such a big emergency

My mother sometimes uses her cell to call my dad downstairs, which interrupts Jeopardy! but it must be done because it's such a big emergency.

Mom: Do you know how much Matt Lauer gets paid?

Dad: Three million dollars?

Mom: SEVEN TEEN million.

Dad: Wow.

the bottom of the bottom

My parents are away and I'm watching movies. Saturday night!

I thought, since this site began with a dating theme and circles around to it again and again eventually, that I'd share the following: I took myself off a certain dating site. And I feel great! I now only make plans with people who know me for real: friends. I have oodles of space to think, to write, talk on the phone, drink coffee, aggravate those around me, obsess over travel plans, an upcoming roadtrip. I spend my time with my dog and my family. I go on walks. More walks. I look at portland craigslist. A lot. I read whole novels and occasionally, I socialize. Why just today I fixed a poppy seed bagel with homemade pecan pesto and slices of sweet potato on top. Also, I blended a smoothie and made a dessert out of pistchio gelato, whipped cream and dare I say it, a sprig of frozen cookie batter. Yum. Soon, I'm going to try my hand at a pizza from scratch. I cannot be stopped.

But I must share a mini-epiphany, if only to help some hapless souls in the single world...

While walking in Brooklyn I was talking to my brother and he asked which dating site I'd been on.

OK Cupid.

His response was to halt, and I mean come to an immediate, dramatic stop on the sidewalk. The screech of crappy brakes in the distance.

And then he told me:

Dude. That's the bottom of the bottom.

Apparently OK Cupid is where singletons go to dip a toe in the dating pool but not dive in. It's for those of the recent break up, it's for those looking to just fuck around or joke around or fool around, or generally act like idiots and not really have relationships. After all, it is free.

All I could say was oh.

Does this mean I have not given NYC men a proper chance? Could my experiment have some skewed variable and not all single men in NYC are in their 40s, drunk-texting and standing women up while also have drug, alcohol abuse/dependence and various mental health diagnoses?

Perhaps. But I'm too tired to try another site right now. That would require effort. Maybe on another day I'll feel differently about it. For now-

Pesto? Or, tomato sauce? Goat cheese or mozzarella?

File under: Dietary Indiscretion

MYSTERY SOLVED!

For days A. was having bathroom emergencies, as in dia....I won't finish it, lest I embarrass her. Each time she had an issue she jumped all over whoever was home and made her needs clear, lest no accidents actually in the house. Still. Poor fuzzy baby.

One day I examined a terrible poop. In it was a mysterious substance, tiny yellow dots and mucus. After some sleuthing, it is now clear that A. was eating the leftover birdseed my dad had been sprinkling on the ground near the feeder. Why? Because birds shouldn't have to work so hard to eat.

A common phrase around here is: Did you feed the birds?

My mom's hesitant answer today was no. It was clear that her being remiss one day in her feeding duties coincided with A. having a normal bowel movement. Coincidence? I think not.

I am relieved. Cracked that case!

Freddy The Mouth

My dad has alternative names for our neighbors. Some have been neighbors for decades, and have real names but who could say what they are. And does it matter?

Sometimes when I take A. for a walk, return home, and say I ran into someone in the neighborhood and chatted, there will be guesses as to who I saw. My mom or dad will ask, "Was it The Windmill? Or do you mean Pedophile? Or Nut-job?"

1) Pedophile: just because someone's accused of something doesn't mean they did it, but it does mean they get a new name! As in, "Pedophile's friendly to you? He's not to me."

2) Nut-job: a man who did not offer dad a ride from train many years ago and speaks to self loudly. Nut-job.

3) The Windmill: a senior lady who power-walks through the development, pumping her who arms, fists included, to gain speed. Hence, windmill.

Then of course there's the neighbor who refuses to put her teeth in. Not so hot. And the crass neighbor who moved; the one with dirt beneath her fingernails.

Lest I forget Freddy The Mouth. A man my dad knew from the train a long time ago. He liked to talk, so he gets a special nickname.

The Best Use of Our Time

The last on-line date I went to was a coffee. The man was a bit petite, not particularly cute but okay, bearded and mildly interesting. He works in advertising and is having some personal issues with a co-worker. I had a good time during our hour together, though my socks did not fly off (as in knock your socks off), but good enough. Good enough for a second date. During the date (Cafe Grumpy, Park Slope, so at least I had a tasty latte with foam shaped into a leaf) he mentioned that if I'd like to go out again I should let him know because he would like to. Do you know where I'm headed with this? Because I think you do.

I emailed him in couple of days later, said I had a nice time and would be up for going out again. The response? First he wrote that he wasn't going to respond to my email but then thought maybe he should and that he did not think it would be the best use of our time to go on a second date. I couldn't help but write back that, look buddy, I hadn't registered at Pottery Barn just yet, but I thought we had a semi-pleasant conversation.

That goes in the whatever column.

In the WTF column, a guy I showed my apartment to, for a sublet, began asking me out via texts. When I met with him to show the apartment, he seemed hyper, manic, or on drugs like coke or in need of drugs, like for ADHD. He bounced on the balls of his feet exclaiming that I charged too little for the sublet and he paid $500 more for a box in Nolita. He used the bathroom (suspect, right?). Then he left and a week later he invited me to a party, then drinks, then dinner, then drinks again. Each time I said no thanks.

Finally, finally, in a moment of pure shoulder shrugging who cares, I agreed to one beverage on a Sunday night at Temple Bar. After we made the plans a friend asked me to go climbing in Brooklyn I said I couldn't because I had other plans. Do you know where this story is going? I bet you do.

I show up, he doesn't. I send a text: the place is closed, meet next door? He responds suggesting the Boom Boom Room. I question if this is code for something gross. I don't understand. I try to assume it is an actual place and text back I don't know it. No response. I say to myself I was 10 minutes late and he gets 10 minutes more then I'm gone. I hop on the subway, waiting for my chariot at Penn Station and the texts begin to flow. Sorry, sweetie. Where are you, girl? Then the drunken voicemail, slurring, the works. Dozens of texts continue for a couple weeks until I text him that I'm moving back to the West Coast to be closer to my fiance. He wrote back immediately, oh come on.

I met this man for five minutes to show him a sublet.

This is all to say I'm depressed. Men, if this is the level of quality you have to offer, count me out.

I'm participating in Operation Cheer the Fuck Up. I have to give B. credit for the idea and title. It goes like this.

1) Take self off dating site.
2) No dating allowed.
3) Move back to Portland.
4) That's all I got.

our big slave

Me: I get it. You're done.

Mom: Believe it or not, I wasn't pushing that plate toward you as a hint.

Me: Oh no (loading dish into dishwasher).

Mom: You're not our little slave.

Dad: You're our big slave.

Good Shabbas, Bitch

My dad's best quote this week, "Good Shabbas, bitch!" This is in relation to the neighbor at my old apartment who may or may not have reported my dog to the coop. We're B-----s, we don't need such a prosaic and pedestrian thing as proof! They are very religious Jews which led to a conversation about compassion, lack their of, and smiling faces in the hallway paired with a certified letter from the coop board. My dad suggested a new greeting the next time I see my neighbors, which I hope will be never. I also have to share that four years ago the walls are so thin I could hear this couple yelling at their son non-stop, shit like, "Because I'm your mother" and also having sex, and then the woman crying afterward. Sadly, I heard the same exact sounds a couple of weeks ago - as if their lives had become frozen in time.

Do whatever the hell you want but do I have to hear about it?

Makes a couple of barks and yips not seem so bad to me.