Tuesday, September 14, 2010

Someone's Scary at the Cemetery

Hello my dear readers. I know, I know, it's been far too long since my last post. Look, I've been really busy! There were things... and stuff... and...you know...things to do...

Ok, I have no excuse. I've neglected you. Can you ever forgive me? Let me try to make it up to you. I feel the only fair punishment would be if I told you about another time where I was the crazy one on the date.

One of my favorite things to do in all of LA is go to the Hollywood Forever Cemetery on a Saturday night anytime from May through October. No, I'm not an uber dedicated goth chick. They show movies there at sun down on Saturdays and sometimes Sundays. You bring a blanket, whatever food and drink you want, and just hang out with your friends until the movie starts, then watch a movie under the stars. It's not nearly as creepy as you're thinking. I promise.

A few years back, I had missed every single movie the entire summer. I don't know what happened! I had let the summer get away from me and suddenly I was facing down the last Saturday movie night of the season. I must go! I wouldn't get another chance until next May! I made a bunch of calls, but everyone I knew already had plans for the night and were not as willing as I to break them. Then I remembered a guy I had a pretty good-sized crush on. We hadn't actually had a date, but whenever we were at social outings together, it was clear we had a connection. I don't normally ask guys out on a first date, but it was the last movie of the season, and he was my last hope. I gave him a call and explained to him what it was, and he said he was down. Yay! I wasn't sure if he'd say yes, so this is sweet! I not only get to go see "The Exorcist" at the cemetery, but I get to go with a guy I like!

This is a very popular event, and considering it was the last one that summer, it was beyond crowded waiting to get in. It's always good to get there early because they only allow a certain number of people in to the cemetery, and if you don't make the cut off point, you don't get in. They've also been known to refund people their money and kick them out if they can't find a spot with their blankets on the lawn. They let in a couple thousand people, so its not that they're stingy, it's just that there are only so many people you can fit in any given area.

Luckily my guy and I had no problem finding a spot. We lay out our blanket, open a bottle of wine, and start chatting in wait for sundown. As dusk is falling, we look around and it is just jam-packed. People are still desperately trying to find somewhere to throw their blanket in hopes of not being ejected. In front of us is one single guy with three large, green blankets spread out. He's clearly waiting for people, but it was so late, it didn't seem likely he'd need all that space. Also, because it was getting dark, his green blankets looked an awful lot like open grass. A young hippie couple came running up, thinking they'd hit the jackpot with the open area, and right as they got up close, the one guy manning the blankets starts yelling at them, "No! Nope! Nope! Nope! This is taken. You can't sit here!" He was meaner than he needed to be, but he was probably pissed thinking he might be sitting on three big blankets all by himself for the night.

The young hippies' shoulders drop in defeat, and they start slowly spinning in place, searching and hoping to find another small spot to put their blanket before people get kicked out. I look at my date who is already looking at me and we both nod in silent agreement. I start moving our bags and what not to the back of our big blanket, and my date tells the couple they can throw their blanket down on top of ours, since we have more than enough room. They are so excited, thank us profusely, and then take up very little room and sit down in front of us. I'm floating in seventh heaven right now because 1) it feels nice to do something good and 2) on our very first date out, I just had a wordless conversation with this guy! Woo hoo! Don'tcha just love that good feeling on a first date thing?

My date and I continue chatting as the sun goes down, and then they start up the movie. As the first scene comes on, I lean over very close to my date and whisper, "I don't remember an excavation scene at the beginning of this movie," and young hippie girl who we just let sit on our blanket turns and looks me dead in the eye, brings her forefinger to her lips and says, "SHHHHHHH," and then continues to stare at me straight in the eyes. Um, what's this now? I look around me quickly and then back at her and say in a low voice, "Really?" She replies back, "Yes. Really."

Excuse me?

Who does that? Who has the gall to be a super bitch after we were so kind to her? I wasn't even loud. And aside from that, everyone around us was talking. We're sitting in a cemetery with literally thousands of people for god sake. I am NOT good at keeping my opinion to myself, and my knee jerk reaction was to tell this chick off, but I looked at my date and I was so content with how things were going, I thought maybe he doesn't need to see my crazy quite yet. It's probably best to try to keep that under wraps at least for the first date, and especially since the first date was going so well!

The movie continues, and we sit there quietly. About 15-20 minutes past the first time I was shushed, I lean over to whisper something else to my date. Whisper, mind you. I'm not even talking out loud like everyone else in our area was. God knows why she needed to shush me and not everyone else in our surrounding area, but whatever. So I whisper something to my date and this dumb bitch turns around to face me full on and says at full volume, "If you didn't want to watch the movie, why the hell did you come here?"

Ok, you had your chance. You had your get out of jail free card. It was all I could do to keep my mouth shut the first time, so you know I couldn't keep it shut the second.

"If you wanted to watch the movie in silence, you shoulda just stayed home and rented it instead of coming to a cemetery to watch it with thousands of people!" We start shouting back and forth in standard catty, female verbiage about who wants who to shut the hell up and how maybe she thinks she needs to stand and MAKE me shut up and I tell her I'd like to see her try, etc. My blood was just boiling in my veins, and we were just spewing all kinds of venom back and forth. She really, REALLY really really wanted to stand up and fight me. I've never once in my life been in a fight, but I was just dying for her to stand up, mostly because I saw her come and sit down. She was all of 5'3" on a good day. I'm 6'1" in my bare feet, and she hadn't seen me stand up yet. It woulda been a nice little Back to the Future moment where Marty picks a fight with Biff, and Biff slowly rises up, way taller than Marty and it scares the ever-loving crap out of him. I SO woulda done that to this nutjob chick.

But I digress. We're shouting at each other and I'm so focused on verbally kicking her ass that I'd forgotten where I was. When I mentally took a quick account of my surroundings, I realized my date is now literally holding me back by my arm as I lean forward in super ghetto I'm-gonna-kick-a-bitch's-ass mode. I might as well have said, "Aw no you di-ent," and told him to hold my earrings. Awesome. I'm sure he's so glad he came out with me. Now my date that has been going so well is possibly ruined by me showing my not-so pretty side in yelling at this stupid hippie girl. I'm thinking all of this while she and I are still ranting. Ok, it's probably time to wrap this up and hope I haven't done any irreparable date damage.

Kate: "I am SORRY..."

Stupid Hippie: "Don't be sorry, just shut the fuck up."

Kate: "Oh, you didn't let me finish. I am SORRY we were so kind as to let you sit on our blanket instead of getting your asses kicked out, and I am SORRY you consider my quiet whispers more of an interruption than you shouting at me to be quiet. Now either stand up or turn around and shut the fuck up."

She turned around.

When I was sure she couldn't see me any more, I took a long, deep breath in hopes to put out some of the fire that was raging inside me. I don't know if other people can, but I can't just flip a switch and go back to not being all peaked in fight or flight mode. I wanted to try to calm down as quickly as possible though so I could assess if my date was mortified by my behavior or not.

"That was pretty cool," he whispered to me. Ha! Date not ruined! Yaaaaaaay me!

As I'm reveling in my success of making the hippie be quiet and not losing face with my date, a random guy sitting on a blanket next to us who'd unavoidably watched and listened to our whole throw down leaned over to say something to me and my date with a very serious and stern look about him. Oh great. Now we have to deal with someone else. What the hell is going on? Am I crazy? Do I need to start gearing up again for more verbal combat?

"I think SHE needs an exorcist!" he said.

Well said my new friend, well said.

Tuesday, May 25, 2010

There Is No Title That Does This Date Justice

I have been debating on if and when to tell this story because it is both funny and gross, but you my dear readers deserve to read this BECAUSE it's both funny and gross. I'm pretty sure this is also be the very date that sparked my desire to write Kate's Dates, so how could I deny you this joy/awfulness?

Another disclaimer: If you think of me as a daughter or I am your daughter, you may not want to read this.

I met a guy online. He was about 5 years younger than me, and I don't normally go for younger guys, but we hit it off and I thought I'd give it a shot. For our first date he took me out karaoking, which I adore. He had asked me if I had a place I wanted to go, but I let him pick. One of my rules I don't think I've addressed yet is I do not take dates places I regular. If it doesn't work out, I don't need some clingy guy just happening to show up at my home base locales. Anyway, he chose a place I'd never been, and it was great. He even got up and sang and totally hammed it up. Too funny. We spent all night goofing around, being silly, and it was great! Ok, maybe I underestimated the fun I could have with someone who's alot younger than me. (BTW, I know 5 years isn't alot, but I was 27 and he was 22, and there's alot of change that goes on in between those ages, so I feel I had a right to be a smidge leery.)

Our second date we went out to a club, which is something I'm not a huge fan of, but it wasn't wasn't some swanky high end club and not too crazy packed, so it was fun dancing around all night without a care in the world. Now we've had two really fun dates and things were going very nicely! It was laid back and exciting all at the same time. How great!

During the week after our second date, we were talking and right before we got off the phone, he asked if we could go out again on Saturday. I said sure, and he said he'd call me Saturday to set up plans. Yay! Date #3! Date #3 to me is a tell-tale date. You've gotten comfortable enough with a person that they almost always let down their first-date-make-a-good-impression wall a little. It's when you get to see little glimpses of the differences between who they actually are and who they want to portray. Friday night he texts me telling me to be sure to keep Saturday night open for him. I write back, done and done!

On Saturday, my roommates are going out for the evening. They invite me, but I say no, I've got a date later. Where am I going? Not sure, but you guys have fun! I had kinda hoped I'd hear from Young Boy earlier in the day so I knew what to get ready for, but whatever. It's no biggie. I don't know where we're going or what we're doing, so I just get ready for a casual night.

7pm rolls around, and no call. Hmm. That's strange. Well, I guess we didn't make set plans, so maybe we're not doing dinner? I grab something out of the fridge and plop down in front of the TV.

8pm rolls around, and no call. Ok. I check my phone again to make sure he didn't say next Saturday or something. Nope. 24 hours earlier he told me to keep tonight open. He's still in his early 20s and is probably just a late-starting guy. I'm not gonna worry quite yet.

At 10pm, I decide this just isn't happening. I get out of my going out clothes, into my jammies and grab a glass of wine trying not to be hurt. Realistically I could've called or texted him, but I just don't do that. I'm not desperate, I'm not clingy, and if he's not interested in pursuing me then I'm certainly not going to go chasing him around. I'm a pretty cool chick, and he's missing out! These are all the things I'm saying to myself to try to ease the pain of being stood up by someone I thought was into me. I'd like to say it helped a little, but if you've ever been stood up, you know it sucks balls no matter what you tell yourself.

11:15pm, I get a call. I was almost mad when I saw his number come up, but I answered anyway as nonchalantly as possible. "What's up?" Young Boy asks. Um, duh. I've been waiting on your ass all night long. Of course I don't actually say that. "Nothing. What's up with you?" "Nothing," he says, and then asks, "Do you still want to get together?" What? It's 11:15! Where the hell are we supposed to go this late? "Where would we go? It's pretty late and by the time we got out somewhere, it'll probably be last call." "Yeah, that's true," he says. "Maybe you should just come hang out at my place." Oooooh, I get it now. You're booty calling me! Interesting choice since we've only kissed at this point, so why he thought a booty call was going to happen, I have no idea. Silly Young Boy. I did still want to hang out, so I figured since I knew where he was trying to go with this, I decided I'd go and just be ready to thwart any advances.

I show up at his studio apartment just before midnight. When he answers the door, he kisses me hello and I can smell and taste the whiskey on him, which I hate. The guy has been great up until now, so I was trying to give him the benefit of the doubt. "Oh, were you out with your friends earlier tonight?" That would make sense why he waited so long to call me. He was out with his friends and time got away from him. It happens, so that must be it! "Nope, just hanging around here all night." Um, what? You've been sitting around your apartment all night long? Alone? Waiting until the middle of the night to call me to ask me to do the exact same thing with you? And you've been sitting here alone drinking enough whiskey I can smell it on you?? All of this is just reinforcing my third-date-exposes-all theory. Not cool, but I've already wasted my Saturday night, so whatever. I'm already here so I'll just bear through it. As if he can read my mind, noticing I'm not drunk and he clearly is, he asks if he can get me a drink. Sure, whatever. We walk into his kitchen and he opens the fridge. The fridge is entirely empty except for a gallon bottle of Jack Daniels and one egg. That's it. Literally. No bottle of ketchup or salad dressing, no to go box with leftovers, no can of pop, not one single thing in the fridge except for a gallon bottle of Jack and a lone egg sitting on one of the shelves not even in an egg carton. "Oh, did you just move in?" I ask hopefully. I mean, come on. That's just weird. Everyone has something in their fridge! Without any notice of my tone whatsoever he replies, "Nah, I've been here for years." Weird!! I don't drink Jack, or egg for that matter, so he has nothing for me to drink. "I'll just have some water," I say. He pours me a glass of water and himself another glass of Jack. Awesome.

We sit down on the couch and watch some movie he had already started. He asked if I wanted to start it from the beginning, but jesus no, let's just get this over with. While the movie is playing, he leans over to kiss me and I think 1) Yuck, I hate Jack! but 2) he's been a good kisser thus far, so at least I can have something good about this evening. We start making out and then he bites my lip. Hard. Not a playful, sexy bite, an I was worried he'd drawn blood bite. I ask him what he's doing and he said he was just playing around. We start making out again and somehow he bites my cheek, really hard. Like leave a mark hard. Even softly, how is biting my cheek supposed to be hot? Not to mention, how the hell do I explain to anyone why I have a bite mark on my face?! I tell him, if he bites me again, I'm going to knee him in the balls. He laughs and I tell him, no, seriously. Stop it. He leans over and kisses me again, and now I've learned his pattern and right as he's about to bite my shoulder (again, come on dude. How is gnawing on my shoulder hot even a little bit?) I push him off me and tell him I'm going to get more water. He was up doing something when I came back in from the kitchen, but he was on his way back to the couch. When I sat down next to him, he leaned in again. I blocked this attempt by turning away and telling him we should finish the movie. He says, "Ok, let me use the bathroom first."

Now I've been quite a tolerant girl at this point. This guy has done weird thing after weird thing tonight, and I've just taken the punches and tried to roll with them. As he's in the bathroom, I start to notice the quiet. He hadn't turned the movie back on, I'm assuming because he didn't want to miss anything, and there are no other noises in this little studio apartment. Except for the noises coming out of the bathroom. I wasn't specifically listening to what noises were going on, I just thought to myself, "Man, you can sure hear everything in this little studio! If I go pee, I might turn the water on so he can't hear me." Then I start to notice that the noises I'm hearing from the bathroom aren't of him peeing. And they aren't from him dropping a deuce. What the hell could he be...no. No no no no no no no. No. He can't be...could he? I thought back to us kissing on the couch and I could clearly feel on my hip he was ready to take making out to the next level, but really? Really?! No, I must be wrong. I HAVE to be wrong. Who does that? I sat for a second and listened really closely.

Yup. He's whackin' it in the bathroom while I'm just sitting out here on the couch.

Ok, time to bolt.

It was summer, so all I had to do was get my shoes and purse and get the hell out of there. My shoes. I took them off at the door, but they weren't there anymore. Where the fuck are my shoes?? I'm in a freakin' studio apartment. There are only so many places they could be! I look under the couch. Not there. I look in the kitchen. Not there. I frantically look by the bookshelves, by the TV, under his stack of video games. Nothing. As I keep searching, I think, they're only shoes. I'm not parked that far away. Even if I was, who cares? Maybe I don't even need them. Right as I'm thinking this, I find them in his closet, behind his hamper. So this guy is not just whacking off in the bathroom at this exact moment, he also tried to steal my shoes?? I sure as shit didn't put them in his closet behind his hamper! Am I on a hidden camera or something? Can this actually be happening in the real world? If everything went his way and I stayed the night, how would he expect me to get home the next day without shoes?? Would he try to convince me I came there barefoot so the little freak could keep them? I need to get the hell out of here, like now!

I make the poor choice of sitting down to put my shoes on (I shoulda just left barefoot!), and as I'm midway done, he pops out of the bathroom with a big old goofy smile on his face. Now there is a smell of not just whiskey, but of a guy who just whacked off and didn't wash his hands. Gross dude. Gross. He drops down on the couch next to me all super close, trying to put his arm around me and says, "What should we do now?" He smelled awful and on top of that, he had broken a sweat. Beads of sweat had formed all along his forehead from his bathroom activities. And now you want to know what I would like to do? Are you freakin' kidding me? "I'm gonna go," I say. His smile dropped immediately and he asked with what I can only describe as genuine confusion, "Why?" Wow. Wow. I don't even know what to say to that. If you don't know why, I can't help you dude. "I'm just going," are the only words I can actually get out. He asks me if he can walk me to my car. Oh, NOW you're a gentleman. Is that that first-date-make-a-good-impression wall I see coming back up? Too little too late nutjob. No, dear god, I do not want you to walk me to my car. I flee so quickly that I didn't even notice him trying to give me a kiss good night. When I get to my car, I see he'd texted me saying, "No good night kiss?" I look up to where his apartment is from my car and he's standing in the window with one hand on the glass and a sad look on his face, watching me read the text. It was so pitiful I felt sorry for him for a second. Then I shook it off remembering he just beat off a few feet away from me and tried to steal my shoes. I put the car in drive, peeled out, and never looked back.

Tuesday, May 18, 2010

Just Another Night on the Town

Dating isn't just about going on actual dates. The whole single scene can be just as ridiculous and entertaining as the dates it produces.

I was dating this guy for a little while who was a karaoke DJ, also known as a KJ. He knew my girlfriends and I loved karaoke (that's how he and I met in fact), so he told me about a bar where they had just started karaoke and asked him to KJ. He asked me to get my girls together, said he and his partner could really use the added support since it was the bar's karaoke debut, and he'd make sure we would all sing alot. Well you don't have to ask me twice about karaoke! Only one of my girls was available that night, so the two of us headed out for the bar.

Karaoke started at 9:00, but we weren't sure how crowded it would be so we got there at 8:30. The bar itself was really a sports bar kind of place, and it was hopping, but we didn't see karaoke anywhere. We asked the bartender and he pointed us to a room in the back. We walked in and it was like an old dance hall. The whole floor was hardwood, perfect for dancing. There was a stage at the front, a bar at the back, and along the sides were little elevated areas with a couple of tables and chairs all blocked in with metal railings. It seemed like the stage would be a great place to karaoke, but they had set up all the tables and chairs on the dance floor to face one of the little elevated, railed-off areas. My friend and I got our drinks and sat at one of the tables. There were maybe 5-10 other people in the whole room, so I guess there was no need to get there early! The guy I was seeing wasn't there yet, but his partner KJ was up on the "stage" setting everything up. I went up to get a karaoke song list, said hi, and he told me my guy was out getting some cord that broke and he'd be here later. OK, no prob.

As my girl and I are checking out the song list book, this older man, probably in his late fifties walks up to us. He looked like a homeless man in a 3 piece suit. He was either really unhealthy, was mentally disabled, or maybe Los Angeles just rode him hard and put him away wet. Maybe all of the above. Who's to say? Regardless, I knew we were both hoping this conversation wouldn't last very long. He walked up to us and started rambling about how he really likes his suit and how pretty we were and how he was glad the weather was nice today and what pretty girls we were and he likes karaoke and oh yeah, did he forget to say he thought we were really pretty? No? Oh, well just in case you forgot you girls are pretty. Thanks crazy dude. He asked if he could sit down with us, to which we politely said no. He wasn't even looking at us some of the time. Just staring off to god knows where, maybe entertaining himself in his own head. Then he randomly just wondered off in the same manner he'd arrived.

My friend and I giggle about the strangeness of the crazy guys and think, this is going to be a funny night! The music then kicks in, and it's so loud, you'd think there were 100 people in the joint. I look around and, nope, still just about 10. After the music kicks in, another man approaches the table. He's probably in his early forties, and dressed very conservatively. Sweater vest, button-down white shirt, khakis. Textbook conservative. He walks right up to us very eagerly and says with a huge, excited smile, "Hey, are you guys here from Beatup.com?" We just stare at him and say excuse me, what? "Beatup.com. Are you guys here from Beatup.com?" I look at my friend and I can tell she has no earthly idea what he's asking us either, so I say, "What is Beatup.com?" He tells us it's a website where people post where they're going to karaoke that night and anyone can join them. I say, "Oh, that sounds interesting, but no, we're not a part of that." His shoulders sink and he loses his smile and says, "Oh, ok," and slowly wanders away from our table. I tell my friend I'm so glad he explained what Beatup.com meant because I was thinking he was trying to tell us we looked beat up or something. She clarified for me that he was actually saying MEETup.com, not BEATup.com, but either way, weirdness.

We look around the room and now there are about 20 or so people there, and we are two of only four girls in the entire place. As we're discussing the math and what the means for the evening, a third guy comes up. This one is young, probably early twenties, and drunk as a skunk. It's only about 9:15 at this point, and this dude is LIT. He slurs something at us, almost knocks a drink off our table and then just stumbles away. Wow. We scan over to the other two girls to see if they're getting this same treatment, and they're talking with Mr. Beatup.com, shaking his hand. Ok, well at least mister internet guy found his posse. That's nice. The girls are dressed a little slutty, especially for a sports/karaoke bar, and they certainly look funny sitting with Mr. Sweater vest Beatup.com, but at least he's got some people to sit with.

Karaoke didn't start until about 9:30, and when it did, we thought we might get a break from the weirdos in the room. No such luck. Wave after wave of guys would walk up to us, creep us out, and then leave. Homeless guy in a suit came back 3 times. An what's funny is each time he walked up, I don't even think he remembered hitting on us before. The last time as he was walking up to us I just repeated out loud, "Please no please no please no." He waited for me to finish and then asked me if I wanted to dance with him. I looked at my friend in disbelief, looked back at him and said, "No." We looked at the other two girls again to see what ridiculousness they were going through, and it seemed their Meetup.com group was growing in size. They were still the only girls, but they had quite a few more guys. The one girl was awkwardly trying to sit on the other's lap in an attempt to be sexy or something, but it just looked uncomfortable. They were both way too drunk for it being so early, and Meetup.com was looking a little Beatup.com.

The guy I was dating finally showed up around 10:00pm. He got things situated up on the stage with the other KJ, and came over to say hi to me. He gave me a kiss, and then my friend and I quickly recapped our evening for him. As we're telling him, Homeless guy walks up to us again. My guy has just given me a kiss and is holding my hand as we're talking, and homeless guy asks me again if I want to dance with him. Again. Without flinching my guy cuts him off and says, "Are you trying to pick up my wife in front of me?" My first thought was to cover my left hand so he wouldn't see I wasn't wearing a ring, and then I realized this guy was so out of it, he wouldn't even think to look anyway. Homeless guy then all the sudden realizes that there's a man there now too and decided he needs to be best friends with my guy. My guy tells him that both the ladies at our table are spoken for, so leave us both alone. Thanks My Guy! I knew I was dating you for a reason! When Homeless guy leaves, my guy asks us how many times we've sung. None, we tell him. Still waiting. Which is weird because there are still only like 25 people in the whole room. Once my guy gets up to the stage, we finally get to sing, which is after all why we're there! While each of us is up, the one of us left at the table got hit with a constant wave of sub-par, beyond drunk, or mentally unstable suitors. As much as we liked singing, it was nice to be back sitting with each other so we didn't feel like lone prey in the wild. We check out the other two girls in the place and they are now standing in the middle of the group of guys, dancing with each other. The circle of guys around them are all glued to the girls and haven't noticed another thing around them. All we can think is, Awesome! That's like 10 guys that won't be hitting on us! Thanks trashy girls!

Around 10:30, we started talking about just leaving when Seth MacFarlane walks in. Seth MacFarlane is the guy who writes, produces, and does the voices for, among other things, Family Guy. Now we're in LA, so seeing someone famous isn't necessarily unusual, but seeing one of them karaoke is kind of a treat. Seth and his friend walk right up to the make-shift stage, say hi to the two KJs, and sit down at one of the tables that's on the stage. No one really seems to notice because the other two girls that were dancing together are now making out with each other, so why would anyone notice some guys walking in? We decide that seeing Seth sing in person might be worth hanging out just a little longer.

We keep waiting and waiting for Seth to sing. And nothing. His friend sang. Seth did not. Then it's our turn to get up and sing, and let me tell you how weird that was. Singing a song with a famous person about 5 feet away from you, staring at your back. Also, all the drunk guys were getting really bold now that they'd watched the girls make out, and it was getting more and more difficult to fight off the onslaught of slurring come-ons, so my friend and I pretty much kinda stayed on the stage with the other while we were singing for our own personal safety. After our songs, we knew it was time to go. If the entire cast of Family Guy showed up and did a full on choreographed production, it STILL wouldn't have been worth the constant harassment.

I say good night to my guy, and as we're leaving, some of the guys from the Beatup.com group stop us and ask where we're going. We're just going, we say. "Don't you want to get in on this?" one of them asks and points to the two girls still making out. "I think we're ok," is all I can say as we power walk away.

As soon as we leave the karaoke room, we're in the normal bar, and it is full of normal people. People just hanging out, eating nachos, drinking beers, laughing. We look back into the karaoke room and we suddenly feel like we somehow just escaped some alternate universe where all that was once good in the world has gone to die.

Later we found out that karaoke didn't take off at that bar. My friend and I just can't imagine why.

Thursday, May 6, 2010

Training a Puppy

I know I've been out of commission for a while here, but have no fear, there are still countless stories to be told!

There was a guy at another job I had that caught my eye, and I was pretty sure I had caught his. You know that fun, flirty time where there's a clear mutual attraction? We played around in that fun time for a while. We didn't necessarily have to see each other during work, but we'd make excuses to run into each other, and it was exciting.

After a few weeks of this, he asks me for my number. I'm thinking, Yay! Finally! As he's typing it into his phone he says to me, not even looking up from the phone, "You can come over to my place tonight." I can? Lucky me! Oh wait, I remember now. I'm not a whore. "No thank you," I say. He stops typing, looks up from the phone and asks, "What?" Apparently I'm the first woman in the world to turn down his stellar charm. "No thank you," I repeat. He stares at me questioningly, and after a pause he asks as if he's speaking in a foreign language, "Well, can I...call you later?" Aw, I feel like I'm training a puppy! "Yes, you can call me later," I tell him.

Work is busy and I don't see him much or hear from him at all, but about a week later I get a text from the puppy. "You should come over tonight." Whap on the nose with a newspaper. No. Bad puppy. My actual response was, "No thank you." "Aw, come on. Come over." Oh, ok. Now I'm sold. Maybe I need to be clearer. "When we go out, we'll go OUT, not in, so drop the 'come over to your place' thing." And to this I get no response.

About another week later I get another text. "Let's do dinner." Ok, well, I guess that's kind of asking me out. "Where?" I ask. He writes back, "If you drive up to my side of town, I'll buy, but if I have to drive to you, you buy." Whap on the nose! No! Bad puppy! "You either want to take me out or you don't. Sorry, no bargaining."

Now I'm not stupid. Normally at this point the guy would have blown all his chances with me. Well, if you don't know me, let me add in a little extra detail. I'm 6'1". This puppy happened to be 6'8". You just don't come across that many super tall guys, so I let a little more slide with him than I should have.

So he doesn't respond to that statement either. I know what you're thinking, this guy's a keeper, right? I know. About a week later, he sends me yet another text asking, "Can I please take you out to dinner? We'll go wherever you like and it's my treat." Well look at that. Good puppy! I tell him that would be great, and we decide to go out 7pm on Sunday night. He said he wanted to pick me up, and even though I don't normally let my dates pick me up for a first date, I'd worked so hard at turning him into an acceptable date that I didn't want to discourage his positive behavior. So against my better judgment I gave him my address and we were set for Sunday at 7pm.

Sunday afternoon at about noon I get a text from him that says, "I'll be there at 8." I write back, "Thanks for letting me know you'll be late, but can we aim for more like 7:30?" No response from him. About an hour later I send another text that says, "8 is a late start. Can you try for 7:30?"Nothing. Around 4pm I send a text, "When are you coming to pick me up?" "8." Mister conversational. Well gosh, I am really looking forward to this date.

I get ready, and I tend to be early for things, so I was ready around 7:40, with high hopes that he would still show up early since I was so clear that I would have preferred to go out earlier. No dice. 8:00 comes and goes, and I'm still just sitting up in my apartment all dolled up with nowhere to go. At 8:30, I start thinking, is he standing me up? I haven't heard a word from him since 4:00, so maybe he's just blowing me off. Most of the time, that would fall under the category of upsetting, but he had left a sour taste in my mouth I was actually happy with the thought of not going out.

At 8:40 I decide that it's jammie time. I change from my date clothes to my pajamas, wash my face and plop down on the couch for some Sunday night TV thinking about how this is probably a good thing.

At 9:15, I get a call from the puppy. "Hey, I'm downstairs, you can come out," like he showed up on time. No 'I'm sorry I'm late,' no 'I was stuck in traffic,' no nothing. No remorse and clearly no couth.

I reply, "You're over an hour late. Technically you're over 2 hours late because I didn't want to change from our original time of 7:00. I thought you were standing me up."

"Well I'm not. Come down stairs," he says.

"I'm not coming downstairs. I'm in my pajamas."

"What? Are you fucking kidding me? It took me 2 hours to get ready and you're not even coming down?!" Yeah, that's the ticket. Swear at your date before it starts.

I ask, "Why didn't you even call or text to say you were going to be late? I'm not..."

Click.

What? WHAT? He HUNG UP on me?! This fucking puppy just peed all over me! Who the hell hangs up on the person they want to take on a date? And what guy takes TWO hours to get ready? I'm a girl and even if I really really try to take a long time, I still only take about 1 1/2 hours to get ready. Maybe you should have been a man and gotten ready in 15-20 minutes like the rest of the known male universe and you wouldn't have been 2 hours late for our date!! I can't even imagine what the hell took him 2 hours to do, let alone why he would even advertise that it took him that long to get ready.

But I digress. He hung up on me! Wait, maybe he didn't. Maybe he or I dropped the call. I mean, a normal human being wouldn't actually show up an hour and 15 minutes late for a date with no notice and then hang up on the girl for asking why he didn't tell her he'd be late, right?

I call him back and it rings six times then goes to voicemail. Ok jerk wad, clearly this was not an accident or a dropped call. As his outgoing message was playing I was debating on whether or not to leave a message. Then I thought, well of COURSE I'm going to leave a message. I tell him he is one of the most disrespectful people I have known, who does he think he is hanging up on someone like a child throwing a tantrum, and do not ever call me again.

I hang up the phone and I am just fuming. What an unbelievable tool! Seriously. Who the fuck does he think he is?! I'm so beside myself that anyone could act so rude, I call one of my girlfriends to recap the whole thing. Maybe I'm missing something. I mean, really, how does anyone feel the have the right to act like that? Maybe I'm too inside the whole incident and I can't see some big flag saying why this behavior could possibly be acceptable. My friend is with her mom when I tell the story and they both agree, yes, he's a terrible human being and no, there's nothing I'm missing. He's just a major tool and all we can do is be happy this all happened before I went on the date so I didn't have to deal with this piece of shit for an entire evening.

At 10:00, my phone rings. I look and it's the god-forsaken puppy. I'm no longer angry, in fact I couldn't care less about this guy at this point, but an apology would still be nice to hear. I answer the phone, "Hello?" He responds, "Are you coming downstairs or what?"

???

Really? Really? You show up an hour and fifteen minutes late, you don't tell me you're running late, you hang up on me, I leave you a message saying to not call me again, and all of this tells you to wait outside for us to still go on the date?!?! What have you been doing in your car for the last 45 minutes you weirdo? If you really wanted to still go out, why would you not lead with an apology? Wouldn't have done him any good, but come on. What a ridiculous douche bag!

"No, what part of tonight made you think I was still going to..."

Click.

Yeah, that seems about right. I've always been a cat person anyway.

Saturday, April 17, 2010

Pick Up Put Downs

I'm traveling quite a bit this week, so in lieu of a long story, I'm going to take us through a handful of the pick up lines I've been lucky enough to hear in my life. All of the following can be read, A man walks up to me and says,



1) "Wanna thumb wrestle?" He holds his hand out to me as if I'm going to grab it and start thumb wrestling, waits as I just stare at him, and then follows it up with, "You probably would have beat me anyway." Waits again as he's just standing there staring at me and then says, "Thumb wrestle?"



2) "So how many kids do YOU have?"



3) "Oh my god, are you Drew Barrymore?!" to which I reply, "No, I'm not." "Oh, thank god," he says, "I hate her. She's so ugly. You're kinda hot though!" [what?]



4) (while "Kiss" from Prince is playing) "Hey, act your age not your shoe size." I stare blankly at him, and he laughs awkwardly, points up at a speaker and meekly says, "You know, like in the song?"



5) "Are you a hooker? Cuz I don't have any money, but I like you."



6) "I think you and I should get together and hang out in my mom's garage."

7) "You would not believe how much you look like my ex-girlfriend. I mean it! It's not even your look, it's the whole way you carry yourself. Man, you're just like her. Wow. Can I get your number?"

8) "My friend over there likes you, and by my friend over there, I mean me."

9) "What's your life about?"

10) "I bet your clothes look good. Oh, I mean they do look good, but they'd look better if they were dirty. No, that's not right. Dirty from the floor. They'd look good on the floor!!"

11) "Will your boyfriend over there beat me up if I hit on you, or is this cool?"

12) "I like hair." [Seriously, that's all he said. He didn't explain either.]

13) "Hey, did I tell you I'm in a band?" "Nope, this is the first time we've ever spoken." "Well I am. Hot, right?"

14) "I heard you karaoke that last song. I've heard better, but you weren't that bad I guess. Want to come sit at my table?"

15) "It's my birthday tonight, so I think you have to give me a kiss right now."

16) [My favorite] A guy asked me my name 4 times in a row, and when I told him he couldn't be that interested in me because he couldn't even remember my name, he holds out his left hand palm up and writes K A T E, one letter on each of this fingers, and then draws an arrow on his thumb, points his thumb at me, reads his hand, looks up at me and shouts, "KATE!" like a child who just passed a test at school.

Just a taste of what's out there folks. Another story to come next week!

Thursday, April 8, 2010

Arrogance at its Finest

When I started online dating, I decided to really try and screen out the really bad ones. After a particularly bad date, there was a new guy I was interested in, and he was interested in me. We started chatting and we got along really well. He asked me out on a date right away, but I wanted to wait just a little longer because I wanted to get a better feel for who he was before we actually met up. I put it all out there and specifically told him why I wanted to wait, and he totally understood and was A-Ok with waiting. He told me just to let him know whenever I was ready to meet up. So we emailed alot, which evolved to texting alot, which evolved to calling alot. I'd get those super cute -thinking of you- messages on my phone and it would totally brighten my day each time I got one. In hindsight, it was all cutesy stuff and nothing of substance, so my waiting to learn more about him was all for not.

After about 2-3 weeks, I decided that this one passed my screening and we were all clear for a first date. On our next phone call, I let him know I'd be up for a date if he still was. Of course! he says, and he couldn't be happier. Yay for a new first date. We decide on the restaurant and to meet there next Friday at 7:00pm.

I show up at about 6:55pm and wait. He walks up around 7:10pm (I know it's not that late, but seriously guys. How hard is it to show up on time?! Or at least call or text to say you'll be late?!), and when he makes eye contact with me, this guy who's been SO sweet to me for the last couple weeks literally rolls his eyes, looks down, and then laughs to himself shaking his head as if to say, "joke's on me."

At this point in my life, I'd been online dating for a while. I'd been on more than enough dates to know my pictures and my profile display who I am to a T. My flaws, my good traits, everything is there, so I'm trying to figure out what it is he wasn't expecting from me aesthetically because we still have yet to speak to each other. I mean, whatever it is must be huge because he didn't even try to hide his disappointment. Well, now I know that he's a dick who's more than ok with being rude to people's faces.

So all this is going through my head as we walk up to each other. I extend my hand to greet him and say, "Hi, I'm Kate." His response is, "Of course you are," as if he were following through on a bet he lost. Excuse me? Who the fuck are you? Now that we're up close I can see that regardless of whatever he thinks is wrong with me, he's about three inches shorter than he claimed to be (which is a big deal when you're a 6'1" girl like myself. Him going from 6'0" in his profile to 5'9" in real life is to say the least, unexpected), and he was balding quite severely. All his pictures online showed him with hats on, and now I can see that was to hide his balding. I don't even mind balding, so I would have been ok with it if he'd been up front. I get that some guys are insecure about it (don't be btw!) and I appreciate trying to downplay something you're don't feel 100% comfortable with, but I would have been pissed if I wasn't ok with bald guys. ANYWAY, again, this is all running through my head as I'm trying to figure out what disappointed him about me. Maybe he thought I was lying about my height too and he was disappointed I was really tall? Whatever. I can tell right now this isn't going to work, but if he's going to insult me to my face, I'm going to get a free dinner out of it.

We get seated in the restaurant and I take a look at the menu. He doesn't open his and I ask him if he already knows what he's getting. He tells me he always gets the same thing, and then just starts rambling from there while I look at my own menu. I'm only half paying attention because what I'm hearing is he's somehow trying to impress me with how rich his parents are. Way to put your best foot forward dude. Your best quality has absolutely zero to do with you. Awesome. Where is the really nice guy I'd get text messages from and talk to on the phone?? After a lull in his monologue, he asks me if I know what I'm going to get to eat. I tell him I don't know, it all looks so good, and he replies somewhat under his breath, "I'll bet it does." What? What does that mean? Just as he says this the server walks up and asks us for our orders, so I didn't get to ask him right then and there what the deal is. I order, so does he. While we're waiting, I'm in no mood for conversation but this guy just keeps going on and on about his parents and how well connected they are in LA. I finally get that he's fishing for me to ask him who they are, but you know what? Not gonna ask ya, buddy. Couldn't care less. I don't care if your parents are Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson, it's not going to make me like you any more.

Our food comes and as we're eating, he just keeps bragging about god knows what. He's just so arrogant, I feel like there's a cloud of his ego settling on the table like summer smog sits on the city. I look at my food and realize, I'm just done with this whole situation and not in the mood to eat anymore. When the waiter walks by, I ask him for a box for my food. Arrogant Jerk asks me if my food is ok, and I say yes, my eyes were just bigger than my stomach. "I doubt that," he says again somewhat under his breath. What?? WHAT?!! Are you fucking kidding me? This whole attitude is because he thinks I'm fat??? "Excuse me?" I say. "Oh, nothing. Not worth repeating," he said. "I heard you the first time, and you're right, it is NOT worth repeating. I'm wondering why you felt you needed to say that to my face," I say, fighting back the desire to just start crying right then and there. I'm by no means petite. I'm not any variation of thin, but I'm certainly nowhere near having someone tell me to my face I'm fat. I am 100% sure every picture in my profile showed me EXACTLY how I look, so for someone I had come to trust to an extent make a jab like that, it's really hard not to get distraught. When he saw how upset this has made me, he said, "Oh, no, see the thing is, I just normally don't date really fat girls. It's nothing against you." OH! Thanks for clearing that up. Nothing against me. I feel SO great now. I don't want to stick my fork in your eye at all.

The server comes back with my food in a box and puts it on the table. Classless Arrogant Jerk looks at the box and tells me, "So now that that whole weight thing is on the table, if you want to eat the rest of your food now instead of when you get home, that's ok with me." Seriously? Is this a joke? I don't get it. "I know the drill. Take home half your food so your date doesn't think you're pigging out? Don't worry, I won't judge." Holy balls. Seriously, who the fuck is this guy?! Are people really this mean in real life? Then he starts chuckling and says, "I mean, you can't possibly be full yet." Yeah, ok. No more welling up with tears. I'm not upset anymore. Just mad.

Now as I've said before, my parents have raised me to be a lady. They've also raised me to stand up for myself, and sometimes those two do not go hand in hand so you have to choose. I stood up, walked over to his side of the table and leaned over to get right in his stupid, still chuckling face. I looked him straight in the eye and said in a low, calm, and painfully sweet tone of voice, "I don't normally date short men who've lost most of their hair before the age of 25. It's nothing against you though," then with two fingers, I casually pushed my to go box of food off the table and in to his lap as I walked away. Lady-like? Probably not, but it was the best I'd felt all evening.

Wednesday, March 31, 2010

It's Not You, It's Me. Really Really Me.

I've had alot of very...unusual dates, but as much as I want to pretend I'm supreme perfect princess of the world and bad dates just happen to me, in all fairness they aren't always the guys' fault. I am not just willing to admit when it's me who's the nut job, I'm willing to write about it.

There was a guy at work who had a thing for me. I was in my own little world and didn't realize it at all. Sure, I knew he thought I was cool, but I didn't get that he was crushing. We'd chat over our cubicle walls, grab a quick lunch together, make silly jokes, etc. Totally a subtle friend thing in my head. At one point we were talking about a movie that was out, he asked if I wanted to go see it with him. I said sure, and then he said we could get dinner too. I said um, yeah, that sounds good. When he walked away, my girl friend who shared a different cubicle wall popped her head over and told me I just said yes to a date with Mr. Subtle! I did? Are you sure? Yup, you and Mr. Subtle are going on a date!!

Well I hadn't thought about him in that way but then I thought, what the heck. It couldn't hurt. I'll give it a shot and see where it goes. This was long before my rule about meeting for the first date had been set, so since I lived right next to the movie theater Mr. Subtle came over to my place and then I drove us to the theater since I knew the area better. The theater was in one of those strips where there's lots of restaurants and shops in the area with one main drag and lots of turn-offs for parking. We drove around, looking and looking for a place to park. Each turn-off was packed and I had to keep getting back on the main drag. Just at the end was a stop sign and a busy street where you could turn to get on main roads and go back around to start from the beginning to look for parking again. It was a Friday night, so traffic was pretty heavy. Well, as I came up to the stop sign at the end of the road, the car behind me rear-ends us. It wasn't too too bad, so I didn't want to get out and look right there because of how it would hold up traffic. I checked with Mr. Subtle and he was ok, and so was I. I saw a gas station literally right next to us on the right so I pointed at it out my car window and the lady who hit me gave me the ok sign with her hand out hers. As I turned into the gas station, this bitch just blew past the gas station and hauled her ass away.

So this is the part where I can only assume Mr. Subtle is writing his own story about me somewhere.

Clearly this lady didn't realize she had hit someone who wasn't going to take this lying down. With little to no regard for the situation, I believe my exact words were, "Aw HELL no," and I peeled out after her. I think in one fluid motion as I hit the gas I pulled my cell phone out and threw it at Mr. Subtle and told him to call the police. I didn't even look at his face because I was not about to take my eyes off the car I was following, but based on the tone of his voice I'm pretty sure he was scared for his life. Crazy Lady Who Rear Ended Me had of course now spotted me following her and she is cutting through traffic like crazy trying to lose me. Crazy Lady underestimated me again. I myself am quite capable of doing the very same maneuvers sweetheart, so game on bitch! She's still just a couple cars in front of us and is desperately hoping I'm going to give up. Again, it's busy Friday night traffic, so we both have our work cut out for us. I hear Mr. Subtle on the phone with the police and he's trying to explain what happened. As he's explaining, I hear, "...yes, she hit us and then took off...no, we didn't get a license plate number before she took of, but we're trying now...how?...oh, we're um, we're trying to tail her now..." at which point I said something to the effect of, "Trying my ass. I'm not letting this bitch get away," and hit the gas. I then hear, "...no, she says she's not going let, um, the other car get away...yeah, I don't know..." And as if Crazy Lady could hear this, she started weaving in and out of oncoming traffic to pass cars where traffic was slower. So what did I do? Well the same thing of course! OK, that's not totally true. I considered it. I even made one faint attempt to get into the oncoming traffic lane but quickly swerved back into my proper lane. You know why? SHE'S the Crazy Lady, not me. I've only temporarily lost it. This other bitch is nuts. So as she swerved in and out of oncoming traffic, I couldn't help but lose her.

In all of this super speedy, traffic-weaving insanity, we'd only gotten the first 3 letters of her license plate, the fact that it was a forest green Mazda, and it had the front smashed in a little from the accident. Mr. Subtle, who was currently white knuckling the bar on the door, told me the police told us to go to a parking lot and wait for them to get there so maybe we should go there. I finally pull over and we get out and look at the car and luckily there's almost no damage. What's funny is if she had just pulled over in gas station, I would have looked at my car and said it's fine, if you don't want to report this let's just go on our way. We waited there and after about 45 minutes, I saw that stupid ass Crazy Lady driving down the street again! That same street where the theater and the restaurants were! Who returns to the scene of a crime just to hang out on a Friday night?!? I wouldn't have even known it was her except for the front of her car was smashed in. I was so angry I just started running after her, which she saw and bolted out of there again. I'm not sure what I my big plan was if I had caught up to her. Kick out a taillight? Just get her plate number? Drag her out of the car and kick her? Probably just the plate thing, and walking would have been a much better plan because I wouldn't have drawn attention to myself, but running at her seemed to make sense at the time. I walked back to Mr. Subtle and my car in defeat and said, "Let's just go. It's not worth waiting anymore," to which he replied in complete and total seriousness, "You're not just saying that so you can chase her again, are you?"

PS. We never did see the movie that night, but either he had a high threshold for crazy or I just wear it well, because he asked me out again the next week.