Dare

Friday night E and I went to our favorite happy hour spot. We were there the previous week and I met the hired entertainment. He was a cute guy my age who half plays covers with his guitar. I say half play because he'll invariably forget how to finish the song and just stop, shrugging, "I don't know how to finish it."

I ran into him again that weekend at the Pete Yorn show. He was wearing the same red baseball t-shirt. "You're that guy from Friday!" I said.

He looked confused.

"The taqueria singer!"

"Oh yeah, that's me." He studied my face for a moment, "You're my Dixie Land Delight!"

It was the song I booed him for not finishing without at least the key change bridge. He didn't know the words so I shouted them over the crowd. He applauded me and I slurred, "We're gonna be best friends!"

"Hey you should come back out next Friday. I'm finishing out the month there. And if I knew you liked Pete Yorn, I would have played more of his songs."

"I'll make a deal with you. You learn my song and I'll be back out."

"Deal."

Which is how Friday E and I ended up at happy hour again. We were at a table by the street, quietly mocking most of the other people there. 2 guys we had already mocked approached out table and asked if they could join us. One was outgoing and one was quiet, similar to E and me. The extrovert and I were soon talking.

When he found out my major in school, he called me a nerd.

"Don't say that! Why am I a nerd?"

"Because you weren't in the business school like me."

"Okay."

As the conversation continued, and he kept picking at me, I couldn't tell if he was pulling my pigtails like a kindergartener or just generally insulting me.

"How tall are you?" he asks.

"5'7" without shoes."

"You're a giant! You're a giant nerd!" He seemed pleased with himself.

I looked down to the nearly full beer he bought me and remembered back to our conversations this week over insulting women being the new pick up tactic. I remember what I said I would do if I encountered that. I told this much to his friend.

"I'll pay you five bucks if you do it."

Pants on fire

I didn't know why he kept calling me.

Sure we were old friends from school, but that weekend in December didn't warrant a phone call every week. Between the university days and last December, we would go years without so much as a IM. Now it's every. Freaking. Week.

Maybe I grew bored because the conversations weren't that great. They were at best a step above the weekly calls to the parents. We'd talk about current hobbies and work, skipping any topic that involved emotion, especially anything involving any naked activities. It was an unwritten rule that we wouldn't even discuss the naked activities we partook in with each other. And I grew bored. I felt like whatever we were doing was forced. He didn't want to hurt my feelings or make me feel bad, so he called every week to prove me wrong. "It's okay," I thought. "I understand. You don't have to keep pretending."

Then one day I was driving home from work and his picture flashed on my cell phone. "Eh," I mumbled and I just let it ring. He never quit; he called every week regardless if I picked up the phone or not. Friday, I answered after six weeks of silence.

We worked our way through work and hobbies. I lied when he asked if I still practiced yoga. "Oh yeah, three times a week," I responded. Truth was I hadn't been in a month and my stomach looked more like a tummy. I didn't care. I didn't even mask my blah mood. Had I not been feeling so apathetic, I probably wouldn't even have answered the phone.

Wednesday he called again. I made a mental note that it hadn't been a week yet. I picked up again. This time I was feeling a bit lonely, settling in The Week Where No Worketh Gets Done, and hadn't spoken to a person in days. Then he did it. He mentioned a certain naked activity. "I was thinking about last week when I was describing my physic to you and then I thought, "Sarah's seen me naked!" he laughed.

"Anyways," he continued. "I'm coming to see you in August. Let's pick a weekend."

"Okay sure." I kicked around a blanket on my couch. He's been saying that since February and I've known since May to not expect it.

"Cool. How's August 11th?"

"What?"

"Okay, your choice: August 4th or August 11th?"

"Um," I looked down at my non-yoga tummy, "August 11th."

"Awesome! And can we go to the aquarium?"

"Uh, sure."

"I've been talking about this for so long, I bet you didn't believe I'd ever come."

"Yeah, something like that."

I hung up the phone. He's called the second time in under a week, brought up the unmentioned naked activity, and set a date to come visit. Nick must be horny.

I'm currently checking my Outlook Calendar. I have three weeks to lose 10 pounds. Now what the hell did I do with my yoga mat?

Because I read it on Vince's and M's blogs and MSN

As long as I'm doing PSAs today:

Somewhere some guy genius has decided that it is a good idea to insult women to get them into bed. "Your goal is... to make her question whether you're really interested in her," MSN explains.

Boy, I can't wait to meet this guy. I'm sure he'll understand why my drink is in his lap and the dinner rolls are being aimed at his face.

You know... so he'll question whether or not I'm really interested in him.

That is all. Again.

The More You Know /*

Just in case clarification was needed on this topic:

It is not okay to ask a girl out via phone text message. She will not respond. Moreover, she will be pissed about the $.10 charge on her phone bill for your idiotic behavior.

That is all.

"When you get a minute come see me."

My entire department is out of town this week, leaving only me. It's quiet. I'm a bit lonely. I've spent all my time on the internet (which explains my sudden increase in blog postings, I can just sit here and think things up).

Yesterday afternoon was spent digging around in other people's archives. It's interesting to see how people got to the points where they are today. An e-mail pops up on my screen from a higher up whom I assume is my boss for this week: "When you get a minute come see me."

Shit. Shit. Shit. She knows I've done NOTHING this week and now she's going to fire me. Or at least have a stern talk with me about internet privileges. A warning. I'm going to get written up.

I knock on her office door and she invites me to sit. She, however, does not ask me to close the door. I lighten up a bit-- when they fire you they ask you to close the door. Her head is bent scribbling something down and there is a pause before she speaks. I begin to panic again. She leans back in her chair and takes off her reading glasses, "So how are yours and E's dating lives?"

I breathed a sigh of relief. I'm so not getting fired. E and I are the only single people in the entire company which is why we've gravitated towards each other. This higher up is neither of our bosses and she likes to live through us and find out what we're up to. E and I always have some crazy plan.

I laughed, "Well we're on perfectmatch.com for this month. E is doing much better than me. She's e-mailing 3 complete hotties and I think she really likes a police officer."

"Have they met yet?"

"No, but they are talking about it. I think they are going to make plans when she gets back in town."

"Well what about you?"

"I haven't had such good luck. I went out with this lawyer who turned out to be a dud. I've had a few people take interest in me, but that seems to be dissipating. It's tough, you know?"

"Yeah. You really have to treat a relationship like you would a job hunt. You really have to put forth quite an effort." She proceeds to give me an activity list of single's events she used to partake in not too long ago.

"We have a goal you know."

"Oh yeah? What's that?"

"We're trying to get dates for the Christmas party. Screw the holidays, we just want an escort for the Christmas party."

She laughed so hard I thought she was going to pee in her pants. "I like that. You're keeping things light!"

Yeah, so not getting fired. I must call E though and let her know about the conversation, because I know this higher up will corner her one day, asking about her date with the police officer.

Hey you,

Yes you. The one looking sheepish. I see you.

I don't take the time to e-mail just anybody, you know. Especially e-mails as smartly and cleverly written like that one. It oozed pure charm. I know this for a fact because I have all my e-mails checked for The Crazy Factor before I send them. It was confirmed: I am a cute girl with a knack for funny and well thought out e-mails. I'm so goddamn great that people have asked me to write their e-mails for them.

So why the no response?

Singing the song to a different tune/tone

I no longer felt guilty about my snap judgment about Lawson. I gave him a second chance and he wowed me with "I haven't planned anything" and "give me a call later on."

I was pissed off. So I didn't call him. I had no intentions of ever calling him again. I didn't care if I left him high and dry on a Saturday night; it's not like we had plans anyways.

As a matter of fact, I called my parents and asked them to drive into the city and have dinner with me. You don't know what a huge step that was for me. I blew off a date with a lawyer to hang out with my parents that I don't even get along with. I took complete control of the situation. This is a first for me.

"Don't you wish your girlfriend was hot like me/ Don't you wish she was a freak like me." (Note: change that ring tone, it's becoming embarrassing.) Lawson called twice. Looked like he changed his attitude on "you call me."

After my parents dropped me off at my apartment, I called him back. I told him I had a car emergency and had been busy with that (technically true.) He said he made other plans for the night but Sunday he would be free.

I told him I was not (true.)

"Well Thursday night my buddy is coming in town and we're going to the Highlands if you want to join."

Seriously? You went from a date to me hanging out with you and your friends? "I don't think so."

"Why?"

"Because I can't go drinking like that during the week."

"Well I'll give you a call later on and we'll work something out."

Looks like he's changed his tune.