TMI Thursday: Terrible Date POV

If this does not sate your thirst for awesome TMI stories, then check out all the other glorious tales of things we probably shouldn't tell at LiLu's home for the staunchly raunchy, TMI Thursdays!

My wife was not the first undergrad I illegally dated at Notre Dame. See, we weren't supposed to date any of the undergraduate population because they might have a friend who could potentially be a friend of one of our potential students, potentially. Being that my hormones were more of a driving force than my hunger for a higher degree (which is why I have only a MASTER's degree), I decided to spit right in the eye of this law. What a rebel am I.

To further push the boundaries, I engaged in some illicit tutoring. See, I had this student, Sheridan, who was awesome. She had two room mates who were also in the organic chemistry class that I taught. When they were preparing for the finals for the first semester, they asked if I could come over and help them study and have me there as a valuable resource. Since Sheridan was awesome (and, yes, rather attractive), I was going to say yes, anyway, but then she bribed me with Taco Bell. Taking any payment from the students--monetary, culinary or sexually--was expressly forbidden in the TA charter. Also expressly forbidden? Tutoring in a student's dorm room.

I was off to do both.

To avoid a long and boring part of the story, nothing happened in the room, other than studying and chemistry and shit like that. Oh, and I met this girl named Margaret.

Margaret was pretty, with dark hair and dark eyes. She was shorter, but she was very nice. I crushed on her right away. She lived across the hall from the girls I was tutoring. She would pop in and out of the room from time to time, because she was friends, and six girls shared a couple of rooms, so they shared a lot of stuff. Consider her the Kramer to my friends' Jerry. Except, you know, a lot less crazy.

Anyway, as I was leaving the dorm, I passed her, and I actually manned up (figuring I wouldn't be back there any time soon, should I fail to execute) and asked her if she'd like to go out whenever she was done with finals. To my surprise, she blushed, smiled, and said yes.

Elated, I went back to my apartment and waited until the next day. I called her (I had a university directory that I stole from one of the libraries on campus) and we set things up: we'd go to dinner. Since I had wrapped up my first semester of grad school and I had just scored a date with a very cute undergrad, I planned for some steak. I wasn't shooting for romantic so much as celebratory: the semester was over, Christmas was looming, it was time to celebrate.

On the night we planned--it was a Thursday, after all her finals were done, and mine too, and before we both planned on going to our respective homes for the Christmas break--I arrived at the dorm, showered, shaved, smelling nice, and dressed for the occasion. I called up to her room, and a few minutes later, she came down. She looked beautiful. We weren't formally dressed up, but we both looked nice, she moreso than I.

Dinner was great. The food was delicious, the conversation was loose and easy, and I had a good time. When we were done, we drove back to campus and walked around south quad for a little bit. It was chilly, as Decembers in northern Indiana tend to be. So, we cut our walk short and I returned her to her dorm, fully expecting the date to be over. I was going to be smooth--I had just eaten steak and a salad with onions!--and I wasn't going to try and kiss her or anything.

But then, as I was preparing to say good-bye, she said, "Do you want to come up to my room. We could watch a movie or something."

Fuck and yes.

So, up to her room we went. The dorm itself was spooky quiet--a lot of people had gone home. Margaret, who lived near Chicago, was heading home the next day. Incidentally, my friends and I were having a party the next day, and then Saturday I was heading home. Anyway, we got to her room, took off our coats, and then settled on a movie. It was Never Been Kissed and though I'm not a huge romantic comedy fan, I went with it. It was her room, and, remember, I look like fat Tom Green, so the Drew Barrymore connection was too good to pass up. Well, basically I kind of shrugged and said, "Yeah, that's fine" when she asked.

I think it's at this point that I should write that, when I read about some of the awful dates that many of the fine women of the blogosphere recount in their blogs almost daily, I take solace in the fact that I had never been on a date as terrible as the ones they tell of.

Except for this one.

Things were going great. A few minutes in, she apparently thought I wasn't the raping and killing type, so she put her head on my shoulder. Feeling brave, I held her hand. She didn't back away. Things were going better than I ever could have imagined.

And then because I was feeling good and happy, fate decided to intervene and fuck me over.

My stomach rumbled. Not a hungry rumble. No, it was more of a "Hmmm...we don't like what you've put in here, chief." I paid it little mind. I smiled away the rumble. She smiled back. I decided to--awkwardly, admittedly--try and kiss her. She didn't pull away. Our lips touched.

My stomach rumbled again. This time, however, it twisted itself in knots. Things were suddenly not going swimmingly.

"Are you okay?" she asked.

"Yeah," I said, hesitantly. I really didn't know what to do. This was back when I still had a gall bladder, so it wasn't like I was about to shit myself from here to kingdom come. At the same time, I've never really had a history of indigestion like this. Heart burn, yes. Acid reflux, sure. Rumbly tummy that didn't involve hunger pangs? New to me.

My stomach settled down and we went back to watching the movie. About fifteen minutes later, it really went to town. It sounded like some kind of gutter echoing with flood waters. I was immediately embarrassed.

"I'm so sorry, Margaret," I said. She looked confused.

"It's okay?" It was more of a question than a consolation.

This is when my dumbass decided to try and kiss her again. I leaned in, closed my eyes, felt my lips touch hers...

...and my stomach pushed it's contents up my esophagus.

Okay, the bad news first, this date was ruined. My chances with Margaret were gone. Kaput. Over. Finished. I knew this when the vomit hit the back of my throat.

The good news? I was able to hold the puke in my mouth as I dove for her trash can (which, thank God, had a liner and was made of plastic). I emptied my guts into her trash can. What this poor girl was thinking while the guy who had been smooching her a moment before was emptying the contents of his stomach, I shudder to think.

Did I ever mention I'm a loud puker? Especially when I'm sober? I tend to retch before bringing it up. A lot. Kind of like a cat does when puking. You know, that whole body contortion, contraction, and then the loud KAFF and puke? Yeah, that's me. Cat Puke Man in my secret identity.

The smell? Terrible. Again, like the night me and Mr. Wodka got cozy, it came out my nose. I could feel it dribbling from my nostrils.

"I'm sorry, I think I should go," I said weakly when I had control of myself.

"Are you going to be okay?" Margaret asked.

"Yeah," I said, partially laughing. I was trying to make it look like I was laughing to cover up the fact that I was crying. I was crying because I nearly puked on this really sweet, really nice girl that I really liked, I had ruined the date, I had stunk up her room, I had filled her garbage can with bile, ichor, vomit and a whole host of other digestive juices, and I was crying because I hurt. Plus, I just puked steak. Do you know how that shit clings to your throat when you puke it up? Like a fucking tentacled sea monster. It was horrible.

I gathered up the bag o' vomit and grabbed my coat. I walked to the door and she followed. She asked again if I was going to be okay.

"I think so, now," I said. "I'm going to take this" holding up the bag o' vomit, its contents sloshing in the sack "out to the dumpster." I heaved a sigh. "I had a really good time, Margaret," I tacked on hastily at the end.

"I had a good time, too," she said, then, somewhat timidly, "until...you know." She offered a pained smile.

"Merry Christmas," I offered.

"Merry Christmas. Oh, and happy birthday!" I smiled back at her.

"I won't even bother asking if you want to go out again," I said. "I pretty much ruined that chance." I hefted the bag o' vomit again. It sloshed. Again.

"No, no," she tried to reassure me. I could see the fear in her eyes that I would believe her. I could sense her fear, smell her longing to scream "EWWWWWW!" and run to the shower. "Maybe...you know...sometime...after we get back."

"I'd like that." I offered a half smile. Puke still was dribbling out of my nose. "Good night. Thank you, again." I turned, trudged down the hallway, and out into the night. I tossed the bag o' vomit in the dumpster behind the dining hall on my way by. The splattering sound it made when it hit the cold, hard interior metal was reassuring and cathartic.

I returned to my car, still weepy, weakened and sore. I went home, cleaned up, and went to bed.

I never called her back.

TMI Thursday: Car Jacking

If this does not sate your thirst for awesome TMI stories, then check out all the other glorious tales of things we probably shouldn't tell at LiLu's home for the staunchy raunchy, TMI Thursdays!

Yesterday, I told you of the girl I dated briefly my senior year of college, Carrie Nation. I call her that because she was a violent teetotaler. Which is understandable. She had a friend in high school die in a drunk driving accident. Well, actually, there was a drunk driving accident, and her friend drove by it. He was rubber necking and the road was icy and then her friend, while not paying attention to the road, ended up in a ditch and was killed from the accident. So, it's not really understandable at all.

This was at a point in my life (my senior year in college) where I would make trips to Illinois with a $20 bill in my pocket and swoop down into Scotchman's East and Scotchman's West liquor stores. Therein, I would promptly buy up all of their 32 ounce Old Milwaukee beers. 32 ounces of beer for $1.09? I'm sold. I would come home with cases of the shit. Will dubbed me "Beer Tsar".

So, here I am, freshly broken up with the Ex- (again), when Carrie Nation "befriends" me. And by that, I mean that she invited me to see one of the on campus movies with her. See, we were sort of friends before. The previous semester, I had met Carrie Nation because some friends of mine had invited me to come and watch a movie with them. The movie was in Carrie Nation's room. When I knocked on her door, I saw a little picture of Sports Voldemort hanging on the door. Someone yelled "come in" from the interior of the room and I swung the door open, struck a dramatic pose, and asked "are you a Packers fan?" Carrie Nation said she was. Jokingly, I said, "Oh, I think I'm in love."

Apparently, this was enough to convey to her that I was proper dating material. So, the fall semester of my senior year, she invited me to come and watch a movie with her and the rest of her friends. I ended up sitting next to her and we watched...Scream, I think? You can see how memorable our time was together. Anyway, during the movie, I sort of held her hand a little. A couple of nights later, she shows up at my room and asks me if I liked her. The only thing it was missing what a "circle yes or no" on a note. It was so junior high. I circled yes, and we started dating that night.

The great thing about that night? I was watching some nature documentary on bugs, because there wasn't shit else on and because I have a strange fascination with Praying Mantises. So, Carrie Nation shows up and we talk until after visitation hours are over (visitation hours were until 11 pm on week nights...remember, Catholic college). She was all worried about getting caught after visitation hours were over, despite the fact that I was friends with all of my RAs. I mean, hell, the RA on my floor was Sweet Mic Mancuso, the most melodic voiced RA in history--there was no way she was getting in trouble.

Anyway, we ended up talking until midnight and I finally was like, "Well, I'm going to bed. You can stay if you want--I don't want to throw you out or anything. You can even have the bed. I'll sleep on the couch." It ended up, she slept on the couch, I in my bed, and at 6:00 am, when I had to get up and get ready for class, I escorted her out of the building. Fortunately, she lived in Halas hall, which was next door (and named for former Chicago Bears owner, George Halas) to Gallagher, so her Walk of Shame wasn't so terrible.

This went on for about six weeks. She'd come over, we'd chat or watch a movie, she'd invariably end up staying the night, and then walk home in the morning. Ah, the luxuriant life of a senior with a single room. The plus side of all this was that I kept my room clean and smelling good. I mean, I made my bed nearly every day--and I was in college!. Shit, you'd only make your bed if you were getting a visit from your parents.

I digress. So, there we are, Carry Nation and the Beer Tsar. And, you know, something had to give at some point. Now, at this point in my life, I watched NASCAR. I was quite the fan. Carry Nation? Not so much. She detested NASCAR, and for all the right reasons--there were cars who were sponsored by beer companies. I do not lie when I tell you this.

And so...on that fateful night when Sam was stinking up my joint, Carrie Nation came over to watch the football game for our normal Monday night affair. Except, there was a replay of the NASCAR race being shown on ESPN2, so I would flip over during the time outs on the football game to see what I could of the race (despite already knowing who had won). This infuriated Carrie Nation. She stole the remote from me and shoved it down her shirt. So, I did what came natural--I went after it. This infuriated her more. She made a reference to how nice Sports Voldemort's butt looked in his tight football pants (as luck would have it, the Packers were playing that night). I made a reference to wanting to bang one of her friends. Something else happened, and I sat on the bed, and then sat in the hallway (the door was open). This really cheesed her.

Needless to say, she didn't stay the night that night.

The next night, she had to work until 10:00 pm at Wal-Mart across the street, so I didn't see her. The night after that, she got off work early, so I told her to come by the computer lab and we could hang out. I worked in the computer lab as a lab monitor. It was awesome. I always signed up for the less popular lab, so all I would have to do is sit there, do my homework, and occasionally restock the printer with paper or--on particularly tough nights--I'd have to put a new toner cartridge in. And all of this for a sweet $6.00 an hour, which really helped fuel the Beer Tsar trips--literally and figuratively.

Anyway, Carrie Nation comes shuffling in, says high in a clipped, curt fashion, and sits down two rows away to check her email. I'm quiet while I'm sitting there, reading about the nervous system in vertebrates (I was working on filling out my biology minor and was taking Comparative Vertebrate Anatomy...which was one of my favorite classes of all time). She gets up, and I thought she was coming over to see me, and I look up and say "Did you know that you shrink an inch during the day because the disks between your vertebrae compress while you're walking upright?"

I've always had a knack for knowing what to say to a woman to turn her on...

She kind of gives me a look and says, "That's fascinating." She then throws a folded up piece of paper at me. "That's for you." I stare at it for a second, without opening it, and I look back up at her.

"You're kidding, right?" I asked. "You're breaking up with me? And worse, you're breaking up with me in a note? What the fuck, is this Junior High school?"

She didn't respond and, instead, shuffled out of the lab and, out of my life. In response to the note (which was, indeed, a break up note), I wrote a very long, and very carefully constructed email in which I told her that I wanted to talk to with her and we could sort this out and that I really didn't want to break it off with her and blahblahblahblahblah. She didn't respond. Two days later, I had moved on. On the third day, after I had said something about dating someone else to one of my friends during dinner, she must have overheard me. She stood outside of the cafeteria and lit into me when I was finished (she usually sat at the next table over from ours during meals) about how I didn't want to work things out after all and some other such shit. I countered that I had written a long letter to her, extolling her virtues and the greatness of our relationship, but when she hadn't written back, I got over it. Fast. I suggested she should, too.

And, that was pretty much the end of the story of Carrie Nation...or is it?

I graduated the following spring. The following fall, for Homecoming, I arrived with a cooler full of beer that I was planning on drinking with my buds still at St. Joe, Will and Giles. At this point, I'm well over Carrie Nation. I'm back with the Ex-, and we finally decided we loved each other more than cheese, and that we should get married. I had asked her over the summer, and oh we were happy together. Spinning around in a circle holding hands with flowers falling from the sky and cheesy montage music playing in the background happy. Is that a flugelhorn I hear?

So, for Homecoming, I'm celebrating the fact that I've got a job, a fiancee, and a future. I had already been accepted to two different graduate programs, and I was waiting for word from two others, so this book store bullshit job wasn't going to last forever. It's time to drink.

When Homecoming hit that year, it was time for the baseball playoffs. The Cubs, by all manner of miracles, had actually won the wild card in the central and were playing the Braves. And badly. This led to a series of events that are cloudy in my mind, but involved me and some Freshman girl sitting on the couch in my friend Derek's room watching one of the final games of the Cubs series. Since I had a shit ton of beer at my disposal, I was pretty well toastified. I kept giving her beers, too, because, hell, I could. Plus, she was cute. Ish.

Sadly, I don't remember her name, but I do remember that she wore an orange shirt. Briefly.

As things progressed, we got more and more toastified. Apparently, this was a girl who "got hot" when she got drunk, and as we were sitting there, she took her shirt off. And then her pants. And then she put her hand on my knee. And suddenly, I found myself at a moral crossroads.

I had been engaged for a couple of months by this point, to a woman I truly and genuinely loved. Here was a cute...ish...drunk college chick taking her clothes off and making amorous advances toward me. Did I want to? Fuck yeah. Did I want to NOT cheat on my fiancee? Fuck yeah. So, I carefully explained the situation to this young lady and kindly excused myself and ended up back in Will's room. Or Giles'. Or someones. Fuck, I don't remember. I just know it wasn't her room.

Anyway, I spent the whole weekend pretty much in a drunken stupor. But, after having a young woman essentially give me a private strip dance, I was on a slow burn. Come Monday morning, I gathered up whatever soldiers had not fallen over the weekend, packed them into my car, and prepared to drive back across the lonely expanse of North Centeral Indiana so that I could get to work by 2:00 that afternoon. When I describe it as lonely, I do truly mean that. It was corn and soy bean fields as far as the eye could see, dotted occasionally with tiny towns that no one's ever really heard of--Royal Center, Lucerne, Twelve Mile (which was fourteen miles from Logansport), just to name three.

As I was pulling out of campus, I saw the girl who had stripped for me a couple of nights earlier. I waved, because I'm chivalrous like that. I then pull out onto US-231 south and head down to turn onto Indiana-16 east and head for home. The stretch between US-231 and Monon, IN on 16 was one of the most desolately boring and lonely places on the face of the earth. And I was horny after having had a private show and then seeing her again on my way out.

So, I pulled it out. While I was driving. The glorious things about roads in North Central Indiana is that they are fucking arrow straight, and the alignment in my car had recently been fixed, so I could get away with not really paying attention to the road. All I had to do was make sure I didn't hit any deer. So, there I was, in the throes of autoerotic ecstasy, thinking about this young lady who had shown me the Holy of Holies just two nights before. Finally, I finish myself off as I pull up to a stop light. There's another car at the stoplight, which turns and heads west on Indiana-16.

It's Carrie Nation, coming back to campus after finishing her student teaching assignment that morning.

So, I honked my horn and waved at her with my cum-streaked hand, a big smile on my face. She looked over as she was turning, saw me, screwed her face up into a scowl (moreso than normal) and sped off into the west.

I cleaned myself up with a handkerchief, laughed triumphantly, and continued on down the lonely road, wondering where I could find a good cup of coffee.

It's Ash Wednesday, Y'all!

Typically, on a day like today, I'd break down the history behind the holiday and/or saint's day, interspersed with tiny little nuggets of extraneous information that would make the post slightly more amusing.

Today, I'm not going to do that. Perhaps it's the solemnity of the holiday, perhaps it's just that I'm ass-tired, or perhaps it's because I've been blowing my creative wad on the comments in your blogs. You have to admit, I've been pretty fucking clever this week, making up for last week's dearth of funny and/or pithy comments.

Anyway, I'm going to give up a couple of happy little stories today in honor of Ash Wednesday that are appropriate, given the holiday. Buckle up, bitches, we're going for a ride on the way back machine. Hold me, Mr. Peabody!

First off, we anachronistically arrive in spring of 1998. I'm in the throes of Catholic Conversion, and so I attend the Ash Wednesday mass. My friend Jeff was an alter attendant...or whatever they call the not quite priests doing the priestly duties. Jeff is now an ordained priest of the Society of the Precious Blood order. You should bear that in mind whilst I go through the tale.

There I am, standing in line, heading up toward the alter where I will get the ashes decorated on my head to loudly announce to the world that "I am Catholic, and I went to Mass. Suck it, pagans!" Sure, I wasn't a full member of the church, but you didn't have to be Catholic to get the ashes. You can just come in off the street and get the mark. Pretty keen, eh? The Catholic Church, much like the Catholic Girls, are all inclusive and will let anyone in.

So, I approach my friend Jeff and lean down (I'm taller than he, but about six or eight inches) and I see him working his thumb in the ash tray furiously, like he's trying to smash a bug beneath his thumb and grind its guts to Hell. I catch a fleeting glimpse of the ashed thumb as he raises it toward my head. It's black. Not just dark, sooty gray as one would expect. No, this was a black so pure, so powerful, that light itself was bent around it as it got sucked in by the absorbative properties of the color. "Great," I think, "he's going to put that on like graffiti." I braced myself for impact.

It wasn't just that he was going for darkness; he was going for maximal coverage, as well. Starting at my hairline, he dragged his thumb down my forehead to the bridge of my nose. He then reupped the ashes and started at the hairline of one temple and dragged his thumb across my brow to the hairline of the other temple. At that moment, there were about thirty, maybe fifty (at most) people still behind me in line, plus, I was in a church, so I had to stifle my urge to scream out "Jesus fuck, Jeff, would you like me just to roll in it like a dust bath?" I also, since he had made his intentions well and clear that he was going to enroll in the seminary that fall, couldn't slug him the gut. I mean, the man was going to be a priest and all.

So, I closed my eyes, offered a heavy sigh, and whispered "Amen", then departed to go back to my seat. One of my friends sat down beside me after she got her ashes, looked at my forehead, and burst into fits of giggles that wouldn't subside for a good forty five minutes afterward. I know this, because we went to lunch immediately after. Along the route to the cafe, everyone whom I passed suffered a similar fate. Those with more tact at least were able to twist their mouths up and stifle their laughter until after I passed, and some of them were able to utter a sympathetic "nice".

Let's hop back in the time machine and this time set course for spring of 2000. I'll set the stage for you here: I was young(er), I lived alone in my own apartment, I was currently enrolled in grad school where I was surrounded--pretty much daily--by hordes of nubile, college-aged girls who, when spring arrived, liked wearing very little. I was also recently single and had no steady girlfriend at the time. Got all that? Good, let's proceed.

Back then, I reveled in my Catholicism, and so I'd try to give up something hard. One year I gave up alcohol, another I gave up desserts and snacks. Pretty standard fare. Well, in spring of 2000, for some reason, I got it in my mind that I would give up masturbation. I felt I was doing it too much and too often, and so I decided to just up and quit. I'd be less lusty, my carpal tunnel would clear up, and my clothes would stop reeking of musk.

Now, my friends that I hung out with most of the time were all female. There were three of them with whom I entered the same research lab and to say that they were a little prudish would be an understatement. If I recall correctly, none of them were Catholic (which might explain it), but they simply did not discuss anything that even remotely had to do with sex. Or bodily functions. Or, well, pretty much anything that I would classify as humor. Yeah, I don't get it, either.

So, when Lent rolled around, one of them asked me what I was giving up. Knowing that they wouldn't exactly want to know about my extracurricular activities when at home, or driving back to my apartment, or if I was bored in the computer lab, or even walking past Touchdown Jesus, I blurted out "I'm giving up candy." Seemed logical enough, and it was one of those things that was a fairly common sacrifice.

On Ash Wednesday of that year, I went and got my lunch, and decided that I really wanted a milky way (God's gift to candy, with its perfect proportions of caramel, chocolate and nougat), so I went to the little college store there and bought one. No big deal. I slap it down on my tray for eating after I finished my salad or whatever meatless meal I was enjoying, and one of the girls points to the candy bar and says:

"I thought you were giving candy up for Lent!"

In a mad panic, my eyes go shifty, I break out in a sweat, my face flushes and my heart races. Finally, I managed to calm myself enough to offer a small nod and said, "Yes. Yes, I am." I tossed the snack in my backpack and carried it around with me for the remainder of the day, craving its gooey goodness. When I got home that evening, I pounded down the Milky Way as if my life depended upon it. Then I realized that there's no eating between meals on Ash Wednesday, so that ended up being my dinner. Meatlessness has never tasted so sweet.

I met my wife a couple of weeks after that. When I introduced myself and shook her hand, I couldn't help but notice the twin midget wrestlers fighting for domination in her shirt, and, since the carpal tunnel had been clearing up, my grip was nice and firm, in that sort of "Oh God, I'm staring at a hot redhead's breasts and I can't do a thing about it" way. Two years later, after we were married and when the movie "40 Days and 40 Nights" came out, I confided in her what I had given up that year. All she could say was "Wow."

In case you were wondering, this is my 400th post. I thought about doing something deep and reflective, but instead, I decided to offer up the tales of how my forehead was violated by the thumb of a priest and how I managed to stave off autoerotic pleasures for six and a half weeks. What will the next 100 posts bring? Probably more masturbation stories. Huzzah!

That Was Just A Dream, Just a Dream...

Breaking news: North By God Carolina blogger had a dream last night...and feels the need to share it.

So, I was transported back in time. I was 16, and for some reason, I lived in a house that we shared with another family. The family had three daughters. The oldest daughter had great legs--fantastic legs, long, shapely, tan, smooth, silky, shiny...I know this because this is the only thing I ever saw of her. She stayed in her room all the time and draped them over the arm of her couch while she watched television. The youngest girl was like ten or twelve or something, but the middle girl was my age.
For some reason, I went in their half of the house, I think to ask the middle girl a question. It was an actual serious question, but I ended up forgetting what it was I was going to ask, and then, shrugging, I asked her if she wanted to go to my school dance with me. She agreed readily, and then that's when I threw in the hook: it was a costume party dance. She still agreed, and so I went back to my half of the house to get ready.

I dressed up as Darth Vader. Except, it wasn't really Darth Vader...more like "albino" Darth Vader. Yeah, my costume was all white. Cape. Pants. T-shirt. Helmet. Oh, I was stylin'.

I got in the car and drove to the other side of the house to pick the girl up. I don't remember much about her costume other than she was wearing red flip flops, but I do know that she had beautiful, long, blonde hair and I have no idea what her name was. So, you know, it was like a perfect date. Nothing like sharing a house with someone and not knowing their name, but dating them nonetheless. Awesome.

So, we're driving to the dance, and I'm headed down the street that goes past Notre Dame stadium. At this moment, there's a pep rally going for a football game. Only problem was, there were some fans from other schools. Like, there was a small cadre of Boston College fans there (Candy, I blame you for this unsightly smear on my otherwise unsullied dream) and there were some people from the University of Pittsburgh. It was an older man and woman, and they had one of those huge, fake, plastic bullhorns and they're lobbing insults on the Irish. I know they're from Pittsburgh because they have the blue and yellow outfits on, but the kicker is they have "Pitt" scrawled across their chest. I'm still wearing my white Darth Vader suit. My date is still in the car.
How dare they! I think and I stop the car, get out, rip the bullhorn from the man's grasp and I decide, then and there, that these two need a lesson taught to them. I go into full crowd-incitement mode, using the bullhorn to call attention down on these people and to get the crowd to turn against them. All while wearing my white Darth Vader outfit. With the voice modulator in my mouth so that, when roaring into the bullhorn, my voice is threatening to deafen people for miles around.
It works wonders. I whip the crowd into a frenzy, telling them that our space has been invaded by these plebes and that we should do something about it. Even the football team is fired up and ready to crack some skulls, so everyone starts chasing after these two people. I keep inciting the riot until the crowd has chased the people away, and I open up the door to my car, toss the bullhorn in the back seat, and slide into the drivers seat and get ready to go.

That's when my date turns to me and says, in as flat and cold a tone as possible, "You know that was my mom and dad with the bullhorn, right?"

I actually woke up laughing. I laughed so hard, I had to get up and pee for fear of wetting the bed. It took a while to fall back asleep since I kept giggling.

I had another dream after this one and it was about as exceptional as the first, but I've forgotten most of the details and I don't want to tell only half a story. However, this one goes down in the annals of dreams so fabulous they must be told to others.

A Pirate Looks at 33

As I was standing in line at Target yesterday, looking to fill yet another prescription to kill the wee beasties (thanks Leeuwenhoek) that had yet again taken up residence in my daughter's lungs, I thought back on the past 33 years. Admittedly, anything much past 28 years ago was a bit fuzzy, but the occasional memory does rise to the surface from time to time.

Here I was, on my birthday, looking to get some medicine for my sick kid. What a joyous way to kick off the day of festivities. I could be at home, being given a sponge bath by a chesty redhead, or I could be lounging gracefully on my couch watching Christmas cartoons. Instead, I was standing there, staring blankly ahead as some vaguely attractive blonde woman was explaining to me what an antibiotic does and how my daughter needs to take it and all the various side effects that comes with an antibiotic and blah blah blah take your shirt off, it's my birthday, dammit!

So then, I thought about my happiest birthday memory, and I think it happened yesterday. See, as I was pulling myself from the warm embrace of that fickle mistress sleep, I heard shuffling footsteps in the hallway outside my door. It was my little boy, and I figured he was doing his usual "Can you make me breakfast?" morning routine. Instead, he ran to my side, throwing his arms wide around me, embracing me in his biggest bear hug. "Happy birthday, daddy!" he said.

And that's why I was standing in line being lectured to about things that I already know by someone who looked a little too much like a cheerleader and less like someone who would know that amoxicillin is a bacterial cell wall inhibitor thanks to its handy-dandy beta-lactam structure. Though I was bored stupid, I can't really fault her too much. She didn't know that I do research in the pharmaceutical field. She was just doing her job, after all, and I was doing mine: making sure that I'd have someone there to hug me in the mornings every time December 22nd rolled around, so that I could keep making brand new happy birthday memories.

However, you don't come here for the happy, sappy stories about my kids. No, you come for my weak attempts at humor. So, let's get back to that.

I've met a few people over the years who share my birthday. There are also a handful of notable public personalities with whom I share a birthday, such as Steve Garvey, Ladybird Johnson and Crissy Moran (I always forget to tell you guys not to look her up at work, as her, ahem, body of work is rather NSFW). I forgot that housewife-cum-jive translator Barbara Billingsly was also born on my birthday, as well as Lord Voldemort, Ralph Fiennes. Also, the Highlander was born on my birthday. I'm not 100% certain, but he was born on winter's day in the Highlands of Scotland, and every so often, the Winter Solstice does fall on my birthday, so there you go.

Recently, I learned that my new internet friend Scope also shares my birthday, but you guys knew that, since he gave me a fantastic birthday post over at his place, despite the fact that it was his birthday, too! What a guy. He did fail to mention that Romania's communist government was overthrown on December 22nd, 1989. This particular historic event was particularly poignant because a friend of mine was in Bucharest watching out of his hotel room while they dragged Ceauşescu's (Chow-chess-cue's) body through the streets. Awesome. I'm sure he said "nuts" right before he was gunned down.

Several other people I've met had the same birthday as me: some nursing student in college that my first room mate drunkenly banged on our first night on campus, one of my teachers in elementary school, this dude Ben who used to have a lake cottage at the same lake as my parents, and two girls I dated in that rebound period after I had my heart ripped out of my chest with my first affianced. I think today would be a good day to tell the tale of these two, because they are prime examples of humanity if I ever met some.


The first girl, Carmen, was a year younger than I. She had all the things I required: pulse, use of oxygen, full use of her legs. She also had dark, curly hair. I met her while I was working at the book store. She came in to pick up a book on Titanic, which had been out for a while, but apparently she was just now becoming wicked fascinated with it or had just learned to read or something. I didn't ask. She had seen the movie something like twelve times, which is more times than I have read the Lord of the Rings, and while that didn't send up a red flag, it did unfurl said ruddy drapeau. I picked her up and we were driving to dinner when we passed Best Buy, and she pointed out that she just learned that her biological father worked there and that he owed her 22 years of family discounts, and that if I wanted anything, she could give me the hook up. Nice. Then we passed the gym where I had a membership and she proceeded to tell me about the lawsuit she had brought against them for slipping in the shower or something. At this point I began tuning her out.

After dinner, she asked if I wanted to do anything else, but that we couldn't go back to her apartment because her roommate had custody of his kids for the weekend and they'd be there. So, we decided to go see a movie, but the only decent thing playing was Apt Pupil, so we went. Nothing like a movie about Nazis to really get the sexual juices flowing. After the movie, I asked if she wanted to do anything else. She declined, saying that she had to go to bed (it was 10:00) to be up at work the following morning. So, I took her home, bid her good night, and returned to my car where I sat there for a few moments trying to think of anything enjoyable about the night (other than seeing Apt Pupil and enjoying some good chicken). Regardless, the next day I called her, told her I had a good time, and asked if she wanted to go out again. She said she was just about to run out the door with her roommate and his kids and to call her back later. I said I would and wished her fun at the farm or wherever they were going. That was nine years ago. In my defense, I did lose her number rather than throw it away, but then, I also didn't exactly look real hard for it, either.

The next girl, Katie, was another girl that I met at the bookstore. She was buying Lolita and I chatted her up a little bit. She told me she had heard about it in one of her classes in college (uh huh...heard about it) and was interested in it. I had to check her ID for her credit card, and that's when I noticed she was born on the same day as I. I mentioned it, and we both thought it was a neat coincidence. She was about three hours older than me. We kept talking for like five minutes and finally I popped the question. She said she'd love to go out with me. So, we set up a date for Saturday evening where we'd meet and have dinner. I was having a lovely time with her; I really liked her, and she had met the same prerequisites as the other one: pulse, oxygen, functioning limbs, but she also had a college degree. And a fabulous ass. It was like I just hit the Daily Double. I'll wager it all on doggy style with a healthy bit of ass slapping, Alex.

So, things are going great, we were talking about college and all. She went to Indiana, and since my best friend also went there (along with about twenty other people from my high school), I had been to the campus a few times, so I was asking her about it. I then asked the question about whether she had gone to many basketball games, and she said she didn't really like basketball and wished the school was known more for other things. Egad. Red flag went way up on that one, but I was having such a great time and she had such a great ass that I kept going. The other interesting thing was that she had a degree in biology, so I asked her what kind of jobs she was looking for, since I had a degree in chemistry along with a minor in biology. It was at about this point that the date went south. Way south (this is called foreshadowing).

Turns out, she had just quit her job at the Fort Wayne Children's Zoo. Intrigued, I leaned forward and asked why she would do that, as it seemed like a great place to work if you a) loved animals (like she did) and b) had a degree in biology (like she did). She said the pay kind of sucked, some of the other employees were dicks--both of which are very valid excuses. And then she said, and I quote, "And...there were also the monkeys."

"Monkeys?" I asked, my curiosity aroused.

"Yes," she said, "I had to take care of the monkeys on Monkey Island." Monkey Island was inhabited by a troupe of brown Capuchin monkeys.

Trying to be funny, I offered, "Did they constantly harass you with their little tin cups trying to get some money for the organ grinder?"

Apparently, this was a bad question.

"No," she responded. "They would...attack me."

"Oh wow. They can be vicious little devils, I hear."

"Well, they wouldn't bite or anything. They just kept...grabbing me."
I was too speechless to say anything.

"They would constantly jump up to grab my ass and they'd climb on me to get into my shirt and everything. It was very uncomfortable. I tried to get transferred to a different group of animals."

I sat there, lip aquiver, trying very hard not to laugh aloud. I could feel tears welling in my eyes and my face growing redder and redder. I'm sure she saw it, too. There was no hiding my trying to hide my mirth. Rather coldly, she simply said, "So, I quit."

I steered the conversation away from the zoo immediately. Dinner ended shortly thereafter, but we decided to go see a movie--mostly because we couldn't talk during the movie and I wouldn't mention the whole monkey thing. We went and saw Pleasantville, which is still one of my favorite movies. At the end of the evening, we bid each other farewell and I promised to call her the next day. I did call, and then I called again on Monday to tell her that the book she had ordered came in (it was some Nicholas Sparks piece of drivel). Later that evening, she showed up, and I asked her if she'd like to go out again.

"Well, you're a very nice guy, but I just don't see us dating."

Not one to take rejection lightly, I quipped, "I can't promise I won't slap your ass, but I will promise not to sling poo at you."

She stormed off. I saw her once again, about a week before Christmas, when she came in the store to get something. I assume she was still unemployed, because she was with her mom, and she handed her mom a pile of stuff and then left. Her mom wrote a check, and I had to verify the address. I looked up and said, "Oh, you must be Katie's mom. I went out with your daughter a couple of months ago. She's a very lovely young lady, Mrs. C. As it turns out, we have the same birthday. Tell her Happy Birthday for me."

"Oh, why thank you," she said. "I'll tell you said so. And wish her a Happy Birthday for you. And Happy Birthday to you."

"Why, thank you, Mrs. C. Could you also pass along something else to her, please?"

"Why, certainly."

"Tell her I said 'ooh ooh ooh, ah ah ah!'" I slapped my head and made a face while doing it. Apparently, her mother had a better sense of humor, because she busted out laughing. And then promised to relay the message. Merry fucking Christmas, Monkey Girl.

On the Married Guy's Perspective

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So, Here's How It Went

I was out Monday, but I'll write about that later.

I didn't get back to the lab until Tuesday, and then we had a lecture to attend yesterday morning, so I didn't get the poop until yesterday afternoon. As my computer at home (the one built during the Clinton Administration...I shit you not) is slowly but surely gasping it's final breaths, I didn't write this up last night (I did something else on it last night, but I'll write about that later, as well, and no, it wasn't what you're thinking, pervert). This morning was dominated by attending safety meetings followed by a good bout of herding cats rounding up the lunch bunch (I'm a natural born leader), so that's why you're not getting this until now. That's right, I have altered the deal. Pray I don't alter it any further.

Apparently, Friday night went alright. They had dinner and some drinks, generally had a good time, laughed, joked, punched each other in the face...you know, typical first date stuff. Saturday, the guy (henceforth known as Pepe) texted my friend (whom I was going to refer to as "the black cat with the white stripe painted down her back", but felt that was a mouthful), but she had other plans for that night already, so she declined his offer to go out again.

Sunday afternoon, my friend is doing her typical Sunday routine of laundry, sweeping, delousing and crack when she receives a frantic phone call (might have been a text...that was lost in the subsequent gales of laughter that spilled forth from my torso as more of the story was revealed unto me) and the conversation went something like this:

Pepe: You can cook, right? You said you can cook.

TBCWTWSPDHB: Yeah, I can cook.

Pepe: Okay. Good. I need help. I have a friend coming over and I have a turkey I'm trying to cook and, uh...INEEDHELP!!!

TBCWTWSPDHB: What's wrong?

Pepe: Well, the guy at the store said that I needed to thaw the turkey out for a day before I tried to cook it and that I couldn't cook it frozen, but I thought I'd prove him wrong. But...my friend will be here in a while AND the turkey's not looking so good and I need help. Pleaseohpleaseohpleaseohpleaseohplease with sugar and honey and crushed up almonds on top?

TBCWTWSPDHB: *sigh* Fine. But if this is just some lame excuse to lure me over to your place, it won't end well for you.

My friend, who is a very accommodating personality (in case you couldn't tell), went over to help this guy out. She walked in and, sure enough, there were candles everywhere and Barry White was crooning something fabulously sexy. And by candles everywhere, I mean that there was smoke billowing from the oven and by Barry White crooning, I mean that there was a moron running around in the middle of the apartment screaming "Ohmigod ohmigod ohmigod ohmigod..." over and over again. So, my friend opens the oven up to assess the situation and finds an 18 pound turkey shoved into a brownie pan sitting in the middle of the oven, the outermost layer of the bird charring and crackling. My friend looks over her shoulder and the following took place:

TBCWTWSPDHB: Have you basted this thing?

Pepe: Uh...what's that mean?

*friend pulls the turkey from the oven and inserts a knife into the carcass; the outermost layer of char peels back instantly and falls away, revealing the frozen inner shell of the turkey*

TBCWTWSPDHB: I'll take that as a 'no.' Hey, where's the pop-up timer?

Pepe: The what now?

TBCWTWSPDHB: The pop-up timer. They put the timer in the turkey so that when it gets done the red button pops up and tells you it's safe to eat.

Pepe: Oh. That thing. I took it out. I didn't know what it was, so I thought I didn't need it.

TBCWTWSPDHB: *vein throbs in forehead; left eye twitches furiously* I...see.

At this point, my friend digs through the remains of the turkey, carefully slicing away the parts that seem salvageable, using the one small knife that Pepe owns to do the cleaning, mangling and slicing of the uncharred remains of the turkey. She then puts whatever pieces make the cut down in the pan and opens the cupboard, hoping to find some broth or some soup or something. Instead, much like the barren wastelands of the tundra, she finds nothing. No food stuffs. No Les Stroud. Not even mammoth bones. Nothing.

TBCWTWSPDHB: Do you have any chicken broth or bouillon or anything like that?

Pepe: Uh, why would I need that?

*my friend spends five minutes bashing her head against the nearest appliance, hoping that one of the blows would end her misery then and there*

She drains what little juice is left in the brownie pan along with the hunks of turkey that haven't been tanned into leather yet and pops them back in the oven.

TBCWTWSPDHB: Okay, how much time do we have?

Pepe: Well, my friend Louis (not his real name, but, shit, why not?) will be here in two hours.

TBCWTWSPDHB: I guess that gives us some time. What else are you having?

Pepe: I have this box of instant mashed potatoes.

TBCWTWSPDHB: *sigh* Okay. What do you have to cook them in?

Pepe: I have this bowl...

*my friend fights the urge to rip the hair from her scalp and instead decides to help the guy with the presentation of the "dinner", such as it was*

My friend then discovers that Pepe owns all of four plates, and all of his "silverware" is of the camping variety: aluminum, flimsy, holes drilled in the handles. He had a couple of bowls, which she used for whatever side items she had managed to cobble together for Pepe's meal with Louis. Finally, at the end of the ordeal, my friend is trying to excuse herself so that she could get back to her laundry and crack, but Pepe's trying to let my friend know how much he appreciated her help by pouring on the pathetic telling her how he really needs someone because he can't cook. This revolves around the afternoon of her ducking and weaving out of the way of his clumsy attempts to kiss her, because we all know how romantic raw poultry is. I mean, yeah, I understand, some people like to work food into their *ahem* extracurricular activities, and I know that certain parts of the male anatomy have that "last chicken in the shop" look to them. Seriously, though. Raw turkey is not a turn on.

Needless to say, my friend has decided to let this one go. And by "let this one go", I mean that she's decided to run fast and furious for the hills and avoid him like a plague-ridden, diseased rat carcass.

As my boss pointed out, though, she doesn't need to worry because he'll be dead in a few days from poisoned turkey.

So, thanks to everyone who helped out with the fashion advice. I'll call on you all again if needed. And I'll be sure to tell more happy dating stories as they come to me (and I get permission to recount them here).