She's a girl with a problem...

I don't like answering the phone if I'm peeing, eating or watching the Daily Show. I don't like answering the phone during sex either, but thankfully sex doesn't happen often enough to warrant much in the way of contingency planning.

My reason for wanting to watch the Daily Show uninterrupted is purely mental. I like imagining myself as a guest on the show, and talking on the phone interferes.

Jon Stewart hugs me, we exchange witty banter, my book becomes an overnight best-seller and Oprah calls before the interview is even over, dying to have me on her show. I turn her down. Then Jon and I go for martinis afterward with Stephen Colbert, and I get a text message from David Sedaris congratulating me on my success and inviting me to visit him at his home in France...

Woe be the person interrupting the Daily Show, and yet friends continually call between 11:00 and 11:30 p.m. Maddeningly, their first question before launching into how their day went is always whether I'm watching the Daily Show.

Sun Tzu may have mastered the art of war, but few have mastered the art of pretending to pay attention while still following Jon Stewart's opening in quite the same way I have.

Sometimes however, I have no choice but to be interrupted -- particularly when the friend on the other line is drunk as fuck and dying to get something off her chest.

For those readers who have met me in person and then immediately sustained a head injury wiping out memory, or for those readers who have never met me but who have had the biblical level of patience required to make it through one of my blog postings...I have some news.

News so big, my friend drank liters of alcohol and then called me up just to tell me.

I'm single.

No, really - it's true. Please try to contain your shock.

I have no significant other, boyfriend, partner, love interest or friend with benefits to speak of.

(Just to clarify, I'm not counting friends with benefits who are happily married or love interests who are well on the way to being happily married to women who are decidedly not me. The English language has not caught up to the finer nuances of my life thus far, and so there are no easy titles for these sorts of people.)

For the love of Cher I can't even keep vegetables healthy in my fridge. I'm afraid if I get a dog it won't like me, and I recently murdered a houseplant that should have been impossible to kill. Basically...cultivating healthy relationships with other living organisms isn't my strong suit is what I'm trying to say here.

In case I wasn't aware however, my drunken friend called during the Daily Show to ask me if I was aware of this, and I replied that I am. Very, very aware. This was good, because she had more to tell me.

I'm alone, will likely always be alone, and it's completely my fault. It's OK though, because even though she'd come to these conclusions and they seem kind of harsh, she knows what I need to change.

As the Daily Show went to commercial, I was hoping it wouldn't take longer than three minutes for her to provide me with the advice that could save myself from becoming a giant Fancy Feast for my hoard of cats.

(I can only assume after slipping in the shower and dying alone on my bathroom floor, kitties aren't going to wait around two years for their next meal and for my body to be discovered.)

Thankfully, she wasn't going to be mean about it. Even though my dating ambitions reminded her of MADtv sketches from back in the day, posting these sketches on my blog in the comments section as was her first inclination was too mean and she just couldn't do it. Best to just phone me during the Daily Show instead.

The sketches she felt were more documentary than comedy for me were titled "Lowered Expectations," and often featured an introduction by the Lowered Expectations spokesperson...

Are you having trouble finding your ideal mate? How about any mate? Do you feel you'll be the last man or woman on earth still not getting any? Are you using roofies to score? And you still hope to land that prince or princess of your dreams? Well wake up Sleeping Ugly! Because your only hope is Lowered Expectations. Our video library allows you to choose from thousands of chronically rejected singles just as hard up and pathetic as you. So good luck! You'll need it.

Some of these sketches were indeed hilarious. Somewhat less hilarious is being compared to a Lowered Expectations sketch.

My friend felt pointing out that it's my fault I'm alone was a kindness, and not many people would have the guts to tell me. This conversation was obviously going to last past the commercials, and that was annoying for one major reason.

I know I'm the problem.

There's a thread that runs through this blog, and that thread is me being pretty fucking sure I'm the problem in some way. Maybe that is the problem. I'm so convinced I will never have a decent relationship that I wouldn't even know what to do with myself if a guy I'm into is ever good to me in return.

In fact, I'm so used to being treated badly, I would probably set myself on fire if the first and only guy to ever call me when he says he will asked me to do it. Luckily, that's insanely far-fetched.

That is, a guy calling when he says he will. Not the fire part.

What sprang my friend into action was a recent blog posting in which I described the differences inherent in being a wife/girlfriend versus being...whatever the hell it is I usually am.

It's not that I don't have experience to back me up. I've been the whatever the hell else many more times than I've been the girlfriend, so I know what I'm talking about. Just the same, perhaps I had been unclear about at least one point.

In my posting I referenced a guy who makes a six-figure salary, and the happy life this can afford a couple who are very happy together and who don't lay awake worrying about money.

This isn't how my friend read this posting though. Six-figure salary turned out to be fighting words.

She took this to mean that I'm secretly gold-digging, and it's "pathetic," particularly because I could never, ever land a guy who makes six figures.

It's not that there aren't guys out there who make six figures, it's more that I could never hope to date one.

She's probably right. If I were actually gold-digging, I'm as much of a failure at that as I am keeping fresh salad ingredients.

Example: for years my affection for a guy named Alex has been well-chronicled on this site. That boy makes about $15,000 less a year than I do, depending on how the economy might be doing overall.

A career in sales is tough, but he's good at it because he has a way of connecting with people that I could never hope to have. People meet him and like him instantly. People meet me, and wonder, "Does she always look that tired?"

Alex has typically worked jobs that truly snotty people look down on, but where he lives there's not a lot of high-roller positions available. The cost of living where he does is considerably lower than where I've chosen to be alone and pathetic however, so he still has a sprawling house with a living room I could fit my condo into.

I'm sure his new girlfriend enjoys it there. And now I need some wine. And to cry.

Some would even think his job title is an insult in itself. He works on commission, thus providing everybody who's ever asked me what he does for a living the opportunity to tell me how his occupation proves I'm sadly gullible and he's a bad person.

He lies for a living, and he's nothing but a smarmy salesman. Anything nice he's ever said to me is a lie told just to get my pants off.

(To be fair, this could have made us a perfect match because I lie in my job all day long too. Yes, the project will be done by the end of January. Yes, I read the strategy documents and meeting agenda. No, I didn't steal your tape. I had no idea I was supposed to be at that meeting! Seriously, I don't have your tape. Or your ruler.)

I dare anybody to spend a day at the office without telling a single lie.

Alex may be a good liar who brings in less than I do but the words, "rat" and "ass," are still the two words that when combined together, best describe my feelings toward Alex's earning potential.

His job, his pay cheque, his education level - did not care. Do not care.

Being with him was all I wanted.

Money for the sake of it is not my goal. It's more that I'd like to take trips once in a while, buy good food, enjoy a night out and maybe even enjoy my life with another person. A partner who wants those things too and can work for them would be all I ask for.

Actually, that's a lie. I am asking for more, because I know too well what life can be like when there's zero financial security.

When I look back at why I stayed so long with my piece of shit abusive ex in Calgary, one of the big reasons was I couldn't afford to leave. Every day felt like waking up in a leg-hold trap.

The people who say money can't buy happiness aren't doing it right. If not happiness, money at least buys options. My ex knew I had very few of those, and made a conscious effort to chip away at the slim chances I held onto.

Of course I would threaten to leave, and he'd threaten that I was too stupid and useless to make it on my own. It would only be a matter of weeks until I was living in a cardboard box, because he was the best thing that would ever happen to me, and nobody else would ever love me enough to tell me the truth about myself the way he did.

As crazy as it sounds now, when you hear these things often enough and there's nobody around to tell you otherwise...you believe.

At the time though, it's not abuse. Not at all. Abuse is something really serious and really different that only happens to those other women. THOSE women don't leave. THOSE women stay when they should run because THOSE women are stupid. THOSE women hide black eyes and THOSE women need to be in a shelter or perhaps a United Way ad campaign.

Not like me. I'm not like those women, and it can't be abuse because I don't have bruises on my face.

Right.

Eventually it does get so bad that skid row seems the better option. Even two black eyes would be a welcome choice. In the end, I didn't walk out - I ran, cardboard box be damned.

I left mostly everything, but made it out with my clothes. I was sneaky. Packing my favorite things into garbage bags for several weeks prior and telling him it was all stuff I was taking to consignment worked like a charm.

What didn't work quite as well was stocking up on a few necessary household items I purchased secretly, and hid around the house in anticipation of leaving, long before I even had a place to go. I had a lot of explaining to do when he found a brand new clock radio tucked behind the fridge, still in its box.

Aside from discovering that behind a fridge is a terrible hiding place for home electronics, this experience taught me something very important.

I may have terrible judgement, but if a guy is willing and wanting to build a financially stable and decent life with me instead of using money to starve and bully me into a dark corner with no other place to go, then that is how I can know he's a decent man.

Or so I thought. Apparently my prospective mate's earning potential is just one way I over-reach. It's not the only one though - I over reach in every aspect.

I always go for amazing, according to Drunkie McDrunkerton on the phone. That's a mistake, because I simply can't get amazing - with or without money.

More realistic expectations can only help me determine what kind of man is more at my level.

Lowering expectations in this area will be tough. Perhaps a high school drop-out drug-dealer then? Not a drug kingpin, because he'd be out of my league for sure. My kind of guy would be the low-life busted for selling meth to a uniformed cop.

It's not just guys with decent jobs and ambition who are too amazing to be in my league. It's my "pathetic" pursuit of amazing physical attractiveness that's the most sad, because I go for amazing again, and I need to check myself. Big time. It's my biggest problem of all, according to my friendly neighborhood drunk dialler.

Instead of doing what I do, whatever that is, I should settle for a guy I'm not attracted to, but could grow attracted to in time if he's nice to me.

Addmittedly, there's some truth to this. The first few times I talked with Alex he didn't make my loins quiver.

It didn't matter though. We were buddies and he made me laugh just about every day, so why would I need to be hot for him?

And then one day I loved the lines around his eyes. That's how it started. That's really what I fell for first. Then I loved the colour of his eyes, and I loved that they were kind. And then I loved his face, and his smile and his hands, and...him.

The loins very quickly quivered and they still haven't recovered.

This approach couldn't work all the time though. There are plenty of guys out there who if I was forced into a choice between seeing said guys naked or receiving a full frontal lobotomy, I'd be quite happy fastening my shoes with Velcro for the remainder of my years.

Apparently, with the disparity between my looks and the overall attractiveness of the men I find...well...attractive, I will never get to be in a relationship with a man I find attractive from the start. Simply finding him attractive should register that he's too amazing for me and is therefore out of my reach.

The trick is to just find a guy who's nice to me. That's all. Even if I'm repulsed by his hunched back and numerous deformities, I should be so grateful he's nice to me that my gratitude eventually replaces the sexual desire I foolishly believed necessary to enjoy sex.

Wow! He held the door for me - somebody's getting a blowjob tonight!

I wondered. Exactly how hideous am I...??

If I'm looking for sex within an actual relationship and not just a steady hook-up, what is so hideous about me that my physical desire for a potential partner alone renders him instantly too "amazing" to be in my league?

Not even a partner every other woman wants to sex up by the way - just one that I do. After all, amazing is in the eye of the beholder.

And so I asked my friend...aren't I amazing?

I am. Of course I am. If we were both inclined that way she'd date me in a heartbeat, but we're not. And so I have to start being realistic, lower my standards and go for what's possible for me to get.

So...if you know of a single, second-rate drug-dealing high school drop-out with a hair lip, open skin lesions and excessive body odour who could handle being nice to a woman just long enough for her to have sex with him out of gratitude...you should probably keep better company and keep it to yourself.

Even when I don't think I do, I deserve amazing. I deserve it, no matter how it's defined.

Amazing...and someday a spot on the Daily Show too.

Heart palpitations are dangerous.

In my last posting I wrote about the frequency of small miracles and the likelihood that we are all less impressed with how we appear than anybody else would be.


I didn't write these things to demonstrate I'm turning over a new and less cynical leaf - let's not be ridiculous. Even though I do believe those things, I also believe in my ability to recognize amazing things happening, and yet still manage to screw them up.


A couple of weekends ago I resigned myself to obtaining level one first aid and CPR certification. I've accepted a new part-time position with a recreation centre in addition to my regular gig, and management at the rec centre would prefer clients not die needlessly.


Admittedly my first aid skills were gleaned solely from watching the first few seasons of ER and occasionally sleeping with emergency services personnel, neither of which would help much in the event of a heart attack.


In order to get any hours on the schedule, I needed to prove I could do better than the four options I would be capable of employing without taking the course. Those options would be patting a victim on the back, offering a glass of water, providing a blanket and or fleeing the scene.


This is how I came to be lying on the floor in the basement classroom of an ancient high school on a Saturday morning, four hours before I would normally ever be awake while a girl I had only met 30 seconds before patted down my inner thighs checking for a possible arterial bleed.


Personally I thought this level of due diligence was a little much, given the scenario was supposed to be all the "victims" lying on the floor had just fallen off of their bikes. Granted, it's always better to check, and if anybody could manage to suffer an arterial bleed from falling less than two feet onto asphalt it would likely be me, so best not to question these things.


The instructor was actually pretty good and I wanted to learn, despite being distracted on a couple of fronts. During the lesson on when never to move a victim, I was texting back and forth on the sly with Alex.


After hearing what kind of permanent damage could be done to an accident victim if moved unnecessarily, I had decided I would never move anybody, ever. Not even if they were in the path of an oncoming train. Therefore, it was safe to take a few minutes to let Alex know I wouldn't be coming to Kelowna the next week as planned.


It was a hard decision to make, because I want it all to be over with. At the same time, there was no way I could justify this business trip to my superiors. Normally I can justify any bad behaviour short of genocide, but if the powers that be saw I spent money out of the budget for no reason at all I would be the one paying.


Also, I was chicken shit.


My first text to Alex said I wouldn't be coming as planned, so very sorry, trip vetoed by the boss but I would be there for sure in February.


He got back to me immediately with a question. Is this Bambi? This is a new phone.


I typed the following message:.


Are you kidding me? WTF else do you think it is? How many randoms are you waiting for to be flying into Kelowna for business? Also, glad our "friendship" is so important you couldn't even be bothered to put my GD name and number into your new GD phone. Ass.


What I actually sent was,"Yes. It's me."


He said that was really bad news, I agreed and we would for sure keep in touch. Then it was time to start paying attention in class again.


This lesson was treating for shock. Should my victim live through the first 30 seconds of my care, treating for shock is always the most important step until the ambulance arrives. Victims should be rolled on to their sides in case of puke, covered with a blanket or coat and spoken to reassuringly with the rescuer in their line of vision.


We practiced various methods of rolling our partners safely, when I was distracted again. More accurately, distracted still.


It hadn't escaped my attention that at the other side of the room was some very intriguing eye candy. Some very young, extremely attractive eye candy. I suspected he was so young there was every possibility that when he was born I was already fourteen, trying to lose weight and crying about boys not calling me back.

Good to know how little has changed two decades later.


Gauging his age took some consideration. On the one hand, he just looked puppy dog adorable. That is, if puppies could be sexy and make you want to see them naked. On the other, watching him watch other people in the class led me to believe that he may not have fallen off the assembly line yesterday. Within a week perhaps, but not within the last 24 hours.


The next day started just as ungodly early, only I had mysteriously found the time to apply make up and find something slightly more attractive to wear than the hoodie and yoga pants I sported the day before. Our first task was to file into a separate class room to share and compare answers to a quiz on what we'd learned so far and what was in our text book.


The eye-candy was sitting by himself on what appeared to be a very small love seat salvaged from the decrepit high schools teacher lounge in 1952, shortly after a fire and flood. Not seeing any better place to take a load off, I nervously joined him.


At any moment I expected Chris Hansen from Dateline NBC to come bursting through the doors with a camera crew, eager to expose female predators wanting to make a date for sex with underage boys.


Shoulder to shoulder, eye-candy turned his head toward me and asked me what was the deal with number 14. We were allowed to talk about our answers, and so I asked him which one was number 14.


Question 14 was multiple choice, asking for the likeliest dangers of shock to the victim. The correct answer seemed pretty obvious to me, so I asked him what was confusing. This was the best mistake ever.


"Well...I could totally see how if you were like, hit by a car or something you'd be pretty surprised but I can't see how being surprised would be that dangerous."


Oh. My. God. Our faces still less than a foot apart, I tried desperately not to give in to bursting into the kind of laughter that could make me pee myself.


Apparently, he was mistaking physical shock - the kind that could cause a rapid and fatal decrease in blood flow to an already severely injured person, for the kind of shock experienced by walking in on your parents having sex.


He also had the nicest eyes. Green with flecks of gold, and the stupidly long eyelashes women would pay hundreds of dollars in mascara to achieve. Really nice lips. He smelled good. Not like cologne, but like the outdoors, laundry detergent and guy.


A friend of mine has told me on more than one occasion that I really need to watch what I say. I can be sharper tongued and more sarcastic than I think I am, and guys especially may not appreciate my supposedly clever wit as much as my good friends do.


It was with this advice ringing in my ears that I tried so hard to choose my next words carefully, and to deliver them slowly without any tone.


"Did you...when the instructor was talking about shock...going into shock...treating for shock...did you think that she was talking about...an emotional condition...?"


I could see slow realization creeping into his face. He was getting what I was trying to say, he wasn't stupid and I didn't have to say any thing further or smart-ass at all.


Except I did. This had struck me as so funny that if I didn't say something withering I would be personally demonstrating the dangers of shock once my spleen ruptured from the effort to hold in the sarcasm.


"Oh yeah. I can totally see it now. The doctor comes out to talk to the worried family and says, 'It was touch and go there for a bit. We were worried it was shock, but it turns out he was just really startled.'"


I may have even waved my hands around at the end for emphasis.


Then I looked at him again. Still so cute. Freckles I hadn't noticed. Those eyes that seemed a little too bedroom for a guy who may not be able to legally buy beer in the U.S. for at least another year got wider. I'm sure he's thinking I'm the biggest bitch he's ever met.


"That was fucking awesome," he said. And then he cracks up, looks away and then back at me with something different...it looked a bit like admiration.


He followed me back up to the classroom which is how we ended up seated next to one another and then in the same team of three with another girl I can only offer my apologies to because him and I were a bit of a shit show for the remaining eight hours of the class.


A large part of our training was participating in simulated situations, or "sims." For each sim, two team members would leave the room, and the instructor would give the remaining victims instructions as to what acute medical emergency we were suffering and how to behave.


Team members would then come back into the room to save their hapless victim, the only information provided being the location and what the victims had been doing prior to disaster.


The other girl on our team took every sim very seriously and the eye-candy and I took every new situation as an opportunity to crack each other up.


When he first played victim I purposely skipped the last steps and suggested he go stand outside to wait for the ambulance, prompting him to ask why I wasn't going to treat him for shock.

Obviously I wasn't going to because he seemed only mildly surprised he'd slipped and fallen on a slippery floor and we laughed like mental patients.


The next time he played victim I did treat for shock, which meant tucking a blanket around him and telling him it would be OK while I rubbed his back. His strongly muscled back. Half way through providing comfort, I realized my thoughts were less comforting and more Mary Kay Letourneau and I should really stop. Immediately.


My turn to play victim I put in an Oscar baiting performance as Little Girl Stung By Bee While Playing Soccer and Experiencing Anaphylaxic Shock and In Desperate Need of Her Epi-Pen Which Is In Her Purse Placed Inconveniently Across the Room Although Most Little Girls Don't Carry Purses and Now She Can't Breathe and Collapses as a Result.


My breathlessness was believable and moving as I gestured wildly toward which bag was mine so that the life-saving incredibly handsome and questionably aged bystander could retrieve the epi-pen clearly sticking out of the side pocket and end the terror.


"Jesus Christ! What do you carry around in this thing? I sprained my arm just dragging it over here.

"Shut-up and keep your hands out of my purse."


I was annoyed to have to break character when I was really in the zone, especially when it made me giggle and forget which side of the epi-pen I was supposed to be sticking myself with.


Once I managed to stop laughing enough to fix this, I swooned as dramatically as I could from a sitting position to laying on my side.


Luckily my team members remembered an ambulance still needed to be called because the effects of an epi-pen are temporary. Every sim had a bit of a trick to it. I would get to survive this particular crisis, and now I could enjoy being covered by a blanket and the opportunity to nap.


Napping proved impossible. Despite having sprained his arm bringing my purse from one side of the room to the other, my distracting team-mate took it upon himself to "comfort" me. He brushed the hair from off of my face and ear, and leaned down to ask, "Were you winning little girl?"


A perfectly reasonable question for him to ask a little girl passed out on the soccer field to distract her from being upset, but I would be very surprised if St. John's Ambulance recommends asking this question with lips actually touching and lingering ON the victim's ear.


This wasn't just comforting it was...what exactly was that? What is it normally when I nuzzle somebody's ear...?


Oh my.


I sat straight up on one elbow because surely the only team member still trying to learn anything had noticed something weird, but she had stepped out for the washroom and I hadn't noticed.

It was just him and I, and he gave me a wide-eyed innocent look and cupped his hand around my neck to gently push me back down.


"The ambulance hasn't arrived yet little girl. Keep down."


Oh. My.


I started calculating in my head. Mary Kay Letourneau didn't get an overly long prison sentence, and Canada is more lenient. There's no reason I couldn't be out before menopause.


The last half hour of the course when we covered infant care was a gong-show. I noticed he and I were the only two people carrying our baby dolls across the room by the foot instead of cradling them like real babies as per everybody else, and then we couldn't look at one another and still behave.


When he sat next to me in behind the bigger circle and fumbled the baby, dropping it on its head while attempting to position the supposedly chocking infant for care, we couldn't hold it in any more. Numerous people turned to give us the evil eye but we still could not stop laughing.

For the record, pressing a baby doll against your face to stifle uncontrollable giggles, then noticing you got lip gloss on the baby and trying to rub it off does not help anybody at all. It only makes things worse.


Finally, after a 16 hour weekend we all get our certificates. I walked outside with the eye-candy, still laughing and chatting. Then we stood there. I shuffled my feet. He flipped up his hood.


"Well..."


"Well..."


Take care!


I turned my back and walked away, already kicking myself. Take care? That's the best I can do? I'm not sure I've had a first date in my entire life as fun as spending an entire Sunday learning about wound care and chemical burns with this kid and the most I can say is take care??


Thirty steps to my car and I'm most of the way there. I should have offered a ride at least. Asked him out for coffee? Something.

He had flipped up his hood, had a backpack on...he's walking or taking the bus.


I'm going to go get him.


I don't care if he's young. There's still time to do what I should have done when we were both standing there in the rain. I'll offer him a ride and whatever way he's going will just happen to be where I'm heading too. I may a little slow on the uptake but I can fix this.


Nobody has ever reversed out of a parking spot faster than I did. It was only about 20 feet to the road. Bus stops on either side of the street and I could see for blocks in either direction. He wasn't anywhere.


This couldn't be possible. We had just said good-bye. It couldn't have been more than three minutes between then and me realizing I'm a complete moron who needs to do something about it.


How could he have disappeared so fast?


It's not like he could have called anybody for a ride. Class was let out early and I didn't see him with a cell phone. There wasn't any other direction he could have taken so as I continued blocking the parking lot exit there was only one remaining logical explanation...


I've cracked. In the absence of anything better I'm flirting with imaginary men through the power of make-believe and maybe the hormones in my new birth control pills.


Or, he went back inside after I walked away so he could figure out how to get where he was going from a warm dry building instead of a wet and freezing sidewalk.


At this point both theories are equally viable, but I'll leave it up to my ten faithful readers to decide which is more likely.

Tidbits.

I have two statistical tidbits I try to remind myself of on a regular basis. I learned these two things from the internet, so I know their believability is beyond question.

These tidbits comprise my favourite two pieces of random and useless crap I've learned over the years that serve no practical purpose in the real world - except as reminders that practical purpose may be over rated.

First tidbit. Some crazy guy with a scientific calculator and too much time on his hands crunched the numbers for the occurrence of miracles. I have no idea where he got his miracle information, but I'm assuming he went to wherever it is miracles are generally filed and did some researching...stuff. Maybe he made some photocopies. Perhaps he just typed a word into Google.

The point is, the details don't really matter.

Once he found out how many miracles are reported world-wide in every country that cares about these things on average, he did some number crunching and came up with a theory.

Every person experiences one miracle a month.

I realize this sounds batshit because I don't expect to see anybody walking on water at any point in my lifetime let alone as often as I have my period. However, I liked his definition of what a miracle may be.

It doesn't have to be biblical, epic or even a matter of life or death. By his definition, a miracle is more like good fortune or luck that really has no right to happen.

For example, it was within days of reading this that I was heading to work during morning rush-hour when I lived in Calgary. By Calgary standards, morning rush hour starts at 12:00 a.m. and lasts until 12:00 p.m. when the evening rush hour begins.

I had been been working 17 hour days for several weeks, as I was supporting my douchebag boyfriend at the time who had lost his job through every fault of his own. I was beyond tired, and didn't register the red light I drove straight through until right after I had done it.

That was my monthly miracle. I had never before or since driven through that intersection without numerous cars speeding back and forth between lights.

It shouldn't have been possible that I didn't cause a 30 car pile-up, but I didn't.

A miracle.

My second favourite tidbit comes from a study undertaken on self-image. The premise was simple. A subject was asked to rate her appearance at that time as a percentage. Not as an overall percentage, but on that very day in that very moment.

Perhaps she was having a fat day or her hair wasn't working or she was vaguely concerned she may have remembered to put deodorant only under one arm rather than the socially more acceptable deodorizing of both armpits. Whatever was going on in that moment, that was the percentage she was asked for.

Meanwhile, another group of subjects were also asked to provide a percentage rating of that same woman's appearance in that moment. What the researchers found made me warm and fuzzy. On average, the group rated the test subject 50% better than the test subject rated herself.

Say you roll into the office thinking you're about 20%, what with whatever is happening with your face and that stuff you must have spilled on your pants at some point.

What you're thinking doesn't actually matter, because everybody else around you thinks you're actually rocking 70%!

I don't recall if this study stated whether the test group was legally drunk and or blind, but I don't care. It made me happy. It still makes me happy.

Like many things that make me happy, I'd rather not focus on the details.

Interesting - now considered optional.

Now that we've definitively established the standard methods for meeting a potential romantic partner employed successfully by at least one half of all happy couples everywhere don't work for me, somebody needs to tell my Mom.

I've ruled out meeting through mutual friends, online dating, making out drunkenly in bars, following men around grocery stores, loving somebody from the Okanagan and finding true love in a Weight Watchers meeting. (Bring it up again John and bad things will happen.)

My Mom labours under the delusion that men find me wildly attractive. I'm surrounded by so many attractive and eligible men that everywhere I go is like a sausage fest flash-mob and the only reason I'm single is because I just don't pay attention to all of the admirers lining up to spend time with me.

If only I would stop breaking her heart and let one of them romance the shit out of me and propose already she could finally rest.

I don't have the heart to tell her what really happens. I would rather she think that I choose to shun even the idea of a committed relationship, and if offered the chance to be the actual wife to a hot fire-fighter who brings in six figures and whisks me away on surprise vacations every second weekend instead of the sanctioned mistress who occasionally gets a bottle of wine I would still choose to be the mistress, just to be difficult and deny her the opportunity to see one of her daughters marry in this lifetime.

She got kind of excited when I was seeing the Bomb Tech. There were occasions she was physically present to witness him phoning or texting me nearly constantly and whenever he did her face lit up.

Every time I mentioned something about him to her was like watching a kid counting down to Christmas with an advent calendar. Things were moving forward as they should. Surely, the long wait would soon be over, and I might actually bring somebody home to meet my parents.

The wait was indeed over for somebody's parents, as I'm certain the girlfriend he acquired without telling me has made the familial rounds. My Mom tried to press me for information as to why she suddenly stopped hearing about him and should never mention his name out loud, but there wasn't a grain of truth I was willing to tell her.

Well Mom - it's like this. Yes we were very close and we spoke every day and our first official date was indeed very memorable particularly because it took an hour to drive far enough out of town for him to feel comfortable that nobody would recognize him. Apparently he didn't want to run into any of his ex-girlfriend's friends, even though he'd been single for over a year. Just to be sure, we ended up on a deserted beach in the pitch black and freezing cold drinking beer even though I had requested wine. I suppose it was rather romantic right up until I had to pee because we were drinking beer and not wine and I had to crouch behind some driftwood where I inevitably and accidentally peed on my pants. He was willing to be seen in public with me when we met up for a weekend in Vancouver, but if we were in our home city our dates took place in his truck. It wasn't as uncomfortable as you may think because all he ever wanted to do was have me watch him jack-off which meant I never had to deal with any of the unpleasant logistics I may normally face while trying not to put my legs through the windshield. Yes, he did meet my sister and some of my friends and could be quite sweet so I didn't mind waiting when he told me he wasn't ready for commitment just yet. Next time, I know to clarify however. If a man isn't quite ready for commitment I should probably ask whether it would be me he planned on taking that next step with. Lesson learned. In retrospect, what annoys me the most is that he took this girl to the most expensive and romantic Italian restaurant in the city for their first date. I'm pretty sure she didn't pee on her own leg while dining on the patio, but she likely ended up in his truck and unless his tastes improved that way too, her and I may be even.

My Mom would be the type to think I'd be the girl on the patio, and I can't tell her that I'm actually the girl who pees on her leg behind some driftwood.

She also got rather excited about Alex. There were a a few times she called while he and I were having breakfast together and I had to let her know I'd call her back.

Back in the day Alex and I decided we hated not being able to do normal every day things together because of the distance, so usually on a Sunday we'd make breakfast and then meet on webcam to chat and eat together.

It was very sweet, although I still haven't been able to get all of the peanut butter I dripped from my English muffins off of my keyboard. My Mom also thought it sweet and would actually sound delighted when I had to let her go in favour of my online breakfast date.

Occasionally she'll ask if I still talk to that nice boy from Kelowna and there is absolutely nothing I can tell her.

Well Mom - it's like this. Yes we were very close and I think there was actually something there for a while. I'm not sure if there was anything I should've/would've/could've done differently but my God did we have a good time together. I never told you but he was always a bit of a whore. I never told you this either, but I've got a few issues with sex for reasons I'm also never going to tell you about. Surprisingly enough he and I stayed close and intrigued by one another even though the thought of having sex with him both terrified and tempted me to the point I thought either my heart or vagina would explode, possibly both, and not in a good way and so I never did. We exchanged I love yous a couple of times but never really expanded on that. If we had to say it we mostly said I miss you. It was I miss you all the time for about three years, but he's changed his ways. Isn't it exciting how people can change? The biggest slut west of the Rockies has a girlfriend and is in a committed relationship. He loves her. Really loves her - he doesn't just miss her. When they have breakfast I'm sure it's very much together. Don't worry though Mom - all is not lost. If I want to he's said he could cheat on her with me and not feel bad, what with our friendship and all. He'd feel bad if it was some sexy chick he just met but he's willing to make an exception for me. See? I really am very special.

She's given up on asking about specific people, but her eternal hope manifests itself other ways. No matter where I go or what I do, she'll ask me if there was anybody interesting there. This is my Mom thinking she's being subtle and slick.

She's not actually hounding me about meeting a guy you see, she's simply inquiring if there was anybody interesting when I picked up a parcel, went to the dentist, went for drinks, got a tea from Tim Horton's, bought a light fixture at Home Depot, saw a movie, took a class...et al.

It's a completely normal question to ask after all, and there is absolutely no deeper meaning behind it. She simply wants to know if there was anybody...interesting.

My Mom is such an optimist I swear she is on the edge of her seat just waiting for the day she asks me whether there was anybody interesting there after I tell her I left my house for any reason and I say, YES.

Well Mom - it's like this. As it turns out, there was somebody interesting there! We are now engaged. We decided not to wait a moment longer because we know you and Dad are not getting any younger. Thank God you asked me if there was anybody interesting there yet again, or I may have completely forgotten to tell you.

There's got to be a morning after.

"You told me I had herpes."

This was a less than auspicious start to the morning. In my defense, I did NOT tell the extremely hot cowboy I brought back from the bar with me the night before after several hours of semi-intoxicated Halloween giddiness that he had herpes.

I simply said he COULD have herpes.

The only reason I said anything like this at all was because despite me making it very clear to him before we even got in a taxi together that he would not be hitting a home-run that evening, he kept swinging the bat.

He was persistent, but thankfully the only real danger I faced was coming close to being annoyed to death. Even though this really shouldn't come as a surprise at this point, men and women really are two separate species.

He assumed that if enough time had passed and it was late enough or early enough in the morning depending on whether one had gone to bed yet at all, I would just agree to have sex with him because, "we've come this far."

Baffling logic.

It was only after this and at least an hour laughing at him for just how hard he was trying, that I tried being practical and told him the real reason he wouldn't be getting any.

I'm extremely paranoid about STIs (and by extremely paranoid read: obsessive compulsive with an anxiety disorder mixed in for flavor) and that we really, really didn't know one another and for all I knew he could have herpes. It wasn't an accusation - just a hypothesis.

Naturally he assured me at this time that he's clean, and just as paranoid as I am. He tried telling me the Army wouldn't have let him in if he had anything. He even gave me a run-down of all the ways he worries about catching something to the point where even I started to believe him.

I wanted to believe him. More than that I wanted just one more excuse to justify throwing caution to the wind to do something that would likely give me panic attacks for the next two months.

On the one hand, I knew I would be spending weeks terrified he gave me something every time I so much as experienced an itch anywhere below my belly button, but on the other I could possibly have some really hot memories if I managed to come through the aftermath unscathed.

(Yes, I know. I have another appointment to see my shrink booked already. It's an ongoing process.)

We were both laughing at ourselves at this point and he was so funny, and so good-looking and I had had such a good time that I really only needed one more reason to put the durability of bed frames purchased at IKEA to the test.

I told him I didn't know his last name, and that's kind of a prerequisite for me. The middle name is negotiable - the last name not so much.

He laughed like I said something hilarious and then said I was probably one of those crazy girls who insists a guy gets tested before he even touches her.

For one, you have no idea how crazy. For two, that sound you hear like one person quietly clapping...? That's the sound of every single one of my orifices slamming shut. Ears, nostrils, and everything on downward now so closed off I'm impervious to air.

He was so close! All he had to do was give me his last name and still he fucked it up. Despite his mind-blowing cluelessness, I felt I could afford to be somewhat magnanimous, mostly because I wanted to go to sleep.

Interesting aside: there is one aspect of getting older that's thrilling. As I advance in age, I am much more likely to get exactly what I want out of every sexual encounter. It's not that my partners have become somehow more skilled (with the exception of the firefighter who should be given some kind of medal), but because I'm no longer afraid to ask for it.

There have been many, many times where I might have said to a guy that it was perfectly OK that he finished first, or got to finish at all while I didn't because I still had a good time. All of these times occurred before I turned 30 and all were complete horseshit.

(Should my parents ever read this there was only ever one guy before I turned 30, and only one encounter. It came about after a session of heavy hand-holding and didn't look at male genitalia again until only very recently.)

Now I'm much smarter and so much more selfish.

Oh, I'm sorry. Did I just do something to you that felt so good you think you may have actually crossed over and into the light for just a moment before coming back with a deeper understanding of humanity and possibly the power to move objects with your mind and now you just want to go to sleep? That's fantastic - but you're not done yet.

Luckily I didn't think Cowboy Wonderful would need to be told, and sure enough he didn't. I was a very happy woman, he was a very happy man and finally I thought we can get some sleep, maybe fool around in the morning and if we still like each other, get some breakfast.

I hadn't counted on Cowboy Wonderful not only looking like a god but functioning like one too. He woke me up every ten minutes, ready to go again. I humoured him about five or six times before becoming frightened. A guy should not be able to do that. At some point it had go down or dry up and it was doing neither.

As is the only reasonable course of action in a situation like this, I asked if there was something wrong with him. We all now know from watching Viagra commercials that in the event of an erection lasting four or more hours the patient should seek immediate attention.

He said he was fine and that it's always like this and then I became frightened for me. I had decided on one single sexual act I was willing to perform on a guy who I didn't know and who wouldn't tell me his last name because I was afraid of developing a sexually transmitted disease and now I was at high risk for developing tennis elbow instead.

Luckily as he got sleepier the intervals extended to an entire half hour before I'd be pestered. Granted the pestering was pretty awesome but still...goddammit.

Besides tennis elbow I had another pressing problem. Despite losing the ability weeks ago to go number two as a side-effect of medication, my innards decided to pick the most inconvenient and possibly mortifying of nights to suddenly start working again - and working with a vengeance.

Let me just explain something right now. If I like a guy, I will succumb to kidney failure before I let him hear me so much as pee. I once ended a movie date with a guy very abruptly and refused to speak to him in order to concentrate on holding my bladder as he drove me home because his only bathroom was off of his living room and I didn't want him to hear me pee.

Number two is unthinkable. Un. Think. Able. It can not happen. Apparently my colon didn't get this memo and now I didn't know how I would make it to morning alive. All I could do was actually pray that I could sneak out of bed quietly enough, that Cowboy Wonderful was tired enough to not wake up, that my bedroom door, part of the hallway and the bathroom door would create enough of a barrier, and that the sound of the fan running at the same time as the bathroom sink and bathtub faucet would be enough.

(I think this may actually be why God hates me. All over the world there's war, starvation, disease, poverty and violence. All worthy causes and completely legitimate reasons to pray, and then comes my earthly request. Please, please, please don't let him hear me poo. And also world peace. Amen.)

Thanks be to God he was still sleeping by the time I crawled into bed again and we slept in half hour intervals until late morning, when he accused me of telling him he had herpes.

I had warned him he wouldn't be getting any. He even told me through out the night that he thought it was a good thing I resisted like I did, even though he shouldn't have had to tell me that more than once.

How could he be shocked when I told him flat out I wasn't going to fuck him? He said because it's what all the girls say right before they fuck him.

Oh. Wow.

I'm obviously not like all the other girls, and maybe he really did have a problem with it. He was being really quiet, but making no moves to go any where. Actually, he was hardly moving at all.

Apparently he was extremely hung-over, which was news to me. When I met him he was drinking water. He sounded sober, walked straight and actually made me feel a little silly for being slightly buzzed. Prior to meeting me he was drinking pitchers of vodka I had now learned, which actually explained quite a lot. Like how he came to be in my bed in the first place.

We stayed in bed until 2:00, cuddling, fooling around, napping and complaining about feeling so sick. Actually, that last part was just him. I got him water, got him Advil, offered him food before finally giving up and telling him a shower might do him wonders.

Normally I would have given him a lift to his car but my poor little Hawaiian Purple Grand-Am was out of commission in my parking stall, suffering from what would later be discovered as a broken sway bar. I called a cab.

Since I was going downtown too, I said we'd split the costs and then we sat there waiting rather desperately because apparently he was going to start puking. Really, really not the morning I had hoped for.

While I still had my phone out he told me to put his number into it and so I did. It's important to note I didn't ask for it. He offered.

Several days passed after we kissed good-bye in the cab, and despite knowing nothing would come out of it, I called him. I really only did it to shut my friends up who thought there was no way he wouldn't call me back just so I could prove I knew better. I wasn't bitter about it, but then I hadn't been hopeful either.

I had figured out over the course of our evening together that Cowboy Wonderful wasn't really totally wonderful. For one, he had some hair on his upper back and shoulders which while not a deal-breaker, was still alarming.

Secondly, his balls were weird. There really isn't a more elegant way to say it. It always seems like a crapshoot the first time a guy takes off his pants, but in his case I began as very pleasantly surprised. And then became unnerved.

It's just that they were so...well...low. Like, really low. We're talking it appeared he has three knees kind of low. Then on closer inspection it seemed he only had one. I realize that terrible things happen and nobody would ever accuse Lance Armstrong of of any impropriety but I was led to believe that two were standard issue.

After tilting my head hard left I realized that there were indeed two, only one was much higher. One was right where these things can normally be found and one had apparently been making a break for it for quite some time. Totally unnerving.

Alright, so I may be slightly bitter he didn't call back when I left my message. Bitter, but not surprised. Cowboy Wonderful was Cowboy Normal after all.

X-Girl

I have a super power. It's a power usually associated with superheros and science fiction rather than neurotic bloggers, but much like Wonder Woman, I did not choose this. It chose me.

(I actually have no idea what Wonder Woman's back story may be but I know she has some pretty awesome bracelets and since I love wearing bracelets, the comparisons are obvious.)

I don't know what rigmarole Wonder Woman went through to get her superpowers, but for me it's been a breeze. No tripping into barrels of nuclear waste, no spider bites...I once ate undercooked chicken with some pretty spectacular results, but I don't think the two are related.

If I had to think about it, my superpower began gradually in 2009 and reached full capacity in May of this year. It comes and goes, so whether I use it for good or for evil is really more of a scheduling issue.

You would think invisibility should be more convenient.

It's true. I have the power to be invisible. I show up in mirrors so I can safely rule out any vampire related causes, but otherwise it's a mystery.

I first noticed the phenomenon the handful of times I ventured out into nightclubs. I'd be standing somewhere, out of the way, sipping on my Diet Coke and wondering when all the underage girls stopped wearing pants when a group of guys would walk through me.

Not around me, through me. I'd be shoulder checked out of the way and then the next guy would plow forward shoving me into the nearest wall or table. They didn't look at me. They didn't seem to realize they had encountered solid mass in any way, which was puzzling. I was nothing if not solid mass. Add a pair of high heels and I'm towering solid mass. Not something easily missed.

It wasn't just the men. I quickly realized if I didn't want to see what the underside of a shirt worn without pants looked like I had best move out of the way to avoid being trampled to the floor. The women wouldn't even shoulder check, which could at least shove me aside to relative safety.

Women would just keep walking staring straight ahead without seeing me, even though I was the largest thing blocking their path. I started starfishing to the walls to avoid internal injuries and possible loss of my spleen.

When I would rejoin my friends, I'd ask if they could see me. Was I plainly visible? Don't lie. Am I shimmering in any way? Do I appear as a mirage? Are you alarmed that there appears to be an empty black tank top and jeans standing magically before you?

They would usually tell me to shut up and go get another drink, which told me the phenomenon was intermittent.


I tried to mitigate my superpower. Although clearly not visible to the human eye, I should still project sound. Occasionally saying excuse me to get by somewhere would result in somebody stepping aside to let me through, but more often I would be left standing there, looking like I was trying to join in the conversation instead of making my way from point A to B.

Forget about ordering a drink. I could no longer elbow my way to the front and should I happen to find a bar without a line-up, my powers of invisibility extended to bartenders.


Going out wasn't much fun when the safest spot for me to be was the far corner by the emergency exit, or hugging a stanchion for balance by the Coat Check. Eventually I stopped going out all together.


I stayed home every weekend since. Invisibility couldn't even get me ahead in the line up for the bathrooms, so I took it as a sign my days of dancing the night away were over. I am 34 years old after all - at some point I will have to accept that an exciting Saturday night means new back to back episodes of COPS.


Not to mention, I was grateful for all the extra Weight Watchers points I wouldn't be wasting or having spilled down the front of my shirt every time somebody took the direct route through my clearly invisible torso.


Then came Halloween, my favorite holiday of all time. I love Halloween. I will never not celebrate Halloween, and invisible or not I was leaving the house. Even being invisible could be fun on Halloween, the one time of year it's acceptable to be spectral and or creepy.


My costume was amazingness. I'm not even bragging. It took a lot of time and effort, but the only person who looked more Cleopatra than me was Cleopatra herself, and since she's dead she can't argue.

I nearly gave up my quest at one point for the perfect Cleopatra dress, but a friend encouraged me that I just had to go as her. Like me, Cleopatra was regal, bitchy and kind of conniving. He had a point, and I persevered.


I found the perfect long black halter dress. Gold chain belt. Matching metallic gold bracelet cuffs. Links of thick gold chain around my arm matching the belt. A black wig with the straight cut bangs and a bob that Anna Wintour herself would envy. Re-purposed glittery gold headband as a head piece fit for an Egyptian queen. Gold shimmering body powder, and enough black eyeliner to give me lead poisoning.


Add my sluttiest friend wearing what can best be described as Little Red Riding Hood lingerie, one shared bottle of champagne, several dances around my living room to the Monster Mash on repeat and we were ready to celebrate pagan style.


I let her go first into the club, because I was afraid the first person who tried to go through me could set my wig askew. She was in charge of getting the drinks because if experience was any indication I wouldn't be able to get us served before last call.


Eventually I had no choice to get up and find the washroom, setting out twenty minutes before I thought I may have to go just to give my invisible self time to get there. I wasn't willing to experiment with any philosophical questions such as if an invisible woman in costume pees herself and nobody around can see it, does she actually pee?

It's was right about this time when the weird shit started happening.


People moved aside for me and I didn't have to ask or wait there anxiously. Some even smiled. Two girls dressed as bananas high-fived me and an extremely convincing Russel Brand toasted his drink in my direction. Unprecedented.


It continued in the bathroom line-up. I had giggly conversations with girls who were still not wearing any pants but for costumes I could let it slide. The first girl who spoke to me said she loved my costume, nearly prompting me to ask if she could really see me.

I settled instead for asking if she knew who I was and she said of course - I was an Egyptian. Close enough. I was just happy being plainly visible.


Back at the table I settled into the only activity made better through stealth invisibility - checking out men. When you're invisible you can be downright disgusting about it, and I leaned forward every time I saw one particular cowboy walk by just to get a better look. He didn't see me, but this was not surprising, and for once, probably a good thing.

My friend and I agreed that he was by far the best looking guy in the entire bar, and we should know having not done much else but sit on our bar stools and ogle like the baby cougars we are.

He appeared to be there with a group of guys, and was totally oblivious, allowing us to discuss his physical attributes in ways that would probably see men ordered into sensitivity training should the roles be reversed.


Finally it's time to rock out to Usher on the dance floor. (Does one rock out to Usher? Jam out to Usher? Groove out to Usher? Whatever it is kids do these days.) People chatting to me in the bathrooms and letting me get there at all had to be an anomaly, so I was being a bit silly. When channelling Cleopatra one must throw in a few classic walking like an Egyptian dance moves.

Ten thousand inspirational fridge magnets advise dancing like nobody's watching, and I can honestly say that dancing like nobody can see you is equally awesome.


I was so busy bouncing away that I didn't notice the cowboy was on the dance floor too until he turned around, stopped in his tracks and smiled at me. Naturally, I responded sensibly. I looked over my right shoulder, then my left shoulder to see how hot the girl has to be for this guy to be smiling at her like that.

Sure enough there's a tiny little blond girl wearing angel wings and not much else dancing away behind me, so I step aside to let the cowboy through to the winged lingerie model, and he steps around to stand in front of me again.

The cowboy hat has to be covering up some serious head trauma because he's obviously not getting that I'm being polite and letting him through. I appreciate that he seems able to see me and is not just plowing through me but could he not just go already?

I step aside again, clearing a wider path and by now almost completing a full backwards stepping circle. Again, he follows me. There was no time to think what this could possibly mean when he tugs on my chain belt and says, "Hey Cleo. Where are you trying to go?"

Holy fucking shit.

REALLY? Really? I'm invisible and now the hottest guy in the entire place either wants to dance with me or possibly mug me for my gold jewellery which actually seems more likely.

This shit just does not happen. At least not to me. Maybe to the little blond thing with the wings behind me, but somebody like me is pretty sure he's about to tell me to hand over my gold cuff bracelets or I won't get hurt. I'd have to tell him they're not real and I bought them at Claire's and then it would just get awkward.

This was one other reasonable explanation. We were experiencing some kind of worm hole that had opened into a parallel universe thanks to something involving string theory or the Large Hadron Collider and somebody better get Stephen Hawking on the phone. Stat.

As it turns out, he wanted to dance. We danced until my friend had to leave and then we kept dancing. Admittedly, sometimes we danced and other times I may have appeared to be trying to share his pants. Nothing more inappropriate than that however, because I'm 34 years old and I'm kind of past making out with hot guys in bars.


He knew all the words to Lady Gaga's Alejandro, which is how I knew he was a hallucination brought on by mixing champagne with anti-depressants. When he told me he was an army paratrooper I was amazed he had made it out for Halloween at all. The commute from Mount Olympus has got to be a bitch.

We sat and talked about everything. Our jobs, our hobbies, our families, where we've travelled to, religion and how we both really, really love Lady Gaga. Definitely a hallucination. A hallucination that smells really good and feels very lean and muscled but obviously I'm having some kind of episode.


When I had to go to the washroom yet again I thought he'd probably disappear. Hallucinations don't usually wait patiently outside. This one did. Exactly how much champagne did I have??


He's holding my hand and we're on our way back to the dance floor when some guy walked into me and bounced off. Now this is normal. I'm used to this - definitely a lot more than having my hand held.

Cowboy Wonderful turned around and called him out. "You just rammed into my girl buddy - not cool."


The dude was apologetic but mostly intoxicated, and by intoxicated I mean he's probably still drunk at this very moment. He said he was sorry, he totally didn't see me. In his drunken stupor he kept saying "I missed her," even though that made no sense at all, and yet it was all perfectly reasonable.

I have a superpower and it's not his fault. When you've actually had half a pitcher of beer sloshed across your chest because nobody could see you climbing up the stairs off a dance floor and nobody apologized even when you yelped, you tend to be forgiving and not terribly surprised.

Cowboy Wonderful seemed surprised though.


"How could you not see this girl?"


Now I'm embarrassed and totally mortified. He must mean I'm really hard to miss because I'm so freaking tall and just about nearly as wide. He's holding my hand and dancing with me out of some kind of joke. I know I'm down four dress sizes but apparently I have a long way to go before I'm no longer an obstacle so large I apparently have my own gravitational pull, and like many other large objects in space, completely invisible, only this is what happens to unattractive overweight women on earth too...


"Most beautiful girl in the place and you don't see her? Jesus buddy - you're wasted."

Or maybe I've got it wrong.


I'm 34 years old and I'm kind of past making out with hot guys in bars...ah fuck it. I grabbed Cowboy Wonderful and I kissed him so hard and so long it's quite possible we now share combined DNA.

It wasn't really surprising then that when he walked me outside to make sure I got safely into a taxi that he suddenly expressed concern and confusion over how he was going to get home. He lived far out of the city...his buddy has a hotel room somewhere...he doesn't have a key...how about he just comes home with me.

Yah-huh.

I kind of thought this would happen. The majority of my hallucinations do end in sex, if they're any good, and so I should have been better prepared. I had about ten seconds to think of something witty and charming that could convey even a trace of the whirlwind emotions I was suddenly facing.

"I am not fucking you," is what I settled on. Charming has never really been my thing. I told him he may even be relegated to the couch.

Cowboy Wonderful said that's perfectly fine. He's not about that anyway, and he's not just some creep who's only out for that, not like other guys.

Yah-huh.

Fine, I said. Grab us a taxi.

Should I stay or should I go now?

As all ten of my readers probably know by now, I harbour one or two avoidance issues. Not large ones per se - it's not as if I avoid hygiene or breathing, but I will hide under the covers feigning sleep at the thought of stepping outside my comfort zone in certain ways.

(On on unrelated note, I'm not sure how or even when I got up to 10 followers. I have no idea where they came from or even whether these followers are following because they pressed a button by accident, which I can't rule out.)

(Also, while I'm grateful for the appearance of 10 readers when the actual number is likely closer to three, it would be nice if I could make it to 12. Saying I have 10 readers seems awkward when I could be saying I have a dozen. If I ever hit 15 I would officially have a gaggle, but three readers who read on purpose and seven people who were searching the web for references to Walt Disney's version of Bambi and landed here instead will have to do.)

(My sincere apologies to those seven people, as arriving at my blog must have been a tremendous and disturbing disappointment.)

Add an element of emotional risk to any activity and I will not only hide, but research faking my own death to escape. I am so much more comfortable with any other less frightening types of risk, such as an imminent shark attack or the Ebola virus. Or an Ebola infected shark attack.

This wouldn't be a problem if avoidance didn't so often turn into prolonging. Just the other day I was sitting in my shrink's office for my bi-weekly check in to make sure I'm not planning on doing anything stupid, with stupid being a very relative term.

Naturally the conversation turned to Alex, and I very carefully explained how I would definitely be seeing him in February because of a scheduled work trip to Kelowna, and face to face, I will tell him that I can no longer be his friend or participate in any form of friendship with him.

It has become painstakingly clear this is something I have to do. Since he told me about this whole girlfriend thing he's been contacting me like, a lot.

It's become apparent that this situation is not sustainable because it's extremely hurtful to me, to say nothing of ridiculous. The day he suggested perhaps when he comes to see me in Kelowna he could bring her and we could have a threesome or something because that would be hot was certainly evidence that I should probably do or say something.

Not to worry, because I really put my foot down that time. I told him that bringing her along for what he hopes would turn into a threesome probably wouldn't be a good idea. I did not tell him it's because I would murder her with my bare hands, but I did let him know that I would not be comfortable doing something of that nature with somebody I don't know.

While it's true that there is a work event in Kelowna next week that I've been invited to attend, it's really not the best time to go because I'll likely need to do some laundry at that time and...

I may not always agree with the woman, but she does pay attention, which is unfortunate for me. She did not miss the fact that I could have this taken care of and wrapped neatly in a bow by the end of next week, instead of prolonging this suffering until February.

I don't see it so much as prolonging suffering as I do allowing myself time to adequately prepare. Next week doesn't give me nearly enough time to numb myself to the point of being able to get through saying anything without needing a tissue, to say nothing of the fact that I'll be even thinner in February.

My shrink may be smart enough to have got through medical school, but somehow she fails to grasp what difference being thinner could possibly make or why I'd be more likely to cry next week and cucumber cool in February.

As if the answers to these questions were not logical or obvious enough, she asked me if I actually had hope there is a chance he would want to leave this girl for me, while actually using the word actually in that context.

To which I answered, of course I do.

I don't think it would ever happen, but I have the same kind of hope that drives people to buy lottery tickets, or the Ab Circle Pro. It's one part hoping just once for a miracle, and the rest pure fantasy.

(I know it's fantasy because in my day dreams about how I say something so moving and profound he realizes he's being a fucking idiot and dumps her for me three seconds later, there appears to be a wind machine in my hotel room because my hair somehow appears to be blowing gently.)

I'm not delusional, but I'll admit I've reached a point of wanting something so badly that any amount of reason can't stop me from wanting it, and that unreasonable want somehow becomes the most pitiful kind of hope.

Whether it's next week or February, I'm not going because I think there could be a happy ending. In fact, the situation is even more depressing than I had thought.

I asked him whether he was messing around with any other girls without his gf knowing, or is it just me?

It's just me. He says he feels totally OK about it with me because of our friendship, but if he were to meet some sexy girl he'd probably feel pretty bad.

Even if I were to ignore the fact that he puts me in a separate category from some "sexy" girl, I can't be flattered he's comfortable doing this because of our friendship.

Friendship sounds less like love and passion and more like security and blanket. I can tell the difference, because I desperately want to be hiding under one right now.

I've known about next week's trip for over a week now, and I've left it to tomorrow to decide and book my tickets.

There was a great seat sale today that could have saved my company a lot of money, but since they'll be paying for the trip, waiting another 24 hours to decide is a risk I'm comfortable taking.

Same great taste, fewer calories.

Since complaining in an earlier post about the multitude of people suggesting I meet men in grocery stores, the mother of a very good friend of mine has suggested a slight variation on this theme.

Forget grocery stores, my friend and I should be trying to pick up men at Costco. I can almost see the logic - everything is bigger at Costco and perhaps this applies to men who shop there.

I do like a man who's practical and good under pressure, and it's comforting to see a guy purchasing 72 rolls of toilet paper at a time. One just never knows when a disaster may occur requiring that level of absorbency.

Sadly, my friend and I are far more likely to be forcibly removed from Costco for ramming people in the back of the legs with our carts, or taking too many free samples of cheese than we are to be meeting the men of our dreams.


However, Costco has not been the worst recommendation for meeting eligible men so far. That dubious distinction goes to the suggestion I should be meeting men in my Weight Watchers meetings. (Hi John!) A recommendation I've heard twice now. (Hi John again!)

If I hear it a third time, John will be dragged to meetings with me. (Love you John!)


God knows, Weight Watchers meetings have long been a popular destination for hot men in any city, and it's certainly true for the meetings I attend every week. The two grandfatherly men who attend with their wives are positively radiating heat due to their high blood pressure, obesity and the climb up the stairs to get to the meeting.


It's not that I'm shallow (I'm totally shallow), but I think I've been relatively spoiled with the men I've chosen to partner with in completely dysfunctional relationships/arrangements these last few years. The firefighter I see on occasion complains he's gained weight because only some of his abs are visible, as opposed to all of them like they normally are.


To be honest, I was not aware there are enough ab muscles to have some showing and some not, as I consider my own abdominal muscles to be an urban legend. It's true that I'm able to walk upright, but I think this is more due to the fact that my bones keep me balanced on top of my heavier bottom half, rather like a Weeble.


Alex is equally...well...beautiful. He doesn't go to the gym so somehow the combination of playing hockey, sexing everything with the appearance of a vagina west of Alberta and selling cars really, really works for him. And it worked for me, just as well as I'm sure it works for his new girlfriend.


That bitch.


The point is, I've done a lot of fooling around above my station. While I've always been able to see my feet, there has been a lot of extra between my feet and my head. It's a good thing I'm very tall, because if I were any shorter during my heavier days I would measure to 3.14 pi.


Men don't seem to struggle with their weight in the same way women do, even if they're bigger. I don't mean struggle physically, as they may perhaps face similar health risks or difficulty finding pants, but emotionally it's not the same experience.


For women, there are only a few ways to describe ourselves if we're overweight that can be considered flattering. There's curvy, but that could also mean a stick insect with boobs. Voluptuous seems to denote nice ass and boobs, and small everything else. Finally, there's BBW - big beautiful woman, but that's really about it.


If you're a woman using these words as part an online dating profile for example, these words won't get much interest. The BBW acronym seems like it's trying a little too hard, and curvy is deliberately vague.


For all the true gentlemen who follow up their online wish-list with the words, "no fatties," there's not many ways for let's face it - an average size woman to feel good about her appearance.


Meanwhile, men who could stand to lose a few have a virtual thesaurus available to describe their physiques, and all of the words come with positive connotations. Stocky, solidly built, football player build, big guy and my favorite, the big teddy bear.


What's the equivalent to any of these words for women? I'm just a big Cabbage Patch - you should see where else I have dimples!


Men aren't labeled simply as fat the way women are, and if they ever reach that point they're usually wearing mumus and needing the fire department to hack through the walls of their homes because they stopped fitting through the doorways a decade earlier.


Women achieve fat much, much sooner. A man could be using his belt buckle as a shelf for his gut, but he's got a football player build. He's not fat - he's an athlete! Show a little muffin top as a woman and nobody's going to suggest she's simply built like a shot-putter.


Which brings me back to why meeting a man I'm attracted to at a Weight Watchers meeting is only slightly more likely than me meeting the pope. By the time a man decides he's fat and needs to do something about it, he's already gone five years without seeing his genitals and is well on his way to not being able to reach them.


I can see mine, I can reach them should I want to and while this may seem superficial, not being able to do so is a deal-breaker for me in a partner.


(Also, if he can't reach my genitals we have a serious problem too.)


I've been thinking about weight a lot lately, largely because I'm having unprecedented success losing mine. I'm down 43.6 pounds so far, with still more to go. People are noticing, and stopping me in the halls of my office to tell me how good I look and ask me just what in the hell I've been doing.


(I tell people it's an aggressive tapeworm. I call him Julio.)


Today I'm wearing a pair of jeans I purchased deliberately too small more than a year and a half ago, thinking it would be good incentive to loose a couple of pounds. They remained in my closet with the tags still on for this long, as an insidious reminder of how far I'd fallen.


While they're still a little snug, today I could put them on no problem and I am wearing the shit out of them right now.


Obviously something is working right, but despite all of these positive signs, I don't see it. I mean that literally - I don't see it. I see myself every day, and I perceive my body the same as always. Too pudgy there, too thick here, how did I forget to shave there, and jiggly here there and everywhere.


I don't think I look different, so I went looking for a picture of me from before June when I started this journey. It had been a long time since I would agree to have my picture taken unless I was hiding behind somebody, so the odds were about the same I'd find the Holy Grail.


The Holy Grail remains a mystery, but buried in our photo archives is a shot of me taken as part of a crowd scene at a work event in May of this year. Sweet Cheesus on a cracker I'm huge.


I seriously never knew I looked like that. I knew I was heavier than I'd ever been but I had no idea this meant I was an aircraft carrier in a skirt.


First I was horrified and embarrassed and now I'm alarmed. If I didn't know what I looked like at my heaviest, I truly don't know how I look now.


This scares me, because for the first time it's hitting me that losing a lot of weight is not going to make me a different person. I'll be the same person with the same issues and the same hang-ups only in smaller pants.


What if I never see any difference and nothing else changes at all? I was kind of hoping that as my clothing size decreased, happiness and confidence would increase.


Somehow, a significantly lower number on the scale would bring about anything I think I'm missing, along with hot men in uniform who in no way resemble teddy bears.


It doesn't look like it's going to, but I'll still take the smaller pants.

Clean-up in Aisle 7.

A friend of mine commented on my most recent posting by saying I must be in a good mood again, because I only rant about things when I'm in a good mood. The rest of the time I'm just angry.

Having only two moods does cut down on possible ambiguity, which is helpful because I really only have one facial expression and it can best be described as "poker."

I could try arguing that I'm actually a more finely nuanced person than that because sometimes I'm hungry, thirsty, horny or watching Glee, but those aren't so much moods as they are tendencies.

It's completely true. I'm ranting or I'm angry, which may explain why not a single one of my friends has ever asked me to babysit. It also demonstrates that I may just be a highly evolved amoeba.

Ranting and being angry aren't the only things I do well, in my defense. I'm also exceptionally good at being in denial. Denial may in fact be the closest I get to happy.

Why bother whether the glass is half full or empty? Why not just ignore the fact the glass exists at all and save everybody an untenable argument? Also, if I ignore the glass I won't have to wash it, so there's really no down side.

Denial has been working well for me, but lately friends of mine seem intent on messing with my completely reasonable and healthy approach to romantic failure.

For example, I really enjoy having my friend and work colleague stop by my office for a chat, but when she asks me whether I've heard from Alex and have I thought about what I'm going to do about that whole situation and how am I feeling about it now? -- my memory fails.

I don't know what she's talking about. I don't know who she's talking about. I don't even know who she is, so she should probably get the hell out of my office.

This level of denial and deflecting of issues is relatively easy to pull off, provided I keep my thinking to a minimum. I only need enough brain capacity to drive, eat, pee and use the TV remote. Anything more and there could be problems and by problems I mean tears and snot.

On one hand I'm fortunate that I can do this at all, because the object of my unrequited affection lives more than 400 kms away. This decreases the threat of running into him and his new gf to slightly more manageable levels.

On the other hand, this distance seems to act as a signal to everybody else that it should be much easier to move on, and in fact I really need to do so. Like, right now. Get over him and just get underneath somebody else, for the love of God.

Given we've established I only have two moods, (three if you count denial) I'm skeptical of this advice. If there was a line-up of eligible men in uniform waiting patiently at my door I could see how I might want to take a baby-step toward somebody else. Anybody else.

There is no line-up however, so the most amusing part of these conversations are the suggestions for where I should be meeting eligible men.

Many days I really don't know whether to laugh or cry, which is natural considering neither option fits with the only two emotions I'm willing to entertain.

The grocery store for example, is brought up so frequently one would think you could order up a man in the deli just as long as you specify a small, medium or large container.

Apparently attractive single men spend hours roaming around grocery store aisles, just waiting for frazzled looking women to come dashing through the store because they forgot their dinner recipes called for ingredients.

What is supposed to happen next when a frazzled looking woman is standing in the same produce section as an attractive man is a mystery though.

I have a theory on why nobody knows what should happen next to bring these two star-crossed people together over suspicious looking melons. Nobody can explain it, because it's never happened. Nobody ever actually picks up in a grocery store - it's an urban myth.

Hollywood is to blame. Characters are constantly finding love at the supermarket, and I can see why it's an easy convention. Everybody goes to the grocery store unless you're a shut-in, really famous, fabulously wealthy or Lady Gaga. Since I'm none of these things (yet) I do spend a lot of time buying food.

If life were actually a romantic comedy, I'd be tripping over Jake Gyllenhaal when we both reach for the same discounted chicken breast and somehow our respective shopping baskets get jumbled and I end up going home with men's deodorant and he ends up with my box of tampons. Somehow we must find each other again to make things right. Shenanigans ensue.

Life is not a romantic comedy. People meet in the grocery store in movies all the time because it's easy, not because it's realistic.

People vanish in movies all the time due to random instances of quicksand, and yet you don't hear much about that in real life either.

"Hey - Did you hear about Phil?"

"No - What happened?"

"Quicksand! Gone just like that! Turned around for a second and all that was left was his hat. Kind of a bummer because he had my house keys."

"Shit!"

Conversations like this don't take place, because they would be ridiculous. Just the same, perfectly intelligent people still seem to think grocery stores are Mecca for lonely women and hot men.

I'm not saying an attractive man has never stepped foot in a grocery store - not at all. I've seen several, and on one occasion even trailed one from the bakery section to the dairy and back to the bakery before deciding I should stop being creepy.

What I am saying is that an average looking mortal woman would have difficulties executing any kind of charm or seduction while squeezing avocados. Even if a hot grocery shopping dude was standing right there, what in the world to say?

Perhaps I can share that I've heard about a recipe for guacamole that includes bacon, and I think it would be awesome if I licked it off his chest. Or just ate bacon. Maybe I could start with a hello, and he could marvel at the boldness of Jehovah's Witnesses nowadays or grow concerned that I'm obviously developmentally delayed because I'm standing in a grocery store saying hello to random strangers and should really be chaperoned.

We'll just never know, because through careful analysis of science and statistics, falling victim to quicksand has been proven 1,000 more likely than falling for my next horrible break-up in a grocery store.

A fact I'm also choosing to ignore and deny until I'm forced to find a low-hanging tree branch and miraculous rescue.

Caution: Highly Flammable. Also easily annoyed.

I'm not a patient person in most regards. Waiting peacefully in tranquility is nearly impossible unless it's for dessert or revenge, but there are a few exceptions.

For example, I may roll my eyes at the elderly person ahead of me in the grocery store line who appears to believe there's a million dollar prize available for paying with exact change, but I'll wait.

By the time you're old enough to have shrank two feet and feel comfortable leaving the house with a tricked out walker, blue perm and a plastic kerchief tied around your head to protect said blue perm from the slightest possibility of rain, I figure you've damn well earned the right to do whatever the hell you want.

I will however come close to a psychotic break waiting for the Mommy who's allowing her three-year old to unload the entire cart, presumably because she finds it adorable, or perhaps because she secretly wants me to die of an embolism waiting to pay for my Weight Watchers Double Fudge Cakes.

Children have not yet earned the right to make me wait and they won't qualify at all until they turn 21. Of course if they're male, attractive and 21 I'd probably want to sleep with them so in those instances my patience would increase accordingly.

(In my own mind I'm Madonna so this would constitute completely acceptable behaviour.)

(It would so, so let's not judge.)

It's not just people who test the very last traces of my patience - I'm equally intolerant of inanimate objects. I have thought for many years that there needs to be a moratorium placed on paintings of fruit bowls and flowers in vases. Enough is enough.

Any value that might once have existed in artistic renderings of objects normally situated in the middle of dining room tables has long ago been lost to time.

I no longer have patience for leggings, more specifically the concerning trend behind leggings as pants. I actually love leggings in the same way I love Spanx - both are convenient to wear under items designated as clothing, but I can no longer give leggings in place of proper bottoms a pass.

The same actually goes for women who just don't wear any form of pants. In these instances I long to see some leggings, because leggings do beat having to stare at errant va-jay while impatiently waiting to go up a flight of stairs.

For once and for all, a shirt is not a dress. It just isn't. The trick to finding out whether an item qualifies as a shirt or a dress is to hold it up to the shoulders. If it covers the rear and some leg, congratulations, because it's a dress. If it doesn't quite cover the rear, it is a shirt.

There is nothing wrong with owning a shirt -- I have several. There is something wrong however with pairing the shirt with no pants, stripper heels and a Guess purse constructed of triple the fabric than contained in the shirt and heading out to the club.

Yes, I have somehow become an old bat who doesn't understand kids these days. I'm fine with it, because I'll need pants for the cats to shed all over when I inevitably begin hoarding them.

Next time I'm having a fortune cookie.

A friend of mine claims to have a spirit guide. This guide is apparently an angel, and she "communes" with him all day long over even the smallest decisions.

Frankly, if there is an afterlife and I come back as somebody's spirit guide I'm going to be really pissed at having to tell some fruitcake whether to buy the organic soy milk or regular every day.

My friend feels at one with the universe at all times, and will occasionally stop mid-sentence because the energy flow is too overwhelming in that moment, and she needs to just "be in that moment."

I foolishly assume that if I can see her standing there that qualifies as her being in that moment, but her definition of being seems to be much deeper than mine.

I'm not entirely sure how it is we're still friends.

I do appreciate being exposed to such a different perspective however, even if that perspective is batshit most of the time. This appreciation was why I chose to attend an annual event and exhibition she coordinates every year, dedicated to the intuitive arts.

There were all the usual suspects. People selling Tibetan prayer flags and singing bowls, aura photography, chair massages, laser therapy where you pay actual money to lie on a cot with a cloth over your face while a multi-bulbed lamp blinks different colours at different times over your body. Actual. Money.

There were palm readers and tarot readers, hippie drum circles and several people touting the benefits of EFT Therapy.

(For those without the benefit of a friend who claims to talk to angels and arranges an annual festival dedicated to anything science can't prove, EFT Therapy stands for The Emotional Freedom technique, some times known as Tapping Therapy. Because that's what you do - tap.

If you're dealing with stress, trauma, anxiety, addictions or pain you can supposedly free yourself from any and all issues by gently tapping your finger on one or more of ten acupressure points on your body.

I know this because when I was going through some pretty serious fucking trauma, a counsellor referred me to an EFT therapist who would "absolutely cure" me. I would be a changed person, with no trauma, no issues and no physical pain. Success rate is claimed at over 90% and I would never have another panic attack again.

An hour of alternating between tapping the side of my head and the inside of my wrist while being forced to listen to whale sounds on a cd did absolutely cure me of two things -- not feeling like an utter moron and my faith in humanity.)

(Also, it is actually physically impossible to walk for 50 metres in this city and not encounter a hippie drum circle. I swear to God there are more hippie drum circles then there are fire hydrants, and this is terrifying.)

The friend I went with was having her tarot cards read and her wrist tapped at the same time so I wandered away to price out singing bowls. A young looking guy sat alone in the booth next door, with a sign that advertised his natural intuitive abilities.

His price for a 15 minute reading was a bargain compared to others, so I decided I'd sit down at his table and find out if he could tell me anything I might already know.

Even though I'm a cynical, skeptical, pessimistic bitch I do enjoy the odd psychic reading now and then. I've actually had a few readings that were eerily, eerily prescient.

One psychic I saw listed off the names of all of my friends and knew my nickname in university before I even said a word. Another warned me I'd have problems with my pelvic bones and I thought she was full of shite. Years later I really wish I'd kept her phone number.

Too many people who choose to frequent psychics give away too much information. The psychic who has no supernatural abilities at all is just really good at reading the client and making educated guesses. Real or imagined, feeling as though you have a handle on what's happening next is still more comforting than a repeated tap to the forehead.

Much like the advertised benefits of EFT, psychics often attract the desperate, the sad, the confused or anybody who simply wants to know it will be OK in the end. If a person calling herself a psychic can provide some comfort that way, then it really doesn't matter to me if she's making it up as she goes.

My psychic was taking a moment with his eyes scrunched and closed, attempting to "see." Apparently communing with the universe looks a lot like having a really hard bowel movement.

His eyes flew open and he told me a door was opening for me. Do I know what that means?

I had no idea what that means. Personally? Professionally? Trap door? Doggie door?

His eyes scrunched shut again. I was starting to feel responsible for his psychic constipation, because I could see how I might be difficult to read.

I'm currently choosing to deal with any of the more hurtful situations in my life by allowing myself a long period of denial. If I don't think about something then it doesn't exist. Perhaps this attitude was blocking whatever signal he was tuning into.

Finally he got something. There are doors opening professionally, but romantically a door seems to be closing.

Goddammit.

The psychic must have received some kind of cosmic laxative, because there was more.

It's so demoralizing isn't it? All the doubts and terribly negative emotions that come when that door closes. He kept something from you. Kept you in the dark. Kept it hidden, didn't want you to know about it. He's shared it now but not all of it. He's passionate about something and you can't be a part of that. Give it six months though. That's all - six months. But in the mean time do NOT do anything to compromise yourself. You MUST be true to yourself. Do you know what I'm referring to?

Umm...I might.

The universe had some insights regarding my working life too.

You're somebody at work that everybody goes to with questions all the time. They want your time, they want your help and you have no idea why at all. They know to go to you but you don't understand why they do. You need a better job. Find something you love doing and just do that.

This part is very true. I do need a better job and I have no idea why anybody comes to me for anything at work. More than 90% of the time I'm talking out of my ass and the rest of the time I'm at lunch.

Time was running out considering he sat there so long with his face scrunched, and there were only a few minutes left for one more question.

For the first time I told him something about myself. I told him that I write sometimes and I'm going after some free-lance contracts. Is that a waste of time?

No scrunching this time.

You write about what's made you embittered and you write because you're angry and don't stop doing that. Whether you make money at it depends on how hard you work.

Admittedly I was a little surprised at how specific his answer was. I decided to test him, and so I acted slightly indignant and asked what if I might be writing children's books?

He actually laughed at that.

You are not writing children's books.

Now he was starting to scare me a little. Do I just look like a naturally embittered and angry person who can't stand children? Actually...I probably do.

He told me he sees the answer to my question being surrounded by a pink aura, which is a good thing. It gives him a warm and fuzzy feeling.

I felt instantly relieved, because I knew right then this guy was full of shit. I could be wearing a Snuggie, cradling a kitten and holding a cup of hot cocoa and I still wouldn't inspire warm and fuzzy.

Good for him though - he really did have me going for a little while.