The elusive yellow gal

I know that one of the oldest, most played out Asian American subjects is the question of why there are so many Asian girl/Caucasian guy couples and so few Caucasian girl/Asian guy couples. Many reasons have been proffered, yet few have been agreed upon. My brother, a guy who does not really "go for Asian chicks," noted to me that looking at an Asian girl makes him feel like he's looking at his own sister. Another Asian guy I know isn't attracted to Asian chicks; when he sees Asian chicks, they remind him of his mother.

All of this struck me as odd because when I see Asian dudes, the mere fact that they are Asian does not trigger that oh-my-god-he-looks-like-my-brother/dad feeling. Unless of course the guy really does look like my brother/dad.

Anyway, a very silly and slightly amusing video on the subject is on YouTube.com, inaptly entitled: Why Asian guys can't get white girls. Contrary to the title, the short movie focuses on why Asian guys can't get Asian girls and only touches on the Asian guy/White girl subject. Nothing terribly enlightening is revealed. But it's worth a chuckle or two.

I want my toothpaste

I know there are terrorists out there.

I know there are terrorists who hate the U.S. and want to do everything they can to destroy the U.S.

I know they have made successful and unsuccessful attempts to kill Americans out of pure hatred.

But damn, I can't believe I'm not allowed to bring my toothpaste in my carry-on luggage on my flight today. I know this is the same thing a terrorist would say: "No really, it's not a liquid explosive, it really is Colgate's Total toothpaste!" But I will literally open the tube for them, put it on my toothbrush and brush my teeth. I mean, would a terrorist do that with a liquid explosive?

Thankfully, the Department of Homeland Security makes exceptions for babies and diabetics so that the babies won't starve on the plane without their milk and the diabetics won't lapse into comas. But what if there are terrorist babies and diabetics? It is possible that a terrorist would put milk in one bottle and a light colored liquid explosive in another. Then the terrorist would carry the bottles with the baby, smiling all the while. It's also possible that a diabetic brings insulin in one container and a liquid explosive in another. I mean, if we're extrapolating that a container of Lancome Juice Tubes lip gloss is a liquid explosive, than why not the milk or insulin?

Okay, wryness aside, I acknowledge that terrorism is very real. I personally know people who've lost people in 9/11. It's just a shame that we've been reduced to living in perpetual fear--fear of taking flights, fear of bringing on containers of liquids or suspiciously clunky shoes, fear of being attacked.

Ah, the inconveniences of living in a country that is hated.

Zack attack

Am freaking out. In a vastly successful attempt to procrastinate, I just learned that Zack from Saved by the Bell is half Asian! I had no idea.

Speaking English good

The other day, I visited the law library. The security guard at the entrance seemed to be in a friendly mood. "Are you a good lawyer?" he smirked as my laptop and papers went through the security scanner.

"Um, I guess," I said.

"You guess?"

"I hope I will be, I'm sort of new," I replied.

He nodded and smiled at me and peppered me with a few other questions. I nodded and smiled back and answered his inane questions as my stuff slowly made its way on the conveyer belt.

"You know, you speak English pretty good."

I looked at him. "Excuse me?"

"Yeah you speak English good," he said approvingly. "What are you? Yellow?"

"Yes, yes I am," admittedly disappointed he correctly guessed my ethnicity. He sat there looking pretty pleased with himself. "And do most Asian attorneys you see not speak English 'good'?" I asked.

"Nope," he said, "they all have an accent or somethin'."

"Oh I see." I didn't quite know what to say. He was smiling and nodding the whole time. I think he thought praising my English skills was an actual compliment to me. I took my stuff, laughed awkwardly, and said "good bye" as I went along my way.

I thought about what the guy said. Virtually every Asian American attorney I knew could speak English 'good.' What the hell was he talking about?

It reminded me of some other time when some guy from a college class had said to me, "Wow I'm surprised you don't have an accent."

"What are you talking about? I was born and raised in America," I had said.

"Yeah but your parents are immigrants. I'm surprised you didn't get an accent from them. You speak English good."

"Um. Okay."

I guess I speak English good.

Stalkers need love too

We women complain about men. How they suck. How they're dogs. How they lie, cheat and steal our hearts.

This is all true.

However, I dare add that women can get crazy too. Present bloggers/readers excluded of course.

A guy I know happened to mention his stalker. Now, I am prone to the dramatic and throw around the word "stalker" glibly, like if a guy calls me more than three times in one week, I'm like, "whoa stalker." This of course is not to trivialize real stalkers out there. I am prone to exaggeration.

Anyway, this guy mentioned his stalker.

"Wait, a stalker, you had a real stalker?" I asked him.

"Yes."

"What happened??" I asked.

He told me he met a girl, Ms. S, they went on a date, and it went okay. The date ended cordially, yet the guy realized he just wasn't feeling it. Within 10 hours of the date, she calls him and leaves a voicemail message. Like 90% of the country, he has a life, so he is unable to call her back within ten minutes. She then emails him and asks him in her email, "Did you get my voicemail message? Just making sure you got my voicemail message. I had a great time, in case you didn't get my voicemail message." Then she called him again and left another voicemail message. Then she called again.

Whatever ounce of potential affection he had for her shriveled into nothing. He called her back and said something to the effect of "I really enjoyed meeting you. You're cool, yet I don't see this being anything more than a friendship."

She heartily agreed and said "Oh sure, sure. Definitely, great!"

Then she called him the next day. He was busy. She left a voicemail. Two hours after her first voicemail, she called again and left another voicemail. One hour after that, she called again and left a message with the receptionist.

That was Monday.

Tuesday. 10 AM, she called his work number. 1:30 PM, she called his cell. 3:45 PM she called his work number again. The guy asked the receptionist to please screen his calls. The receptionist complied.

Wednesday, the guy got a phone call from the front desk. "Ms. S is here to see you."

The guy was stunned. Ms. S? Ms. Stalker was here? At his office? At his JOB?

Ms. S apparently looked up the guy's full name on the internet, found out where he worked, found out his work number, and found out his work address. She then traveled during the work day to his office, took the elevator to the 39th floor, and stood in front of the receptionist to ask for the guy.

The guy came out to greet his stalker. Ms. S stood there, smiling, expectant, beaming. In her arms she held a vase. In the vase were twenty to thirty species of flowers.

"Ms. S," the guy said, "Wow, what are you doing here?"

"Hi!" she said. "I just happened to be in the neighborhood and I had these flowers and I just wanted to give you some!"

The guy forced a smile. "Oh wow, that's so--"

don't say creepy don't say psycho say something nice say 'nice'

--nice!"

Ms. S beamed as she handed the guy her bright pungent flowers.

He took them and held them and looked at her. "Thank you," he said.

She stood there, smiling uncontrollably. He tried to smile back. "Thank you," he repeated.

"Well aren't you going to show me around?" she lilted to him.

"Uh, sure," he said.

They walked around the office. She showed him his office. She ooh-ed and ah-ed over his leather chair and shiny desk and autographed baseball. Then he showed her out.

"It was really nice seeing you again!" she chirped maniacally.

"Yes, it was..." he replied.

That was Wednesday. Thursday, 11:00 AM she called his cell. 11:30 AM she called his office. 12:00 she called his office. 1:00 she called his office. Ms. S began to suspect she was getting screened. Since she had spoken to the receptionist so much more than the guy, she became all chatty with the receptionist. "Say," she said to the receptionist, "would you mind not telling him that I'm calling whenever I call?" The receptionist knew what was going on but lied nonetheless through her sweet teeth, "Sure."

2:00 she called. 3:40 she called. 4:00 she called.

Friday, the receptionist was not in. The phone rang directly at the guy's desk. The guy picked up. "Hello?" he said.

"Hi there, it's me, Ms. S!"

Shit motherfucking shit, the guy thought to himself. "Ms. S. Hi."

"How are you?" she asked excitedly.

"Ms. S. I don't even call people I like every day. You have been calling me at least three times a day."

"No I haven't, what are you talking about?" Ms. S asked.

"Let's see, you called me seven times yesterday."

Ms. S was silent. "She told you?" She being the receptionist.

"Yes, she told me."

"Oh dear," Ms. S said awkwardly.

"Look, I don't think this friendship is working out," he added.

"Oh," Ms. S replied, defeated.

"Goodbye."

"Bye."

Ms. S got caught in a lie. Thought she could get away with it. Her true psychotic behavior was revealed and, mortified, she never contacted the guy ever again. The problem he fretted over so much solved itself.

On behalf of females, I was embarrassed. So these are the psycho girls that I hear guys occasionally refer to. I can see why some guys are hesitant about dating some girls. I mean, geez, I get obsessive over guys in that does-he-or-doesn't-he-like-me way, but I'd never call a guy ten times a day, stalk him on the internet, call him on his work number when he never gave it to me, show up at his office unannounced and then ask his own staff to lie to him about my psychotic calls!

Dude, if a guy doesn't return my phone call, it means he doesn't like me. It sucks, but it's true. And I got better things to do with my time than sweat him. What did Ms. S think she could do? Bully him into making her like him? Think that the more she called him, the sooner he'd realize how real her feelings were and he would eventually see the light?

I am amazed that there are people out there who ascribe to the belief that they can badger/bully/pressure/suffocate a person into liking them back.

Newsflash: Psychotic behavior = not attractive. But I suppose stalkers need love too.

Virtual non-encounter

I was having lunch outside with a gal pal, enjoying the lovely weather, when in front of me, I espied a guy whom I suspected to be Online Guy #2 from my online dating days. After our first and last date, I had never heard from him again. (Which was not as big of a deal as getting dissed by Online Guy #3 who ended up being a liar anyway.)

I was tempted to yell out "Online Guy #2!!" to then turn away and ask my gal pal to see if he responded to his name. My maturity (what little of it exists) however prevented me from following through on that urge. Also I had a stain on my shirt and I'm kind of bloated now so I didn't want him to think "Whoa what happened to you??" / "Whoa dodged a bullet there!"

Ladies, no matter how much we bitch and moan about guys, in all seriousness what would life be without the stupid drama that surrounds dating the other half of our species?

Whoa jelly

I was recently dragged into a candy store, where I saw Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans. If you've ever read Harry Potter, you'd know what these were. In the novels (and the movies), the beans come in every flavor, from blueberry to buttered popcorn to dirt. So thinking it was cool, I bought a box. Some thoughts:

Third place for worst flavor: Bacon. It tastes like bacon...except it's a sugary jelly bean!

Second place for worst flavor: Sardine. Imagine an intense fish flavor mixed with jelly bean sugar. They listed real fish in the ingredients!

Tied for first place for the most disgusting flavors are "Vomit" and "Rotten Egg" which has the extra touch of being white on the outside and a deep yellow on the inside. And indeed, the Vomit tasted like vomit and the Rotten Egg tasted like rotten egg. I bit into each one and then spat them out.

Interesting not-so-horrid flavors: Black Pepper, Buttered Popcorn and Toasted Marshmallow. I never got to taste "Soap" but I'm sure that would've made the list. "Dirt" and "Grass" weren't so bad. "Earthworm" was kind of nast, but didn't make the top three.

The ingredients say "natural flavors" and I can't help but wonder if they really used earwax, vomit and booger in their respective jelly beans.

Yeah, call me a traditionalist, but I prefer the good old fashioned cherry, grape and lemon jelly beans.

This world

I along with other chaperones spent this past Saturday going to the zoo with a bunch of rascally kids. Never thought that being pummeled, dragged by the arm, jumped on and teased would be fun. Kids crack me up. Instead of discouraging them when they uttered wildly inappropriate things regarding bodily functions, I'd start laughing like crazy which of course just encouraged them more. The way children see the world is so amusing, so refreshing. Their joy is almost contagious.

So it should be no surprise that I was utterly traumatized today after reading this NY Times article on pedophiles. It is not for the faint of heart. I think about the children and how there are sick people out there trying to become camp counselors and teachers to get closer to children. And not only that, but the pedophiles see themselves as victims of a bigoted, close-minded society!

It's amazing how one planet can harbor something sweet and perfect like kids running through a petting zoo and something so disgusting like a pediatrician fantasizing about his patients. Ugh.

Q & A

You know, some of these posts I post just for the hell of it, that is, for argument's sake, to get people's wheels turning, et cetera. There've gotta be other yellow folks out there who are thinking, "Goddamn does this chick ever stop sputtering out her lame-ass cliche pseudointellectual hyper-PC bull shit?"

My answer: Nah.

More than a color

As I've mentioned in previous entries, I'd rather be treated as if I were white (i.e., like a normal person) rather than an "Oriental" (i.e. like a minority).

A couple other yellow gals and I went to a couple bars last night when a couple of much-older white dudes started chatting with us. I prefer that a guy just chat me up like a normal person, asking the usual lame but effective questions like "So what do you do for fun?" and "Did you grow up in the city?" I feel at ease and comfortable. When a guy starts venturing into race, I put my guard up a little. I start thinking, Great, what's this guy going to ask now? Whether I know kung fu? Whether I've watched all of Lucy Liu's movies? When was the last time I've been to my mother land? Yes, I'm paranoid. But unfortunately, I have been asked those questions. Seriously.

So one guy -- thinking he's oh-so-PC -- asked me "What nationality are you?" I looked at him with pity. He just asked the wrong girl the wrong question. My yellow pals, being much more normal and nice, simply told them their ethnicities. But I wasn't feeling particularly charitable. So I replied, "I am American."

As I expected, he asked, "No I mean your nationality."

I replied, "I am a citizen of the United States of America. My nationality is American."

He shook his head and said, "No I mean NATIONALITY. Like I am German Irish."

This was getting boring so I refrained from saying "Ah, you have dual citizenship in Germany and Ireland?" and instead said, "Ah, you mean to ask my ethnic background?" He disregarded the question and repeated (for what felt like the nine hundredth time) "I mean your nationality."

I smiled. "I am American, but my ethnic background is Yellow." Then they started asking all these questions about the Yellow Country, Yellow culture, and the Yellow language ("Ooh, how do you say 'Hello' in Yellow?"). I couldn't help but wonder whether they really gave a rat's ass about All That Is Yellow. Granted, maybe I was being way too hard on the guys. Maybe they were genuinely, honestly curious about All That Is Yellow and it wasn't until they bumped into three yellow gals did they remember their burning curiosity about Yellowness.

However, I suspect that, like so many other people, they mistakenly believed that if they dwell on someone's minority status, they are being more respectful of her status by being painfully aware of it. They have to acknowledge it, discuss it, philosophize on it, and praise the accomplishments of all people of that demographic. For example, a guy once told me that once a girl realized he was Jewish, she exclaimed "Oh, you're Jewish? Henry Kissinger was a great man!"

No doubt, there are minorities who would eat that up. I don't. This is not to say I deny who I am or what I am. But my color does not define me, and by conversing with someone on the basis of her race seems to presume that. I am more than my color (contrary to what my blog name and moniker imply). I like swimming. I'm sarcastic. I like red Skittles. I bite my nails. And oh yeah, I'm yellow.

The mission

There is this police officer I've seen around. I first noticed him in a Subway restaurant near my office. I couldn't help but notice him because he stood at a towering 6'7 height. Not exactly that great-looking. Light blonde hair, light blue eyes, and kind of a dull yet friendly face. I've seen him at the same Subway a few times now. Once I stood behind him as our sandwiches progressed and they were putting too much lettuce on his sandwich and he good-heartedly laughed "That's enough!" and looked to me and laughed some more. I smiled back at him and gave that sympathetic laugh you give to strangers, that ha-ha-yeah-I-year-you laugh.

Today, I saw him at the courthouse escorting a handcuffed guy to a van. I could see why they picked him to escort the handcuffed guy. Like I said, the cop is tall and he has a bit of a thick build.

After seeing him today (which is probably the fifth or sixth time I've seen him total), I've decided I'm going to talk to him. I'm not interested in him or even mildly attracted to him. There's no purpose in this mission except to see if I can do it. It'd be interesting to just walk up to some random stranger I've seen around and ask him out of the blue, "Don't you work at the courthouse?" Chances are, he'll say "Yes" and I'll reply "Oh okay." And that'll be the end of that, in which case, mission accomplished.

Nap time

It's the end of a Tuesday work day. I feel incredibly lazy.

Yes, I have a crapload of work to do.

Yes, I have pending deadlines.

But right now, I want to curl into my bed and snuggle between my sheets and take a nice, long, warm nap. Feel so lazy and unmotivated. Feel so sleepy.

Sleep beckons.

The beloved

The boy sat in the corner and scribbled in his journal. After each entry, he carefully ripped out the page, crumpled it, and lit a small fire to burn it. The thoughts would never escape his room.

If anyone knew the truth, he was sure they would hate him. Which wasn't to say he didn't want to tell. He desperately wanted to tell someone about it. But he couldn't. Because if people knew the truth about him, if they knew what kind of freak he really was, they would hate him. And so, being alone and unjustifiably liked was better than being alone and justifiably hated.

At least that's how he rationalized lying to everyone.

People walked by him and talked. Their mouths opened and closed and sounds came out. He would open and close his mouth to emit sounds in reply. Everyone saw this layer, this barely opaque crust of who he was. And to each friend, his sister, his parents, even his best friend, he was lying the whole time. He led them all to believe he was human. But he was a freak. None of them would ever know. And so his only solace was to write in his waning journal his sin, his freak, his evil. The lined page was not judgmental. It was smooth and silent and simple. It may never love him. But it could never hate him. And that's all he ever wanted.

Not colorblind

I was chilling with the Naysayer the other day, telling him about one of the guys I had a crush on when I happened to mention he was Asian. The Naysayer paused for a moment and was like, "Dude, no way, he's Asian?" I too paused. "Uh...yeah." The Naysayer replied, "Dude, no way."

Why was it a shock that I was interested in an Asian guy? And then I thought about it. I have encountered a couple similar comments over the last several years.

I was once at an Asian party with my Asian girlfriends. It's one of those parties where some Asian social organization rents out a huge club in the city and gets all these sponsors and a bunch of Asians go and dance to hip hop and/or trance. I was sitting on the couch people watching, when my yellow pal asked me, "Do you find any of these guys attractive?" I looked at her. "Sure."

"Oh okay. So you still find Asian men attractive?" she asked.

"Uh, yeah," I replied.

"Oh okay," she said, as if reassured.

Then several years later, I was hanging out with a white pal totally unrelated to the yellow pal, and I mentioned something about some guy being cute. The guy happened to be Asian. She looked at me. "Wait, you like Asian guys?"

"Uh, yeah," I replied.

"No way, I thought you only liked white guys," she said.

"No, I like Asian guys too," I insisted.

"No way, I thought you only liked white guys!" she repeated.

"Um...I never said that."

"Oh okay," she said.

So what gives? Okay, so I admit, I talk and act very "white." And yes, the last several guys I've dated were non-Asian. But that was just a result of circumstances. It's not that I deliberately shun Asian men from my dating pool. There were simply no viable candidates. And when I see one I find attractive, I like. Like right now, I have a crush on this totally cute Cantonese guy. Totally out of my league. Totally revolted by me. Hence we're not dating.

All of this led me to believe that Asian chicks are pigeonholed into two main dating categories: Asian chicks who only date Asian guys, and Asian chicks who only date white guys. As much as I pontificate on the evils of racism and stereotypes, I myself am guilty of pigeonholing Asian chicks into those categories. For example, when I see an Asian chick with a white guy, I automatically assume she only dates white guys -- even though I myself have dated a white guy and still am open to dating other ethnicities! It makes no sense. And when I see an Asian chick with an Asian guy, I make that corresponding assumption. I also assume they're both fluent in their native language (even though they might not even be the same Asian ethnicity) and that they intend to make their kids go to Chinese/Japanese/Tagalog/etc.-school.

Maybe part of the reason I harbor this stereotype is that I've met other yellow gals -- a number of yellow gals -- who openly admit, "I only date ___ guys." So maybe it's not so much a stereotype as it is a pattern I've noticed.

Another interesting thing I've observed about myself (i.e. another facet of my inadvertent racism): I see white guys differently than Asian guys. Not in a bad way, but in a neutral-different way. It doesn't just apply to guys, just people in general. When I meet someone who is Asian, something clicks in my mind, "Oh, she's Asian." Something very subtle just registers in my mind. And if the person is the same Asian ethnicity, it registers again. It's neither good nor bad. Just different.

Anyway, I suppose my point is, I shouldn't pigeonhole and I try not to pigeonhole myself. A person is attracted to a person, not a color. At least that's the way it's supposed to be.

Not feelin' it

It's Friday, and I've allowed myself to procrastinate calling that I-wanna-just-have-sex-guy so that it's at that oh-too-late-to-call-him-so-why-bother point. I think I'm still getting over a myriad of other guys (or guy issues), so using one guy for sex to achieve that end would seem counterproductive. Knowing me, I'd get unnecessarily attached and then would have to add that angst on top of the other dumb angst I have.

The 9.5-good-kisser-guy is on vacation somewhere I think, but if I never hear from him again, I'll live.

In fact, I'm not really in the mood to date. Or maybe I just haven't met the right guy who excites me enough to want to date. At any rate, I suspect I have lapsed into an asexual orientation.

The happy one

Em was still in love with her ex-boyfriend, Matt. Of course, he didn't know and he couldn't know. First, he was happily married. Second, she was "happily" married. Her husband was a wonderful man, and her son was the joy of her life.

Still the fact remained, she was still in love with her ex-boyfriend. It wasn't a lustful love. It was just something that would always be there and never disappear. They would have lunch from time to time, and it was obvious he was deeply madly in love with his wife, his "soulmate" as he put it. Can a man be a woman's soulmate if the man already has another woman as his soulmate? Em wondered.

Matt was the only one who called her "Emily." Everyone else called her "Em." Which was fine. But it wasn't "Emily." And there was a way Matt pronounced "Emily," the "m" sound rolling softly into the "l." He was the only one who said her real name. He was the only one who said it right.

Em sat in her office and looked at the clock. It would be twenty more minutes until her next patient came in. Instead of using the time to read up on her med journals or clean up her email, she just sat there and stared outside her window. Somewhere in a different hospital at that precise moment, Matt and his wife (his soulmate) were in a room with an OB GYN and a flurry of nurses and blue sheets and silver pans and metallic devices. Somewhere Matt's wife was lying on a bed, her hand in Matt's, in painful anticipation. Somewhere some other woman was having Matt's child.

She remembered Matt telling her all about the unexpected pregnancy, how they intended to wait another few years, but how this was a blessing. For some reason, despite her family, his marriage, and his happiness, Em could feel her heart sink the moment he told her the news. It made no sense. And then a morbid curiosity overcame her. She had to hear all about the pregnancy, what they were going to name the child, whether they were going to move into a bigger house, when was she due, when was the baby shower, et cetera. He happily apprised her of each and every detail, relishing each advancement of the pregnancy, for example when they saw the first sonogram or when they felt the child's first kick. Em envisioned it all, Matt's hand resting on his wife's womb, Matt reading Dr. Seuss to his unborn child, Matt looking at his wife with the love he never had for Em.

Em stood up and peered between the blinds. She rubbed the warm ring on her finger and sighed. Right now, a new life was entering the world. She pictured a child as beautiful as Matt and his wife. The nurse would hand the child to Matt, and Matt would be holding a tiny human being in his arms, reverent and adoring. They were a family now. Perfect and loving. And she was happy for them. Really, she was.

The return

I was sitting in my chair, talking on the phone and surfing the web. That same moment, thousands of miles away in another country on another continent, a man's life expired.

I received a phone call last night from my brother informing me that my grandfather had passed away.

I didn't know my grandfather that well, I perhaps met him only a handful of times. But the sadness I felt was for my mom. One year, she loses her husband. The next year, she loses her father. I want to ask God to give the woman a break. But she sounded fine on the phone when I called her. Ironically, she told me she worried about her mother, my grandmother. She said my grandparents had been married for sixty years. Sixty years. What is it like to be with someone for sixty years and have him just one day disappear?

My mom was the eldest daughter of five, the sole child to immigrate to America. And tonight, she is flying back to the mother land.

The celebrity(ies) in me

A friend forwarded me this little webpage that tells you what celebrities you resemble the most by uploading a picture. I seemed to match up with quite a mix of people, and I suppose it depends on which picture was uploaded. Also, it was interesting to observe that my face was matched with non-Asians. I was pleasantly flattered when I was told I resembled BoA (apparently a famous Korean singer), Zhang Ziyi, or Hilary Duff, but then less than flattered to see I also matched up with Ricki Lake and Sean Astin (yes, a BOY).

So that narrows it down. I'm either pretty or ugly.

No crumbs

Someone put a plate full of muffins in the conference room. Unattended.

Bad move.

Mr. Wrong

There is no point in liking a guy when there is no future.
There is no point in being with a guy when there is no future.
There is no point in falling in love with a guy when there is no future.

There are thousands of other men, eligible men, who can make a gal happy. Why choose the one who is guaranteed to make a gal unhappy? Why write off other eligible men on account of their abnormally long pinky toes, slightly crooked smiles or off-white socks? Why screen their calls and ignore them for a guy who is just plain wrong? Why is it the wrong one who feels so right? Why is it the wrong one who is so impossible to resist? Why is it the wrong one who takes the fact that there is no future and turns it into something so marginal and forgettable? Why is it the wrong one who makes a gal ignore all of her friends, her conscience and her better judgment? Why is it the wrong one who knows exactly how to make a gal feel beautiful?

There's just no point, no matter how exquisite it feels, how perfect he seems, how passionate it all is. He's just wrong.

A blah email

I get the oddest spam. Here is an email I received in my spam/bulk box:

---

From: "Robert Wright" [e9cMartin@blogs.com]
Subject: Re: HI

blah
blah
blah

blah2
blah
blah
blah

blah2

---

Sadly, I sometimes get emails from actual people that sound a lot like this. I wonder, what does the "blah2" mean? There must be some existential reason for the blah2 and the line break before it. And who is this Robert Wright and why is he emailing me a blah email? There isn't even an attached virus to attack my hard drive.

Most curious.

The question

He sees her without her make-up on. She is lying next to him on her bed, props herself up with her elbow and rests her head on her hand, facing him. Her damp hair falls across her face. He touches her hair and tucks the tendrils behind her ear. Then he looks at her through his glasses.

"You're beautiful," he says.

She laughs. She tries in her late-twenty-something mind to write it off as corny, cheesy, silly, stupid, and - oh yeah - just plain false but she can't. Like a girl, she laughs. Laughs and looks down.

Can a man really think she's actually beautiful? No make-up, hair a mess, just her, raw and plain and naked. How does one respond to that? "Thank you"? "Oh please, stop"? Or perhaps the self-deprecating "Are you blind? I'm hideous, what the hell are you talking about"?

But she doesn't argue or agree or thank him or even acknowledge the comment. She just laughs and look down. When she looks at him again, she sees he is still looking at her.

"You know, I can't fall for you."

Fall for her? Did she just hear that right? Fall for her? As in ... fall for her?

"What do you mean?" she asks. She wants to hear him say it, but she knows he wouldn't. He couldn't.

"I can't get attached."

She blinks and says, "I know."

He leaves her bed that night and goes home. "Fall for you," what does "fall for you" really mean? she asks herself, thinking maybe there are different meanings for "fall for" but hoping it is the one she is thinking of. Maybe in some circles, "fall for" means "getting attached," as he implied.

Allowing her neurosis to get the best of her -- and just to be extra sure -- she goes to dictionary.com and looks it up.

fall for

1. To feel love for; be in love with.
2. To be deceived or swindled by: fell for the con artist's scheme and lost $200,000.

She knows it couldn't have been definition #2 as she hadn't been involved in any con artist's scheme she was aware of. It had to be #1. It had to be ... hadn't it? Could he be falling for her, in the dictionary.com-definition-#1 sense? Or had he meant something else?

She wonders.

The notable noodle

I ignored the health nut voice inside my head and took the liberty of ordering spicy Thai noodles for lunch. I've had a craving for noodles for the past few days but held off for reasons like, noodles are too heavy for the work day, the noodle shops are too far, and noodles aren't exactly the most healthy meal.

I love noodles, though my favorite type of noodle is the udon noodle. It has the perfect thickness and texture. The Thai noodles I got today were flat and wide but yummy nonetheless. I prefer thicker noodles over thinner noodles, firmer over mushy. I like them in soups, stir fried, or marinated in a sauce. Soooo good.

I think there's some contention over who invented the noodle first, Italians, Arabs or Chinese. However, the finding of a 4,000-year-old bowl of noodles in China may point to the Chinese as the originators.

Whoever invented them, thank you. A life without noodles is a life not lived.

Expiration dating

Had my date last night with the other guy, not the 9.5-on-a-scale-of-1-to-10 from Sunday night, also not the boy in the hypothetical blurb below. (I need to think of new monikers for these guys.)

Anyway, a few disconcerting things: First, he kept hinting throughout the night about having sex. Like he thinks I'm attractive, he likes me, he wants to take me home, or alternatively I could take him home. I admit I do get flirty and risqué in my banter. I have the gifted ability to make anything into a double entendre. So I arguably led him to incessant thoughts of sex. Still though, there's perhaps nothing less sexy than a guy making it patently obvious all he wants is sex with you.

Second, and this may be related to the first point, he is leaving for grad school in two weeks. Said grad school is far, far away. What is the point of starting anything if there's only two weeks left? The only answer I can think of is a two-week fling. And then I wonder, could I be That girl? The fling girl? A flinger? A fling to be flung? (Okay I'll stop.)

Third, when he kissed me at the end of the night, our teeth bumped. I hate it when that happens. But maybe a first kiss with someone is like first sex - awkward and weird at first, but after a few more tries you guys get into each other's grooves. So to speak. Only rarely do either go perfectly well the first time.

All that aside, the guy is charming and funny. He's a very likeable guy, and maybe if he wasn't leaving in two weeks, this could have been something. I'm just not sure what to think of him, or how to proceed. The Naysayer states the obvious: the guy just wants unbridled sex for two weeks and then leave.

Perhaps a risk-benefit analysis is in order. Risks: I'll get attached, I'll kick myself for having meaningless sex, I'll get hurt. Benefits: Sex.

Hm, decisions decisions...

A sign

A girl and a boy are having dinner together. The girl accidentally drops a fry into her water, effectively contaminating it. The boy has his water, full to the rim, and continues to drink from it while she's eating a salty, spicy sandwich. They finish their meal, the boy finishing his glass of ice water, the girl finishing her sandwich, parched.

It did not even cross the boy's mind to offer her a sip of his water. Still though, the girl could have just asked, "Can I have a sip of your water please?" at which the point the boy would have probably said sure. Boys aren't mind-readers. Moreover, it was his water and if he didn't want to share it, that's his prerogative.

And little details are just little details...Right?

Thanks Rich

I always wondered why guys loved watching girls make out, bathe each other, have pillow fights and the like.

Richard Posner, a judge sitting on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, a professor at the University of Chicago Law School, a summa cum laude graduate of Yale University and valedictorian of Harvard Law School, former clerk to United States Supreme Court Justice Brennan, and perhaps one of the greatest legal minds of all time, had it figured it out when he stated in one of his opinions:

"Few men are interested in lesbians."

I read this and laughed out loud. Some chick sued Hustler magazine for showing pics of her that wrongfully implied that she was a lesbian, in the case Douglass v. Hustler Magazine, 769 F.2d 1128 (7th Cir. 1985). The article showed her "straddling" other women and apparently "engag[ing] in sexual activity." Posner wrote on behalf of the Court:

We would not ourselves think that Hustler was seriously insinuating -- or that its readership would think -- that [the chick] is a lesbian. Hustler is a magazine for men. Few men are interested in lesbians. The purpose of showing two women in apparent sexual embrace is to display the charms of two women.

So it's not the actual homosexuality of two women that drives men crazy, it's just that the vision of 2 amorous women is better than 1 woman.

Never thought I'd look to a judge to figure out the answer to that mystery.

Smart guys are hot

I think if given the choice between dating a guy more intelligent than I or dating a guy less intelligent than I, I would opt for the more intelligent guy. It's a slight turn off when, during the course of flirtatious banter, the guy doesn't get a joke I make, thinks Islam is a sect of Judaism, or interrupts me to ask me the meaning of the word I just used (in one real case, the word was "superficial"). Don't get me wrong, I don't want a guy who will wax philosophical about philosophy or will only be friends with other pretentious stick-up-his-ass intellectuals. But I think it takes a certain amount of intelligence to be funny, to see things in a quirky amusing way, to make witty allusions to random things. Also, conversations on how cool it is that mentos and Diet Coke react together and how funny it is that some dogs chase their tails, while entertaining, would after a certain point grow tiresome.

Of course this preference runs the risk of my feeling dumb in the presence of an intellectually superior being. But that I don't mind so much. I think it's cool when a guy knows so much about a topic I know little about it. It's an opportunity to learn about something new, be exposed to something different, and at the same time make a guy feel good cuz he knows sooo much about something sooo cool.

Now to find a guy who likes dumber girls...

Kicking the habit

I have a perfectly disgusting habit. It isn't the only bad habit I have, but it's one that, from time to time, revolts me.

I bite my nails.

I know it isn't as bad as heroin or porn, but it's pretty nasty. I don't know what compelled me to start biting my nails that one day in 1985 in elementary school, but I've been biting my nails for about 20 years and it doesn't look like I'll be quitting anytime soon.

I have my mother's hands and I look at the way her slender ivory fingers taper off to her perfectly formed nails. I know, I just know that if I let my nails grow, I would have graceful fingers like hers. Instead, I see slender fingers taper off to ugly, mangled nails.

It's so easy to just yell at someone, "Just stop!" So logical: Just stop biting your nails. But there is this inexplicable, irresistible urge to bite them off once they grow. It makes no sense. It's bad for my teeth, and it even hurts my fingers when I bite my nails.

But nail polish, vinegar, disgusting tasting potions, scotch tape, chewing gum and the like all have failed in getting me to kick my habit. Whenever I meet former nail biters, I ask how they did it. Their so-called solutions: "Oh now I bite the inside of my cheek" or "Now I eat the outside of my fingers" or worse, "Oh now I smoke." So I'm guessing this is an oral fixation. I need to satisfy my oral fixation with something other than my nails, without having to gnaw on the inside of my cheek or lips, eat the skin off my fingers or smoke. Chewing gum does not help. Okay, right now, I'm just going to stop. This article on kicking bad habits and another one on nail-biting might help.

Better late than never.

Thinking = Good

I think of myself as being somewhat fearless. I'm not afraid to take the subway at night. I'm not afraid to walk home by myself. However, as I learned the almost-hard way, there's a difference between being fearless and being senseless.

Saturday night, the girls and I stayed out until about 4 in the morning. We were leaving this club fatigued and still buzzing. Four of the girls were headed in one direction, while I lived only several blocks in the opposite direction. They hailed a cab and as they piled in, I yelled out to them, "Have a good night! I'm walking this direction." They bid me good night, one of them instructed me to call her when I got home, and they drove off.

So I began walking away from the club when I heard a guy behind me yell out "Hey--" and ask me some unintelligible question. I didn't turn around nor did I stop. I kept on walking.

It was a bit chilly, I was wearing a sleeveless dress, and so I put on my jacket as I walked down the lonely street. Then I got the feeling that the guy was walking behind me. Whatever, I thought to myself, he's probably just walking to an ATM or happens to live in the same direction.

Still just to be sure, I began walking faster, pounding my black high heels on the pavement.

I could still discern the sound of him behind me. He was keeping up with my pace. I started feeling a little anxious. It was four in the morning, I was in a large city, I was alone, and the normally busy street was dead.

Chill, I thought to myself. You're being paranoid. Just cross the street and see what happens. He probably isn't even following you.

I began to cross the street. As I crossed it, I looked both ways -- to the left, to the right. When I looked to my right, i.e., behind me, I saw that the guy began to cross the street as well, silent, looking in my direction all the while. He was following me.

OKAY, I thought to myself. I thought about calling a friend on my cell -- but I remembered that being on the phone distracts the caller and makes her more prone to attack. I thought about dialing 9-1-1, but I figured the cops wouldn't come in time. I had no cash on me for a cab but I knew a few accepted credit cards. I saw a couple cabs drive by. I walked in the middle of the street and hailed a cab. It turned around from the other side of the street and stopped in front of me. I opened the door and jumped right in and told the cabbie where to drop me off.

The guy who had been following me stopped outside the cab. The cab driver motioned him to walk by, but he just stood there, looking in. The cabbie then drove off. I took a deep breath. "I think that man was following me, so thanks for picking me up." The cabbie said, "Oh really? Wow. Yeah I thought it was weird that he didn't move out of the way and just stood there."

"Yeah, that was scary."

I wonder what the heck that guy was thinking, following me. Wasn't my complete silence in response to his calling out to me indicative of the fact that I was not interested in him? What would he have done had he caught up to me? Persuade me even more? The eerie way he stayed silent while following me, the way he crossed the street when I crossed the street, the way he stood outside the cab when I got in -- it makes me think he was not in the mood to persuade. Even if I had in my purse a bottle of mace, a stun gun, a .45 revolver, a bazooka, it still scares the shit out of me that some guy could have actually contemplated...doing something to me.

So gals, be aware, be smart - and take a cab after leaving a club at 4 AM.

Long story long

Had a fun weekend. A lot of things happened. One included meeting a guy.

Four gals and I entered a bar to meet up with one of the gals' male friend, who was with his buddies. The bar was packed. I scanned the room and happened to glimpse a certain guy. He was very attractive, and I would've probably been wary of him as a playa if he wasn't wearing glasses. Something about his unassuming glasses just made him all the more cuter. We made eye contact every so often; I even smiled at him when he looked at me, but he never approached me.

So I was introduced to one of my gal friend's friend's friend. We were chatting happily away and I did my girly-flirty thing of ooh-ing and ah-ing over his college days as a track star and his ability to run a 4-minute mile. Then one of my gals tapped me on the arm and said "Go get a drink on my tab. I need to hit a $20 minimum before I can close it." I looked at her swaying body and the glass of beer in her right hand. Clearly, she could not polish off that beer and another without dire consequences. So I went up to the bar to order a screwdriver. They served it and then asked to see my gal pal to close the tab. Just as I was speaking to my gal pal, the very attractive guy came up to me and said "Can I buy you a drink?"

I was stunned for a second. Then I composed myself and smiled. "Sure."

We sat at the bar and just chatted away. He was a graduate student at a nearby university who liked to take photographs and dance to hip hop. I was enamored. We talked and talked when I feel a tap on my arm.

It's Track Star guy whom I had been speaking with earlier, and his friend (who's my gal pal's friend). "Oh hi," I said smiling painfully.

"Hi," he said, "look, I just wanted to let you know I'm heading out now. I would've liked to see you more some time--" at which point he leaned in closer "--but I can't compete with a guy who wears cargo pants," he added mockingly.

I looked at the very attractive guy's pants. Yes, they were cargo pants. Maybe I am not that fashion-conscious, but it didn't bother me that the guy wore cargo pants.

My gal pal's friend chimed in, "Yeah, the guy wears cargo pants."

I nodded and smiled. They shrugged at me. I shrugged back. What did they expect me to do? Dis a perfectly attractive, interesting, smart guy over cargo pants? (Now if they were spandex or leopard skin pants, that'd be another thing.)

"Bye," I said and waved. And that was the end of that. The very attractive guy and I exchanged numbers, and just last night, we had our first date (he was very very busy for the next couple weeks so that was the only time he was free).

We had dinner and drinks and talked about everything from politics to the environment. It was a good date. After dinner, he walked me home.

When we got to my apartment building, I stopped in front of the entrance, smiled and said the typical "I had a really good time tonight"-closing, with which he agreed. He looked at me and then leaned in--at this point I had no idea and no expectation that we'd ever kiss, it never crossed my mind--and he kissed me. It was one of those slow gentle kisses that slowly grew into something more ... involved. He was holding my face when all of a sudden we heard these hoots, whistles and cheers from some random people walking on the sidewalk. We looked at each other and laughed. Then he kissed me again, my lips, my face, my neck. (Can you tell I've been replaying this in my mind all day?) Then he said good night, and that he'd call me.

The very attractive guy was a very excellent kisser. On a scale of 1 to 10, easily a 9.5. I hope he calls.

On a separate note, the guy with whom I went on the excellent date with last Wednesday called me today. We're going out on Thursday.

They say when it rains, it pours. My question, why can't it just rain consistently? Why can't I just not have any dry spells or droughts, and just have an even precipitation of cute smart guys throughout the entire year? Is that so much to ask for? I don't think so.

Worst Album Covers Ever

The worst album covers EVER.

It's so bad, it's good.

Mother may I

As my friend was driving me home last night after dinner and a drink, I gazed at all the sights of my immediate neighborhood. I live in a predominantly gay area of the city, where men openly hold hands with each other and rainbow flags hang in the windows of every other store. The Gay Pride parade marches right next to my apartment building. Nearby stores openly sell sex toys, leather, fishnet stockings and wigs for "down there." There are also trendy little shops and outdoor cafes. So the vibe is a bit yuppie, very liberal and a tad risque.

I really like my neighborhood.

Then I remembered, my mom mentioned visiting me some time. My mom, my Bible-thumping, evangelical mother, would be visiting my neighborhood. How do I pull that off? My apartment building is next to a hair salon called "Good Head" and a palm reader. The vision of men holding hands and stores with mannequins sporting black leather pasties would probably not bode well with a Christian Asian immigrant. I think her head would literally explode. I contemplated putting blinders on her. Maybe give her a brochure to distract her while we walk from the train to my apartment? No idea.

But at least she'll think the rainbow flags are pretty.

Wednesday night

Last night I went on a date with this guy I met through a friend from school. Another younger guy. This time though he's 26. Very smart, cute, laid back and funny. The first time I met him, he tried very hard to get me to go home with him ("I literally live just around the corner"), which I declined. I did give him my number and decided to give him a chance when he called me the next day. (3-day-rule? What 3-day-rule?)

Last night, we had dinner and drinks. Much to my surprise, I had an awesome time. I'm still surprised at how well it went. He apologized for trying so hard to get me to go home with him, and was a total gentleman throughout the night. Did not try to sleep with me. Did not even try to kiss me! I have to say, that earned him a few points. We had great conversation and a lot of chemistry. At the end of the night, we hopped into a cab so he could drop me off. He refused to let me pay for my cab fare. I got out, and then he cabbed back to his place. Afterwards, he called me and we chatted for a few minutes. I think we said to each other at least ten times throughout the night how much fun we were having.

Then this morning he emailed me. I can't deny that I squealed just a little when I read his email. Perfectly flirty.

I just met this guy. And I think I might like him.

Adventures in researching

I went to the library this afternoon. It was cool and damp and quiet, the way a library should be. A woman in a suit walked by my table where I had my laptop and a few reference books sprawled about. The woman sat down at her table, several tables in front of me, and began reviewing one of the various binders and books that were piled on her table.

I was typing away when I heard this hissing sound. I figured it was a pipe or something. The hissing became louder, like an angry whispering, and suddenly morphed into this screeching voice. I looked up and saw it was the woman in front of me. She was alone at her table, her back toward me, and shaking violently. She held her hands were in the air, as if begging some imaginary monster to please leave her alone. Maybe she's practicing her opening statement, I thought. Then she began whimpering and shaking her head, shielding herself with her bony hands. Suddenly her voice changed into this guttural voice and I could hear her cursing and whispering and shrieking insults and obscenities like "Idiot!" and "Fucking asshole!"

Needless to say, I was scared shitless.

I tried to concentrate on my reading, but my heart was thumping so loudly in my ears, I couldn't hear myself think. Maybe she had Tourette Syndrome. Tourette Syndrome was better than just plain crazy. Maybe she was possessed. Or maybe she had multiple personalities -- that would explain the different voices. At any rate, I had to wrap up my research to go back to the office, and slowly reshelved my books so as to not disturb the Scary Woman. I was actually afraid she was going to attack me, teeth baring, fingernails outstretched.

But she didn't.

I seriously think I'm traumatized.

The tangent

He was supposed to be a tangent. A marginal recreation. A thing on the side. A good lay.

Her friends, her job, her family--this was her reality. This was the thing around which the tangent flitted meaninglessly. He was supposed to be meaningless.

But somehow, he crept into the corner of her mind, slowly and carefully, crossing that boundry line between tangent and real. And somehow, this most flagrant violation of her rules of geometry became a welcomed wrong. Her reality inverted and he became the thing that seemed most real to her. It was the white pressed shirt that fit over his shoulders. The way his forearms pressed against her back when he held her. The way she felt when he kissed her. And everything else became marginal, her real life became a formless mass that surrounded him.

Friends asked her to dinner, and she wondered if he would be free then. Mother would call on the phone and she would click over the moment he called. She stayed late at work just to make up for the time she spent daydreaming about him. And as she watched her life revolve around him, she remembered to herself, He was supposed to be meaningless. He was supposed to be a tangent to my real life. But her real life had become a tangent to him.

Just another face

I think I'm pretty good at recognizing faces. Remembering people's names, however, is another thing. I can be introduced to someone and one minute later, completely forget her name.

At any rate, I took this test that tests your ability to recognize both familiar and unfamiliar faces. For famous faces, I got 97% correct. For unfamiliar faces, I got 92% correct overall.

Still though, what's the point in remembering faces if you can't remember their names?

Just say no

I've been carded for alcohol. I've been carded for gambling. I've even been carded for rated R movies.

But I've never been carded for cough syrup.

The other day, I was at the neighborhood Walgreens buying the generic brand of Robitussin DM for my cough when the cashier demanded to know my birth date. As I was uttering it, she asked me for my ID, which I produced. She studied my ID, gave it back and then rang up my cough syrup. "Do you need to be 18 to buy cough syrup?" I asked. She looked at me like I was a moron. "Yes."

I studied the ingredients of my Robitussin DM ("Wal-Tussin DM," actually). No codeine. No alcohol. No cocaine. So what the heck would a teenager do with cough syrup? I know you can make meth from Sudafed.

I did some research and one website stated:

Dextromethorphan is very often passed off as Ecstasy at clubs and Raves, it can also be found in many over the counter cold remedies such as Robitussin DM cough syrup. DXM produces hallucinations and a heavy "stoned" feeling in users but none of the desirable Ecstasy effects. DXM pills are wide-spread over the United States how ever it is usually misidentified as MDMA by users and police alike.

I did feel pretty mellow and sluggish today, like in a Keanu-Reeves-"Whoa"-kind of way. But have not been hallucinating. At any rate, I hope this entry doesn't spur people on to buy the DM to get high. It's not all that. Really.

Just a Number

I was sitting on a table in my doctor's office, wearing one of those humiliating light blue paper robes. It had been over a year since my last check-up. The doc sat in front of me on a stool, and asked me a bunch of questions about myself, like medical history, allergies, etc. Then she asked, "How many sexual partners have you had in the last year?" At first, I thought she was asking me how many sexual partners I had in my entire life, which if you think about it, is a very personal question. So I thought about it for a second, gave her an answer, and then later realized I was off by one (I overestimated). She put her folder away and began the physical exam. I resisted the temptation to say "Excuse me doctor, I was off by one, the number is actually X, not X + 1. Could you please go back into your office, retrieve my folder and correct that? Thanks." It seemed like too much effort over a miscalculation of 1. And the number was so small that it didn't seem to matter that much (see past blog entries where I complain about not getting any and how it's been a while).

Then I reflected over my Number. I don't think anyone, not even my vault of my most intimate and scandalous secrets, the Naysayer, knows. I remember how in my holy moly days, I wanted to wait until I got married. If I had, I'd be a 28-year-old virgin today. How different I would be... Well, knowing me, I'd have probably gotten married just so I could get some.

They say age is just a number. Is the Number just a number? Or does it reflect something about ourselves, in the present? A reformed mimbo (male bimbo) could have had 100 sexual partners in his life, but in the present be a monogamist; while another person could have had only two, but that's because she married the guy she lost her virginity to at age 13 and cheated on her husband last week with another guy. And a person with two one-night stands has less sexual experience than a person who has been in a long-term relationship with one person for five years.

So perhaps the Number doesn't truly reflect who you are as a person or your sexual practices in the present (how wonderful it would be if we could delete our "errors in judgment" from our memories and our Numbers?). Indeed people use the Number as a proxy for sluttiness and sexual prowess. Yet it's the sum of one's personal experiences that defines who one is, not a Number.

All that notwithstanding, I still want to correct that number in my doctor's folder.

Buzzkill

How long does it take for a buzz to wear off? An hour or two?

What about the emotional equivalent--the infatuation? A month or two? Or maybe three?

I suspect that my romantic buzz is wearing off. The beer goggles are coming off and things are starting to come into a hazy focus. The once beautiful person starts to revert to its hideously deformed state, and each flaw, plain as the sober eye can see, becomes very real...and repulsive.

Yay!....I think. It did feel good to be in like with someone. And when the like wears off, it's just this feeling of bleh. Still though, there is a sense of relief in knowing you're back to normal. Even if you are stuck with a stinging hangover.

Now

The mirror by the door was not a mirror by the door, it was an altar where he stood for only a moment to put on his cap before going out. The red rocking chair was a rocking of his own hips as he sat in the kitchen. Still, there was nothing of his -- his own -- that she could find. It was as if she were afraid she had hallucinated him and needed proof to the contrary. His absence was everywhere, stinging everything, giving the furnishings primary colors, sharp outlines to the corners of rooms and gold light to the dust collecting on table tops. When he was there he pulled everything toward himself. Not only her eyes and all her senses but also inanimate things seemed to exist because of him, backdrops to his presence. Now that he had gone, these things, so long subdued by his presence, were glamorized in his wake.

An excerpt from "Sula." Toni Morrison is an exquisite writer. It is exactly what I feel right now.

Yellow gal in the country

I spent the weekend with a gal pal and her family in a very very small town in a remote area of a certain Midwestern state. I don't view myself as a prissy little city girl (I drink Jack Daniels on the rocks and I like hole-in-the-wall diners). But I can't deny that I was a little scared when my friend and I stopped at a truck stop in the middle of rural America at 10:30 at night. The fifty-something-year-old waitress sported a well-coifed mullet and smoked a cigarette while she waited for our orders. The place was empty. The jukebox played a mournful country song. And we saw a couple guys by their pickup trucks standing by our car.

"This feels like a scene from a movie, doesn't it?" I asked my friend.

She smiled at me. "I'm used to it."

As a non-white person, I get very paranoid. I was warned by others that there are people in parts of the country who have never seen a minority -- EVER. I can't imagine going through my entire life and being exposed to only one race. People can be harmless-ignorant ("Do you know kung fu?") or mean-ignorant ("Go back to China"). So what would they do? Stare at me? Yell at me? Assault me?

My friend didn't help the situation by informing me she wouldn't have brought me along if I were African American. She told me that some of her family members in those parts still use a certain N word to refer to African Americans. My jaw dropped when she told me this and I started freaking out. "Don't worry," she assured me, "you're fine!" As in, "you" as an Asian.

Well, I came, I saw and I went...unscathed. The family was very friendly. No one asked me the "What are you?"/"Where are you from?" questions. I suppose I was treated like I was white, which is always a relief. I was also grateful to see other minorities speckled in the area (granted, there were only two others, but still).

So I admit, I'm more comfortable in a world of bums, lewd construction workers and pickpockets than a world of cornfields, dirt roads and 503 country stations. I guess that makes me a prissy little city girl.

A good thing

I'm not supposed to talk to you or see you anymore.

So I'm not.

I still check my email and cell phone every minute or so, hoping that maybe you'll breach our agreement and email or call me.

But you don't.

When I checked for the thousanth time today, I saw a new message. My heart skipped a beat. I clicked on the message.

It was Someone Else.

Someone Else asked me how I was doing. Someone Else asked how my weekend was. Someone Else asked me to dinner. I wondered why it was Someone Else. I wondered why it wasn't you.

This afternoon Jamba Juice was giving away free smoothies in my building. I thought of you and thought how perfect it could have been if I just called you and asked you if you wanted a smoothie. We could have met on our street corner, sat outside in the sunny eighty-degree weather, and chatted about nothing. You'd make me laugh like you always did. And I'd make you smile.

But we didn't.

And that, as we agreed, is a good thing. I hope.

None the wiser

My blog is exactly 1 year old. As I perused my past entries, I noticed that (a) I complain a lot, and (b) I obsess over boys. I suppose if I were perpetually happy and everything always went my way, there wouldn't be much to blog about. It'd be like, Entry 1: "Today I'm happy." Entry 2: "Today's a great day. Nothing went wrong." etc. Angst and drama are what make life interesting. Perhaps one day, I'll reach that I'm-perfectly-happy phase, when I'm an old granny and have all the answers to life figured out and realize that the ones I don't figure out don't even matter. The blog will be less than tantalizing, if even existent.

Until then, my angst-ridden blog continues.

Fancying the Brits

There's something about British sarcasm that is distinctly biting. Now I know Americans can be pretty sarcastic. But something about the way the Brits deliver their sarcasm is unparalleled. For example, I happen to like the British "The Office" better than the American one. The American one just doesn't have the same edge. I know NBC has to abide by certain FCC rules, while the British version has unbridled profanity and raunchiness. Still, there's just something about their humor that you just can't replicate with an American accent.

Anyway, I happened to stumble upon this UK ebay listing for a minivan. The bloke's responses to bidder inquiries are hilarious.

Story of my life

I was jogging by the water the other day, absentmindedly admiring the view, when I literally got caught in some guy's fishing line. As I pulled the fishing line out of my hair, the guy came over to help detangle me. It would have been a perfect pick-up situation if the guy wasn't a 49-year-old flabby man with a mullet. But he was. And he didn't even apologize.

Getting caught by the wrong guy's fishing line. Seems to be a recurring thing.

I'm with stupid

I think it's funny when you recognize your own relationship pattern, your friends recognize your relationship pattern, you realize you are repeating your relationship pattern, and you willingly repeat it, knowing full well it will end miserably.

I used to be hard on people who engaged in behavior or stayed in relationships they knew were wrong and doomed. Now I know there was obviously something else there, aside from logic and reason, that compelled them to do what they did.

Humans can be so brilliant and at the same time, so devastatingly stupid.

On guys

I've learned something new about guys. I've gone out with girl #1 once to a pool hall and girl #2 to a bar. Both times, guys chatted us up. Both times, guys lost interest in moments and left us alone. I wondered what it was. It couldn't have been that we were butt ugly, otherwise they never would have come up to us. Then it hit me: Guys don't like to be insulted/teased/emasculated.

I know that sounds so common sense. But the things that girls #s 1 & 2 did were SO subtle, so tiny, that I didn't even realize it was an insult until I pieced it together this morning on my commute.

With girl #1, the (cute) guy came up to us during our pool game, marveling at the strange sequence of moves that just occurred. I know none of the rules, but #1 knows them - and she corrected him. He said, "No I think it's this" and she, smiling sweetly all the while, said "No, I'm sure it's this. That's the rule." She gave him no out, no way to save face. And so he was like, "Oh okay." Then he walked away.

With girl #2, a (cute) guy touched my back and started chatting with me. Then his friend comes over. The guy went to a certain school in a certain city, and girl #2 jokingly teased his school/city. The guy defended himself, and she jokingly did not let it go and again, gave him no out, no way to save face. Not too soon thereafter, the guys "had to go."

So subtle digs can turn a guy off. And I will be the first to admit, subtle digs can hurt girls as well ("wow, are you sure that dress is the right size?" or "you actually get carded? weird...").

Another theory I have is that some guys don't like smart girls. They don't like girls who have graduate degrees. They don't like girls who are successful. I don't understand this. But the painful reality of this fact hit me when one night when I was in a bar. A guy started chatting with me. We were getting along fine when he asked me what I did for a living. I told him I was a lawyer. He talked a little bit more. Then he turned around and walked away from me. Forever. Never to be seen again. See Sex & the City episode "Don't Ask Don't Tell," Season 3.

The Quest for Figuring Out Guys continues...

I asked for it

Perhaps more dangerous than asking a potentially blunt guy "Do you think I'm fat?" is asking someone who cards you "How old do I look?"

Went to a ball game last night. I got carded by the guy behind the stand. I asked him that oh-so-dangerous question, "How old do I look?" He turned around and asked an older woman behind him how old did she think I was.

"Hmm...31?" she said.

The guy studied my license for another five minutes, clearly unable to subtract 1977 from 2006. I did the math for him. "I'm 28."

"Oh woops, was I wrong?" the elderly hag asked. "I'm sorry... it's... just... that you act very mature for your age! Yeah..."

I mustered a half-patronizing smile and got my drink. Needless to say, I did not tip the guy. Not his fault, I know.

Now, for all you 31-and-over-year-olds - this is no offense to you. 31 is not 81. But imagine yourself as a 28 year old and being told you look 31.

Add to that, you're ASIAN and Asians are supposed to look young for their age. So she probably thought I was actually 45 and was being safe by guessing 31. Anyways, I went back to my seat and my friends made pathetic attempts to assauge my ego by concocting the wildest stories as to why she had no credibility and and how I don't look 31, reasons ranging from "She's probably drunk" to "She's a crazy old lady!"

Ah, friends. I wonder, where would we be without the sweet delusions of our friends?

Simple

Last Wednesday, I went to a little social at a bar. I met two guys. I chatted with one guy a bit more than the other guy. I gave both my number.

It's Monday. Both guys coincidentally contact me today.

Guy #1
My phone rings this afternoon. I see it's Guy #1. I pick up. We chat for a few minutes whereupon he asks me for my email address. I ask him what he's emailing me. He says he'd just like to email me. He then suggests that we get together some time. I say "Sure." Soon after our phone conversation, he emails me. I reply with a friendly email. He emails me back immediately. Up to the point he sends me his second email, I'm thinking, "Hey, he's cute, he seems nice... Potential."

Guy #2
He texts me this evening asking me how I am doing and when the next social is.

My psychological Seinfeld-ian self-sabotage:

Guy #1
In his second email, he inserted emoticons after every sentence. I'm not talking about :) or =D. I'm talking about the big cartoon yellow faces with exaggerated facial expressions after EVERY sentence, alternating between winks and toothy grins. I suddenly felt my interest level shrivel.

Guy #2
He was cute and very built. Like uber-muscular. And while I appreciate a nice build on a cute guy, I have this unjustified stereotype about guys who are very muscular, like that they're vain, cocky jerks. I know, I know--it's totally unfair. In addition to that, he texted me. If a gal gives a guy her number, the guy should call her. Texting is just impersonal and passive. Maybe he felt more hesitant towards me because I flirted much more with #1.

I know these reasons are totally stupid, nonsensical and Seinfeld-ian. I can't help but suspect that I'm looking for tiny flaws so I have an excuse not to date. I confess I haven't been as adventurous/open-minded as I usually am in these dating settings. So why the recent reluctance to give guys a chance?

I suspect that the Guy For Whom I Pine is holding me back. Not literally. I suppose I'm not letting myself let go of him. It's safer to pine for a guy you'll never have than to delve into a real situation where things can get complicated and feelings can get hurt. I suppose I am in a semi-dysfunctional "relationship" with the Guy For Whom I Pine because we feed into each other's feelings for each other without really fulfilling them. We don't get the full benefits (or burdens) of a real substantive relationship. It just feels simpler and nicer to like a guy who likes you back. Even if it is pointless.

God I need help. Maybe we all have a little Patricia in all of us.

Cute guy alert

This morning I got on the bus. I saw a cute Asian guy. (Why is his race relevant? the knee-jerk-liberal-reaction-prone-voice inside me asks. I don't know. It's just something I noticed.) He wasn't super hot. Perhaps six feet tall. Athletic build. Not so pretentious or gorgeous-looking as to render him totally out of my league, but cute enough in his striped button up shirt and charcoal slacks. Then I thought to myself: Prey identified. Now what?

Seriously.

How does one intiate contact in a random setting? In a bar or cocktail party, the assumption is that random people will chat with other random people. But on a bus or train or street, it's just random. Girl sees Boy. Boy sees Girl. Smile? Say "hi"? Walk up to him and ask him what time it is, while hiding your watch and cell phone and ignoring the huge clock towering across the street?

At any rate, I never saw Cute Guy before on my previous commutes... but perhaps I'll see him again. Maybe I'll concoct some excuse by then.

After all, fate is what you make of it.

Entrepreneurial amorality at its best (or worst)

The other day, a friend forwarded me a link to this company called the AlibiNetwork. It's a service that will go to all lengths to concoct alibis for you if you want to have a discrete affair, lie on your resume or even break up with someone without the messiness.

Some clips from their website:

Having a Discreet Affair?
We invent, create and provide alibis and excuses for attached adults involved in discreet relationships.

Impression Services?
What is your dream job? Would you like to create an impression that you have that job? How about having your own executive assistant?

Rescue Call Services?
The phone call from us to communicate any information you desire or to help you escape any situations such as dull meetings, bad dates or other unnecessary commitments that need to be cut short or cancelled.

Break Up?
Do you need to start a new relationship or stop an unwanted one without feeling uncomfortable?

-----
How crazy is this? I can't believe this service exists, but at the same, I am not surprised. There's definitely a demand for this kind of service, and it's the American capitalistic spirit to meet that demand in amoral style.

Fun

I am a walking motification.

Yesterday I wear a white shirt which I later discover to be translucent. Then it begins to rain.

Today I wear my black fitted pants, thinking I'm the shiznit. I happen to look at my rear end and upon closer inspection, realize there are white streak marks on my ass. It's 9 AM.

I can't wait til I see what happens tomorrow. A spaghetti string lands on my sleeve? A glass of wine on my lap? Who knows what future motifying events lay in store for me. Oh the adventures I'll see!

My #1 fan

Dear Obsessee,

I think I'm fallng in love with you. Yes, I know it's not real love because I've only known you for so long, but honestly I really do think I'm falling in love with you.

I am enamored with every thing you do, from the way you say "Hello?" when you pick up the phone, to the way your voice quivers when you say "Who is this? Answer me!"

I see you the next day and overhear you complain to your cubicle mate about some "psycho" who keeps prank calling you.

If psycho means being in love, then I am psycho. Psycho in love. If you only knew how much I think of you.

From the moment I open my eyes in the morning to the second I close them and in all the dreams in between, I think of only you. I know what train you take, which car you step on and off, what muffin you get at Au Bon Pan. You always pick the banana nut muffin with the most nuts.

Once I bumped into you and you smiled at me and said "Excuse me." I almost died.

So, my dear love, I write this letter to you and on behalf of all "psychos" out there who are madly, deeply in love--and really, we are not psycho. A random phone call here and there, a little harmless following you on the way home, a little Google-ing. Not psycho.

It's love, pure love. I'll be thinking of you. Always.

Love,
Your Obsessor

Funny

A clip on Star Wars fanatics, its offensive comment to Koreans notwithstanding.

A simple wish

Sometimes I wish I could take my mind, put it on a cutting board, incise the parts I don't like, and throw them out in the nearest waste bin. Then I could reinsert my modified mind into my head. That way, all the mortification, pain, brain farts, and drunk dials are removed forever. I'd be a bit lighter and a lot happier.

Oh the manity

My friend Patricia has no faith in what she calls "manity." ("humanity" minus the "hu," i.e. all men.) She is the cynic, the unapologetic pessimist when it comes to men. "They're all dogs," she repeats to me like a mantra. I however still believe that the Ones are out there, that the Ones are not dogs, and that one day I'll meet one of my Ones. She thinks I'm silly.

"There are no 'Ones,' " she says. "Just dogs."

I suspect that this belief underlies her embarking on an affair with her third married man. It is so odd--Patricia is perfectly fine in every respect except when it comes to men. When it comes to men, she has no conscience. Maybe it's because of her parents' bitter divorce during middle school, maybe it's because she later learned her father got another woman pregnant while her parents were still married, maybe it's because her last real boyfriend cheated on her. At any rate, she has a pretty low opinion of "manity."

I tell her she's smart, pretty, and funny--she can have any guy she wants. Why the married guys?

"It's not that I actively seek them out. The ones I happened to be immensely attracted to just so happen to be...married," she says to me matter of factly.

Married Man #3, however, gives her pause. "He has a family," she says to me. "A daughter. I saw her picture."

"Oh god," I say to her. "Please....just stop it."

"I know I know," she says, cupping her face in her hands. "I only saw that picture once, early on, before anything happened."

"Uh huh."

"Now, I keep seeing that girl in my mind. That girl reminds me of me," she says, "I think of my dad. And what my dad did. It kills me."

I nod at her.

"What the fuck is wrong with me?"

I don't know what to say to her. If I say "nothing," I'm lying. If I say "I don't know," I'd be acknowledging there was something fucking wrong with her. So I just look at her. "Patricia, you know what you have to do. You know what it was like, as the girl."

"Yes."

"So please stop it all. It took you like twenty years to forgive your dad and now you guys are finally speaking," I remind her.

"Yeah," she says.

"And aren't you and your dad doing something for Father's Day this Sunday?"

"Yeah," she says. Then her eyes light up and I instantly know she's thinking about Married Man #3. "But he's--he's--wonderful," she effuses. "God I'm fucked up."

I look at her. She is clearly in pain. I try to understand and not judge.

"Today he called me while he was driving," Patricia says.

"Uh huh."

"With her in the car."

"His wife?!"

"Worse," she says, "his daughter."

"Oh god."

"He tells me not to worry. She's falling asleep and she can't even understand what he's saying. She doesn't speak English, only Chinese. He and his wife speak to her only in Chinese." Patricia is an ABC -- American Born Chinese and apparently so is Married Man #3.

She continues, "They get to the park, and he opens the minivan door, with me still on the phone. And I hear this tiny voice squeal in the background. 'Is that her?' I asked him. 'Yeah,' he said. I heard what she said. 'Let's go!' in Mandarin. It was so cute, it fucking broke my heart."

"Patricia," I say.

"His wife is living the life I'll never have."

"What, a cheating husband?" I ask her. I look at her to make sure I didn't offend her too much. But she just nods.

I see her pattern. She is attracted to unavailable men. Maybe it's just easier to like an unavailable guy because that way, she could never get hurt and never get too vulnerable. Everything could be attributed to the fact that he was married. And she would never have to deal with the drama of a real relationship, of real love, which in her past has always been linked to pain and deceit. Who knows how anyone would've turned out had they had her childhood? Obviously, my constant lectures to her about the One or the Ones have been about as effective as her lectures to me on the Dog-dom of Manity.

"Patricia," I say, "you know I love you like a sister. I don't want you to get hurt. There is no way this can end well."

"I know." She sighs. I always envied her perfect oval face. Even at her most miserable, she was beautiful. I can almost discern the expression on her face at this moment; it was one of resignation and yielding, one in painful recognition of the fact that she will always be, out of choice, unhappy.

The craving

I went into the pastry shop. I wasn't supposed to, but I did.

I was not supposed to have any pastries of any sort. I knew the best way to avoid eating the pastries was to avoid the pastry shop altogether. But I entered it. I wanted pastries, and I figured the best way to satisfy my craving was to be as close to the pastries as possible without having any. (Behold the power of rationalization.) And so I entered the shop and was met with an indescribable aroma and sight of the delectable pastries. Samples were displayed invitingly in glass trays. A baker held a tray before me and asked me if I would like a bite, just one bite, that's all. He held the tiny clear toothpick in front of me, the end of which poked into a pastry bit. It had a golden flaky crust and a glistening filling. I took the toothpick in my hand and smelled the morsel. It was still warm from the oven.

What harm could one bite do? It was just one bite. Could I live with the guilt?

"Now that you have it, you'll have to try it," the baker mused. "Otherwise we throw it out since you touched it."

Oh that would be a waste, I thought to myself. Might as well have it... Think of the starving children in Africa...

I brought it to my lips and the warm filling just glazed my upper lip when I stopped. It was right there in front of me, but I suddenly felt weird. I wasn't in the mood to have pastries. It didn't feel right. I gave the toothpick back to the baker and laughed sheepishly. "I gotta go," I said, and promptly ran out of the shop.

After I left, I could feel my heart still beating. How close was that? I asked myself. I was somewhat relieved that I avoided giving in, but at the same time, guiltily disappointed that I didn't have any, when I could have, just a little, and no one would have been the wiser.

Avoid the pastry shop I could hear my conscience and my friends' voices in my head say.

But I can't. I don't want to. Perhaps the reason I walk by that shop and step in "just to look around" is the craving itself rather than the pastries. How odd it is that an unfulfilled craving can be just as exquisite as the craved thing itself.

Fun stuff

Obsession is an interesting phenomenon. It's so easy to label it and judge it when you are not amidst it. But once you are possessed by it, you become unrecognizable. Everything you perceive becomes a tangent to the obsession. A candy wrapper on the floor. A typo. An obese woman in a muumuu. Every event is some reminder, some link to the obsessee. It's fascinating really.

And then all the songs you hear on the radio transform into the story of your life, even though you know the composer did not have you in mind at all when composing the song.

Obsession is also interesting in that it completely eliminates your ability to function as a human being. Your eating habits, your exercise routine, your time hanging out with friends, your work ethic, your ability to read for more than five minutes straight--all of these dwindle down to nothing and your obsession takes a seat in their place. Projects and assignments are divided into one-minute concentration spans, separated by twenty minute musings over the obsessee. Charts, graphs, words, sentences drift into a hazy unfocus. And that crack in the ceiling has never been so mesmerizing.

Indeed, obsession is fascinating. You live off the high of wanting more of something but can't have. It makes you sick, and you know you're sick, but you can't help it. Life and everything including yourself seem to swirl around the one, simple object - the obsession.

Amusing

My friend recently lent me the soundtrack to "The Wedding Singer." For some reason, being able to listen to "Blue Monday" and "Pass the Dutchie" from the same CD is incredibly amusing.

The song

She walked to the office on a Sunday morning. A uniformed man in his booth ate a powder donut. Cars paused at red lights and old ladies with white poodles ambled past her. Her headphones filtered out the city noise and all she could hear was the wistful melody of the song she had on repeat. She felt distant from her life, like a detached audience member watching the movie of someone else's biography. These were her feet walking and her skin straining to keep everything inside. Yet she floated on thoughts of her sweet addiction. She thought of him.

She imagined him listening to the song. She wondered what he would be thinking. It would answer all of his questions and explain everything she's been feeling. Then she wondered if he was even thinking of her this moment, or if she was a mere afterthought to his real life.

The light turned green and she crossed the street to her office. She took the elevator, walked to her desk, and turned off the song. Life resumed.

Finish it

Her boss paused in front of her desk at 6:33 PM. She sat there amidst piles of paper, post-its and pens and looked at him. "Is something wrong?" he asked her.

For a moment, she considered telling him everything that was wrong in her life, her hangover, her embarrassing drunken behavior the night before, her self-induced romantic problems. But that would be unprofessional, she concluded and instead perked up, smiled and replied, "No, nothing's wrong."

She turned back to the screen and stared at the words and the unfinished sentence. The cursor blinked at her. She was in control, wasn't she? Why did she feel like she wasn't?

Mr. Wrong was wrong, wrong wrong wrong. He interfered with her thinking, her self-respect, her work, even her colleagues. She tried to stop wanting him. Then she didn't want to stop. They had talked, analyzed, rationalized, moralized, fantasized, and chastised. It all became a blur in their minds and they weren't thinking clearly in the haze. Something inside each of them was telling them do something, while everything else was telling them not to. It was so exhausting. It would be easier to stop fighting it, stop thinking, and just relent to what they could not deny.

Wrong wrong wrong, she thought to herself.

The cursor continued to blink at her. If she made a mistake, she could erase it easily. An incorrect keystroke would only exist in her mind then. It would be nothing more than a memory of something insignificant. But she would know it had happened, even if it was erased.

I don't know, she thought. She ran her fingers through her hair and looked at the clock. 6:37. She turned back to the screen and watched the cursor flicker curiously against the white backdrop of her screen. She knew how to finish the sentence. She just had to do it. And so she placed her fingers over the keyboard and began to type.

Thanks Satan

I'm feeling particularly low this Tuesday evening. Today was an unproductive day. It's one of those useless days where you know you have stuff to do but you just can't bring yourself to do it. Perhaps my day turned bad when I got on the bus on my way to work this morning and sat on a particular seat. It felt cold. Very cold. I touched it and realized it was soaked wet. I got up, pants soaked through, to change to a dry seat. Then a blond haired girl comes on the bus and was about to sit down on that very seat when everyone at once yelled "That seat's wet!" Had I been blond, would everyone have warned me? Or did they assume I no speak Engrish? Then I felt guilty for assuming everyone's racist, just like the typical self-victimizing minorities in the U.S. So I alleviated that guilt by concluding it was probably because I was ugly.

I get to work. Having just moved into a new apartment, I need to set up phone service. Because the phone company is only open during the day, I have to call during work hours. I'm on the phone with them for literally an hour. All I want is basic service. They try to cajole me and emotionally blackmail me into getting more. I don't. Then they say my apartment isn't listed. Apt. 1, 2, and 4 is listed. But not 3, which is me. How neat! I then enter this Kafka-esque world of setting up phone service, where they can't give me phone service unless I let them in, but I can't let them in because my landlord isn't available at that time, and when I try to set the right time, they won't set the time because I don't have an order number which was never given to me in the first place. They can't find my order number and so they can't come in and so I can't get phone service. Oh but my order number will be on my $60 bill. It's so nonsensical it's funny.

On top of that, the Guy For Whom I Once Pined called me twice. I didn't pick up. I didn't even begin to indulge the where-are-all-the-good-guys stream of thought, because, quite frankly, I didn't feel like exerting the effort.

Then at the end of the day, my boss totally rips on me in front of other people by calling me an idiot because I don't know X, and I had no comeback because, um, I didn't know X.

So here I am. Blogging. Being totally self-indulgent. And useless.

Out of sight out of mind?

The Guy For Whom I Pine has since my last blog entry called me and emailed me. When my phone rang, I didn't recognize the number and picked it up. It was he. I can't deny that I was pleased that I had the excuse of not knowing it was he before I picked up and got to hear his voice. He immediately confessed to breaching our agreement. I told him I had to do something and hung up the phone, ending it with the "I'll talk to you later"-farewell. When I got his email, I realized that the I'll-talk-to-you-later line may have been construed literally.

My friend firmly told me that he is being manipulative by putting me in this position. I feel rude for not calling him back and for not replying to his email; but she asserted he is being rude for creating the situation in the first place. I relented to her logic and have resisted calling him or emailing him.

I feel that some of the allure is fading. Perhaps his persistence in violating our agreement and not taking the situation seriously are the causes. At any rate, I hope to maintain my hiatus despite my weakness for irresistibly charming men.

God, what would we do without our friends to support us or bitchslap us when we need it?

I'm laughing on in the inside

Life is funny.

It turns out that the Guy For Whom I Pine -- whose taboo status is not entirely unlike that of a certain best friend's ex-boyfriend -- has appeared to develop some feelings for me as well. At first, we thought we could just be friends. Two people can be incredibly attracted to each other, have great chemistry, and know that the feeling is mutual without resorting to jumping each other, right? Well, according to both of our confidants, "no." A drink after work, a misplaced hand, a loose tie that begs to be fixed. Each instance of seemingly casual contact is the tip of a very slippery -- and very inviting -- slope. And it would be so easy to descend down that wonderful slope into what we want but shouldn't have.

So after a very frank discussion with the Guy For Whom I Pine, we concluded that our confidants were right -- we couldn't continue to be friends without being faced with temptation. So we are going cold turkey. Nothing. No contact at all.

It's very difficult. It's like a dessert you can't have. Before you knew you couldn't have it, but you liked to look at it, smell it, listen to and watch the chef make it before your eyes. Each walk into the pastry shop and each sensory input reminded you how wonderful it would taste if you only had a smidgen. And now, not only can you not have it, but you can't even want it. You can't enter the pastry shop at all or even read the menu posted in its window. The dessert is now an idea in your head, a memory of collected sensory input, a thing that shifts and pulses inside your very wild imagination.

Last night, the Guy For Whom I Pine violated one of the rules by emailing me. It was one sentence: "this sucks." I resisted the urges to reply and call. I just sat there, feeling both exhilarated and dejected.

Another time, another place, perhaps something great could have happened. But it isn't that time or place. It's here and now. And here and now sucks.

A walk

The air was cool and moist. The sky was a placid gray. She had told the people at work she would only be stepping out for a minute. Maybe she had said "a few minutes." But one minute turned into five. Five turned into ten. Ten turned into twenty. Twenty minutes with him. Next to him.

She noticed the nape of his neck, the clean taper of his haircut.

"Did you get a haircut?" she asked.

"Yes," he replied.

"When?"

"Last night."

"Ah."

"Why?"

"I just noticed it and figured you got a haircut."

"Okay."

They walked along the water, watched the blue ripples lap against the wooden docks and talked about nothing. There were things she wanted to say, things she wanted to do. But her skin held it all in. She let the air between them circulate around her and him uselessly. She held her spine straight so that her back would not buckle under the weight, that thick heavy weight that bore on her mind. She watched him speak his words the same way he walked, careful, articulate and perfect.

Then they went back to the office.

"This was nice," she said, looking at his face.

"Yeah it was," he replied. "I gotta get back to my desk."

"Oh, okay."

"Bye," he said and walked away.

"Bye," she said.