Shamelessly Mining the Google Searches. Again.

I hate to shamelessly mine the Google searches that have landed people here, but when people arrive here having used the search words, "slutty pumpkins", what the heck is a gal to do?!?!? Besides, how do you even know if your pumpkin IS slutty? Do the pumpkins tell you themselves after you've carved them a face?

I had a search recently for "orthopedic bodily functions". What does that even mean? I suggest stopping by a blog that's a little more medical in nature.

I still get searches wondering who should call during dating. And I continue to insist that it's the man's job. The man should do ALL the calling.

Now it happens that I do call The-Guy-Who-Knows-A-Song-About-A-Chicken these days, but that's only because I live with him. Up until moving in together though, I'm certain it's the man's job to do all the calling. Except, a friend did tell me once that an engagement ring also serves as license to call a man.

So, shacking up and/or engaged and the women get to call. Otherwise, still the guy's job in my book.

Somebody searched "What do I do if I'm dating a guy that does cocaine all the time." Obviously this person was a day late and a dollar short for my best dating advice: don't date cokeheads.

I got this search: "i ran over a dead armadillo can i get leprosy." Now I don't know a heck of a lot about leprosy, besides the fact that it's hard to spell. But I'm going out on a limb here by saying that unless your driving is REALLY unconventional, most of the germs from what you drive over end up on the tires, not on your body.

"Untouched boobs" isn't coming up quite as often as it used to, although predictably "vibrating boobs" is coming up in the ranks.

Way more people want to know about lips than boobs though, specifically "sun burnt lips" and "pictures of sun burnt lips." LOTS and LOTS of people want to know about sun burnt lips.

I hate to disappoint half the free world (or at least that portion of the free world that is landing here having sought pictures of sun burnt lips), but sun burnt lips look pretty much the same as regular lips. They just feel sort of puffy and raw. They could be a little more red I guess, who knows.

So that's the best I have to offer here at Google-Searches-R-Us, folks! The picture at the top of my cat making yoga toes, by the way, has absolutely nothing to do with this post. I just thought the post should have a picture. And, y'know...a picture of sun burnt lips wouldn't really have looked any different than a picture of regular lips.

Smile God Loves You

I took this picture because I liked how the optimism of this sign contrasted with the total devastation of the neighborhood. I couldn't quite capture it adequately, but I did get hit on by two different guys while I was taking the picture.

One asked if I would take his picture, and when I didn't take him up that, he asked if I wanted to go home in his truck. The other guy merely called out something unintelligible and blew kisses from the window of his car.

So of course I told The-Guy-Who-Knows-A-Song-About-A-Chicken that I was coming back to that neighborhood for an ego boost if he ever dumped me for a younger woman. But he said that was never going to happen and that he can barely keep up with me as it is. So acting immature for one's age has an upside, apparently.

At least now I recognize being hit on for what it is. When I very first got divorced this guy was talking to me during a religious program and I was all, "Why is this guy TALKING to me?!?! Doesn't he know we can't hear the program?!?!?!?" And I was literally handing him my phone number before I realized what had happened.

I still beat out my blogging friend Ms. Q, who says she was actually on a date with a guy before she realized what had happened. And even then it was only because he told her. During the date.

Older Gal says she doesn't recognize being hit on at all. And I know this to be true, because awhile back we were at the sushi counter and the kid preparing the sushi was asking HER all kinds of questions about roe.

It's not like I'm any kind of expert or anything. But I'm thinking that if a guy who prepares sushi for a living and has the option of tasting roe day in and day out is asking a customer all kinds of questions about roe, he's probably interested in...well...something besides roe.

Right. So what was the point of this post? Oh yeah - God loves you, even if you live in a crappy neighborhood. And if a guy is asking you all kinds of questions about things that he should know the answer to or is trying to get you into his truck, then he's probably hitting on you. Or wants to kidnap and murder you. One or the other.

It's Okay to Drink in the Streets

I mean, it's totally illegal in most of the country, but it's OKAY! You shouldn't feel ashamed or anything if you do it.

All right already! So I took the picture in New Orleans where it actually IS legal to drink in the streets. Still, I wanted to provide this public service announcement so that street drinkers the world over can keep some semblance of self esteem. I'm Okay, You're Okay and all that...

Which brings me to my second, totally unrelated point: you gotta love a guy who uses a propane torch to scramble eggs. Or I do, at any rate. It didn't actually occur to me to question why scrambling eggs would necessitate a trip to the garage, but he came back with this stuff:It turned out he wanted the propane torch to roast a pepper. See?YES! In case you're wondering, the rest of him is every bit as cute as that one arm would lead you to believe. But for some unfathomable reason, he doesn't appreciate me publishing his picture to the internet. Still, he makes great scrambled eggs. And he uses a propane torch. What more could you want from a guy?

The Boobies of Washington

My daughter's bat mitzvah is this coming weekend, so that means I spent three straight days on the telephone last week.

It also meant three hours in a mall with a child that hates shopping as much as I do. Here's what she lacks that I had at her age though: the ability to open a door to a clothing store and say without taking a single step inside, "I don't like anything here."

So for a break Razor took me to see the boobies of Washington DC.

Well really he brought me there to meet his mom and aunt and cousins and brother, but the side benefit was that we got to tour the boobies of his youth. Here's Razor's mom in the boobie room of the Market Inn having dinner:Actually, I cropped out Razor's mom because y'know, of that bothersome privacy stuff. It's too bad you can't even see the boobies all that well in that picture, because for some reason my camera automatically focuses on people's faces. Somebody could maybe make a killing selling a camera that automatically focuses in on the boobs.

But that's okay, because this room was FULL of nakey women. Here's Razor next to one of them:Except, I cropped him out for the same reason I cropped out his mom.

We also saw the boobies of the Arlington Memorial Bridge:At least, I think it was the Arlington Memorial Bridge. The point is, Razor likes his bridges with boobies. And I like bridges in general. So it was a nice trip.

But now I have to get back to pretending I started planning this bat mitzvah thing when all the other moms started. That would have been two years ago when I first received the date in the mail instead of last week...

So This Is It

Believe it or not, this mixing bowl is why it's totally impossible to stay irritated at Razor/the Guy Who Knows a Song about a Chicken for even fifteen seconds:You know how when someone comes over and you're like, "Well, he's not here yet. I get a chance to put away my dirty socks before he sees my sorry excuse for housekeeping."

And then like ten or fifteen more minutes go by and your like, "Let's see, do I start some serious cleaning or do I just settle in with a book and try to pretend to be one of those relaxed kind of people?"

So then you start reading blogs instead. But every single time the cat jumps up about some godforsaken piece of fluff you told the kids to throw away three days ago, y'know how you have to stop and figure out if the cats are trying to use their supersonic hearing to tell you someone's coming up the stairs?

But then no matter how many times they jump up it turns out that the piece of fluff really was the cats' main concern and that they don't actually care if anyone's climbing the steps or not.

So you think you'll call up a friend and chat, but realize that it's too late to call and even if you did you'd mostly likely have to cut the conversation short because surely he's about to waltz through the door any ole' second.

So you go back to reading for awhile. But then it occurs to you that maybe turning on the cell phone would be a good idea because maybe, God forbid, he's in a ditch or a hospital somewhere. Or as my cousin and dad explained once, he could have been an explosion that blew off both his hands so he couldn't dial a phone.

And you remind yourself that it never turns out that the men are in a ditch OR have both their hands blown off. It always just turns out that they were totally convinced that time would bend or stretch out for them JUST THIS ONE TIME. Occasionally it turns out that the cell phone ran out of battery.

So then you turn on the phone and it turns out he HAS been trying to call.

And when you call back he says something about the possibility of you being asleep by the time he gets there and you're all thinking, "WHAT?!?! I've been sitting here analyzing every last noise in the apartment complex (not to mention my cats' motives for attacking fluff) for the past hour and I'm going to fall asleep when you're twenty minutes away?!?! None for me thanks!!!!!" But your better judgment takes over just for a split second and all you say is, "I'm awake."

So then you decide it's a great time to get some vacuuming done. Because why wouldn't 11:00 at night be the perfect time to vacuum?!?

But then you get this idea in your head that maybe he mentioned falling asleep because he's really thirty or forty minutes away and not twenty. So you call up to make sure but then hang up on him after one ring because for some reason your rational side takes over just in the nick of time...

No? That doesn't happen to you? Is all that just me then? Ok, because I thought everyone was as impatient as I am.

Something VERY similar happened to me recently, but when Razor/The Guy Who Knows A Song About A Chicken DID show up, he arrived with the above pictured glass mixing bowl. Did I mention I broke my favorite mixing bowl awhile back and had wished for a replacement just the previous morning?

I mean seriously folks, how can you even attempt to stay irritated with a guy like that?!?!?!? It's just not even possible.

On Helping People Decide Whether or not to Steal Condoms

I'm still fascinated by the google searches that find this blog. I feel like I might possibly be helping out the umpteen searches I get per day for chapter books, picture books and the like. But I'm less certain how helpful I can be to the people who searched for these:

Tampon eating
Tampon munching
To both of you, I'm going to say I think they'd be a little dry.

stealing condoms
I’ve already stated my opinion on stealing condoms: Steal them. Do the human race a favor and steal some condoms if you are so inclined. Please.

i always do all the calling
If you're the guy, you SHOULD do all the calling! I've explained my reasoning several times over, but in my opinion the phone calls are the guy's job. The gal's job is to glance at the phone now and again as if it's betrayed her and wonder why you haven't called.

heroine addict personality
I really only feel qualified to give advice on dating coke heads. I apparently don't even recognize a heroine addict even when I talk to him extensively about xanax, or whatever the heck it was Shannon had to offer. Actually, I'm not all that great at recognizing the coke heads in a timely fashion either.

sugar booty
I don't know what “sugar booty” is, but I’m wondering if it’s related to “booty balls”, a product my friend Laurie added to my shopping list recently while I wasn’t looking. I went ahead & added it to the shopping list of the-guy-who-knows-a-song-about-a-chicken while HE wasn’t looking too, because whatever the heck they are, it sounds like you could never have too many...as opposed to:

hair booty
I don't know what hair booty is either, but it sounds a whole lot less appetizing than the sugar booty.

This is a picture of an Alcoholics Anonymous (Unidos Venceremos) right next door to a liquor store. My dad asked about it when he went into the liquor store one day. The guy at the counter shrugged and said, "We were here first."
This picture is at the request of my 12 year old Cassie, who thought all the beer bottles next to a sign about it being illegal to drink would be funny. I'm not really all that great at making those arrows, but for her sake I did my best:

Just to Clear Things Up

As talented as that cat 'o mine is, he did NOT send flowers! The photo shows him merely inspecting them to make sure they are of a certain quality (they are). It's the-guy-who-knows-a-song-about-a-chicken who sent the flowers!

The cat is very talented at weighing himself and imitating a water bottle. He also has incredible aim when it comes to tossing various objects into the toilet. But as of yet he has no access to a credit card and has not ordered me any flowers.

This photo is just to prove that as ugly as Houston is, it still has its moments (I mean besides the fact that it's 63 degrees out at 10:00 at night in February). I took this while driving to work the other day. I should have stopped the car, I imagine, so it wouldn't have come out so crooked:

So anyway, one more happy Valentine's day and remember, don't give your cat access to your credit card! It's sure fire trouble if you do!

It's Chocolate Day Again!

I got a Valentine from a cat today. This may seem odd, but Sugar actually sends mail to my kids while they're at camp too. He hates putting his paw into the ink pad, but I think what really gets his goat is that he can't address the envelope by himself. My daughter had to help him out on that one, and you know how cats are about their independence.

Let me tell you, it's entirely possible that I gave some wrong advice the last time I wrote about dating. My exact words were "Don't try it!" I always say the only thing I know for certain is that I don't know anything for certain. So, y'know...I could have called that one wrong. Here's Sugar inspecting the flowers I got for Valentine's Day:


Now, since I only tried online dating for ten days, only gave my phone number out to two guys, and only went on a date with one of the two, I'm probably not qualified to give advice on online dating.

But then again, I got exactly what I requested: a guy who knows a song about a chicken AND a song about whiskey, who calls frequently but not enough to be considered stalker material, who is willing to eat outside now and again, and a harmless yet demented sense of humor. So maybe I am qualified. You choose.

If I am qualified to be dispensing advice, more or less this is what I've got: Date a guy who really CAN come up with a song about a chicken! They just don't make 'em better than that.

Thank you again for the wishes for my grandfather and happy Valentine's Day everyone! Since I haven't figured out a way to put real chocolate at the end of the post or transmit it over the internet, here's a Valentine for everyone via Roger at Idaho Daily Photo!

Have I ever mentioned how graceful I am?

Since Disa requested more information about the guy who knew a song about a chicken, I decided to go ahead and oblige. It turns out I'm a total sucker for a guy in jeans and a white t-shirt, too. Now let me tell you WHY he had on an undershirt. The reason is, when you're scrubbing the daylights out of your car carpeting because of an unfortunate accident...or two...or three...and you live in Texas where it's still in the low 80s during late November, two shirts might be one layer too many.


In case you were wondering if there's anything better looking than a guy in jeans and a white t-shirt, let me just tell you that there is: it's a guy in jeans and a white t-shirt who is laughing his boohonkus off at the fact that you've flooded the floorboard of his practically new car with an entire cup of chocolate syrup and milk filled coffee.

I don't know a whole lot about a whole lot, but I'm thinking there's probably something to be said for a guy who finds that particular scenario hilarious instead of disastrous, especially considering I practically blinded him for life earlier that very same day by sticking my thumb into his eye. And, in case you're wondering if eyeballs are as wet and gooshy as they seem like they'd be, they are.

Here's the sign I was stopping to take a picture of when I seemed to suddenly decide that practically blinding a guy was not sufficient to reveal his true character and that I should cover as much of his car in liquid as possible. Did I mention that I also tossed a water bottle with a loose lid into the back seat?

I thought it was a good sign, even though we were going the other way.

Happy Thanksgiving! Hoping you're all enjoying dead bird today! This one's for you, Saradevil:

Well, I can't find an Alice's Restaurant that can be embedded in its entirety, but at least here's a link!

On the second thought, I do have dating advice

So, thanks to the online dating world, I’ve been seeing this guy who actually does know a song about a chicken. It happens that he has a 19 year old daughter who claims he’s “Twipply Skwood” (or "triply screwed" as pronounced by a seven year old if you're still wondering). But I’m fairly certain he has to be doing something okay in her eyes, ‘cause she’s willing to spend a pretty fair chunk of time with him.

All I wanted to do when I was 19 was see skip college classes and date cokeheads. Have I mentioned that I’m an EXCELLENT role model?!?!?!?!? After all, I know where all the best body piercing studios are.

I said on one blog post that this is not the place to find actual dating advice, but I was mistaken. I have some really valuable dating advice for every young adult on the planet:

DON'T DATE COKEHEADS!

They lie a lot and then tend to either die or go to jail. Besides, I’ve heard that coke decreases sex drive, so who wants to bother with that?

I say, wait until sex feels like a chore because you’ve been married for umpteen years and you're exhausted because your husband rarely helps with housework or parenting and still expects you to work full time and THEN encourage him to start using coke. I’M KIDDING!!!!!!!!!! I am totally and completely against the use of cocaine. I mean, why bother when beer is legal and all?

Despite being infatuated with cokeheads during my late teens, I’ve never had even the slightest interest in actually using cocaine. I’m not really sure what the draw is, although as popular as it is there must be some advantage or another. Perhaps it’s desirable for people who aren’t as naturally caffeinated as I am.

All that said, I absolutely LOVE music about cocaine. Who wouldn’t? I mean, there’s such a variety:

Townes Van Zandt - Cocaine Blues
Jackson Browne – Cocaine
The Grateful Dead - Aren’t most of theirs drug songs?
Eric Clapton - of course
Johnny Cash - Cocaine Blues (but a different song by the same title than the Townes Van Zandt song)
The Old Crow Medicine Show - Cocaine Habit and Tell it to Me

And those are just songs about cocaine that I can think of right off the top of my head. I’m sure there are plenty of songs with drug references that I don’t get since I don’t do drugs. And there are probably also a number of songs I will think up fifteen seconds after posting this. I actually hope to see more show up in the comment section.

By the way, in addition to being pro-songs-about-cocaine, I am also still in favor of skipping as many college lecture classes as possible if the material is easy enough to learn without going to class. Kidding!!!!! Okay, only partially kidding. Sorry David and Matt and parents the world over. Did I mention that I’m an excellent role model?

One final note: since I truly am getting at least two Google searches a day looking for motorized, ride on beer coolers, I've set up a link on the side bar! Say "Hi" to Martin from me!

Online (Up)dating

Since finding out that I can occasionally sort of tell how people find this blog, I've been fascinated with how they make their way here. Lately the majority of the google searches are for dating information. I only have three words for you people:

Don't try it!!!!!!!

Dating is bound to end in either crying or marriage, and if divorce statistics are to be believed, marriage also ends in crying a great deal of the time. I'm kidding! But only partially so.

I happen to know exactly what I don't want from dating, and not actually a whole lot about what I do want:

• I don't want to ending up doing some guy's laundry or washing his dishes after dating for however long that entails.
• I don't want some guy telling me that (having already adequately fed my children) I can't spend my last $15 on a CD instead of food.
• I don't want anyone telling me that I can't go to Lola's, although I'd be okay with a guy telling me it was out of bounds to kiss a bald Spaniard while I was there.

I'm kidding! But only because Etro is actually a more popular hang out for bald Spaniards.

That said, I've already learned this much about online dating: It's every bit as absurd as the rest of life. For instance, the site I signed up for has an option for sending a "flirt." I believe these "flirts" offer a selection of canned phrases, all of which roughly translate to:

"Hey! I'm interested in your profile, but not interested enough to compose my own sentence!"

They should really nix the canned flirts in favor of canned rejection. I need one that says:

"I didn't read your message yet, but I'll get back with you the next time I get a wild hair and think a bunch of potential rejection and crying would be right up my alley."

or even

"Thank you so much, but I have a date to go hear Hayes Carll, and Porterdavis isn't until next month."

Since they don't actually offer an anti-flirt though, I'm sort of just living with the guilt of a bunch of unread messages. What was I thinking? I can barely keep up with the emails from people I actually know.

I did manage to give my phone number to two guys. One of them was pretty obvious. Out of the messages I managed to read, he was the only guy who actually came up with a song about a chicken. Besides, he had a music reference in his very first sentence and books in his picture background, so how could I not?

I gave my phone number to one other guy, because he's a member of an outdoor club, and that sounded interesting. But when he called he told me that he was selling his jukebox! I can't date a guy who would hang onto all kinds of who knows what, yet sell a perfectly operable jukebox! I mean, technically I COULD, but it sounds like guaranteed misery. No pun intended. Or pun intended. Either way.

Besides, he told ME to call HIM! I don't do that. He apparently neglected to notice that I specifically requested borderline stalking behavior from a guy who enjoys songs about chickens (or whiskey)!

Meanwhile, if you're up for actual dating advice, I think you'll have to look elsewhere. Since I'm also getting a fair amount of searches for the word "naked" these days, let me just say that I'm afraid I won't be much help on that front either. I CAN, however, put you in touch with a guy who sells motorized ride on beer coolers.

Motorized Coolers, Dancin' Naked, I don't actually have a great title for this one

A friend (whom I've referred to as "coach" in the past) moved in across the courtyard from me a week ago. Thus far he's been good natured about being blog fodder, even when I've gone so far as to discuss his homophobia or lack thereof. For whatever it's worth, his level of homophobia doesn't seem excessive, though it may just be that I'm oblivious.

My point is, I'm relatively certain that he won't mind reading about himself again, as long as I don't post a picture of him riding a motorized-ride-on-beer cooler. I will post a picture of MYSELF on a motorized-ride-on-beer cooler though, since you asked:


OK! I know no one asked! But in general when I make statements like that, someone asks. The smiling yet slightly nervous guy in the background is Martin, the owner of the cooler. I can't imagine why he looked nervous, aside from the fact that he kept informing me that the cooler did, in fact, have brakes...I guess 13 miles an hour could seem speedy when a total stranger is racing away aboard your livelihood.

In any case, it turns out that when I look out my window, coach's window is in my direct line of sight. Because I don't know the first thing about wireless internet, I spend arguably too much time between my bed and the wall with my feet propped up against said window. It is an odd feeling to be on the phone with someone who can witness your eccentricities as you discuss them.

Another friend said that it would be cool to have him for a neighbor, that coach is "really nice". But, she informed me, I would have to be careful about dancing naked in my room. Which is a serious bummer, 'cause if a gal can't dance naked in the privacy of her own room, where the heck can she?!?!?

DON'T ANSWER THAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I don't actually want to know anyone's thoughts on appropriate locations for dancing nakey...it was bad enough just finding out that "activity partner" may not mean exactly what I thought it meant!

That said, me and Denise do all our best dance moves before seven a.m. And just for the record, I am TOTALLY dressed! Denise on the other hand...

I actually don't have anything to worry about. Coach spends all of seventeen seconds a week not at work. Just kidding all you crazy stalkers out there! He actually spends the majority of his time polishing his gun collection while gazing out his back window!

Fruits, Nuts and Dates (or lack thereof)

I surprised my friend Melissa last summer (and myself) by saying this to her:

...and that's why the phone message I might have left you may or may not have been intentionally vague.

Once her laughter subsided, Melissa told me that they should slap that right on my tombstone since I practically defined my personality (if not my very existence) by using those words sequenced just so.

Due to that conversation and a couple others, I decided that maybe I should take the word "straightforward" off my dating profile. Who do I think I'm kidding? Half the time I can't even figure out my point.

I've changed my response on the perfect first date question from, "Is this a trick question?" to:

Is this a trick question? Just in case: the perfect first date includes alcohol. I don't see any reason (recovering alcoholics and teetotalers notwithstanding) that either person should have to endure undue anxiety.

I can see the potential suitors lining up even as I type! "Here's a gal who knows how to self medicate in a socially acceptable manner! She's the one for me by golly!" Yep.

I almost want to change the "I am looking for" section (which gives options like a date, marriage, a long term relationship, etc.) to include "activity partner." I mentioned to Ms.Q that my friends would most likely be deliriously happy if I quit trying to drag them to see live music and instead found an "activity partner."

They'd probably be equally as happy if I found someone to eat outside with me now and then. I'm sure my friends are tired of explaining to me each and every time we eat somewhere with outdoor tables that they don't actually like to sweat. I have to admit I don't see what the big deal is about sweating. It's not like getting a tattoo; it comes off in the shower. Sweat seems like a small price to pay for getting to be outside, but what do I know.

In any case, I'm not adding "activity partner" to my list of requests at the moment (Edited to add: especially after being informed via the comment section that the term could have other connotations!!). I doubt I have it in me to distinguish between guys who would answer "yes" if I wanted to go rollerblading and guys who want to date. It seems like an unnecessary hassle and too much emotional upheaval to make the distinction.

Then again, it might offer an easy out, as in "Would you like to not enjoy this activity with me again sometime?"

***Pictures and Stuff***

Who needs an "activity partner" when you have kids, anyway? I don't know whether it's just the venue or what, but both times we've seen Michael Fracasso, (who's awesome by the way, if you like acoustic/folk type stuff) people were determined to throw money at my boy. This time Christi gave him two dollars for eating three limes in one minute:

Here's a picture for Roger. It's the middle of the day with almost no traffic, so you can't tell that the tractor is meandering along one of the larger boulevards in Houston. It's sort of a crooked shot, because I was trying to drive and roll down the window and operate the camera all at the same time, but the clouds still look neat:


And last but not least, this one is for Frogger:

If You Hear Your Phone not Ringing

I finally signed up for an internet dating service. That would be the dating service which presumably features local men, as opposed my "starter dating site" which exclusively featured men from the actual soil of the country of Turkey.

It's still sort of a niche site I guess you could say, as evidenced by the fact that I already knew or at least had met two out of the first three people who stalked me. Still, I figure pretty soon I should try being the stalker instead of the stalk-ee.

I'm pretty sure my answers to the canned questions read: "emotional train wreck waiting for a dangerous intersection" but what the heck...I can only be who I am.

That's not true of everyone, however. A teacher at my school heard from a friend that people can fake a personality for up to 90 days. After 90 days apparently one's true colors can't help but show. Inventing and maintaining a personality even for 90 days sounds like too much hassle for me though. I figure I'm better off with my neurosis laid right out on the table.

I thought I should have been able to expand on some of the questions where the only option was to check boxes. For instance, I checked off some music types, but there were so many categories missing from that list. And why is there no distinction between liking Delta Blues and Chicago Blues? Ok, so I happen to like both, but do they give me any option of stating that I prefer Delta Blues? No! And yet you're supposed to write an entire essay on your personality. I don't even HAVE a personality!

There's a section on pets, but the only options were cat, dog, fish, etc. Unless someone has severe allergies, does this really need to be a screening question? It happens that I have two cats mostly 'cause they're low maintenance and I can only care for a certain number of living creatures at a time, having already killed off 3/4 of my houseplants.

I just left that question unanswered. Because do I really need to get into whether the untimely deaths of my houseplants were the result of neglect or suicide before a first date?

Food is another category where none of the check boxes seem to apply. Or all of the check boxes apply. I love food! I just don't particularly care from which continent, country, ethnicity, race, culture or subculture the recipe originated.

There was a question about past relationships. I didn't put down that I am incredibly attracted to intense personalities who require more emotional energy than I actually possess. Instead I filled it out this way:

Is there really an answer to this question that doesn't involve a cliché? My past relationships were fun! At least until they weren't fun anymore...My past relationships are the basis for much of my current neuroses...KIDDING! !!!!!!!! Is there a graceful way out of this one? How about: I was married for 12 years and now I'm not. Does that work?!?!?!

It asks for political orientation. Although I'm pretty sure I recognized the orientations that don't apply to me, I wasn't sure I could pick out which one might be an appropriate label. And since "pinko commie scum" wasn't an option, I went ahead and left that one blank too.

Next was ideal relationship. After muddling through my last post, that seemed easy enough to figure out:

My ideal relationship is with someone who calls a lot, but not often enough to be stalker material.

By my reckoning, that should be about once a day. But, of course, I shouldn't have to actually answer the phone!!!!

Super Cool Dating Lessons

The dating world can be a tough travel destination and has been for me for the past...well, we'll call it month and a half. But what the heck, I've learned a whole new method of communication 2 skru up: txt msg!

If you're in the market for a new method of being rejected, I highly recommend texting. It's every bit as instant as a phone call, but you don't get interrupted as long as you don't have a lot to say.

Along with texting, I also learned some great new phrases. Whether or not any of them actually apply to my most recent go round is up for debate, but here they are regardless:

Each time I describe some heartache or another, my brother claims to hold up an imaginary sign reading, "Dump him!" Recently he discovered new lettering:

"DTMFA" or Dump the Mother F* Already

I'm not a big fan of acronyms, but this one in particular, to quote Mary Poppins, "helps the medicine go down".

Here are two from my good friend Ms.Q. She's not sure if she wrote this first one or assimilated it. Let's just call it hers:

Some people have dealt with their shit and some people smell of it.

Other people blog about potty training, but that's beside the point.

I don't think of people as trash and neither does Ms.Q. I like to think of people as having inherent worth despite their circumstances, occupations or much else for that matter. I've enjoyed the friendship of two people convicted of manslaughter, and both of them have been every bit as kind and compassionate as the average teacher or soccer mom, for whatever that's worth. Still, this saying Ms.Q. learned from a friend made me smile:

Kick him to the curb...just kick him to the curb! Move on. You've got better things to do than think about the trash on the side of the road.

I saw this saying on a dating blog. I'm not sure about the second half of each sentence. But I could perhaps buy the first half of each, in as much as I ever believe sweeping generalizations about humans:

Men look for sex and find love.
Women look for love and find sex.

This is not a saying I learned, but it seemed funny at the time. In general I'm against rigid gender roles, but for reasons which could be a post all it's own, I truly believe the male should do all the calling. I think I may have been engaged before I initiated a phone call to my ex-husband. I found myself defending my position without explaining it:

"It's NOT a 'policy'"
"It is. It's your policy not to call men."
"No it's not! It's not a policy!"
"It is. It's a policy."
"It's not a policy! It's a defense mechanism!"

Let's call spade a spade for cryin' out loud! Then again, spade calling didn't actually work out so well for me this time.

This was a saying Jeff learned from a friend that seems to sum up quite a bit:

It isn't about finding a sane partner. It's about finding one whose crazy matches your own.

Which, y'know is great for me because I tend not to pay too much attention to the fine line that distinguishes "normal" from "boring".

Now, is there one of those cute blog awards for quoting Mary Poppins and using Mother F* in the same paragraph? Oh wait...you probably have to be willing to spell it out to win that award.

Dating - The One Year of Divorce Anniversary Edition

If the countless hours I've spent with girlfriends this summer over-analyzing the nuances of each date any of us have ever been on doesn't qualify me as an expert, perhaps the handful of actual dates I've been on over the past the year will. I'm sure there have been a good four or five, maybe more depending on how one defines the word date.

I haven't consulted ole' Webster on what exactly constitutes a date. But I think a traditional date might go something like this:

Guy contacts girl to set up date in hopes of eventually convincing girl to remove all her clothing. We'll just say this happens by phone, though it could just as easily be by email, text message, or smoke signals. Guy feels anxiety and fear of rejection, or so I've been told numerous times over the years.

Girl agrees to date for some reason she can't quite fathom. Girl wonders if this will be the father to her children and whether she will eventually be interested in removing all her clothing. Girl spends the hours or days between phone call and date dissecting every part of the call with any and every available girlfriend. Girl attempts to discover and inspect all hidden subliminal meaning from the words, "Would Italian food be okay?"

Girl considers excuses for canceling date and runs them past her girlfriends for validity. Girl wonders if there will be alcohol available on the date to help dissipate awkwardness and anxiety...or no wait, maybe it's the guy that wonders that. It might be both.

Somewhere between 24 hours and thirty minutes before the date, girl realizes she has nothing to wear. Girl considers canceling date due to lack of appropriate clothing.

Girl and guy go out to eat, they have a nice time or have a boring time. Guy says he'll call girl. Girl doesn't believe him.

Guy attempts to determine optimum number of days or hours to wait before calling girl in order to increase chance that girl will take off all her clothing as soon as possible. Or, guy calls at a random time using the time in between to look cool as a cucumber or to pursue others in case girl never takes off all her clothing, or because he hasn't given girl another thought.

Girl spends next three days over-analyzing the meal with girlfriends. Girl tries to determine whether the words "I like alfredo sauce better than marinara" means guy was secretly turned off by a zit on her ankle. Girl tries to determine whether guy's attempt to kiss her or lack of attempt to kiss her means he was secretly planning never to call her again.

Girl decides to wash her hands of the entire situation, vowing never to give the guy another spare thought just at the exact moment the guy picks up the phone to call her.

Or something like that. I'm sure I have some of the details wrong or that they vary and I for one have never had Italian food on a date. (Or a zit on my ankle for that matter.)

This much I've figured out for certain: "fun" relationships have been mis-named. As far as I can tell, it goes like this:

• If two people enter into a relationship they enjoy, are having fun, and the relationship has some chance of lasting a good, long time, it is considered "serious."
• On the other hand, if both people enter into a relationship already certain that it can't or won't work out and that one or more hearts have a strong chance of breaking into little tiny pieces, then the relationship is considered "fun."

I'm not sure who invented this rule, perhaps the same person who decided men get to look more handsome once their hair begins to gray while women just end up looking old.

I've received my share of dating advice, some of it in the form of encouragement to try online dating. I figure it makes sense to try, but I've chickened out each and every time I start to click.

Finally I decided that an obscure, starter dating site would be the way to go. As a person hesitant about dating, my experiment worked quite well. In fact, it worked SO well that almost every last man who emailed me through the site was Turkish. I'm not talking American of Turkish descent. I'm talking living on the soil of the country of Turkey. I don't know how many miles there are between Istanbul and Houston, but I'm thinking I'm relatively safe.

My dad gave my girlfriends and me some dating advice not long ago, although at the time he thought he was giving my daughter advice on how to get her cousin to accompany us to a museum:

Dad - How do you get a dog to come?
Cassie - You call him?
Dad - Right! You call him!
How do you get a cat to come?
Cassie - (confused look, while probably thinking something along the lines of "You don't")
Dad - (using her silence to support his argument)
Right! You ignore him!
And you've got to figure out if you're dealing with a dog or a cat.

Without further explanation my daughter promptly began ignoring her cousin. Not many moments thereafter he jumped into the car as if going to the museum had been his idea in the first place. For what it's worth, I've also found it interesting to think about whether I'm playing the part of a cat or a dog when over-analyzing dates. Not that it makes any difference of course, but a little introspection never hurt anyone.

This is some totally unsolicited dating advice I once gave to a friend who will remain unnamed. I'll also refrain from mentioning whether I know this to be true from personal experience:

If you find yourself saying to yourself or anyone else, "Oh good! He DID have a good excuse for not calling me! He was in jail!" it's time to (at a minimum) reevaluate your stake in the relationship.

I mean, not that any of it matters. It's not like my girlfriends or me actually follow any of our own advice much less each other's, but if we did...

well, I'm not exactly sure where we'd be with men, but our collective emotional health would probably be right up there with the best of them.

Short of Scandelous...

I hope. Since I stuck with tame the past couple weeks (except for a mini-volcano-heart-attack for my mom and dad), I guess I’ll go ahead with blogging about birth control and random phrases this time.

I couldn’t help but notice one day when I went into the pharmacy that they have their birth control in a *locked* cabinet. Curiosity got the better of me and I had to ask the pharmacist about it while picking up my daughter’s prescription. “You really gotta lock that stuff up?!?” He was quite chatty about it and I was immediately glad I had inquired. “Yes”, he told me, “and you’d be surprised at how long it takes the men to ask me to unlock the cabinet. They’ll stand around here for *hours* waiting for there to be nobody around.” He went on to explain that studies had actually shown that women were much more likely to waltz right in and ask to buy what they needed, the theory being that they were accustomed to having to buy tampons in public so it was easier for them to generalize their lack of discomfort to other products bound for that particular part of the body.

I could be way off base on this one, but if I were a store owner I’m thinking the birth control would be the last thing I’d lock up. Surely there must be more expensive items sitting right there on the shelf for the taking. And in all honesty, if I were a store owner planning on keeping my business around a good long while, perhaps even leaving it to my children someday, I’d be pointing shoplifters in EXACTLY that direction. I’d be like, “The disposable cameras and perfumes are locked up right over here, but the condoms are evenly distributed around the store. Try stealing some on your way out, would you?”

Doesn't it make perfect sense to encourage people who steal NOT to reproduce for lack of the measly cost of a condom? Why make it so difficult for them?

I got three new words/phrases this week that I’m pretty pleased with:

Hyper-focus – My dictionary had no interest in this word, although Wikipedia provided the definition I would have expected. This word perfectly describes those times when the world disappears except whatever particular endeavor MUST be completed at that time.

Next time regular life-spackle, phone calls, and even food are ignored in favor of a creative outlet, try helping me use this word in a sentence. I haven’t quite yet figured out how and I forgot its original context. Is it “Yes, I was home, but I couldn’t answer the phone. I was working in hyper-focus on a handmade card.”? Or “No, I didn’t end up making those cookies I was talking about. I was a victim of hyper-focus that day.” Or maybe it’s more of a verb: “No. I didn’t actually do any laundry today. I was hyper-focusing on a painting.”

Acci-date – The original definition I got for this word actually sounded sort of awkward and unpleasant, and I imagine it’s hard to dress for the occasion much less avoid garlic. But an accidental date definitely has potential, especially if one gets to describe it using the word “acci-date”.

Mental margarita: These are bound to make tough days a lot more bearable.

For the Love of Bars...or something...

I love bars. I don’t get the opportunity to go to them all that often, which may be why they remain appealing. Why would anyone willingly give up visiting a place with music, beer, dancing maybe, and big guys named Lewis who won’t stop following them around? Oh, wait, maybe I just answered by own question.

I thought for a moment or two, maybe even an hour, that I might have a split personality. ‘Cause I’m pretty sure I was born to hang out in bars now and again AND be a Sunday school teacher all at the same time. Well, not at the exact same time, but at least within 48 hours of each other.

But I suddenly realized, it isn’t a split personality, I just like people…little people in preschool and grown up people in bars and people of all sorts and in all kinds of locations. I don’t actually know a single person that I don’t like, although I have *heard* of people I might dislike if I ever did meet them.

I told my boss once that I thought he disliked more people than I actually knew. Probably I should have nabbed those words before they escaped my mouth, but he’s a great guy and…well, took it in stride as far as I know.

Anyway, Dad always told me, “Don’t meet men in bars.” But my friend Chris met her husband in a bar, and they’re still married a decade and a half later. I, on the other hand, was introduced to my ex-husband through his cousin, so you never can tell. Although I guess you can hedge your bets. Dad probably feared just this type of thing, a conversation I had a day or two after spending an evening at a bar:

Me: Lewis is a heroine addict? How could you tell?
Amy: (says something that makes me realize she was talking about a different guy)
Me: Oh, you mean Shannon! The skinny guy who kept offering to pass around xanax?
Amy: Yeah, that guy. Who was Lewis? I think I missed Lewis.
Aunt Lynne: These people have NAMES?!?!?!
Me: Lewis was that big black guy that kept following me around and telling me that he was going to make me feel things without touching me. And he kept saying he was a cook and he was going to make me breakfast.
Bernard: He was going to make you feel things without touching you!?!? Like REVULSION?!?!
Me: Revulsion, yeah, must be. He wouldn’t leave Gigi or me alone. But he was adorable, in a pathetic kind of way.

So yeah…people are interesting creatures for sure. But I always like them anyway.