Two Birds, One Stone

Didn’t I tell you all I would solve the matter of yummy?


Okay, so I didn’t solve it. Cricket did. But it is solved. And the best part, it also plays into my desire to travel more.

The answer is vacation yummy.

I will give you all a moment to slap your foreheads, mutter of course, and then shake your heads while you wonder why it took us all so long to think of it.

Now everyone on the count of three, let’s say “Thank you, Cricket.”

I can’t believe it was just sitting there the whole time. Such an obvious solution. I mean, every women’s magazine has written on the phenomenon that is the holiday hook-up. Discussing how, when you are away, your inhibitions are lowered, and you find it easier to meet and flirt. Of course the magazine then offer tips on how to harness that power to find something more meaningful, but I say – eff that. I am going to use this super power to get some. And then I am going to get on a plane and never think about the guy again.

Now the only question that remains is where to first?

My Inner Athlete

I was recently out with the girls when Bridie noted that it seemed “I had gotten my athlete back.”


For those of you that don’t know, I used to be an athlete: a Division 1, full college scholarship athlete. But I lost it. Well, not so much lost as suppressed. Not because I wasn’t proud, but because, during my four years of college among the many things I learned about myself, I discovered I am a terrible loser. My competitive side, is not my pretty side.

But something happened to me recently that brought my athlete out of retirement.

For the past several years I have run a half marathon in my hometown. It started as something my brother and I did, but I liked the race so much, that I continued to run it, even after he flew south.

The Jet Set

One of the best things about being single is that at any time you can pick up and go whenever you feel like. I mean isn’t that the very thing we singles brag about all the time when sitting with our coupled-off friends? Sure. Co-habitation is nice; always having someone to snuggle with on a cold rainy Sunday is awesome. However, if I want to spend the weekend in Europe, I can. Just like that. No questions to answer. Just pack my credit card and take off.


Except, who really just randomly takes off to Europe? Or Mexico? Or Africa?

Well, it turns out, I do.

Or at least it was offered to me. A friend of mine randomly emailed me late last night with a proposal. Along with a bunch of her friends, she was headed to Morocco. Now, one of the friends had back out. So, if I wanted to, I could join them for a week in Marrakesh.

Did I want to go?

Hell to the yes.

But could I go?

Well. That is slightly more complicated. I have the money (I would be eating Ramen noodles for a while, but I could make it work) and the time to take. But it would mean cancelling other plans and living under the weight of a huge credit card bill, and worrying that something should happen and the money or time that I now needed was spent in Africa.  

And therein lies the rub. Yes. I am single and childless. But I am not without responsibilities. I have a job and a credit score and bills. While it is lovely to fantasize that I can just pick up and run off to Rome at a moment’s notice, I can’t.

Or can I?

After all, work and bills will be there when I get home. I lived on Ramen noodles before, I can do it again. So why not take off for Morocco? I don’t have to make arrangements for a sitter. Or assure my boyfriend that my single girlfriends and I will be on our best behavior. I did just buy a maxi orange skirt that would look awesome wandering around a bazaar in Marrakesh. Isn't it my responsibility as a footloose and fancy-free single girl to go on this trip?

Maybe, but it's not me. I am neither footloose nor fancy-free. I tried to be. I got all the way to entering my credit card information and almost hitting the purchase button, but the anxiety and questions and nausea were just too much. I need to plan and map and chart and budget and see it all laid out in front of me. All I saw before me were questions I couldn't answer for sure.

So, I closed the browser instead.

Table for One

Sometimes it’s lonely being single. Of course it is. But sometimes the loneliness hits you when you least expect it.

Friends and I signed up for a party run. For the uninitiated -- a party run is a race followed by a party. But by the time the race came around, everyone had backed out for one reason or another.

Everyone except me.

Now, typically I run by myself, so it wasn’t the race that worried me. It was before the run that had me freaking out. Before a run you are just standing around, talking with friends, trying to keep warm, thinking about bailing, and wondering why you keep signing up for these things.  You hop around, you laugh, judge other runners and wait for the starting gun. But when you are alone, well, you just stand there. Alone. Surrounded by hundreds of people.

Of course I thought about bailing, too, as I walked down to the start. I kept thinking I can just go home. No one will know.

But I had made a promise to myself earlier. If I went to run, I didn’t have to face the party. After all, this was my choice -- to be single. And being single means sometimes I will be all by myself. Sometimes there will be things I want to do that no one is contractually obligated to do with me. But all that pep talk aside, I still wasn’t ready to go to a party alone.

When I finally made it to the starting line, it wasn’t nearly as bad or as lonesome as I feared. I saw people I knew, talked to them for a bit. Checked my bag, lined up at the start. Saw CK. He wasn’t running but was waiting dutifully with his new girlfriend. I waved. He waved back. Then the gun went off, I took off, and before I knew it, the race was over and I had finished the four miles in a time that even shocked me.

I was feeling so good post-race, I almost wanted to brave the party.

Maybe next year.

The Matter of Yummy

I realized early on in my single for life adventure that there was a flaw in my system.

The flaw, as some of you may have already guessed, is what to do about sex.

Now, for some, this isn’t a flaw at all. Unfortunately, for me (and maybe others of you out there) I don’t have an eff buddy (nor have I had much luck with them in the past) nor do I have a friend with special benefits (this, too, in the past has proven to be a special kind of disaster). And while I know, thanks to one of my guy friends, that getting a stranger to have sex with me is as easy as walking into a bar and just saying, “Yes.” I’ve never been super comfortable with one night stands. Yes, I have enjoyed my share, but the self inflicted guilt and shame I experienced the next morning (which has increased over the years) diminished any enjoyment I remember from the evening prior.

So, what does a girl like me do for a little something-something? This is the exact question that my dear friend Cricket and I were contemplating over a pitcher or tequila. Because the whole thing has be recently fantasizing about a relationship. A relationship I don’t want anywhere else but the bedroom.
Cricket is still on the fence about the whole single for life thing for herself, but she fully embraces it for me. She too, is just concerned about my lack of yummy, especially as it concerns my inability to carry on a conversation with Hot Attorney, but more on that later.

The first obvious solution was that I get involved with a professional baseball player.  And while I am still working this angle, I figured it would make sense to explore other options as well. Especially for those of you out there that don’t live in a city with a professional baseball team.

Another option that came to us after our third round was getting involved with a married man. Forgetting for a moment the moral objections one might have with this arrangement, for someone like me, this could work. However, I really try to keep my life as drama free as humanly possible and sleeping with another woman’s husband is just inviting crazy into my apartment.

Still, a married man wouldn’t likely develop feelings for me. The boundaries of our relationship would be very clear, dictated by the fact that he has a wife he shares his feelings with. I would just be someone he shared his bed with. And really, isn’t that what brings so many of these friends with benefits relationships crashing to a halt. Often, one of the partners confuses sex (or the hormonal release post orgasm) with love. For my part, I can control how I feel (and even when I can’t, I can get out before I get too hurt). But what about him? What happens if its his line that starts blurring? I like hurting people even less than I like drama in my living room (unless it is Law & Order).

Ideally, what I am looking for is someone I find attractive, but could never actually be attracted to. So he would have to be less than smart and/or less than funny and/or a Dallas Cowboys fan. He would also need to find me attractive without being attracted to me. Maybe there is an expiration date (he is only in Philadelphia for school or a work assignment) or perhaps he has a rule about falling in love with someone who worships Peyton Manning.

So Cricket suggested I try meditating before bed, focusing on exactly what I am looking for and then asking the universe to bring him to me. We then agreed this seems a lot like masturbation, so I decided I would also put this out in this universe and see if you guys could bring me a solution.

But know this, other spinsters, I am working on the problem. And when I find an answer that works for all of us, I will share it with you.

The Family Jewels

My mother has taught me two things (well, she has taught me a lot of things, but these two are the most important): How to work hard and how to treat oneself.

My mother’s treat of choice: jewelry; specifically, diamonds. Over the years she has amassed quite a collection and every once in a while, she will let me borrow something. Last weekend, when I was visiting, was such an occasion. She let me go home with a tennis bracelet.

Before I left she warned me not to lose it.

That’s a joke. I am her neat-freak, super-organized, type-A daughter. Sure I get drunk every now and again, but the only thing I ever lost of value is my virginity. Her bauble would never be safer.

Fast-forward to yesterday, and I am at the gym. I had come right from work and was still wearing the bracelet. I contemplated leaving it on, but I hate girls that wear a lot of jewelry when they workout. I was also afraid something would happen to break it. The problem was, my gym/work back is huge and small things disappear in it all the time. There is probably $47 in change floating between the lining and the leather right now.

As I stood there, torn between taking my chances in class or with my Bermuda Triangle of a bag a brilliant idea occurred to me. I took the bracelet off, stashed it in a secret, super-safe spot and then jumped on a treadmill.

The next morning, after my run and shower, I went to my dresser to retrieve my jewelry. The earrings and the necklace I wear everyday were both there, but the bracelet wasn’t. I didn’t panic because I remembered I never took it out of its hiding spot.

I then went to my gym bag, pulled my wallet out, unzipped the change department and discovered the bracelet wasn’t there.

Oh. Holy. God.

I looked again. Pulled all the change out and looked a third time. Put the change back in, went back to the dresser, and then looked in my wallet (which I was still holding) for a fourth time.

Now, on mornings following a crazy night of drinking, I typically experience 15 minutes of panic as I tear through my apartment to confirm I still have my wallet, phone, and everything I wore out the night before. Those anxiety attacks were nothing compare to the heart palpitations I was experiencing after I came up empty the fourth time.

If I lost my phone or my wallet, it would suck and going through the chore of shutting everything off and replacing it would be inconvenient, but I would manage. And I have already lived through the challenge of waking up without an item of clothing, but this? There was no living through this. My mother is still angry about a dent in her truck (that is no longer hers) that I didn’t put there but may have happened in a parking lot while I was borrowing it.

That was just a small dent. This was her tennis bracelet. I started emptying my bag and wondering if the gym was open yet. The worst case scenario running through my head was that someone saw me put it in my wallet and then took it. My best case scenario was that I missed the change pouch and it landed in my bag. Somewhere in the middle was that it landed on the floor next to my locker. Would someone have turned it in? People are good right? Or maybe it really was in my bag. I am a good person. The universe could throw me a bone on this one.

Then my sunglasses' holder tumbled onto my couch and my heart stopped in a good way (if that is possible). I didn’t put it in my change purse. I put it in my sunglasses' holder. Right?

My breath caught as I slowly opened the case. There it was. In all its glory and sparkle.

And thank goodness. Because otherwise, I would be writing this post from the lam.

The Ladies Privilege

It came to my attention (and not because of the terrible Amy Adams’ movie) that Leap Day has historically been a day when it is perfectly acceptable for women to propose to men.

Now, setting aside the fact that I think it is always acceptable for women to propose to men and that I have no intention of getting married and thus have no intention of getting down on one knee to ask a man to be my groom, I do like the idea of proposing to someone today. So long as we all understand that by propose, I don’t mean marriage but merely making out with me until March.

Now, kiddies, back in my day, I wouldn’t have needed a special day on the calendar to approach a random guy and say, “You. Me. Lip-lock. Now.” Sadly, though, I don’t know where that girl went. I mean, I have some idea – she might have been run off by all those fools who kept telling her guys don’t like aggressive girls. But I digress. It is 2012. I am older and not much wiser and now require an occasion to get my groove on.

Ideally, I would propose to CK, but since the chances of randomly bumping into him are slim and none, and this doesn’t feel like the sort of thing one should plan, I crossed him off the list. This also eliminates Peyton, Ryan and Daniel from proposal contention. Leaving my two current crushes, Trainer Boyfriend (who is not really my boyfriend, aka Fake BF) and Hot Attorney.

Forgetting for a moment that he is so hot he melts my face off, when it comes to Hot Attorney, it actually shocks me a bit I haven’t already blurted out “Do you wanna make out?” I’m also shocked that I have refrained from doing anything else to make myself entirely too ridiculous to ever consider desirable. Maybe for this reason alone I won’t be throwing myself at Hot Attorney today. Or maybe it is because as horrific as rejection would be, I think it would be worse to actually have to come into the office tomorrow knowing what his mouth tastes like and not be able to do anything more about it.

This brings us to Fake Trainer Boyfriend. He is hot. I want to make out with him. I am going to the gym after work. This should be a no brainer. Except, that is exactly the problem. I’m not sure he has much of a brain. He starts talking and even when he is talking about something he should know about (like hamstrings, or quads, or the Brachialis muscle) he just doesn’t sound bright. And while much, much younger me wouldn’t have minded, current me struggles to get hot and bothered by someone who I worry might not be able to spell hot or bothered.

I think I’m beginning to understand why guys get so worked up about proposing. Thank god we women only have to deal with this once every four years.