It's Goodbye Time

The Sap was a nice guy. At least at the beginning. He was sweet, even went a little overboard by bringing a dozen roses to our first date. Granted, it was a week after my birthday, and he felt compelled to make sure I caught that he noticed and had listened the day I met him. It was actually a very nice gesture.

Our second date took a turn towards stalker. Let's talk about bringing up what a girl wore on the day before your date, when she had not planned or even noticed that you had "seen" her. Let's also talk about dropping the L-bomb. And, to really round it out, let's find out what you want to name your kids.

The Sap and my budding relationship quickly ended. A quick talk explaining that we weren't in the same place and I was no longer interested in pursuing this relationship, and I felt the deal was done. A few calls over the next week that were not returned, seemed to send a similar message. (Apparently, explicitly saying "no, I do not want to date you anymore" just doesn't do the trick.)

But the Sap was not done.

Six months later, (SIX MONTHS) I get a text message. From a number I do not know but has the area code that the Sap would have possessed.

"BJA, hey it's Sap. I wanted you to know I haven't met anyone who is as smart and beautiful as you and I really want to see you again. Please call me. My house number is __________, my pager is ___________, or you can email me at _____@_____.com. Hope to hear from you soon. You are the most amazing woman ever."

OMG. Stalker's suck.

High School Never Ends

I don't know about you, but when high school ended, I was relieved. No more pencils, no more books, etc. kind of relieved. I had college to look forward to! String Bean, on the other hand, wasn't going to college. He had actually graduated the year before me and hadn't managed to find a way to get into a decent community college, let alone a four year institution and a far cry from the ivy league.

Here's the brutal truth about those who don't go to college. For a large portion of them (but by no means all, there are many brilliant non-college grads who do very well for themselves), high school was IT. The highlight of their lives! It was all downhill from there, right? But for those of us who either went to school or at least matured in some manner (although many who even went to college never saw the light of maturity...), we never wanted to revisit our high school years.

So when String Bean said a friend of his was throwing a house party the summer after my freshman year of college, I was perfectly content with going. I'd just come home from college, where house parties meant kegs, having fun, letting loose, and generally having a fantastic time because the cops weren't coming by. I wasn't 21 yet, but who cares? We were blocks from campus and had plenty of friends to make sure everyone could walk at the end of the night, or at least one person could be the one we leaned on. (Very little "law enforcement" in the Big Easy...)

Much to my surprise, String Bean drives us to this hole in the wall house in the middle of lower suburbia on the outskirts of my home town. This isn't a college level party... its not even in an area where college kids live... let alone where cops won't dare travel. Worse - it was some high schooler's house.

She was 14. Not completely unfortunate looking, but certainly not the queen bee of anything, and definitely barely out of diapers. Have you ever noticed how those younger than us think that the more the show the hotter they look? Let's remember that this mindset is only expected from strippers or for costume parties. If your midriff is showing and you're jailbait - you darn well better put some clothing on. This concept apparently escaped these young high school bimbos.

We arrive, I disdainfully examine the "party." Guess what we're here for. We're the alcohol buyers. The high schoolers fish through their pockets for the twenties they stole from their parents' wallets. Needless to say, I wasn't pleased. But I used their money to get some fine liquors I wanted, so I felt at least some sense of revenge.

When we returned, the drinking began. That part was expected. What wasn't on my list of things to do was run from the cops. But that is exactly what happened.

Let's be clear - I had high school parties in high school. But we weren't retarded enough to let the drunk guys go out back and have wrestling contests while blasting music at 1am. And never, EVER did I have to deal with diving over a fence to escape cops who actually care about noise and underage drinking violations.

Since when is it ok to take your girlfriend to a party thrown by 14 year old skanks? Thank goodness that ends after college. Or at least I really really hope I don't run into any losers who think that's ok at forty.

Seriously. Why were we there?

I do not miss high school.

Follow Your Nose

Sometimes when you need to blow your nose, a box of tissues is just not close by. I understand this. In college, I would only buy tissues if I had gotten sick enough to go through them in a few hours. The rest of the time, I used toilet paper. Sometimes even napkins. I am not ashamed to admit my gross habits (for the record though, I have gotten past this and currently have three boxes of tissues on my desk ... but that is only because work pays for them since they are office supplies).

When tissues are unavailable, there are alternatives, some better than others. If I had to rank the alternatives, I would put toilet paper at the top of that list, followed by cheap napkins (softer than the nice ones), then nice napkins, then paper towels, and then...creative options. Thankfully, I have never gotten to the creative options. Fred, on the other hand, has.

One night I was at his apartment making enchiladas and he decided that he absolutely had to blow his nose immediately. Sure, there were napkins and paper towels in the kitchen. And there was toilet paper in the bathroom. If he were truly a purist, I am sure his anal-retentive roommate had some tissues to spare (Actual real tissues! What a concept!). But Fred opted for the creative option. His choice? A corn tortilla. I'm sure his inner monolouge was something like "I'm such a rebel, I am blowing my nose with food!"

I can't even begin to describe how nauseating it is to see someone blow their nose into the food you are cooking, but trust me, it was not a good time.

I was completely appalled that he decided to use a corn tortilla to blow his nose out of some sick interest rather than out of necessity. Furthermore, an unfried corn tortilla is actually kind of crumbly and not really a good material for this, ergo, it did not exactly work out the way he had hoped. Not to mention, they were much more expensive than any other option and they were what I was fucking cooking for dinner.

I don't know if he thought he was being innovative, funny or both. I found his display to be none of the above. And he was making his own dinner for a very long time after that.