The Best Gift (And 10 Extra Lbs Gained) Ever

On Seinfeld, everyone knows the "code" to Elaine's vault of secrets is Schnapps. Just like everyone knows the way to my heart is food. And also puppies.

Anyway, this weekend J and I exchanged presents, a little Chrismukkah celebration if you will.

In the tradition of me giving him semi-selfish gifts (last year I got him Netflix, which he deemed "the best gift ever" seeing as how he loves movies...it was really more of just a gift that just made perfect sense) I got the two of us massages - no not couples massages - we can just go at the same time if we want. I also got him a super cute knitted hat with faux fur lining and ear flaps - at least accessories like this make winter seem more tolerable - an "old man" cardigan, and a lobster bottle-opener (duh).

What did he get me?

A box full of my FAVORITE Texas barbecue - Salt Lick - that "feeds 8." The same bbq I made my guy BFF slash Fake Husband venture with me to gorge on while I was home for Labor Day and mentioned here.

The bbq really has been the gift that keeps on giving. We shared it on Friday, I had some on Saturday [Note: A plate of sausage does not make for a good pre-workout snack, FYI], then we shared it with some equally-bbq-fanatical friends that night.

After meal #5 just now, J might have officially set the "Food is Love" bar so high it's impossible to beat.

So if you want to earn my love, go with puppies. Just throwing that out there.

Okay now please excuse me while I go pass out in a food coma again.

MOJB

Discussing my new "IAR" (in a relationship) status with a friend, she asked whether or not the blog was going to change too. The answer, who knows. I've always loved to talk about "boys" - I guess they're "guys" now? - whether or not I'm single. Plus perhaps now I will divulge less awkward/embarrassing stuff about my own personal life?

Doubtful.

Anyway, she also said I needed a codename for J. I explained that Pinch Hitter or any other lobster-related names got a little old after typing them more than a few times, so I was going with "J".

Clearly not clever enough for her, she suggested MOJB.

MOJB?

My older, Jewish boyfriend.

HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHA.

Seriously, Tiger!?

Dear Tiger,

Up until last week, your reputation has been spotless. Now you have fallen to the level of other mortals due to your indiscretions. Nobody is perfect, so the fact that your squeaky-clean image has been tarnished is not the issue. Cheating is to professional athletes as being a giant dbag is to John Mayer. It is (sadly) common and expected.

But the two "WTF were you thinking??" points I want to make are:

1) Have you seen your wife? Not that I condone cheating if your wife is fugly, but OMG!?!? She might be one of the hottest women ever. You cannot do better than her. I get that people cheat for a lot of reasons, but I really don't think any of the reasons could possibly measure up to the hottness of your wife. Especially the ones you picked up in Vegas. You are a fool. But, you seem to have realized that and are willing to pay up (monetarily and emotionally) to make it work. Good for you.

2) One of the skanks who has come out with allegations (and texts, voicemails and detailed accounts) is referred to as "a former contestant on Tool Academy." YOU ARE BETTER THAN THAT.

Note to all celebrities committing adultery: TRY AND CHOOSE SOMEONE WHOSE MOST NOTABLE RESUME REFERENCE IS NOT A TRASHY VH1 RELATY SHOW WITH TOOL IN THE TITLE.

So what should Tiger do now? According to Gawker, he should play some golf.

"Your job is simple. Just be Tiger Woods. That means, continue being the most robotic, uninteresting sports megastar of our time. You, sir, are a cipher. Fans and sponsors love you for it, because they can project whatever image they want upon you, and your inscrutable, uninteresting being simply swallows it up.

Golf is the most uninteresting spectator sport in the world. Golf fans are not moralists. They are people who believe that golf shirts in various shades of coral are acceptable outerwear. They are the bland upper crust of Middle America. That, and rich assholes who love to cheat on their wives. Neither of these groups of golf fans cares one bit about your marital infidelity, Tiger. Nor do your sponsors. What they do care about is being forced to think about something other than golf."



Update: Too good not to share. My mom's opinion on Tiger:

Do you find it ironic that golf is a game where integrity of not moving the ball and cheating is sooooooooooooo important?? and the fact he is such a competitor, but slutting around with cocktail waitresses...how hard are THEY to pick up? He could at least try for a nun or something if he wanted to challenge himself!!

Thanksgiving-inspired Dating Memories

I just had a flashback to the start of my relationship during my junior year of high school, which began with a date the night before Thanksgiving.

We will refer to this guy as Baby Gums, because that's what The BFF still calls him. I'm not totally sure why? I guess he might have large gums and small teeth? Either way, he's actually pretty cute. But, that's neither here nor there.

Anyway, Baby Gums and I met through a shared journalism/yearbook class...obviously I'm so cool that I dated TWO guys I met through yearbook...

He finally asked me out right before the holidays, and he took me to a UT basketball game for our first date, which I assumed would also include eating.

Wrong.

When he picked me up around dinner time, he proceeded to excitedly tell me that he was in fact "fasting for Thanksgiving," his favorite holiday.

Fantastic.

Now, let's be honest, eating is one of my all-time favorite activities/interests and I'm not one to skip meals, but I tried to conform to his Thanksgiving-mindset. I too could bypass dinner in anticipation. I was fine.

Until the second quarter when I excused myself to go to the restroom, and by restroom, I mean the snack bar where I purchased and subsequently scarfed down a giant pretzel before returning to my seat. Because otherwise I might have died of starvation. Sometimes you have to censor your image a little at the beginning of a relationship, it's fine.

We went on to date for a few months until he broke up with me. At his house. Directly after my mom had just dropped me off.

Double fantastic.

Coincidentally we watched another UT basketball game on TV before he drove me home. Fact: not having a car or access to public transportation to escape post-getting dumped scenarios SUCKS.

In the end, though, I will say I won that relationship. Based on the fact that I made out with two of his friends (only partially out of spite), and went to prom with another one.

And this post would not be complete without me telling The Prom Story.

So when Baby Gums ended things with me I had a fairly strong suspicion it might have had to do with another girl. It did. Shocking. They started dating soon after and obviously planned on going to prom together as it was quickly approaching. Being fairly opportunistic, I realized that one of Baby Gum's best friends (who I had become friends with) was my best potential date option. Since he was fairly shy (read: afraid of girls, especially me and my powers of manipulation), I schemed my way into the role of his date...which included being part of Baby Gums' & Mrs. Baby Gums' group.

Suckers.

My date and I arrived at Baby Gums' house for group pictures.

My look for the evening: long red dress, curly dark brown hair half up, black shoes/accessories

Mrs. Baby Gums' look for the evening: long red dress, curly dark brown hair half up, black shoes/accessories

Update: My mom read this post and then scanned and sent me her fav prom photo - solo shot obv. Thanks, mommy!

We looked SO similar (although, let's be honest and humble, I looked better) that my other BFF from HS Shawn TRIED TO DANCE WITH HER thinking she was me.

Hahahhahaha. Awk-ward.

And that's the saga of Baby Gums. Maybe it would have turned out better  (i.e. I wouldn't have had to upstage his new GF at prom - IAAB) had he fed me dinner during that first date.

Food is the way to my heart.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!! Hook 'em Horns :)

And since no post would be complete without an available animals-in-costume photo, here you go:

The M Word

In the last year my peers and I have crossed into marriage territory. Well, not literally for most of us, but the topic of marriage is now a real, timely "thing." Any quick browse on Facebook documents another person taking the leap.

It's so weird. Becoming an adult just sort of sneaks up on you. Last time I checked, we were talking about who asked who to the middle school dance.

Anyway, I just got an adorable, glittery Mr & Mrs. engagement party invitation in the mail. Being a thousand miles away with limited vacay time and plane fare funds has unfortunately severely restricted my partcipation in friends' pre-wedding festivities.

Although I'm not physically there, it's still a reminder of a world I have one leg in while the rest of my body is in a different time zone. A time zone that thinks if you're under thirty and married it might be due to some sort of child bride scenario. Like whenever I mention another friend from home has gotten engaged, older coworkers always slip a "But you're so young!" comment in there.

While I have a few more years until it's the main focus of my New York friends' agendas, the majority of guys I have dated fall in the big, fat middle of the almost-all-my-friends-are-married-slash-engaged category. As a side note, I would like to point out that it should have been more apparent that there might be a reason why they're the ones still single...

Anyway, both worlds I occupy are filling with marrieds. It's fine, I'm getting older, and I'm also associating with people who started life a little ahead of me. But part me still finds the idea of marriage so foreign. Part of me feels like the way my friends and I approach the topic is with the same curiosity and gossipy anticipation as when we started liking boys in the first place.

"Oh so and so, I bet you have a crush on him. When is he going to be your boyfriend?" Replace boyfriend with fiance/husband and we're still using the same script. After a few dates with a guy, I get at least a couple "Do you think this is going anywhere?" questions. I've even come to expect the totally premature "Could you see yourself marrying this guy" Q because, hey, I ask my friends the same unanswerable thing.

Our focus on the future should be expected, though, because it's our nature. We like long-term planning. Yes we might jump the gun a little, but at the heart of it, deep down inside, we're still excited by the same possibilities as we were in 7th grade. We love gossip, we love boys, we love love. And now we love weddings and marriage too. And cake.

You Don't Let Prime Real-Estate Sit on the Market

I'll be honest, finding an apartment when The BFF and I first moved to the city was one of the hardest things we've ever had to struggle with. Yes, we've had pretty easy lives, but seriously, the experience was SO painful. I won't bore you with the details (mostly because I'm too lazy right now to adequately describe the horror), but for two weeks, three amazingly generous girls allowed us Texan vagabonds to share the living room futon in their spatially-challenged Greenwich Village apartment.

For fourteen straight days we endlessly scoured Craigslist for anything that would work. After having two almost-signing-the-contract situations fall through, we were desperate to find something suitable. We had a checklist of required apartment specifications and had narrowed down our scope to a few, particular neighborhoods, but other than that, we were pretty open to whatever came our way.

We saw a lot of apartments. I mean a lot. Most were terrible. Like "a ply-wood 'wall' with a hole cut out for the front 'door' separating us from an annoying 18-year-old guy" horrible; like "a creepy stay-at-home chain-smoking creepster roommate" horrible; like "legitimate Craigslist 'wire us some money through MoneyGram' scam" horrible.

So once we found The One, we did not let it out of our sight. It had everything we wanted - good location, beautifully remodeled features, A DISHWASHER! It was love at first freaking sight. Yes, there were a few things that could have been better, but it didn't matter - we wanted it.


When you find something you've been searching for and realize it's everything you need - maybe even surprising you with hidden charms like courtyards visible from both sides of the apartment! - you lock it down. We knew that we couldn't let this one get away; we couldn't bear to live without it.

So after meeting a guy and dating for long enough to get a good sense of one another (the initial "getting to know each other" stage of dating obviously requires more time than judging an apartment - think a couple of months not days) and, if nothing has moved forward in terms of commitment (e.g. more frequent communication/hanging out/inclusion in activities/The Talk), I begin to realize that I'm not what they're looking for.

The longer a piece of property (i.e. a potential relationship) sits on the market without so much as a contract negotiation, the more likely it will decline in value. My mother is a realtor so I know what I'm talking about.

If you're really interested and truly wanted it, you wouldn't risk losing it. You sign the lease (or you buy it! Although I'm clearly nowhere near THAT kind of commitment, metaphorically or otherwise).

You're not willing to commit to me? To jump through some hoops to get me off the market? Sorry ... Snooze = lose.

How Much Does a Polar Bear Weigh?

The inspiration for my latest date-meeting scheme started this summer with one decent looking guy who I would pass on the street each morning – him just getting off the subway, me hopping on to head uptown to work. We started seeing each other so regularly and catching eye contact that we both began to give slight acknowledgements to one another. I saw him recently for the first time in awhile. Minor look of familiarity. All is not lost, but doubtful anything will ever come from it.

I hadn’t seen him for awhile because I had to tweak my work schedule, leaving a little earlier than before. My Park Ave friend was replaced by a couple of interchangeable, cute guys in suits who all ride in the same car I specifically wait for each morning. For those of you have never experienced commuting via subway, you should know that it is a great day when autopilot takes over and you instinctively begin to line up to wait for the subway car that will let you off directly in front of your final destination’s exit.

Almost every day – depending on the time I left – I began to recognize the same guys, all of whom could potentially be The One. Okay, maybe that is a tad dramatic, but based solely on shallow first impressions, they all look like guys I would go out with. I mean, yeah sure it’s a long-shot to meet a guy on the street – or in this case underground – but so is meeting someone at a bar. But much like my Park Ave friend, there has never been an opportunity to break the ice.

This is when it hit me. I just need a purse full of cards to pass out to hot guys. Kind of like business cards, but not. While some people do hand out their business cards to strangers (e.g. FH 2.0), I know the IT guys at work, and I would rather not have "hey random girl on the street, thanks for picking me up" emails stored on the server. Plus, if my recipients are taken or are not interested, having my full name and place of employment makes things muy awkward, in my opinion.

What I need is an icebreaker card – a card with my name and email address. Just like an online dating profile. And maybe a funny joke or something. You know, to break the ice.

It’s like guerrilla marketing meets matchmaking – two strangers connecting. What would be the harm in that? I live in a city of millions of eligible bachelors, yet how come it seems like I never meet any of them? I need to expand my dating pool.

And, in the case with my subway boyfriends, I already know we have similar schedules. Dating convenience is something I hold in high regard. We could even be that annoying couple who commutes together ... although for the sake of those around me, I promise to limit my early-morning PDA.

So if society embraces this trend, or if I get ballsy enough to go rogue and print up a batch of these bad boys on my own, maybe the next time I see Park Ave I can casually slip him a card as he walks past ... and we'll see where things go from there.

Who could resist calling me after receiving this?

(front)

(back)

I Heart Halloween

As a holiday, Halloween is very much either a trick or a treat. Those who aren't fans get turned off by the level of stress presented when trying to find a costume. Although holidays that demand locating the perfect gift for that hard-to-buy-for person or involve extended-family interrogation sessions about why you're still single can be stressful too, getting dressed seems to really take it out of some people.

For me, though, I always look forward to Halloween - I love it. My mom, in addition to her unparalleled matchmaking skills, is very creative and was always more than willing to help create inventive costumes. Like the time we dreamed up a homemade gumball machine costume when I was in elementary school. A sheet of clear, pliable plastic sewed into a sort of intertube fitted around my body and filled with small balloons wasn't something every other kid on the block was wearing, that's for sure.

So basically I've been breed to spend far too much time and effort dreaming up costumes. "Oh it's Labor Day? Now I can get to work." Yeah, I might should get a hobby or two?

When you love Halloween and themey get-ups as much as me, what's better than having a boyfriend to dress up too (especially one who cooperates with all of my hilarious ideas)? Nothing. Double treat.

So it was fairly awesome the College BF and I had our first official date at a Halloween party. Less awesome was that I ended up drinking far too much during the pre-party and lasted 30 minutes at the bar before I had to be taken home. Classy. But even though I was a hot mess, he still liked me.

Halloween became "our thing," a marker of how long we'd been together. The following year was one of my favorite couples costumes ever - Fred & Wilma Flintstone. He borrowed his costume from a friend, but with my aversion to most costumes you get out of a plastic bag, I bought a few things from thrift stores and threw together this little number.


We also didn't make it at the bar more than an hour. Seriously, what is my deal? I'm like the little kid who gets too excited, eats all their candy in five minutes and then is sick the rest of the night. Except my candy is booze.

The following year was one of the worst nights of my life - let's just say when the devil throws a tantrum it is NOT pretty. Trick.

Somehow our relationship survived that rough patch, and our final Halloween together he agreed to let me be in charge once again. Since I was sporting my blonde hair and already owned a periwinkle blue dress, I decided that it was time to get back to my Disney roots - I was going to be Cinderella.

Now, a normal girl would make her boyfriend Prince Charming. But clearly I'm not normal. So he was Gus Gus the Mouse. Let that sink in how awesome it was that he agreed to not only go as a rodent, but a fat rodent. He even wore a pillow under his shirt to the bar. What a guy.

And, apparently fourth time's a charm. We were both on good behavior. There was no drama, no going home after 30 minutes. Success. Victory. Treat.

Last year, Ol' Year of the (Slutty) Lobster - my all-time best costume that I spent far too much effort concoting - had not been in vain.
A guy I had talked to at the bar had tracked down my number. And a year later, he's still in my life. Which is more than I can say about any other guy I've dated in the city. Who knows, maybe he'll be around for next year too. We'll see what happens, but at least he's made it this far. Treat.

So even though I'm not getting to plan two costumes this year, I'm holding out hope this Halloween is a great night. And I'm pretty pleased with the costume I've thrown together for myself.

Sexy Julia Child. The legendary author of the book "Mastering the Art of French Kissing." And I just found some hilarious toy plastic cookwear to complete the ensemble. Bon Appétit.

PS - One of my new fav blogs - Do You Fancy Us? - has two adorable costume ideas too! Eloise (my absolute fav book from childhood) and the Lucky Charm's Leprechaun! Love it!

PSx2 - I am obsessed with having a dog. Especially one that will wear hilarious costumes like this:


... or these.
OK I'm done now ...

Poker Face

Casual dating in New York is like playing high stakes poker. If you want to play at the big table, you better have some game. And you won’t be able to stay at the table if you don’t have at least a few cards to play.

You have to have equal if not better hands than the guys you’re dating. They’re professionals. You can’t expect them to go down without a fight, and you better be able to raise the stakes when necessary. If you aren’t seeing anyone else, you will become too available because, let's be honest, he probably is. You will blow your cool and he will know you’re bluffing.

Even though he might be your Ace, if you don't have anything else to compete with, it won’t do you any good. It's hard to win with just one card. You have to have a few other interests to spread out your time. Even if it’s just a couple of twos, keep them in your hand.

The thing is, though, eventually the game gets old after awhile. Unless you’re on the World Series of Poker tour, you realize there is more to life than playing games and trying to have the best hand.

Most of the guys I’ve dated recently seem to be more focused on their game than seeing where things are going with me. They’re players.

And I'm not the kind of girl who can keep up her poker face after awhile. I just get fed up with the games.

On that Bumpy Road to Love

Ella Fitzgerald. Louis Armstrong. Duet. “Can’t take that away from me.” Trumpet. Talent. Soul. Best song ever.

The way you wear your hat
The way you sip your tea
The memory of all that
No they can't take that away from me

The way your smile just beams
The way you sing off key
The way you haunt my dreams
No they can't take that away from me

We may never never meet again, on that bumpy road to love
Still I'll always, always keep the memory of

The way you hold your knife
The way we danced till three
The way you changed my life
No they can't take that away from me

Sometime in early high school I developed a random appreciation for old school jazz and blues. Still love it. And this song. Not only is it beautiful, but the lyrics have always stuck with me.

There have been a few guys who I’ve actually loved. There have been million guys who for a millisecond I thought I loved. There were the guys that matter – who I will remember forever – and there are the guys who no longer exist in my conscious memory. And some are in between.

This song helps identify those that deserve to be in the first category. You never know how things will end up in life until you’re past them. I thought the college boyfriend was The One for years. I loved this song then and would occasionally think that I had already made it past that bumpy road to love.

HA HA, naive.

But looking back now, I’m not sad that it wasn’t the case. It wasn’t meant to be. But the way he wore his hat, the way we danced till three, the way he changed my life, no they can’t take that away from me. Coincidentally tomorrow would have been our five year anniversary.

Every relationship that counts will teach you something. Just because someone wasn't The One doesn't mean you should forget them all together. You shouldn’t block out the memories - they’re not just about him, they’re about you too. About where you were as a person and how you've changed.

Wowza this is deep stuff...maybe this will make up for yesterday's bitchy outta yer league post?