Work

I hate my job. It makes me almost physically sick. I do not enjoy it. Basically, it boils down to the fact that I do not care about other peoples' problems.

I am also up for my annual review later this month. I am very close to just declining the review and stating I am not interested at staying on. Of course, then I would have no job. But a part of me thinks that the pressure of that may spark me to find something better for me.

Mood Music

Not sure if I really want to write about the new girl, as it is going really well, but I do want to share this experience.

Last night, we went out to eat at a very small, romantic, tasteful Italian restaurant. It is highly recommended as a date place, by word of mouth and by the Internet. We go in and start reviewing the menu. The music is modern at this place. In fact, I think they just hook up a worker's iPod and let it do its thing. Which is fine by me, I actually really like Nelly, and don't mind random N*Sync and other popular music. There was nothing too offensive at all. However, one song clearly needed to be removed from the iPod:

The Sponge Bob Squarepants theme.

Psuedo Update

Several months ago, I kind of ended things with someone because it just wasn't going to go anywhere. I figured I would just rest up, and then try dating again in a couple weeks. However, I completely randomly met someone and she is great, we have been seeing each other sense.

During the "get to know you" talks, I found out she went to the same undergrad as I did, but several years later, the same class as my old LTR ("Long Term Relationship"). In fact, she was in the same college as LTR. With the same focus. And then, while talking about a couple specific classes, I recognized the classes, and they were in fact classmates. I checked facebook, and they were facebook friends. I told the new girl about LTR. She handled it well, they just worked on some projects together and weren't actually friends.

However, after things like Halloween, pictures are posted to facebook. Pictures that show up on feeds. So my picture should be showing up on LTR's feed. This fact kind of wierds me out, I am not going to lie.

Also, a girl I dated for a bit un-friended me in facebook. Can't say I didn't deserve it, but still thought it was odd.

Riding the rails (or bus, whatever)

I take public transportation to and from work. Due to my work schedule and construction on the el, I tend to take the bus to work, and the el home.

Specifically on the bus, when I get on there are normally a handful of people on it when I get on. By the time it gets downtown, the aisle is full of people standing. Thus, I am always seated. When I get on, I never sit next to anyone, especially never next to a cute girl. I just hate the idea that anyone would think of me as "that guy". Where this gets odd is the fact that I completely judge myself by whether or not the attractive girls boarding the bus after me sit next to me. Last week, I got a string of fat men, and felt self conscience about it.

Of course, none of this matters because I spend my entire bus ride with my nose in my book.

Credit Card

Yesterday, I decided to pick out a gift for a friend's wedding that I was unable to attend.

After selecting a lovely deep frier, I tried to check out. My card was denied. I called the credit card company and they said there was abnormal charges and they had to check with me. The charges:

- a monthly charge to the CTA for my bus pass
- the grocery store
- a couple internet orders (shipped to my place)
- gas
- a restaurant

Really? That is enough to question the validity of my charges? Also they never called me. It would have been pretty embarrassing to have this happen out in public. I need a new credit card.

Also, the girl from the airplane is in town this weekend. But due to the short notice, I was unable to meet up with her. She is kind of strange, I get about one text message a week from her now, after not hearing from her for about a couple months.

It has been a couple months

I am lazy.

Today, at work, I went into the bathroom. I walked up to the urinal, unzipped my pants and went to take out "Destroyer" (just trying out new names, we'll see what sticks). However, all I felt was boxer. I figured I must have rotated my shorts while busy at work, so I searched left. Nothing. I searched right. Nothing. Finally, I had to pee, so I stepped into a stall and undid my pants and just dropped the boxers.

Yeah, I put my underwear on backwards today.

Pants

This morning I had court at 9 AM. So I arrived to work a little early to get some stuff prepared. During this, I somehow caught my pants seam on something. Made a nice 4 inch rip just beneath the pocket.

Luckily, the suit jacket covered it. However, I still wore my bag up before the bench. It was less than fun.

So now I am spending my day trying to not let anyone see my right side.

Slip of the tongue

I was out with an engaged couple and some of our other friends. We were at a table eating, I was sitting next to the female, the guy was across from us. She said something to him and said the wrong name. No one by the name she used was with us. I was the only one who noticed.

That was probably nothing, but still awkward.

People look up to me

I never followed up on this.

As for the actual date, it went fairly well. We got some good food, and had some good conversation. The only drawback was she was not a recent college grad, as I had guessed. In fact, she was still in college and was in town for a theater internship. And she was 20. I talked to her a couple times after that, but I think she just wanted to have fun in the city for the summer, and I can't really fault her for that.

Anyways, the point of this story, besides the fact that my friends still mock me for dating a 20 year old, was it inspired my friends. Just last week, one of my friends slipped a girl a note on the Metra. He said he felt like he was going to puke. This friend is a really nice guy, but completely clueless and gutless with the ladies. I encouraged him for his effort, but reminded him that the initial contact probably comes off a lot less creepy if you do verbally. Since then, he has seen her on the train and she has ignored him.

To Do List

List of things I need to do before I bring another girl over:

1. Put real food in fridge, just in case.
2. Fold laundry, instead of just having a large pile of clean clothes a couple days old.
3. Remove dirty laundry, mainly the pair of tighty whiteys on my bathroom floor (I can only run in them, and they tend to just get tossed on the floor as I shower).
4. Actually put handtowel in bathroom (see issue from #2).
5. Make sofa not look like a homeless person is crashing on it.
6. Clean up table top.
7. Put away shoes.
8. Put away sweaty running stuff.

Really?

One girl, we'll call her Giggles (for reasons I am not stating here), I have been hanging out with a bit lately. She has been getting more and more flakey. Last night, I text her tell her that my softball team finally won a game (and then we lost the other half of our doubleheader, but still, we finally won). She texted back that she was at a W-Ville bar she is often at and that she has a headache. I know that means she doesn't want to see me, but I figure a flirty text should still be fine and tell her, "Poor baby. Anything i can do to makd it better?" (ignore the typo, we were celebrating). Her response: "I wish. Just a lot of stress and then my uncle just died today so i have a lot on my mind." Yeah, she's now cut off.

Also, another girl who I went on a couple dates with early in the year, but then life just got in the way, recontacted me a couple weeks ago. We agreed to get lunch. She e-mailed, said, "How about Wednesday?" I told her that was fine, 1 pm works for me, but you can pick the place. Never heard back. Then today I get an email from her asking me to donate to a charity for her. Yeah, stand me up and then ask for money? Classy.

Dinner

An old ex-girlfriend took me out to dinner last night. I helped her get a job in the City, so this was her repayment. I have always been infatuated with her, and probably always will be on some level. Oh well, I got free steak.

We're talking softball...

Like many 20-somethings in Chicago, I play on a co-ed rec softball team (though I play 12-inch, not the true Chicago 16 inch, what can I say, I like not having broken fingers). My team is pretty horrible, but we have fun and get to drink free pitchers of beer after our games.

Last night, in the middle of getting slaughtered by a team whose girls had all played college softball, one of their girls was standing on first and looked out at me. (Yes, I play right field for the worst team in the league, you can guess what that says about my softball skills). She then says, "hey, I think you were my TA."

During undergrad, I was an undergrad assistant for the lowest level math course offered (so not technically a TA, because there was no professor, but to the kids, I served the same function of knowing the subject matter and being fluent in English). I had this job for 4 semesters, and thus well over a 100 kids, plus helping out randomly in the other sections, I clearly don't remember most of them. Sure, there were some really attractive girls (dumbest math class in a state university attracts a lot of dumb kids and athletes). After thinking about it, I think I remember this girl. She was actually the closest I came to having a crush on a student (as opposed to a lust for some of those girls).

We played the last game, so the lights were shut off and everyone cleared out very quickly, but we'll see if I bump into her next week.

grumble

I generally have good relationships with exes. However, there are two that I don't speak to (one by my choice (though she probably agrees), one by hers). LTR and the girl from law school I dated right after.

LTR works for a large brewery in their corporate offices. Said brewery is merging with another one. In the spirit of compromise, they are thinking of moving the new corporate offices to Chicago. I live in Chicago now. LTR wants to live in Chicago, but can't due to her job. I like it like that. That may change soon. I don't like that.

Law School Girl hates me now (she has several valid points for doing so, several invalid ones as well, but let's focus). It is easy enough to not come in contact with her, I only hang out with a couple of people from law school (lawyers really aren't very fun). However, one of my good friends is getting married. He (and his fiancee) went to law school with me. He is good friends with LSG. I couldn't attend the engagement party, so there was no issue there. LSG cannot attend the wedding, so there is no issue there. However, my friend is having a "couples shower," whatever that is. There will be a keg and drinking games and other amusements, all of which I like. However, there will likely be LSG as well. I am ok with us not talking, but I don't want a big awkward anything to happen. So I am not a fan of that. Especially because the shower is the day before my birthday. I am trying to turn my birthday into happy time.

Also, I am not a fan of the fact that I am supposed to bring a recipe to the shower. Can I just cut out the side of a mac-and-cheese box and call it a day?

Voicemail

Holy shit, I just got turned on by another attorney's voicemail to me.

It is a stupid case, a small debt type case that we are doing to try and convince the guy to give us more business. In these types of cases, the debt-collecting attorneys have huge caseloads, and thus they basically drive when settlement occurs.

A couple weeks ago, we had a court date. The attorney was a typical semi-cute female attorney. We briefly discussed settlement parameters, figured we should be able to settle, told the judge we want a month, and I took her card. I called her last week to try to hammer out the details, but had to leave a message.

She called yesterday after I had left (I leave at five, I get here early so I can have a night life). Her message sounded like a phone sex operator. When she gave me her cell number, I was expecting a 900 number. It was awesome. I am not dealing with anyone else from her firm, I want to have a phone talk with her. Clearly, that is in my client's best interests.

Insert over-played Vegas cliche

I know I am a slacker, but noone reads, so it doesn't matter.

Last weekend I went to Vegas for one of my law school friend's bachelor party. After cancellations and whatnot, there ended up being 6 of us, with the other five all growing up together and being involved in real relationships. Despite that (and only really knowing 2 of them before), I never really felt like the odd shoe, so that was nice. We did the typical Vegas things: lost money, went to the pool, lost more money, drank the entire time, looked at females, and lost money. Despite the offers of the other guys to wing for me, I declined to try to get laid.

In fact, I almost went to efforts not to get laid. At one point, a lady (with amazing fake breasts) sat next to me to play some blackjack at the Belliagio. At some point, I cleverly deduced that she was from Montreal. It may have had something to do with her speaking French. At that point, I declared my hatred of all things Canadian. Despite numerous opportunities, I did not step down from this stance. The other two guys from my group at the table were dying with laughter at my expense.

However, to save some face, I did convince the cute girl seated next to me on the flight back from Vegas to give me her phone number. Not too bad for someone going on about 10 hours of sleep over the last 4 days, during which there was debatable personal hygiene done, and plenty of alcohol consumed. Sadly, she lives about 2 hours away from the city.

All American

Last friday I was at a party. I had noticed a girl (hereinafter "Puck") check me out when I first got there. She was a good looking blonde, seemed to have a toned body. A little later, the hostess called me over to talk to Puck and that group. At first, I assumed one of the guys was with her in some form or the other. We all chated for a bit, and then drinking games were started.

After some flippy cup, the hostess came up to me to inform me that Puck thought I was cute. I had already decided that I didn't want to be "the single guy who hits on girls" at this party, and this was pretty junior highish to me, so I just smiled, said that was nice, and returned to drinking games.

Over the weekend, I was talking to the hostess again and she was harping on me for not talking to the girl. Her points being that she was attractive, in shape and interesting because she coached hockey (hence, "Puck"). I explained to her my reasons, and she was annoyed still. This continued through the work week. After one accusation of being lame, I said that if my date that night (see post below) didn't go well, I'd contact Puck. Clearly, the date did not go well, so the hostess gave me the contact info.

After googling Puck's full name (because that is what you do when you get a name), I found out that my assumption that she taught pee-wee hockey on the weekends was wrong. She was a former all-american hockey player and currently coaches a local college team full time. So I found that all very hilarious.

I sent her an email today, so we will see how this one ends up.

Outstanding

Last night I meet up with a girl I have been out with twice before. There had been some making out, this was the third date, and she wanted to come over to my place to watch a movie. Sounds simple right?

I go pick her up, we order some food, sit down to watch, eat, and chat. After we finishing eating we start making out again, ignoring the movie. It is kind of late, so I ask her if she just wants to crash at my place. She says yes. We go into the bedroom, and then she tells me.

She is a virgin and saving it for marriage.

St. Patrick's Day WTF

My St. Patrick's Day

7 am - shower, first beer.
8 am to 3 pm - Irish bar with friends
4 pm - Thai dinner (i'm not sure how that is Irish)
5:30 - Go to other bar (now in lakeview) to meet other friends.
6:00 - Run into a girl i haven't seen in 8 years. Don't have anything to talk about.
7 - Start texting from cute girl I meet a couple weeks ago and have gone to dinner with.
8 - Leave bar to go to friends house.
8:30 - One of my friend's lesbian girlfriend demands that I do 3 shots with her. This puts her out for the night.
9:00 - Start to play strip trivia pursuit with a girl I barely knew while her boyfriend was on a beer run.
10 - Realize I don't want to be playing strip trivia pursuit with a gay guy, a lesbian, and a couple that I don't really know. Decide to go to Cute Girl's apartment.
10:30 - Arrive with pizza.
10:35 - Abandon pizza, start making out.
12:00 - Cute Girl gets up, announces she is going to bed and starts walking to her room. I follow and ask her about the lights. She says she will get them later. I leave the apartment and go home. What the hell was I thinking!!?!?!

The next day I got the "don't call me" text. I guess not taking that hint eliminates her. Too bad, I kind of liked her. I can't believe i got cut off for not having sex.

Doing Laundry

I was doing laundry tonight. I was going to describe something I noticed on Friday night, but instead I will relate a text:

Old College Roommate: Would u go on a blind date with an attractive 22 year old personnal trainer who is friends with one of my coworkers?

Ignoring the fact that he wrote out "attractive" and misspelled "personnal", what else could I say?

So I asked male or female.

Now some personal trainer has my email. Which makes me feel out of shape.

Who Needs Words?

While out with some friends on Friday night, I started talking to a girl. I hadn't realized it, but lately, beer makes me lose all track of time. So I may have talked to her for far too long. Regardless, when it was time for her to leave, I got her number. I called her up to ask her to dinner, but had to leave a message. She called me back, and had to leave a message. I called her back, and had to leave a message. As far as I can tell, we've agreed to have dinner tonight without actually talking to each other. Communication is over-rated.

Catch up

I have been lazy. Not just in posting, but in many areas of life. I wish I could hibernate in February.

Regardless, last night I tried crazyblinddate.com. It was almost as hilarious as I hoped it would be. The girl was nice enough. However, she tried to tell me some stuff she learned at the planetarium earlier in the week, and I kept having to correct her on basic science stuff. So she clearly didn't get points for that. More importantly, if you use an Internet dating service thing and say that "average" body type is ok with you, think long and hard. Are you referring to the Average of what you have dated? Or are they referring to the Average of the city. Because if you are in Chicago, there is a big difference between the two.

More exciting, and less lame, I just got the full names of a bunch of consultants that I went out with last week. Including two very cute girls who I had decent conversations with. However, I'm not a fan of mixing business and pleasure, so since their company was paying for my meal, I did not try for phone numbers or the like. But today, my e-mail was sent to all who were there, so hopefully one of them doesn't mind the mixture. Or at least now I can get alternative contact info for them. I'll figure that out later.

Fuck. I am still broken.

Lent

It's that time of the year again. Time for good Catholics to give up something for Lent.

Before I get to my sacrifices, quick aside: I just had lunch with my old college roommate. He is also Catholic, like was still a virgin when he got married Catholic. He brought up a good point when I pointed at his head and said he hadn't gone to mass yet. He hates Ash Wednedsay mass because the homily is about how you should show no outward signs of the fast. Then everyone lines up and recieves a black cross on their forehead. However, if you are going to complain about the Church being hypicritical, this seems like a silly place to start to me.

What i will give up:
1. Soda, pop, cola. I will continue this experiment through Lent. However, in about two weeks (i think), not consuming soda has made no apparent change in me. Someone claimed I would lose 10 lbs. in 2 weeks. I didn't lose one, not even with some running involved. That is how bad the rest of my diet is.

2. I'll play the masterbation game. See how long I can last. I make no promises to Jesus that I will make it all 40 days.

I am weak willed

I finally broke down and had a coke. So now i am on a sugar high. What stressful event in my life lead to this breakdown? Clearly something work related. Or some personal tragedy. Or because I went grocery shopping and had to deal with the public. Oh how I loathe the public.

The aforementioned girl's dad is fine. He apparently had it since birth and had a successful surgery. So far no horrible side effects have appeared. Therefore, I get to go on another date with her monday.

Also, why, after spending several hundred dollars at the grocery store and therefore having a fully stocked fridge/pantry, is the only thing I feel like doing is ordering takeout?

Timing is Everything

I scheduled a second date with the potentially crazy girl. We decided that tuesday dinner would work good, but I needed to double check my work schedule first. I actually was at work at 7:30 this morning (pulled my first 12 hour day... it was lame). So I sent her an e-mail around 8:30-9. Never heard back.

After I got home and ate, I decided I should give her a call. She picks up. She is at her parents home. In Michigan. Because her dad had a brain aneurysm. Outstanding timing. She said she would give a call when she returned. I offered my condolences and told her I would talk to her when she returned.

Yeah, I am good at this.

Thinking of Me

So I ask a girl if she would like to get dinner on Wednesday. She says yes. All good.

Wednesday morning I get a message asking if we can switch it to lunch instead, because she has some things she needs to get done and a meeting that night. I'm a nice guy, so I say sure. We meet up for lunch, and it goes pretty well. Honestly, it probably was actually stunted first date conversation in my recent history. But the girl was interesting and cute, so I can deal with some slight awkwardness.

Wednesday afternoon I get an e-mail from her saying her meeting was cancelled and that something she had been working on just got the green light, so she wanted to celebrate with some drinks and wanted to do so with me. As I now had no plans for the night, had to work a little late anyways, I said yes against common sense.

We remeet up for drinks at a bar near her place. We have some drinks and conversation. Then I walk her home. She asks me up for hot chocolate, and I give her credit for remembering how much I hate coffee. So I go up. Her male roommate is in bed, with his door open, which directly faces the entrance way. Then I find out her cousin is crashing on her couch. Regardless, she makes us some hot chocolate and head into her room. We make out for a bit and whatnot.

Today, I get this e-mail:
"The skin on my chin is raw from kissing you. I wanted you to know that the patch of painful skin on my face makes me think of you, and in some strange way, very happy."

She might be crazy. Therefore, I will be getting one of two things:
1) Hot crazy girl sex (face it, crazy girls are better at sex), or
2) A restraining order.

Either way, I win

sacrifice

Yesterday I woke up and was grabbing my stuff for work. I was out of pop, and thought that I would just have to pick up a can on the way to work.

No, that is how an addict thinks. I'm not an addict. I don't need pop. No more pop.

So yesterday I decided to quit pop. For no good reason. So far so good. But a friend pointed out that mixed drinks are often soda related. I have to decide to a) go all out, b) make exceptions for alcohol, or c) give up now.

In other news, tonight may be awesome or lame. It is a real tossup.

Cousin

My cousin announced her engagement awhile back. The plan was to have a small ceremony in the St. Louis area. However, over Christmas, she announced that they had actually eloped in September.

My sisters and I decided to get her a gift (even though my sisters were annoyed because apparently all the other cousins were lax on giving them gifts when they got married). I mentioned that I was the store earlier and did not see any elopement cards. My sister said she would just make one and asked if we had any ideas.

My entry:
"We were going to give you a real wedding card, but decided to do this half-assed thing instead."

I think I am going to win.

I continued the sock experiment on Saturday playing poker. Wore some from Sock It To Me. Broke even on the night. So all in all, who knows.

Oh wait, this is supposed to be about me and my interactions with females. The poker night was basically because a girl I went to college with was having her bacherlette party and thus a couple of the guys with wives who were going to that decided to have a man night. As I am still on the wagon for 2008, I was designated driver for a couple of them (which lead to one of the guys vomiting out of my car at 3 am, this is the same guy i once had to break down a door in a London sports bar to make sure he hadn't passed out in his own pile of feces, he has control problems). Also, the bacherlette was the girl i traded virginities with. The whole her getting married thing is strange to me still. I don't really talk to her much (only when other people put us in the same room).

Perhaps the more annoying aspect of it is that my old roommate, the guy who hosted everyone, tends to try and stick his nose into my dating life. He is a great guy (and pretty much every girl i know describes him as an ideal husband candidate), but can be condensending (not the word i want) at times. So he shakes his head at me for being 27 and single. Perhaps because I only disclose a bunch of half-truths to him, he is confused. I can handle that as long as he does not try to set me up with anyone. Then i may punch him. Which I can only do without repurcussions if we are playing basketball. And it is hard to get a game going. So let us hope it does not come to that.

That Was Strange...

Last night I had a disturbing dream.

I dreamed that I was at a wedding. It was a Catholic wedding, but not at an original Catholic Church (everything was rounded... though i guess it could have been a Spanish mission Church...). I was in a tuxedo. Just fyi, I look good in a tux. Damn good. So I was part of the wedding.

Then i figured out that it was my wedding. I was marrying LTR. I woke up in a cold sweet.

But then i went and got encased meats from Hot Dougs. And Duck Fat Fries. If you live anywhere near Chicago and never been to Hot Dougs, go now. It will cure what ails you. Though now i think i may miss my run today because i may fall asleep at any moment.

The friend i went with wanted me to come out tonight to wing man for him. As much as asian chicks are hot, I am still drying out and promised some guys it could be a poker night. So unless i get knocked out early, I am likely taking a pass. Plus, asian guys have horrible taste in girls.

My New E-Crush

http://sockittomesocks.com/about.html

The girl, not the cat.

Anyone who makes a living selling awesome socks is ok in my book.

I have 4 pairs, have worn two of them. As far as i can tell, the ladies love them.

I hope the Horse Socks make me good at putt-putt because i have a high stakes game coming up next week. And I have been told i will not be allowed to cheat during it...

long week

I am pretty sure my week of debauchery is over.

Thank god. I don't know how people who go out constantly can do it. I feel dead, in my body and my soul.

However, i am better off then my friend, who's boyfriend got ringworm. No sex for her.