friend, being Russian, has Russian drugs. So if your roommate is okay with taking Russian drugs...
-Are they...shady?
-No, they sell them over the counter in Russia. It's like Ketamine, but for humans, not animals.
I put E- on speaker as he explained the history of Ketamine.

An hour later, E- came over with an unmarked pharmacy bottle containing 8 small green pills. I offered him a glass of water, which he gladly accepted, sitting on our floor to roll a splif.
He looks at my roommate, lying back in her bed grimacing with ice over her eye.
-I'm going to put some cannabis in your tea.
-Okay.
Now she's losing interest in finishing complete sentences, but hopefully she feels a little bit better.

Acronot #2: bl-iatus

This blog *should* be on hiatus for the month of November for nanowrimo. I can't make any promises though.

Virtually awesome

Overheard in the kitchen:

"I can't believe I totally made out with a guy on second life."
"...what? hahahahaha."
"It totally sounds funny once you process it."
"I think it's funny pretty much the whole way through."
"You can make out on second life?"
"You can have sex in second life!"
"He wanted to go all the way!"
"You don't even know each other!" "We don't even know each other!"
"Yeah, he asked me to go to the bathhouse!"

"He just said 'click the orb' and I was like, ooh, what's that?"

"Can you get out of it?"
"Yeah, you can just hit escape."
"You can totally do so many funny things. If I played it I'd be like, 'come here, hug me.' escape. 'just kidding. okay, for real. hug me.' escape. 'now for real, hug me.'"
"You'd be an asshole!"
"ha hahahahaha."

"I was totally innocent, he was like, 'let me show you around' and I was like 'I don't even know what to expect!'"

"Afterwards he...held me and we watched the sunset...I can't go back online tonight, he's sent me two messages, he's totally going to jump me."

"Apparently, you can totally like purchase genitals for your second life character."
"Oh my god."
"Yeah. I bet there's a whole culture about it."
"I have two penises."
"ha ha!"
"I have one on my head."
"I'm a unicorn."

"I wanna be a floozy on second life."

"Yeah, they totally have prostitutes on second life."
"I should be a prostitute on second life."
"Oh my god, you totally should."
"That would be so easy!"
"All you have to do is click the orb"
"I could quit my day job"
"I think you'd probably have to learn to...talk, too."
(in monotone) "oh wow, give it to me, big boy."

"Whoa, what if you catch an std?"
"Like a virus?"

"if I were to actually like, be a prostitute on second life, I'd have to have sex, like, a LOT."
"heee heee hee hee hee hee"
"Otherwise it wouldn't be enough money. I'd have to be like a pimp, with a lot of people below me."

paradise and the City and such

I thought it would be sad to leave Hawaii and come back to San Francisco, especially because Jon was leaving for a week the next day. Back in my apartment there was a vague post-vacation depression hangover in the air, provoked by my still having a cold and laryngitis almost a week later (and all during my trip), amplified by my bitterness at the experience of trying to catch a late-night taxi solo with my suitcase near Civic Center BART (ugh, should have gotten off at Powell). But I fought off low spirits by changing my employment information on LinkedIn and Facebook in preparation for my first day at my new job (so satisfying), and soon I'd never been happier to be back.
Maui was outstandingly relaxing and totally gorgeous and Jon was a ton of fun, but after an early morning earthquake we were in trapped mentality and instantly ready to come home the next day. We were in the comically remote Hana town (two restaurants and one general store total, a two-hour drive down the windiest highway imagineable). I just figured it happened all the time (er...volcanos just come with the geological volatility territory, right?) and rolled my eyes at Jon's attempts to connect to the internet to check for Tsunami warnings, until he finally connected and the papers said we should have run for higher ground. When they closed the roads, we thought we might be trapped in paradise (ha), so three hours later when they opened the roads any prospect of sightseeing went out the window and we booked it back to town (booked it as fast as one could book it down the windiest road ever, which under normal circumstances becomes one lane instead of two around snaking cliffs, and now had giant rocks fallen along one lane). It definitely cut things shorter, leaving even more room for slight regret that I'd let myself catch a cold that lasted all week and stole my normal voice away, and that I had in one way or another failed to take advantage of the situation and make things perfect.
Still, it was a really great trip - I got to swim in perfect water with awesome fish, read mediocre paperbacks with my knees in the waves, eat fruit and sorbet in divinely comfortable chairs, dig my toes into cottony red sand, and spend tons of time with my still-relatively-new boyfriend. While the restaurants were nothing to write home about, the guacamole at Maui Tacos was uncommonly good, and the Thai food was definitely up there. I was ready to go back and do some real work (I'd done so much screwing around at the end of my last job it felt like I'd forgotten how to do any real work).

All ready to go back to work except
why hasn't my voice come back yet?
why is it even worse than before, even though I'm feeling better?
My first day at work was great - everyone seems really cool, the commute is phenomenal (8 blocks!), the office is awesome, and I'm pretty excited about the work. I was even showered with corporate gifts (embroidered laptop bag and matching folder) and the promise of inconceivable publisher client perks (I heard a rumor involving massages and expensive concert tickets). Beyond the existential guilt crises I vaguely felt obligated to have (did I *sell out* to get this dream job? Is it *wrong* to have changed my plan to have a job in which I suffer in order to hold a job title that once seemed glamorous on television? Will I never be a *real writer* because I am on a career track that does not involve being paid to write?), I had the additional pressing concern that my raspy voice was in and out while introducing myself to various superiors. And oddly, the better I felt, the worse my voice got, which got me worrying it wasn't just a matter of one more day, and while my superiors might think it's cute now, in a few days they won't think it's very cute anymore that they hired a mute to talk to clients on the phone.
I went to Rainbow grocery and whispered my problem to a vitamin-aisle lady. An hour, 6 cold-related products, 7 unnecessary luxuries and much money later, I headed back home, generally loving San Francisco and life, because all of these lovely organic product are only 3 blocks from my home. It's not so bad, being back.

the horizontal billboard dance

I was heading home from the Mission the other night when we saw a crowd of people at the 14/49 bus stop. There was dramatic borderline-circus music, and maybe 150 people standing above the BART stop watching a red billboard across the street, with two women harnessed from the roof dancing horizontally on the side of the billboard, merging themselves with the architecture. I had a chance to check it out while waiting for the bus (which conveniently arrived just as the show was over).
All I can say is I love San Francisco.
http://sfbay.craigslist.org/eve/213686783.html

out there in dorkosphere

exciting upcomings:
1. after upcoming final day, complete tenure at current uninspiring, meaningless job
2. no longer have to commute daily to Palo Alto, which while I love the Caltrain segment of said commute, there have been 4 disasters in the last month that significantly delayed my journey and left all passengers trapped aboard, a first-ever Caltrain fare citation for the charge of "misuse of fare media," and the final leg of said commute being the worst free shuttle service in the galaxy because drivers are so unreliable and uninspired they will sometimes drive off with no passengers even as you are waving your hands wildly and running after said shuttle because the bullet train was 2 minutes late.
3. start brand new job I am lucky to have landed at awesome company in just over two weeks, meet new coworkers and work 8 blocks (albeit long, SOMA blocks) from my apartment
4. go to Hawaii with boyfriend for 5 days
5. have 4 weekdays off with zero responsibilities in between final days at current job and Hawaii trip to pursue current nerdy projects

reservations:
* I will miss lovely current coworkers, a number of whom have said sweet things about how they will miss me, and talking to current train friend, a married Irish man in his 40s with whom I talk historical politics and who lends me Nicholson Baker books about stalking and perverse sexual fantasies (!), as well as sparkling conversations with other train acquaintances
* I will fuck everything up because I am not as awesome as I talk and mean clients take my confidence down instantly
* I will fuck everything up and my boyfriend will tire of me and/or dislike me after spending 5 days with me
* I will fuck everything up by being generally shy in all areas of life and not be able to be myself because I am worried about fucking everything up

notice.

Almost as nervous as before an interview, I went into my boss's office to tell him I had received another job offer I couldn't pass up, and I would be taking it once two weeks were up. I chose my words carefully off a selection of HR websites to be as diplomatic as possible.
He probably couldn't have guessed how good the offer was with an industry-leading agency in the City, only 8 blocks from my apartment. Honestly, would anyone in their right mind turn down a more interesting job with a more prestigious company, more money, better benefits and no commute?
And luckily, enough time had passed so that I was over any spiteful impulse to say what did you expect after the way your partner treated me, because I am burning no bridges here.
The office is buzzing with rumors about my leaving, and I've been assigned very little to do so I'm still doing very little.
I couldn't tell if they were surprised or saw it coming, and I can't suppress a smile at the fact that even they might be surprised at how well I've done, when they look me up and down and I don't look as put-together as I should. When it came down to it I even surprised myself at how tough I can talk. I keep playing diplomat and smiling sweetly, half-beaming about my awesome new job, and life - is looking pretty good.

Palo Alto explorer

I went to see the birthplace of Menlo Park on a walk during my lunch break the other day, from my work's new Palo Alto wasteland-area office. The city of Palo Alto was born near downtown, by my work's former office, when a passing Spanish explorer camped by the creek at a tree they called El Palo Alto. Spaniards soon decided against settling there and abandoned it for the Presidio. But Menlo Park was born in 1850 when Irish sea captain John Greer sailed into Palo Alto harbor, just a 5-minute walk from my work. He and his brother-in-law fell in love with the landscape and built homes and a gate that read "Menlo Park."
"The men named their new homes after their old, in Menlough on Lough Corib, County Galway, Ireland. No one knows whether they abbreviated the name to "Menlo" because the space on the arch precluded the longer version, because it was their way of Americanizing the name or because they just couldn't spell."
San Franciscan aristocrats began building vacation homes in the area, attracting then more aristocrats, who attracted more aristocrats who make up the present-day demographic of Palo Alto and Menlo Park. The area by the former harbor, past 101, remains the desolate and depressing home of soulless gray business parks, the Municipal golf course, the Palo Alto airport and the semi-restored wetlands.
I started walking past the airport. The sidewalk disappeared and left me to walk in the bike lane while cars crawled back from the bayside road. The marsh was surrounded with that yellow grass that grows everywhere in the South Bay in summer months. An egret and some seagulls were standing in the stagnant water. The sound of loud, small planes taking off was constant. It smelled of fennel, except when the wind blew a certain way smelling vaguely of sulfur, probably from the nearby recycling center. There were dull green reeds everywhere, the occasional green shrub. I followed the path past the abandoned harbor building, now surrounded with dirt and reeds grown over the carved wetlands. Around the bend was a duck pond, and a sign that read Duck Pond, where sad gray geese and ducks were dragging their feet, looking stupidly at this awful fountain that looked like an upside-down pyramid throwing slaps onto the surface of the gray-blue water. Everything had that gray, humid-looking color that parks in the South Bay suburbs have, which you have to be completely numb to in order to live there without becoming inordinately depressed. The benches along the trail where no one sat, the industrial towers in the distance by the bay, the electricity pylons and the rows of masts on the hill all colored by a clear film of dull, the kind that tells you you have to get out someday and do something big to keep from wasting away here.
I totally mythologize the Silicon Valley, its engineers and dreams and bright ideas. But it makes more sense than anything - this is how the Silicon Valley was born.

doesn't look like a day spent in bed

At the advice of several people I used one of my sick days for a mental health day off work today, which was so great for my mental health, and helped remind me that life is in fact very good. Several people at work probably knew what was going on, and none of them could blame me. The weather was stunning, I ate Tartine take-out at Jon's house for breakfast and sat at ocean beach with my roommate. But now I have a total sunglass tan, and even under those dim office lights it's going to be hard to pretend I spent the day out sick...

really.

Avi Ehrlich to me:

AND while you're online and bored, this is really
funny and I just ordered $100 worth of free awesome
shit to display in my apt:

http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/Content?oid=54084

nerdosphere

My coworker took me aside for coffee during 'lunch,' (which I almost never really take anymore).
"I was like you about 6 months ago," she said. "I was so stressed I couldn't sleep at night, I had nightmares about accounts, I stayed late, I worked so hard, I was always telling our bosses what I thought needed to be changed. Then I realized that I wasn't going to be rewarded for it, and it was just costing me my health. You have to learn to separate yourself from it and put your health first."
I knew she was right, but it's hard to tell someone with a relentless work ethic to toss it out the window, and it's not really possible in the midst of this total chaos insanity to blow things off.
"Oh, and you should ask for more money too," she said.
After months of bragging about my phenomenal job that leaves me free to pursue adventures after work, my foot has now been in my mouth for so long that I'm worried my face is going to stay that way. My job has been bursting at the seams of 9 to 6 and invading my life. It also seems to combine itself with all other anxiety associated with my personal life, since the stakes seem to be higher on everything since life started getting really good a few months ago while work has been getting worse and worse.
"You're so different from the Lee I knew 3 months ago," said our former Marketing Director (who just quit, coincidentally) on the train last Thursday.
"What do you mean?"
"You used to be like, 'Oh, I'm going to an art opening,' 'I'm going to a reading,' 'I'm going for a bike ride' and now you're so stressed you bring your work home." I told her I still believe what I've believed for three months because that's what they've been telling me, that these are temporary Startup growing pains and any day now it's going to change. But it's only been getting worse.
"Isn't it pretty ironic that you care so much about your job when you said you only wanted to work for a few years and then write your novel?" Igor said at the Oh No! Oh My! show at the Independent tonight, which totally made my week and saved my day.
Yeah, yeah.
See, it's all things I know. But the problem about trying to be open-minded and open to opportunities is that it puts a damper on stubbornly chasing whatever you think your dreams are or sticking to whatever you think is really important. It's not like I'm ready to quit my job, but something needs to change, definitely.
It took two drinks and two bands to make me shake the anxiety and dread of everything hanging over my head and all of the careless things I've been doing and regretting in all avenues of life as a result, but eventually F.U.N. kicked in under the shaking heads and movie projector lights. Made me realize I need to try harder to find it under the building mess of all this, and stop putting myself aside.

My dad came home from work and came upstairs to see my brand new Macbook. He opened up Ha'aretz on the browser to 15 soldiers killed Wednesday in south Lebanon and said it was my cousin's paratrooper battalion. Apparently he sent my uncle a text message telling him he was okay.
It should have been obvious to me that his reserve would be stationed there by now. I guess it just didn't occur to me to ask.

quasi-sickday

I didn’t realize why I was feeling so awful last night at the Google Dance, I just assumed it was the hard day at work or the hangover, or drinking on an empty stomach. I didn’t much feel like exchanging business cards, dancing, playing with remote-controlled robots or standing in front of a bluescreen and having my face projected onto a dancer’s body in a cartoon background. It hit me late last night that something was probably wrong with my body again. I took a number of herbal supplements my roommate recommended and went to bed. I got up and dressed to a T for my half-day appearance at the trade show, but an hour into work I realized I was going to have to see a doctor, and spent the next hour panicking about potential complications I’d read about on the internet and dealing with idiotic Palo Alto Medical Foundation bureaucracy while squatting on the office bathroom floor. It’s hilarious to work in an office where upper management is always gone and everyone else is so busy that no one realizes when you’ve been gone for 40 minutes, or that you’ve spent the last 15 minutes reading medical websites about hypothetical severe illnesses until you feel physically faint and your face is a shade of pale green. I finally got an appointment after cutting through bureaucracy that could almost rival Kaiser’s. I went back to the office and basically hung around just to see what my test results were and wait for my prescription to be filled. When I left the office at 3:00, there was no upper management to tell, so I was able to get away with saying I’d be “working the rest of the day from home,” when really I was moping around my parents’ house in Sunnyvale (the best place to be sick ever) and there’s no way I could have accomplished anything.

and another tradeshow week

Funny, because I started this blog during my first tradeshow. Luckily this second one probably only means a few hours of floortime and several who's-who high techie parties. At the Ask.com party tonight (where out of sheer hunger I accidentally ate two kinds of meat in the form of hors d'oeuvres and luckily did not become violently ill, after all it has been over 8 years since I'd eaten meat of any kind) we drank on the open bar tab of the always-hopeful former AskJeeves (where's the butler at, after all?) and my empty stomach left me writing drunk text messages at the Gordon Beirsch about the highlight of the evening, when I watched my almost equally-drunk coworker schmoozing with the VP of Yahoo Search Marketing on the way to the Ask.com photo booth with our El Salvadorian coworker who was there on business. Ask.com knew their shit, and made strong drinks for the important, and weak watered-down shit for us nobodies. When the VP told her his drink was a monster, my coworker slurred, "let me try," and stuck her cocktail straw into Mr. VP of SEM's glass and took a slurp - fucking priceless. She kept blushing while telling it later, swearing that tomorrow he would be pulling their BUs accounts, but you had to admit it was pretty awesome of her to really take schmoozing to a head to head like that, and he's probably a cool enough guy to have been okay with it (let's hope).
On the drive back to the city with my North Beach-residing coworker, I played DJ via iPod (such Suburban trash, I know) and leader of raving, drunk conversation, screaming about how the lights in the distance in Colma knew something, and the downtown and Bay Bridge lights know something about what makes inspiration, because we keep paying San Francisco and coming back, and we can't get enough of it - this inspiration we drink till our eyes water and we fall asleep, dreaming techienerd dreams and imagining a life in creativity that is so, very tangible it is coded in a language so many can learn, and we keep coming back making the blocks that build the internet-country that begins to tie us back together again - Finally.

baloney

Elaborate misunderstandings always begin to reveal themselves in disjointed events you fail to take note of.
Last week I went over to my friend Colleen's place for drinks, and she asks me, "So what's going on with you and Yoni?"
"What are you talking about?"
"You know, Yoni, who was at your party," she said. I only vaguely remember meeting a friend of a friend named Yoni at my birthday party, and definitely don't remember what he looks like, nor did we exchange more than two lines of dialogue.
I set the record straight: "I'm dating that guy Jon who was at my party, and we're going away for the weekend together. I hardly even remember meeting that guy Yoni."
"That's so funny, because according to (name of their mutual friend), you guys have been text messaging like crazy all week."
This is especially funny because not only do I not exchange phone numbers with this stranger, I also hate text messaging that doesn't go anywhere, and I like to keep my text messaging conversations to a maximum of two back and forths. I take out my cell phone and look at my most recent messages, just to make sure I didn't receive any messages from a mysterious new number that I didn't notice. Definitely nothing there.
Bizarre! We hypothesize that maybe he met a different girl at my party and confused my name with her's, or maybe there is a girl out there pretending she is me.
I think nothing of this episode until today, when I am talking on the phone with my mother. After about 20 minutes, she says, "Oh, I have a funny story." She proceeds to tell me that at a party she ran into a friend, who told her that one of her friends is the mother of my boyfriend. My mother is confused. The woman says her son's name is Yoni, and that he is a graduate student of some kind. My mother tells her she doesn't know about any Yoni, and only knows that I've been dating a guy who works for Google for over a month. Apparently, Yoni's mother is thrilled that he has been dating an Israeli girl in San Francisco for about a month, and upon repeating my name, word got back through the grapevine to my mother, because how many girls could there be in San Francisco with the same name as me? My mother tells her friend not to tell Yoni's poor mother that she said anything.
Now, one of two things is possible:
1. Yoni's mother and friends are giving him shit about not dating girls or not dating the right girls (he could be in sexual orientation denial or have bad taste in women, or still getting over a girl from months ago he should have gotten over) and he is telling them he's dating me because I'm a convenient scapegoat he can namedrop.
or
2. He is seriously delusional and thinks we're dating although I have never exchanged more than one line of dialogue with him and have not seen him once since I met him three weeks ago.
3. Some girl he met at the party is pretending to be me or using my name as an alias for whatever reason.
So long as it's not #2, I'm fascinated to be mixed up in such a weird (and creepy) situation. And seriously curious to get to the bottom of it.

acronot #1: F.U.N.

After being out of San Francisco commission all weekend (with Jon in Mendocino: stunning, enchanting, sleepy, immensely calming), catching up with friends revealed that two of my friends were in complete romantic crisis. I'm not sure how it happened that I've become someone people go to for dating advice, or why anybody thinks I'm qualified to do so, but apparently I give effective advice, and after a few months of seriously trying to date I've learned something about crush e-mailing. Part of me feels weird rewriting and composing crush e-mails for my friends' crushes on behalf of my friends, but in a way it's remarkably similar to rewriting my friends' resumes and cover letters (which I'm tragically good at and secretly kind of like to do). I totally think dating should come with resumes now, so it's not a conflict of interest or anything. After my roommate had a mini-triumph this week (he calls my advice+storysessions Dating Club), I knew whatever I'm doing is working. Which is good for when I'm kicking myself for not being serious about writing or otherwise not being productive, because I think helping people is important. So I'll keep helping people in whatever way I can, one peptalk and crush e-mail rewrite at a time.

workplace conundrums

I may be speaking too soon but it seems like work is starting to veer on the side of reasonable again, and I was back on the 6:06 train today. Which is a good thing because the crowd on the after-7:00 trains is pretty dejected.
I was feeling out that bleary-eyed crowd while waiting for the train and I saw this man smile at me, several inches shorter and easily pushing 40. We didn't exchange so much as a 2-second glance. When I got on the train, he sat directly behind me. Since I was on the super-long train that makes every stop after a totally frustrating day, I spent the better part of the train ride talking trash to others in my Verizon network and leaving grandiose voice mails for people I'd meant to catch up with.
At Millbrae, the man gets up and hands me his business card, very quietly mumbling something that resembles "dinner" and what I think was "from one commuter to another." At least, it was from one something to another, I thought it best not to ask. He was a director of development for some department at Stanford. I didn't notice until I took his business card out of my bag that on the back he'd written "Text me your name and phone number if you would like to have dinner some time!" I guess he had nothing to lose, but I was pretty surprised because it didn't seem like we had even a moment of connection. That's when I realized how lonely the 7:20 train is. When I used to ride the 5:06, it was hard to even get a guy to even look at me, let alone smile back, but on the 7:20 they'll go for any female who's merely present.
Anyway, I think it's time to get back to a work schedule that conforms more closely to my salary. At least the amount of trash talking via i.m. and in elevators with coworkers just to get through the day can't be good for my karma. And giving in to the urge to buy consumer products after an infuriating day can only be sustained for so long. Plus, yesterday, in a seriously low point of frustration and hunger, I went into the office kitchen and prepared one of those Instant Lunch things I used to eat as a kid, which my coworkers eat all the time. I don't eat much processed food, and most of that consists of veggie burgers or Trader Joe's frozen food, so I guess my body was extra-sensitive to that noxious poisonous crap - ugh, my body went into MSG-stupefied insatiated bloated shock. I don't know how people eat those things, especially out of those horrifyingly toxic styrofoam containers.
Guess I'm not cut out to work late.

after the rager

After our F. Scott Fitzgeraldian party on Friday to celebrate my birthday among other things, there were 4 hours of cleanup and enough alcohol to easily throw another 80-guest party. I had my reservations about the risks involved in combining all of the disjointed acquaintances I have ( coworkers, computer nerds, designers, hipsters, freemasons, students, chemists, accountants) with the somewhat less disjointed acquaintances my roommates have (they all went to the same art school together), but there were enough people to keep things from getting awkward. It's great how into throwing parties my roommates are, especially Kelly, who's an awesome designer, and designed the party flyer in which I was transformed into cartoon via Adobe Illustrator. A hundred burgers and buns vaporized, cakes vanished, empty bottles accumulated and people said, 'you guys really know how to throw down.'
It's such a cool thing to have almost everyone you like in the entire Bay Area make an appearance within a few hours of each other, share the same space, even interact (if they're social enough).
Even though I now have nothing notable on my calendar for...ever now, there was no post-party letdown, partly because it's still my birthday-week-and-weekend-celebration-period, but mostly because things have been going so well, and there's been no shortage of quality people and great opportunities to recreate.

Jon, the resident Gmail expert I've been seeing, invited me out for birthday dinner last night to Bong Su, which was possibly the best Vietnamese I have ever had. And I mean great Vietnamese. He was worried when we first looked at the menu that there didn't seem to be a lot in the way of vegetariana, and I assured him that this is San Francisco, one of the best cities for vegetarians in the world, and I'd get by. I didn't even have to try either, because the waiter just picked out 3 courses for me and went back to the kitchen to have the chef alter the menu for me (the best vegetarian dishes in San Francisco are the ones that the waiter and chef collaborate to make up). I also love not having to make any decisions because I'm so tragically indecisive, so this was phenomenal. It was really nice of him to take me out for my birthday to such a great place, especially since the poor guy was so wrecked from an epic 50-mile bicycle ride that day that it appeared to cause him excruciating pain to even grip and maneuver utencils. When he dropped me off at 10:30 so he could crash out, my roommate looked at me with concern like, 'dinner didn't go so hot?' but I assured her it wasn't something I said. We concluded that we should go out, and just then I saw a text message from Avi that said he was in the city and down to meet up if I wasn't [sic: something disturbingly vulgar] and was free to hang out. He came over and we drank several half-empty (that's right) bottles of wine leftover from the rager, when my other roommate awoke from her post-sailing nap (she's so high class), and we recruited her too. I probably overdid the preparty given how hard I saw myself dancing, an unfortunately placed mirror revealed. I was also wearing these shoes that were a bit unusual, which turned out not to be as comfortable as I thought for walking 14 blocks to the Mission and dancing on for several hours, and as we were flagging down a cab Avi said that's what I get for wearing those gremlin shoes. For the record, I've gotten compliments on them too, Avi.

to me

I started out my 23rd birthday the night before, just out with one of my roommates trying to have a fun time. We went out to the Mission to meet her friend's own birthday party, and for some reason we got talked into going clear across town with them to the Alpha bar, which I always say has such untapped potential - mostly because it's a great spot but there's never anyone there. The topper to get us to go was that they were allegedly filming a Budweiser commercial there - the two of us looked at each other intrigued by sheer curiosity. It ended up being starkly abandoned as usual, though (despite the halfway decent DJs always spinning live), and luckily I had called up my friend Igor, who resides in the neighborhood, to keep me company among all of the friends of friends I had zero relation to.
Worked way too many hours again today, frantically (to the tune of the buzzing of dear friends wishing me happy birthday on my mobile phone, in the background of coworkers bringing me cakes and flowers as I worked through lunch), we all keep saying the psychotic work schedule is temporary until the new people are trained and I can stop being held responsible for two people's jobs.
Got home at 7:30 and realized if I wanted to put anything remotely social together I would have to think of something. I made some calls and cooked myself dinner in an empty apartment.
Birthdays aren't a big deal, but they still make you feel like you're going to want to make remembering them not lonely.
I wanted to do something low-key, and it worked out perfectly - 2 out of 3 roommates (the 3rd was under the weather) plus Igor and a friend. We danced so hard to 60s soul in the back room at Delirium I felt like I was living something I'd been half putting off for a really long time.
It's hard to gleam insight from contentment, because you can't conclude much except that you've done a few things right and you should try not to allow them to change, but things have been getting good for a while now, better even, good enough to get down to projects, good enough to want to give back.

my first wedding

It remains to be determined whether or not I am good at faking it when I'm out of my element. I've been told I'm good at visibly keeping my cool with gigantic crushes or when I'm nervous in social situations, but usually I kind of doubt it.
My friend Shonelle's wedding was the first wedding I'd been to without my family besides my friend Danielle's grandmother's wedding several years ago, and definitely the first friend-friend of mine to get married. Since the guest I RSVP'ed to bring turned out to be wishful thinking, I was kind of nervous about coming solo.
I didn't really know anyone who would be there, so I had to guess about everything, like gifts and how to dress and everything. I let myself get talked into wearing this big, fun dress by my mother and sister which I had a pretty good feeling would put the over in over-dress(ed). But since I adore dressing up, I had to take the opportunity.
I had to do my hair to go with the over-dressed, and of course I don't know what I'm doing since I missed out on that chapter of girl 101 and neglected to make up the credits in sorority 101 or anything like that. I spent a while just figuring out how a curling iron worked and I was running late, but my parents were like, "Don't come on time, they won't start till at least a half hour to an hour in, you'll just miss the welcome cocktail."
I showed up maybe 40 minutes late, and saw everyone hanging around (and I of course knew no one) so I dipped a carrot stick in dip and walked around. In the next room I saw Shonelle glamorous, beaming, stunning, and I tried to tell her so.
I very un-smoothly asked when things were getting started and her face dropped, confused.
Uh-oh, did I miss it?
Everything.
They started on the dot.
"That's okay! That's okay!" she said, because she's so sweet like that.
Boy did I feel like a jackass. I guess I shouldn't have trusted my parents on that one, after all they do operate on IST (Israeli Standard Time).
I saw a friend of Shonelle's who I'd met once at UCLA, and introduced myself (she'd of course forgotten me). I was feeling seriously stupid (and did I mention overdressed?) and I couldn't get conversation to pick up. I took down a glass of champagne and some cheese and crackers, took a deep breath and plunged head-on into a conversation, introducing myself to everyone.
I don't think people believe that I actually have social anxiety, because the way I cope with it is by all-out sending the opposite signals out and hoping for the best while consuming alcoholic beverages, if possible.
Luckily, this was a great strategy at a wedding where I didn't know anyone. Since there were so many couples and married 24-year-olds, I didn't want to just abandon ship with the single girls if conversation didn't take off. I was pretty persistent with the 5 single people I met, and by the time we were seated we were all like old acquaintances.
So I ended up having a fun time, sat at a table with some nice people and swapped stories, even might have made a couple of friends.
I'm starting to wonder how many times I have to have certain experiences before I can actually start to feel confident about my ability to be awesome in them and not be nervous. At least, in dating it doesn't appear to be possible yet, but I'm pretty sure I'm getting there in the business meeting scene and the wedding scene.

Spent the day Saturday with the engineer, walking and talking. We went to the Jazz festival, ate Burmese food, sat at the park and walked like a hundred miles. So fun!

sapporo in a brown bag

It's been such an absurdly, psychotically, unreasonably crazy and stressful week at work (supposedly only until next Monday's newbies get adequately trained to pitch in) that by 5:40 PM (when the majority of the office was long gone - further evidence of the inequity of the distribution of labor within the company) my brain had seriously crashed out (also due to staying up just slightly too late talking to this engineer, a guy who outdoes me in both my follow-through and internet background checking skills by miles, and comes close to meeting my cynicism - very impressive).
I left the office 20 minutes before a train was coming and wandered workstress-drugged aimlessly, realizing I should call Avi back because since I loathe excessive text messaging I've got to return a phone call now and then to keep up with great people. While telling Avi about my week and trying not to go into arduous detail, I realized I wanted a drink to bring on the train (you're allowed to do that on the Caltrain, you know). But where to find a to-go beverage on the yuppiest stretch of Peninsula south of Burlingame, downtown's own University Avenue?
"Are you by a computer, Avi?"
"Yeah."
"Could you look up where there's a liquor store around here?"
"I'm so proud of you, Lee."
Apparently there's a 7-11 right on Lytton, a stretch I've never found reason to explore. Their selection wasn't spectacular but one can never go wrong with a solid steel can of Japanese beer. I can't decide what I think about drinking alone, let alone drinking alone in public, but it did feel like an appropriate way to kick off the weekend, a would-be 4-day weekend were my job not at a startup (that's right, I am actually expected to show up to work on Monday or take a personal holiday).
I got a couple of bewildered glances when I looked up from my Houellebecq novel, mostly subtle grins. I felt kind of like a middle-aged man listening to Nick Drake on headphones and drinking beer alone on the most archaic form of public transportation, but it did leave me feeling very pleased by the time I passed the thick nude clouds layed out onto the hills of South San Francisco.

a miraculous cure

Taking my roommate's advice, I e-mailed the librarian on Friday telling him I still had his movie and wanted to swap back, and asked if he wanted to meet up at Tartine for breakfast.
When I hadn't even heard back by Sunday, I knew he was opting to ignore it, which as we know means he is so dumb because even if you don't like me, it's really hard to turn down breakfast at Tartine (especially potentially free breakfast at Tartine), even harder than it is to have Almodovar's Talk To Her in your apartment for over a month and not have watched it yet. Anybody with a remote sense of politeness would have at least e-mailed back a thanks I'm busy. The guy must have a lack of follow-through of almost clinical proportions. In any case, today I saw him and handed him back The Apartment, and he told me he started watching Talk To Her last night and was almost done (exceptional evidence of lack of follow-through handicap). He sat next to me and we talked all the way back to the city, and neither of us mentioned the fact that I'd so nicely invited him to breakfast.
I don't know what it is about guys who feel like they have to act like seriously flaky assholes in order to not lead you on when they're not interested - especially when he was the one who approached me and asked me out in the first place. Honestly, I wouldn't have pushed things any further than that harmless breakfast invite. But after semi-putting myself out there I think I am finally cured of this crush.
I better as hell get my movie back though.

Sidenote: and guess who never called this weekend? Guess we can prune that guy out of my phone as well...

city promises kept

It's been foggy in the evenings for the last few days, and the city looks even more like a dreamland while doing its best to keep up the spontaneity. And there is big payoff to anyone who sticks around town.
On Friday night while hanging out with Igor in his neighborhood, we stopped between bars at the Plough and the Stars near the beginning of Clement, since I know they sometimes have great bands playing. It looked abandoned, but at a closer look it was actually full and cozy inside, and when we entered this spectacular jazz band was tuning up. They had a standing base, a fiddle, a mandolin and this amazing guitar I would describe if I knew the names of guitars, but let's just say it was phenomenal, and we just happened upon it, and stayed through their whole set.
On Saturday I went down to the Mission with one of my roommates and she egged me on to talk to boys. But it was she who got picked up on by a very pretty boy, and I obliged to be versatile by talking to his friends. They convinced us to come along to Beauty Bar, which I was happy to do. Pretty Boy was still chatting up my roommate pretty intensely, who was in turn pretty into it, and I was talking to his friend, this hilarious Pure Mathematician. My roommate leaves for a total of two minutes, and I see Pretty Boy immediately planting seeds in the direction of some provocative looking blondies. Uh-oh, guess he gets around. She rolls her eyes, again not all that optimistic about what's out there in singleland and it's hard for me to find any evidence to the contrary.
The bar closes soon afterwards, and we're waiting for the 14 Owl, but decide to take a Taqueria Cancun pitstop. It takes over 20 minutes to get our burritos, but well worth the wait. When we sit down, we see Pretty Boy outside the window, walking down the street with (get this:) three blondes (How would it play out?). We laugh, and soon a guy asks if all of his friends could sit with us. We say okay, and they are friendly, after a minute it becomes clear that they all work at Google, so I immediately start making jokes and talking shop. I guess my roommate didn't feel like she could relate, but I was totally into it, being acquainted with Google culture and all, plus working in the field. I guess they thought we were great, and invited us to a party several blocks away. When San Francisco throws you spontaneity, it's best to go with it. At the party, we sat on the roof looking at the blurry-white city and drinking Gray Goose, which I admitted I had never had (since I'm pretty new to trying to be classy), and had a great time until we left at 4:00.

I decided to check out the Gay Pride parade today, since I've never been (last year I had pneumonia). I rode my bike down halfway in. What struck me is that despite the unrelated corporate sponsors and gaudy sexuality, the parade really did get across what I think was the message, which is that everybody deserves to be able to find whatever kind of love does it for them, and in San Francisco people should do what they can to make that possible. The parade was also the first parade where I actually thought the presence of unrelated corporate sponsors was excellent, because catering companies and bike tour companies joined churches and nonprofits to go out of their way and reach out to communities that still sometimes have a hard time as consumers. That's caring about customers, I think. I'm not too liberal to be all for business and advertising when it actually cares about consumers.

After the parade I took an epic bike ride through Chinatown and North Beach all the way to Crissy field and back. The air was cool and hot, the clouds were dispersed and fast, and it was generally, completely amazing.

trying to be awesome.

The architect called me on Tuesday, after some phone tagging over a few days. He asked what I was doing that night, and I said I was going to a friend's DJ gig (though 'friend' isn't as accurate as guy-I've-been-throwing-myself-at).
He said, "Maybe we could meet up sometime later this week or on the weekend."
"Yeah."
"So yeah, hit me up later this week."
I came home and told my roommate I thought this was totally weird and overly casual and dismissive, and who says "hit me up" anyway? But she has this cool super-modern attitude of gender equality which I'm really into, and she didn't think it was weird at all, and said I should call him. Yeah, maybe. She also thought I should ask the librarian out for breakfast, I guess we'll see how that goes.
I think maybe too much advice from my mother, too much trash-talking with female friends or too much Sex and the City has made me feel like I'm supposed to be constantly outraged at male behavior when it's not that outrageous - things like not being walked to a cab stop or only getting a call a week later. I'm starting to think it's actually probably remarkably normal for the first couple of dates, but I don't have enough experience to really say. I'm not actually offended by that sort of thing, I think I just feel like I'm supposed to be. It's far more important to me to date a guy who respects me enough intellectually to have interesting conversations with than that he be a gentleman, and I'm actually starting to rightly be a little bit wary of anyone who's too smooth of a gentleman and doesn't have much else going for them. And according to some of my male friends, dating in San Francisco is a lot more 50-50 as far as what girls do, so it's probably time that I completely shake off my mother's early 70s sensibility and actually taking some subtle initiative.
So after the trainwreck of a date on Wednesday with the Craigslist Missed Connection, I started to want to hang out with the architect sooner rather than later, because we actually did click, and it would be so refreshing to go on a date with someone who's fun and actually interesting to talk to.
I called him up last night when he was out with a friend, and met up to join them for a drink. After talking for a while, the first friend got up for a game of pool and a second friend showed up. Both seemed like pretty quality people, no freaky red flag stuff, though they still didn't give me any clue as to how old this guy is, which I think is probably between 28 and 33, but it could really actually be anything and I guess it's past the point where it's going to come up in conversation without me asking. I'm still not sure if I can handle dating guys in their mid-30s, or older (!!), I know that's pretty arbitrary but it still seems crazy.
After a drink the two of us ate some seriously delicious Thai food and continued to have a pretty great time. When we left the place it was almost 11, and he asked if I was going home or what. I said I didn't know, not knowing if he was going home to rest up for work or going to invite me somewhere else. He said he was headed home and I could walk him, but I said I'd just hop on the bus. He asked if I was around on the weekend, and then said he would call me and kissed me before taking off.
I was feeling pretty awesome for pulling off this casual thing so far without obsessing about where we stand or what's going on, and I'm wondering how long I can continue to do so.

History of bad dates Part II

It was possibly the worst date in all of San Francisco on this hot first day of summer. My Missed Connection was clearly never meant to be unmissed by Craigslist. I gave it an honest shot, but maybe dating meets technology is not for me.
I waited outside Valencia Pizza and Pasta 5 minutes before our 7:45 meeting time because the bus was early. 8 minutes late, I get a text message: On da bus. see you soon. I try not to judge the use of 'da by boys from the Midwest, because it seems like things are just different out there.
He gets there at almost 8:00. He doesn't apologize for being late. He is wearing jeans with some seriously risque fashion holes in them, and a shirt all the way unbuttoned to show some baby chest hair. You can tell he's been sweating, and his wet hairline is sticking to his head (it does so all evening). I try not to be shallow. I don't think I'm shallow, but how is it possible that a guy can look so attractive when he's just doing his laundry, and so unattractive when he's dressed for a date? We wait for another 10 minutes for a table in the most sweltering restaurant in the entire Mission. His phone rings, and he answers it and talks for a couple of minutes because it's long-distance.
When we finally sit down, he says, "You look really pretty tonight, thanks for coming out with me." I smile, and decide to try to be positive about it. We have very little to talk about, and I drink my glass of red wine down on an empty stomach. We make uninteresting smalltalk, until finally he starts telling me about a friend he has on a farm in Marin.
"They used be all about the partying, but now they don't really do that anymore, they're more just into nature. Which is cool and all, but you know, it's not the same."
"And that's a problem?"
"I mean it's really all about the partying."
I tell him I'm really not into the 60s or drug culture, and that I think any ideas or potential that they had was diluted by decadent drug use where nothing is accomplished.
He says, "I mean, when you do that, you're not really affecting others, but you are making a difference."
"?"
"You're affecting yourself."
"And gorging yourself in decadent drug use is going to make you a better person?"
"Not a better person, but you know, it changes you. I kind of want to get back to a point where partying is like a way of life."
I can't believe I am on a date with this person, and I can't wait to leave.
It's only 9:15 when we pay the check, or rather he insists on paying, even though I've already plopped down cash in front of him: "I'm taking you out."
I am seriously crashing out from drinking red wine on no food after waiting in the hot sun. We have nothing to say, it's awkward and I'm looking down wondering how long I have to hang out in order to be polite.
"Are you watching me seriously space out?" I say.
"No, actually I'm kind of admiring your looks." I smile while looking down. I feel like a bad person. I'm seriously not into this.
He asks where we should go, and I say I can't do any more alcohol. He says coffee, I say okay because it'd be rude to go home.
We have a cup of coffee, and he tells me about his job working in sales for UPS. I would seriously rather be anywhere else in the universe, and at 9:50 I finally decide that I could probably go home without being totally rude.
"Where to now?"
"Actually, I should go home."
"Okay, fair enough."
He walks me to my bus stop on Mission, and is putting his arm around me. I don't know what to do, and it's on the tip of my tongue to say "I don't think this is going to work out," which I decide to myself I will say if he tries to kiss me.
I walk on the other side of obstacles to avoid his arm, but it's back.
I just miss a 14, so I have to wait around. He puts his arm around me. I want to be honest and cut the bullshit, but I don't know if he'll feel obligated to keep waiting with me, it seems rude, I don't know what to do. We are quiet for like 5 minutes, where is the fucking 14? All the while he has his arm around me and is rubbing my arm, and I'm looking down and don't know what to do. What is protocol for this situation? When I see the bus coming, he hugs me and says thanks for coming out with him, then kisses me on the forehead. I hope this is all, but then he closed-mouth kisses me on the lips before I board the bus. My skin is still crawling.
I guess if he calls I'll have to make up something about a new exclusive relationship or something, because he doesn't seem like the type to get the hint if I just don't call him back.

It seriously makes me rethink every okay date I've ever been on, because when I only kind of click with a guy, I don't realize that it's apparently possible to completely not click with him, and for him to still have no idea and think it's going great.

Brainwash, Don Delillo and all that - m4w - 26 (SOMA / south beach)

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Reply to:
Date: 2006-06-19, 7:39AM PDT


Lee, I thought you were pretty and fun to talk to, and I'm ashamed i couldn't ask for you number.

that's what Missed Connections is for I guess. Hope you find me

no -- it's NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests




(I got in the habit of checking out Missed Connections on Craigslist once in a while after my coworker Natee raved about it.
I usually search a few places I frequent like Caltrain, Brainwash or Trader Joe's - I never actually expect it to be for me, but I figure it will always be hilarious. )

how I'm a fraud

Out of nowhere, after a couple of weeks, my librarian crush was back at the station waiting for the 6 o'clock train. I tried to act like I hadn't noticed the profound monotony of his absense, but when I sat by him my knees were shaking like an 8-year-old girl. I planted them firmly on the ground and kept trying to talk like I was so cool. I'm such a fraud.
Towards the end of the ride he tells me he's DJing again tomorrow, and I try to act moderately surprised even though I totally remembered from last month's e-mail that he does it the third Tuesday of the month, because I am a creepy stalker.
"That sounds cool. I think I'll ride my bike down to that."
"You should."
I'm going to have to drink so heavily to not be too nervous around him and his friends in a non-Caltrain setting for the first time.


In other news, on the day of her final wedding headcount, Shonelle writes:
Your flying solo actually helps a LOT with seating arrangements. :)
This is too funny.

commitment to the lack thereof

We were eating breakfast at Tartine when I got a call from the Berkeley grad student freemason who had been out of town for a few weeks. Actually calling me, which is an occurance so rare I can count the times on one hand. My roommate says he's into me and terrified because he recently got out of a 7-year relationship. He took the bus in for the North Beach festival, Malaysian food, a walk and burritos. The problem with him is we'll be having a great time, and then he feels awkward and overcompensates by telling me in great detail about some aspect of upper-class, east coast prep school racquet club esoterica to alienate me and everyone else. It's hard to get him to have a good time or have an interesting conversation with him without the conversation eventually steering to this unless he's had something to drink, which is unfortunate because I'm honestly just not interested in Ivy League, aristocratic, letter-of-introduction private-club obscurantism. I guess I'll just have to tell him, but the way things have been going, I probably won't hear from him until he comes back from the next conference or two, in a few weeks.
In the meantime, I got a message from the architect that day (a week and a day after our date), and so far have just played phone tag. My innate serial monogamy made me feel vaguely slutty thinking about when I would call him while hanging out with another guy, but all I can conclude is that I can't possibly feel bad, since none of these guys actually want to be even remotely committed to me. It's still going to take some training on my part to be so aloof.
I did tell Shonelle I'd be coming solo to her wedding. What a commitment to being single. Hope it won't be too awkward since I won't know anyone there except the bride and groom.

When we came back to my place last night my roommate said, "Want to go to a party in a mansion?"Apparently her friend from school was housesitting for a professor in the Berkeley hills and obtained permission to have a rager. Impossible to turn down an offer like that, I threw some Sake and some sparkling red wine into my bag and we hopped on Civic Center BART. The party was small and fun, the house was big and stunning with an incredible view. I spent the night in the east bay, and getting back by slow Sunday BART schedule ate up a big chunk of today.

To take advantage of the last bit of weekend and sun, I went with my other roommate on an epic bike ride down the Embarcadero over to Fort Mason Center. Totally made my day.
Then, the four of us housemates had laundry night at Brainwash, where I discovered that Sunday night is unofficial semiattractive single man laundry night. My roommate and I were staring at a devastatingly attractive guy with a giant cast on his hand. I was reading Don DeLillo's Underworld, still having trouble getting through the 60-page baseball game at the beginning. After a little while, the four of us are sitting around while he is loading the machine by the table where we are sitting, and he asks me what I'm reading. I tell him a bit about it, and then ask him how he hurt his hand. I tried to talk to him about my recently broken elbow, and bike riding, but the conversation never took off. After I reloaded the dryer, he tried talking to me again.
"Yeah, I tried reading this other book by him but I coudn't get into it. White Noise, I think," he said.
"You didn't like White Noise? It was great, just lost speed at the end."
"No, I started reading it, and the beginning was funny, but then I wasn't into it. Reminded me of people I know." (?)
"Oh..."
My roommates are all watching him, it's all slightly awkward.
"I read books I get at garage sales. I've found a few good ones."
"."
"."
"Example?"
He gives me a few, including Hesse's Steppenwolf, and then there's nothing to say again.
Awkward.
Finally, he's leaving, and I say it's nice to meet him, he says so too and says Ciao.
"That was weird," I say to my roommate.
"Was he hitting on you?"
"Yeah, I guess so. But there was nothing to say, we just didn't click."
"He was hot. I mean hot!" she says, while shaking her wrist. I nod emphatically, and as we do this, she sees him looking in from outside the window, seeing her make this gesture, clearly about him, and me nodding away. He most likely could tell we were talking about him, which was funny.

punks in the Miata, among other things

There was nothing much doing on a Friday night, we were hanging out drinking red wine in the kitchen, and then the doorbell rang. It was just my roommate's sister dropping something off, but when he opened the door he saw the sight on 10th street - there were 8 cop cars on the street and 10 guys lined up cuffed in front of the auto shop. We all went into my room to watch it unfold. Looked like a drug bust of some kind - all 10 of them looked like suburban coke guys or something. We watched the cops waste city tax dollars talking, walking in circles and doing the occasional questioning with a notepad. This went on for almost an hour, and had probably been going on for a long time before then.
After like half an hour, we saw two punked out guys stand beside them. We were joking around, laughing about how we'd get to watch them talk trash to the cops. But then, they got into this blue Miata parked in front of the row of arrested men. We lost it laughing. They clumsily maneuvered around the cop cars as the cops finally loaded the guys one by one into a few of the 8 cop cars.

the semi-promotion

At work today they told me I've been promoted to Account Manager. This is supposed to be a great honor (though two of our Account Managers have quit already, and one semi-quit and is being semi-promoted). Whether or not it is a good thing remains to be determined, but I will be the go-to person for a lot of my clients and will spend more time on the phone and writing e-mails, and less time pushing buttons and taking orders. There is also a pay raise of some kind, but I haven't seen the number. So I guess it's pretty cool.

My back has been beyond fucked up since yesterday and my ability to process anything is virtually nonexistent when all I can think about is how it hurts. And there's no one around that can help me. Really makes a good case for having a boyfriend.

when they called it the mile-high city I thought it was a vulgar airplane joke, but apparently that is in fact its nickname

Business trips are awesome, but waking up at 6:00 AM Denver time to catch the flight back has left me feeling like my brain has been gutted, stretched, crumpled back up and stuffed back in through my nostrils. And I'm incapable of napping.
Luckily my United hookup went through on the flight back. Business Class is so cool! When you walk into the plane you realize that you have to go left instead of right! The flight crew treats you like you'll never get your money's worth, but they're willing to try to help you get close to it. They keep bringing you beverages every half hour and asking if you'd like anything else. Plus, the seats are super soft and comfy, and everyone's over 40 and jaded from becoming so accustomed to luxury as I don't believe I will ever be.
[6.19.06: don't I feel petty now:
http://www.rym.com/rlog/_vti_bin/owssvr.dll?Using=Default%2ehtm]
My boss was more than slightly bitter about my upgrade, since they stuck him at the back of the plane. He kind of insinuated that I must have been a flirt to have been hooked up like that. I was hoping he would just laud my networking skills, but you know, I guess that's life.
Of the 21 hours we spent in Denver, 5 were spent in transit and 7 with the clients, so my limited exposure to the city suggested to me that it looks exactly like an exclusively caucasian San Jose, but with taller mountains and more interesting clouds, an amusement park downtown, this stadium that looks like a 60s era fantasy spaceship, and an airport with a row of white tents that look like funny disneyland-foam mountains when you drive up. The clouds were so great there - like these bulbous ripples over the mountains that filter through these majestic rays of light.
Other highlights included when the Budget Rental Car woman said "Oh, you're staying in Greenwood Village? Great restaurants. Like Maggiano's and P.F. Chang's." Wow, I'm so glad I flew all the way to Colorado to eat at mediocre national franchise chain restaurants owned by Jack In the Box and other dubious corporations.
After I totally kicked ass at the 4-hour presentation meeting (okay, I'm being generous here, but I didn't choke) we ate at P.F. Chang's (woo) with the clients, several of whom were stunningly attractive males in their late 20s, and I unintentionally got just drunk enough to be flirting with potential public embarrassment, as well as with the new clients. Back at the hotel my engaged coworker told me she caught herself flirting too, so I didn't feel so stupid.

It occurred to me recently that I still don't have a date for my friend Shonelle's wedding in 2 weeks. I RSVP'd for 2, which I guess was wishful thinking, especially considering that I'm not even really dating anyone (among other busts, the architect may never call me and the librarian disappeared ever since Stanford went on final exams schedule). Plus, it's on 4th of July weekend, when everyone will be out of town. I'll probably end up coming solo, but I won't really know anyone there and really would like to bring a partner in crime. My mother thinks I should just take the tallest boy I can find to go with the heels - her words being, "It'll be too loud to hear each other anyway, so you should just bring someone who looks good and have a good time." Sometimes I don't even understand how we share any of the same gene pool, when the only similarities we seem to share are neuroses, hypochondria and nerves.

like a c-list celebrity

Had a gorgeous day yesterday at Jeremy's birthday barbecue in sunny Almaden. At the party, I met back up with one of his friends, who evidently has so many frequent flyer miles that last year he flew 10 of his closest friends to Australia. I told him about my business trip, and he very nicely offered to upgrade my ticket to business class. He was apparently only able to do so for the return flight.
He wrote:
I was able to get the return flight upgraded, but not the outbound. I guess you'll have to sit with the vermin on that one. Explaining it to your coworkers is the fun part. I suggest the implication of a secret admirer. Have fun on your trip!
It's going to be a ton of fun to explain to my travel companion higher-ups why I will be flying a notch above them on the air travel food chain. Yes!

Jeremy had a copy of the SF Chronicle magazine from last month which I'd been trying to get ahold of, the reason being that it's my first published fiction piece in a major publication.
Back when we were dating, my ex and I were both looking for apartments on Craigslist. He was getting resentful because I was getting more responses to my e-mails than he was. I said it was because everyone wants to live with a girl who loves to cook and clean, and nobody wants to live with a boy who describes himself as an Artist and a Musician. He finally decided that he was going to start sending out the exact e-mail I was sending, to make himself sound like a fun gay guy. I helped him tweak a few of the sentences. The next apartment he went to see turned out to be that of the Craigslist project photographer. The Chronicle picked his photo for the story centerpiece, and reprinted an edited version of the e-mail. They did keep the best part, about how he likes to "make the kitchen and bathroom sparkle." Didn't get either of us a Craigslist apartment though...

Woke up at 4:00 in the morning scratching violently. Looks like our occasional visitors the mosquitoes are back. Now they're even bigger mutants than usual, probably from hanging around the alleged meth labs of our neighbors. Usually I wake up and slather myself with this Burt's Bees lemon-flavored insect repellent and fall back asleep, but I woke up again at 5:30 with my eye swollen shut - I guess I didn't cover all of the conceivable area. At work this morning my boss looked nervously at my freakish face and said, "What happened to your eye?" He seemed mostly concerned that I would look this freakish tomorrow for our big meeting. When I get back to my apartment I just might have to break out some citronella or introduce myself to our drugged out neighbors to see if I can figure out where the infestation is coming from.

dancing so hard

I actually just danced so hard I got my own gum stuck in my hair.
The lock was unsalvageable.

on the inherent complete mystery of dating

I met up with the architect at the Red Room.
I ended up walking there from my apartment, because the bus was clearly not coming and it was a nice night, and Hyde St isn't really that sketchy in the early evening with a lot of people out. Enough excuses, it wasn't the best idea to walk through the TL alone in a skirt at night but anyway it was fine.
I was slightly nervous because I had only met him once, at a dark bar while drinking the strongest Manhattan ever made, and because I have humiliatingly little dating experience.
He was far more attractive than I remembered, I mean super cute, and I was having a great time talking to him. After a drink we walked to another bar, which was relatively empty and only emptied further. He didn't have to test his boundaries for too long before his arm was around me and he was holding the palm of my hand to look at my ring. He went in to kiss me just after we both exchanged stories about our broken bones in the months of March and April, completely out of context, which is of course fine by me.
Soon afterwards he asks if I've been to the Starlight room, and I say no, though I always see it from Union Square, with its Las Vegas circa 1978 animated lights at the top of a skyscraper. He says he's into the view. $10 apiece later we are inside and are in the minority of the non-tourist population that is not super shady, even though that in itself is debatable since we spent the vast majority of the time making out at the windowsill and speaking occasionally. Conversation grew increasingly superficial, because it's always hard to get to know someone once you're already intensely making out in a lounge that's exotic in a Hearst estate kind of way. When it emptied out he said we should probably vacate too.
We walk 3 blocks back up to his place, and he asks if I want to get a cab or come up to his place for water or beer. I say I'll come up for a little while. I'm pretty sure I broke a dating rule or something by now but I was curious to see the residence of the guy whose name, age and phone number I don't know (the latter because his new cell phone is mysteriously restricted and he can't figure out why). I drink cold Crystal Geyser out of a glass and look at his fairly stunning televisionless apartment. I have no idea if he wants me to be there or not. We start making out on the couch, he's very sweet, he takes his time before it gets to the point where I say, "I should stop you." "Okay." He pulls me in under his arm and we talk for a little while. He tells me he had fun hanging out wiht me tonight. I can't tell if he's bored, while telling me about his trip to China.
When he yawns I say I should probably let him get some sleep. Realizing I have no way to contact him, he writes down his phone number on a piece of transparent drafting paper. The craziest part - he writes his first name and last initial! What was that about? Was he afraid I'd perform an internet background check and find something? And it's a V, no less. What the hell does V stand for?
He asks if he should walk me down to a cab and I say, "You don't have to," so he doesn't. He kisses me and flashes a killer smile.
I take a cab home and knock on my roommate's door because I have to debrief with someone, and he had also helped me prep. I have zero idea if he has any interest whatsoever in doing anything but try to sleep with me. And it's not anything he said or did - that's just the thing about dating.
So my roommate is kind of baffled too at this point, since neither of us know anything about dating, and I realize that it must be hard to be an attractive guy with a good personality and a decent job in San Francisco, because where do the options end, and doesn't it just get boring and turn into a game of how quickly and frequently one can have sex with strangers?
I could go on a thousand first dates with strangers and never learn anything more than I know now about reading signs or signals or anything. All I know is in the supposed adult dating world things seem like to work inversely - first you hang out and see if you have physical chemistry and then you get to know each other better.
God, do I have a lot to learn.

the lazy T9

So I get this text message from the guy I went to the Giants game with almost a month ago, and went out of town on business. Since he got back, he's been IMing me and sending me text messages telling me to call him, but never actually calling me. Like he needs me to chase him or something to put in any effort himself. It's gotten beyond tedious. This one was priceless though:
Hey. I know you foot like texts but he you are up gimme a call. He not sorry to wake you.
The guy was too lazy-texting on T9 to hit 0 and change the auto-selected word or to proofread. I feel like a bitch ignoring it, but would you return a text message like that, which wasn't even looked over before being sent? Almost makes you think he's too busy sending texts to girls all over town to look at what he's writing.

The other day I hung out with the guy I had drinks with last week. We made food and hung out talking for a few hours before I hopped the bus back. It was fun, there was some flirtation on his part, nothing over the line. I started to feel bad, because this guy was maybe investing time and effort into being a gentleman, and I was kind of ambivalent about him, especially since he's moving away in a couple of months. So when he asked me to hang out again this week I felt bad and kind of blew him off to a possible later in the week. It's really funny how I excuse my flaky bitchy tease behavior with alleged good intentions, but I guess that's dating (?).

Today I found out that I'm going on a business trip to Colorado next week, and even staying the night! Luckily I'm so excited about my first business trip that I don't even care that we'll probably be in a lonely suburb in Detroit chatting up an eTailer.

I got a call from the architect I met on Friday night, but told him to call me back because I was on a loud train and he was en route to a Giants game. At least, I can only assume it was him since he was the only stranger I was expecting a call from whose name I didn't quite remember. I seriously have to get better with names!

quantum forces vs. San Francisco

I'm hanging out with Igor at Medjool, and we're supposed to meet up with some coworkers of his or something before heading over to Tartine for the flower-themed art opening. It's packed with blazerwearing Marina expatriates, and we can't find anyone and aren't sure we want to. We decide to get a drink, and just as we're within shouting range of the bartender, my purse strap breaks - that's right, that purse you bought at the sales at the H&M in France when you were studying abroad for 2 euros apparently wasn't cut out for two years of use and has hand-picked this as its moment to die. I am in the process of ordering my drink and the purse falls onto the floor along with its contents. "Myntz" are rolling out of the tin, Japanese plastic wallet hits drink puddles on wooden deck, pens are rolling. I am on the floor picking things up and miss my chance to buy Igor one of the 46 drinks I owe him by now. ("Uh, I'll get this one.") I place my plastic cup of Cabarnet Sauvignon on the counter because I still can't find my mobile phone. People are shining their handheld devices under the bar counter, a minute later it is found way beneath. I stand up quickly to ask the waitress to retrieve it for me, at which point I knock over the Cab. It is everywhere, over my black skirt, my beige polka-dot sweater, my white jacket, Igor's entire nearly wine-proof-colored wardrobe.
It is 10:15 PM.
It is too funny and crazy to even be upset.
Igor is a sport.
I am unsure what to do.
The line for the women's restroom is 15 long.
I start to descend stairs hoping my experience with renovated youth hostels will help me navigate to a floor restroom. No such luck - this hostel actually has in-room bathrooms. I walk into a room labeled "Laundry" hoping for a sink. All I find is machines and a fridge. I pour blue Kirkland-brand liquid detergent all over the stains in an absentminded half-panic. My hands are now slightly soapy, and I am trying to find my way to the downstairs bathroom.
The door opens - it's a guy with a wine stain on the shoulder of his t-shirt. He asks if I know where there is a sink.
I preempt an apology in case he was caught in the crossfire of my natural disaster, but he says this was a Merlot spilled on him by a bartender, who made it up to him with a free beer. We both get lost in the downstairs labyrinth and give up on the whole thing, climbing the stairs back to the upper deck.
If this were television we would have become friends or lovers. Since this was real life we didn't even notice what the other looked like and never spoke again.
I met back up with Igor and we cut our losses and left for Tartine. This turned out to be an excellent decision.
As soon as we arrived I saw at least 6 estranged college classmates and about a dozen friends, drank free wine, listened to great music, washed detergent out of my clothes and had a fantastic evening. Several of these old friends from college were from out of town, including a girl from my freshman dorm who just finished school at Vidal Sassoon and is moving up here from LA in a month - my haircut hookup is here!
I got to talk to my former freshman orientation counselor, who I've always thought was completely brilliant and interesting. (Also gave him this blog URL - the pressure!)
Lin made my night at least 6 times from behind the wine bar, and I had a generally great night.
When they shut down, my night was made again by the fact that the soft, dewy fog wasn't cold at all, seeing as how both of my sweaters were still lightly stained with wine and completely soaking wet. San Francisco takes care of me.
I then joined my roommate and his friends and went down to the Uptown for the strongest drink of my life, where I somehow found myself in a conversation that led to the handing out of my phone number to an architect whose name I don't remember. I don't know how these things happen to me. The funny thing is of all of the phone numbers I handed out tonight to people I'd really love to hang out with, I bet this stranger is the only one I'll hear from.

on not caring.

While watching the movie the librarian lent me, it occurred to me that the film (which was excellent, by the way) was all about a guy who's obsessed with the girl who operates the elevator in this office building, while she in turn is having an affair with his married boss in his apartment, and I wondered if he was trying to tell me something. But what? He is the guy on my commute who I'm obsessed with, who asked me on a lunch date and canceled and never rescheduled, and now I sit by him and talk to him several times a week during our commute and we just swapped DVDs. When I told my roommate the story, he said, "That's stupid, why didn't he just ask to watch the movie together?"
"Because he's not into me."
"Oh." (look of uneasy sympathy)
"It's okay, I don't think it's actually going to happen."
I've always thought my first impression needed work, because people tend to like me better once they get to know me. This must be the only case in documented history of my life that a guy seems into me before he talks to me and gets over it as he gets to know me.
This morning he sat with me and for the first time there was zero even imaginable flirtation, granted he said he was feeling sick and would leave work right after his meeting. Don't worry, I'm over it. Let's just hope I get my movie back soon.

Last night my roommate's Freemason buddies came over, including the Berkeley grad student who is trying to have a tacit arrangement with me where he acts like he's my boyfriend when he sees me and then doesn't call me ever. We ended up drinking tea at the Fairmont, which is apparently just the way they roll. When the check came I actually laughed out loud - a cup of tea was seriously like $5! I don't know if it was my not-boyfriend's behavior or the fact that their conversation was so intense and cryptic that I didn't know what they were talking about for 20 minutes at a time, but I needed out fast and turned super cranky when they were taking their time bringing me home. I thought I was intense. It's nice to know that there are always people in the world that are crazier and more intense than you are, and entire secret societies to accommodate these people.

The other night I met up with a friend of a friend for a drink in SOMA - He said he'd be in the neighborhood because he was riding the Caltrain while his car was in the shop. I'm not sure if it was datelike - I guess it was borderline. Actually he insisted on paying, but who knows what that means. This is the first time in my life that dates and quasidates seem to be falling into my lap, and definitely the first time in my life that there's been so much ambivalence. He was pretty cool, and I wasn't attracted to him per se but I wasn't unattracted to him either - like I could have been, and if he'd tried to kiss me I would have probably rolled with it. We had a great time and hung out for a few hours. Then he said he would walk me home the 12 blocks, but I said I'd rather take the bus than walk through the sketchy part of SOMA. I don't know if he took this as rejection. He's moving across the country for lawschool in the fall, not that I'm out to necessarily get in a relationship and not that he's asking, and not that I know if I'd be into it with this guy. On the bus he said we should hang out this weekend, and I said sure, and I told him I was busy Friday night and part of Saturday, which again, he could have taken as rejection or not. I might have been rejecting him, but I'm not sure. I'm not into him enough to try to make it happen but I'm not against it - when did I become so damn ambivalent?
It feels like ambivalence is the official dating disposition of the decade. Whenever I'm really excited about a guy it never gets off the ground (most likely because I am too intense for them).
I'm getting some attention from guys, and actually having fun dating around, but I'm somehow surprised that everyone seems to want to be in weirdly casual, sporadic, noncommittal, text messaging and not calling, dating-around thing. This shows you how new I am to dating - I'm sure that I'm just a million years late realizing that this is what dating is, and I've just consumed too much media and maintained some delusion that people should actually be really excited about dating each other and want to do it with that person only, and as a consequence I've only been in a couple of intense relationships and almost never dated.

it's not pathetic if they actually remember you

I don't usually see my librarian crush on the morning train, even though he's usually on the same one as I am. Last week I loaned him my DVD copy of Hable Con Ella to start off the trade, pretty sure he wouldn't keep up his end of the bargain because he probably wasn't even interested enough in me to remember that he had my DVD.
He got up from his seat and sat down next to me handing me a copy of The Apartment starring Jack Lemmon and Shirley Maclaine, which I'm now so excited to see.
He told me he's been busy, with friends in town since he last saw me and more coming today. We talked for a while before he went back to what looked like an involved conversation with his friend, but getting off the train he lagged behind to tell me to have a good day, and that tomorrow he was 'sick' because his friends were coming into town. Another killer smile.
It was so super cute that I walked to work with the stupidest grin on my face.

tricks of the trade

Today Jeremy told me that he saw my blog linked from Dr. Frank's blog. I know Frank Portman's strategy is to reference everybody who references him, but I was ecstatic to see the first link to my blog that wasn't a direct result of me telling a friend about it, so now I suppose I'm referencing it again - how postmodern.
Since I am not fooling anyone any longer about my nerdiness by working at the Internet and accidentally mentioning the new version of Excel when I'm drunk at barbeques, I started a techie blog, which is for nerds only. I have delusions will make me famous by the time I get finished talking about Office 2007.

Over the last few days in addition to text messages from friends I've been receiving text messages from boys who may or may not be trying to date or hook up with me. As if it isn't hard enough to tell these days with such delicate matters, they have to use the stupidest form of communication available - like an e-mail only less space and not free, with fewer social rules dictating response, and some guys apparently think a text counts as calling, which I'm sorry - it doesn't. Sorry, gentlemen, we don't appreciate it more just because it costs money - but that is some weird, sick Vox logic I've heard employed. I use text messaging only when necessary, polite or dating-related, and even then my maximum is one back and forth exchange before I decide whether or not to ignore it or use my Verizon minutes. In any case the possibly dating-related texts probably only warrant an e-mail or IM response, because I heard guys like it when girls play games, and that means always giving less than you receive. I obviously have a lot to learn in that arena because I hate games and I am overtly maternal and an excellent cook and caretaker. But since I'm doing this whole serious about dating thing I guess I will try to pick up the tricks of the discourse.

partying like an F. Scott Fitzgerald novel

Memorial Day Weekend, which as we know is all about decadence, got started a little early after my post-blind date clubbing session on Thursday night. It was a good thing I had already made plans to meet up with some friends at 10:00, because the date was...the guy was nice and all, but I really wasn't attracted to him and by the end he was definitely taking every opportunity to touch my arm, shoulder and back and there was nothing I could do to make him get the hint.
I went out with some old Sunnyvale friends to popscene - where I hadn't been since years before I was old enough to drink. Of course I stayed out till 2:30 and somehow stumbled to work the next day only to go to another birthday party that night.
On Saturday I spent 3 hours at the bike kitchen trying to make my bicycle slightly more rideable (new chain, brake cable and brake pads and it still needs work), then went to Carnaval in the Mission for several hours.
When I tried to unlock my bike to go home, my cheap combination lock was jammed, and we had to ask a local resident to give us a hand. It took him ten minutes of intense sawing to get through it, which leads me to believe it wasn't that bad of a lock except for the fact that the combination gears jammed. Master Lock is definitely going to hear about this.

We had a barbeque on Sunday, and we might have been the only people to ever buy their actual barbeque at 10:00 pm the night before the barbeque ($25 at the Foods Co - amazing!).
The barbeque was utterly decadent and extravagant - six wines, three kinds of meat, two types of soy, three desserts.
Then proceeded to go out drinking in the Mission until the bars closed.
Now invited to another barbeque today that's supposed to be at a chef's house. I don't even know if my body is up to another day of decadent eating and drinking, but on behalf of research, youth and other miscellaneous values I will have to do my best.

about target markets

Got to talking last night about this theory I have that my generation, the most recent to enter the working world and which can only be called the September 11th generation, is inherently disenfranchised because we never got to become the target market. As in, we consumed media heavily and were subtly trained to identify with the Generation Xers portrayed and always feel like we were born just a few years too late to be part of something, and just as we were about to enter the promise of being the same age as the glamour portrayed in media the dot com crash wiped us off the marketing map and the Tweens were the next big thing. And suddenly we were not only born too late, we were never going to come into our own as glamourous or important because we were also born too early. And the only thing we got to identify with as a generation was September 11th, war, bad politics and an unpromising economy.
But a fellow 9-11 generationer didn't have the same sentiment, and felt that he was always part of a target market, especially now. Which brings up an interesting question: Was I just choosing not to identify with people in MTV programming, clothing, cosmetics and soda ads because I identified with some kind of supposedly counter-subculture?
If that's true, does that mean that maybe our generation isn't disenfranchised with something to prove as I have thought?
I concluded only recently that maybe it's not so much the sixties and seventies that I hate, but youth culture in general, which the more I study the more I realize is always consumerist in nature, fetishizing political action rather than actually taking it and commodifying culture by any means possible. Maybe the reason I didn't identify with advertising was because I was deluding myself so heavily into believing I was above marketing. But since most of the people I know identify with either another nationality or a subculture, maybe marketing has only been targeting the subcultures that would actually put up the money, and the only place where I fit in is as someone who rarely will. And could that be the death of a kind of marketing?

doesn't this warrant a warning?

A while back my mother mentioned that this lender she used to work with wanted to introduce me to his younger brother after he met me and was so impressed by my, you know, being a single Jewish female without a wedding ring. But besides the fact that I lived in Los Angeles, I was too young to introduce to his little brother, apparently about thirty. Now that I am a year older and no longer in college I am apparently not too young, and he got to talking to my mother about our City addresses. We are only seven blocks apart, in yuppie SOMA and in-transition SOMA, respectively. He was surprised we hadn't seen each other around, since he was unaware that we are separated by the 3-block stretch that is frightening ghetto SOMA.
Anyway I told her that I wouldn't be against meeting him, but I didn't know she just went ahead and gave him my number. You'd think she could have told me to possibly expect a call.
He left a message while I was showering after test-driving my bike (something fishy going on with the chain). When I called back I got his voicemail.
Looks like my mother has fixed me up with a game of phone tag with a stranger.
Love the way she looks out for me.


He called back half an hour later and we talked for a while, going to meet up later this week. I've never been on a blind date before. Yikes.