5:57pm

Well I am going on a second date with this guy. The one from Monday. Some interesting developments have taken place on that front.

1. This gentleman has a pet snake that lives in his apartment. He informed me that the snake sometimes likes to break out of her cage and roam his living room. Snakes are my single worst fear in the universe. The snake’s name is Zia and it is one of those snakes to which that rhyme applies… you know. What is it? Red next to yellow is a friendly fellow and the other one kills you. I am not sure on which side of this divide Zia the Snake falls.
   

   So what do you think, is it gonna eat me or what?

2. This gentleman had a total freakout on Wednesday where he told me that he liked me a lot and wanted me to be more than a rebound girl to him and said “I know you like me and are fighting it, but I know you can trust me and I will be here waiting for that to happen.” Excuse me, what, we had two glasses of wine.
3. He invited me to his apartment (in Harlem) to eat dinner with him and his snake and I was like “Maybe just drinks in the Village for now.”

Anywho. You are probably wondering why I am even going to get a beer with him after all of this and the answer to that question is he is really kind and seems to really like me, and the first date was fun, whatever happened since. Everybody gets a second try. If I don’t have fun tonight I’ll nicely end it.

The main adventure in my life today happened after school. I had to run to the Dept. of Education building and while I was over there I decided I needed Chipotle to reward myself for going to the gym for 40 minutes two days ago. There was a lady outside asking people for money and I didn’t have any cash, so I offered to buy her lunch. She came into the restaurant with me and we stood in line. She starts to tell me about her five friends who were also very hungry and wanted lunch. I nicely said that teachers don’t make very much money, and that I would buy her whatever she wanted but couldn’t afford to buy lunch for everyone.

She got the biggest burrito bowl I have ever seen, chips and guac, a tortilla on the side, and a drink. I didn’t mind at all, I’m sure she was very hungry and I was glad to do it. However, after I paid, she went back up to the cashier and started harassing her for more bags of chips. The manager came out and told the woman she had to leave, and she started yelling and making a scene. I walked her out but she was not happy… it made me wish I had just given her the money, but maybe the food was better.

Anyway. Friday. Must go do makeup for date #2. The bar that my date has picked is a (very) gay bar and I don’t think he knows. Doesn’t bother me in the slightest, I go there sometimes and always have fun, but should be interesting to watch him process this information.

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6:10pm

Ah, crap. Roomie returned from pharmacy and I accidentally said “yeah” when she said “hi” and I guess the line was really long at the pharmacy and they messed up her insurance and she was telling me this and I was distracted by my blog post. I really cannot do two things at once. How do people multitask?

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6:17pm

Must never tell any friends or family or snake-owning dates URL for blog in case they ever make me mad and I want to write about them.

What’s URL stand for, anyway?

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7:02pm

Was supposed to have left five minutes ago and am somehow still in my pajama pants reading people’s blogs. Oh, bother.

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7:16pm

If I wear yoga pants and boots will he be able to tell? But, like, NICE yoga pants.

I can’t tell if I am gaining weight, losing weight, or just changing shape from all this Miami yo-yo dieting but for some reason all my jeans are sliding off my butt when I sit down and I look like I crawled out of a Mississippi trailer park.

6:20pm

Well.

Roomie and I were cooking dinner and preparing to drink wine and watch the Bachelor when all of a sudden someone starts ringing our doorbell incessantly. This happens sometimes when you live in the hood, so we were ignoring it. Finally, we got annoyed and I went down to check.

It was Roomie’s ex-boyfriend, back from his two-month vacation and looking to reconcile.

This guy dated Trish for 7 months, told her he loved her, but somehow never texted her back within a timely manner and consistently stood her up. Roomie was finally getting better after he just up and left for the Caribbean around Thanksgiving. She was finally seeming happy again. And now he is here.

I hate this. She constantly, constantly ditches me when he’s around. I can think of a dozen times where we have been out and either he has shown up or she just sneaks off and gets in a cab and leaves me to go see him. Or the time right after Sam and I broke up where she left me alone at her friend’s apartment on Halloween. It’s selfish of me to say all of this. I should be a good friend and be happy for her but I’m just not. I was enjoying not being the only single one.

I guess you’ll probably be wanting to know how my date was last night. It was fine, he was really nice. Only dealbreaking flaw was he just broke up with his ex-girlfriend three weeks ago and kept talking about her. And he reminded me of my first boyfriend. Like, a lot. I’m not sure I want that again. He’s really into me, though. We’ll see how it goes.

I’m just not over Sam. I’m not. And he treated me like absolute shit. He never once acted like he was into me or wanted to be with me, it always seemed like he was just tolerating me which made me try even harder. I did everything for him. I loved him, I really did. I just keep hoping that he’ll show up at my door and say he made a mistake and that he wants me back but I know that he never will. I shouldn’t even want that. I should be trying with everything I have to move on.

I think I’m just having a really depressed day. It’s all piling up. I didn’t go to work, which was horrible, I just said I was sick so that I could stay in bed. My grandpa fell and broke his back and is back in the hospital. Nobody has any idea where my mother is. Now, Roomie’s boyfriend is back. It’s just all too much right now.

6:42pm

Have not blogged all weekend because was hanging out at Roomie’s family’s house on Long Island. This basically always means that her father buys me lots of delicious Italian food and I spend two days watching TV, getting fat, and playing with her black labs. Puppy therapy is definitely a thing. Their neighbors just got a little three month old black lab puppy, and it is impossible to be angry, stressed, or sad when you have a face this cute looking up at you.

The only downside of all this is it made me homesick for my own little black lab who lives out west with my dad. The 4 acres is great for her, but I wish I could have her here with me. It really is impossible to have a dog in the city when you have a job. I cannot afford a doggy nanny, so I wound up with The Cat when my depression prompted me to buy something warm and fluffy. If only she liked to cuddle and didn’t hate everyone I would be set!

Speaking of The Cat, I finally bought her a laser pointer. What they say about cats and laser pointers is turning out to be very true. She has gone ballistic. She is a slave to the little red light. As soon as she sees it she forgets everything else. I have devious plans to use it to train her to scratch one of her four scratching posts instead of my door frame, but I am not anticipating much success.

I am leaving here in fifteen minutes for a date with that boy I talked to on the phone the other day. He of the Pokemon and the “I don’t really look like my picture” comments. I am not sure how to feel about this, but I think at least it’s good that I am moving on from Sam. Or trying to, rather. Maybe I’m jaded, but I’m making bets with Roomie on what his OkCupid flaw will be (for those of you just joining me, Roomie and I have a theory that every single male on online dating has one flaw that they do not advertise on their profile that makes them inherently undateable, and it’s anyone’s guess what it will be).

I think I know what it might be, though. I think it’s this (actual texts):

I mean, hooray for fitness, but come on. It’s the playoffs. That Packers/Seahawks game was insane.

Not to mention, I’m one of those people who cannot touch her own toes, so I always have to use the special people block when I go to yoga. And then I fall over. This is why I do not do yoga.

 

5:29pm

Have just returned from gym. Yes, that’s right, I have gone every day this week. The only hiccup today was when I forgot my gym locker combination, despite opening it successfully 12 times already this week. FYI, it’s 4-6-26, NOT 6-4-26. People kept staring at me as I tried to open my lock 8 times and grew increasingly frustrated. Today was just one of those days.

On my way home, I was struck with the desire to cook. Now, if you’ve been keeping up, you will know that I cannot even hard boil eggs without catastrophe. Nevertheless, I have bought a lot of different kind of vegetables and will be shortly be attempting to create something palatable.

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7:43pm

Was in the kitchen singing along to the Wicked soundtrack and happily stewing vegetables in a pot when Roomie poked her head in and asked what I was making. Well, you don’t just tell your Roomie you are making up your own recipe when she knows how disaster-prone you are. Our smoke detector is currently sitting next to the microwave sans batteries because I have set it off so many times we had to disable it. That is not a joke, that is actually true. It seems counter-intuitive, like maybe if I am that bad of a chef we should keep the smoke detector on. However. It’s very very annoying and persistent and there’s nothing in our apartment worth saving anyway. Bring on the fires!

Anyway, I informed my Roomie that I was making “Vegetable Pot a la Mode.” I added the a la mode to sound fancy. Of course I know it means with ice cream. I’m fluent in French. I can eat ice cream after, can’t I?

I think I overdid it on the onions and also Roomie suggested that next time I cut the garlic a little smaller. I should mention that the garlic in Vegetable Pot a la Mode was in grape-sized chunks. I was worried that if I minced it I would cut my fingers.  Anyway, the only actual casualty of this adventure was when I dropped a fork behind the stove. I don’t think it is coming out. A small price to pay for my healthy onion and noodle pot. Ever since I got a good look at the girls on the new season of the Bachelor, I have been obsessed with having thighs like a baby giraffe.

Also, I forgot to tell you. The guy from the other night finally called. 10:32pm. What does he think I am, some sort of scarlet woman?

It was alright, though, because it transpired that he was babysitting his 7 year old nephew and had only just gotten him to bed. We had a really nice conversation and he seemed too good to be true. If I tell you we talked about our favorite Pokemon, does that make me nerdy?

Right when we were wrapping up, he said “I have two things I have to warn you about.” And here I am in my bed drinking tea thinking, oh, my goodness, this guy is a killer. But no. The things were…

1. He just got out of a long term relationship, but I told him that was alright because I had too
2. He said he hadn’t updated his profile picture in a while and looked totally different.

Now, that bit about looking totally different is a scary thing in the online dating world, but he sent me a more recent picture of himself and he still looks cute. He has a nice smile and cute scruffy hair, but you can definitely tell he’s gained a lot of weight since his profile pictures were taken. Not that it matters. Or maybe he hasn’t gained weight and I am just looking for something to freak out about. Okay, he’s probably gained a little weight. Or not. It’s a picture of him from the elbows up, it’s not like I have anything tangible to go off of here.

Anyway, we’ve been texting and we are all fixed to get a drink on Monday. He’s nice enough that I know I’ll have fun even if I don’t end up being attracted to him.

Tomorrow’s Friday and thank goodness for that because I’m totally wiped out and it’s a three day weekend. Cheers to you Marty.

6:07pm

First day back at work after vacation. Teaching middle school is somehow even more exhausting when I am supposedly well rested from a two week vacation.

I spent most of my planning periods daydreaming about my upcoming trip to South Beach. I was supposed to go to Costa Rica with Sam in February, but then when we broke up of course I had to plan some stellar vacation that same week to show him that I don’t need him and all that jazz. Whatever. Going to the beach with my best girl friends will be way better. I can drink margaritas and hit on cute boys with reckless abandon.

The fact that he’s not going to Costa Rica anymore doesn’t hurt either. Have fun sitting in freezing New York in February, loser.

After work today my work husband asked me the age-old question “Nap or Gym?” (At least it is age-old when you have been work spouses as long as we have). Having turned over a new leaf of not napping (did I include that leaf in the original resolutions? Should have done) I told him I wasn’t going to do either. It’s my first work day of the new year. No gym. I’m pacing myself. Besides, I spent at least 20 minutes trying to corral Alberto into his homeroom, and that’s some pretty intense cardio.

Must go tomorrow. Will go tomorrow.

Must also find a way to get cat to stop scratching the shit out of my door frame when I’m at work.

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7:32pm

One unfortunate thing about me is I cannot cook a thing without having some sort of kitchen disaster. Isn’t there a saying about people who can’t even boil an egg? It sounds vaguely familiar, but maybe that is just because a few weeks ago I tried to hard boil a dozen eggs. I put them on the stove, promptly forgot, and was reminded about them an hour later when all the water had boiled away and the eggs were exploding all over the inside of the pan.

As a result of this, my hilarious Roomie got me some sort of idiot-proof egg cooker for Christmas.

I am about to attempt to boil eggs. She is safely away getting her nails done but I am carefully reading the entire instruction booklet nonetheless. I have to puncture each of the eggs with a sharp spike and place them in the cooker with the required amount of water. There are all sorts of accessories.

Eggcessories.

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7:39pm

Eggs are bubbling merrily away inside my little pot of “impossible to fuck up” and The Cat is gazing reproachfully at the steam coming out of the hole. I should mention that the egg cooker is on the floor of my bedroom because we only have two outlets in our tiny NYC kitchen and they were both in use.

That’s a somewhat odd smell. Is it supposed to smell like this?

I don’t even have to turn this thing off. It has a SENSOR.

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7:52pm

New lows: I have just realized I am using an egg cooker to get out of grading my students’ unit exams.

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8:05pm

Eggs appear to be fine. No explosions, at any rate, but one very startled cat. I’ll chalk it up as a win.