Good News for People Who Love Bad News

I haven't posted much in the last week or so, if only because nothing interesting is really going on, aside from the usual dramas.

Roommate 1 / bff is wallowing right now. Last semester I was casually seeing this guy - we went on a few dates (a formal date? in college? I know, I was shocked too), he said a lot of really sweet things. I was genuinely ready to turn in my party girl stilettos and maybe settle down.

Then he got weird. Not replying to messages, disappearing for days a time, when he did want to hang out, it'd be a group thing and he'd call my roommate to set things up. 

I was out of town for a week and come home to everyone acting very suspiciously. To make a long story short, they had been seeing each other behind my back. A lot of tears and arguing later, my bff (as she will be referred to from here on out on the blog) decided she wanted to pursue things with this guy.

Fast forward two months and everyone is civil, even friendly. I've realized that I avoided a romantic grenade with this one - he's far too needy than I could handle.

On the downside, they fight a bunch and she'll lay in bed all day and mope. So he's not even my boyfriend, yet he's still managing to (relatively) ruin my life. Charming.

I did get some good news though: If my schedule works out the way I'm hoping (fingers are crossed), I won't have any finals. Meaning I get out of school a week and a half early. Meaning I can satisfy some of my wanderlust and visit my friends studying abroad.

I just need to find a (legal) way to make $1000. Any suggestions?

St. Crispen's Day

You know, I'm always reluctant to blog about hot topics; I honestly believe that my appeal lies entirely in quirky irrelevance. 

But here's the thing. It's the night before the inauguration and after a marathon viewing of Band of Brothers (which I've been trudging through all winter break), I just....well damnit, I feel hopeful. 

I won't lie: my inner cynic wants to watch Obama's inaugural speech at a bar tomorrow and drink every time I hear the words "hope," "change" or and allusion to a speech by Abraham Lincoln. But for the first time in a long time, I want to set aside that cynicism and believe that maybe, just maybe we have a clean slate. 

Maybe all those campaign promises weren't promises. Maybe we can fix some of the damage of the past few years. Maybe we can look past our differences, be they obvious or a little more hidden, and focus on our humanity.

I have my doubts, of course and I certainly disagree with Mr. Obama on many big policy points.

But at the end of the day, he makes me hope, against all reason, that there may be a better future just around the bend, for extraordinary times break the mold for the ordinary men. 

Goodnight and good luck Mr. Obama; Lord knows you'll need it.

Rookie of the Year.

This post is in response to the January Blog Carnival over at the 20 Something Blog Ring, all about First Kisses.

While it's entirely possible my first kiss was earlier, the first one I remember was at the tender age of 15.

 I think I reached my romantic peak somewhere around kindergarten, as I don't think I'll ever be able to top having two very public boyfriends at the same time and having it be perfectly acceptable. Then again, maybe the key to the success of those relationships was that they were entirely platonic. 

Complements of puberty, I went through a really lengthy awkward stage post kindergarten, ending with my first (and only) boyfriend during my sophomore year of high school. 

As a sophomore dating a senior, I thought I was possibly the coolest person ever. I had his class ring, a chauffeur with a sky blue  Coupe de Ville and my best friend was dating his best friend. It was like something out of my late 90's teen movie dreams.

After a few weeks of dating, my boyfriend, his best friend and my best friend all came over to my house for a snowy evening full of sledding, hot chocolate and trivial pursuit (clearly, I ran with a wild crowd). 

As things were winding down, I walked Matt to his car, having a hunch that this would be the setting for the big kiss - I mean, it HAD been a few weeks, after all. It couldn't have been more perfect: the full moon reflecting off the snow, the stars glimmering overhead. Dreamy.

Of course he leans in for the kiss, I lean in, there's contact...and the next thing I knew his tongue was essentially down my throat. But mind you, it wasn't really moving, it just kind of...sat there like a rock or a dead jelly fish. As the same time, his lips were going crazy, like a fish gasping for water. 

It's a good thing he had his eyes closed, because I'm pretty sure mine were popping out of my head.

I broke  the kiss as quickly as possible - I may never have been kissed before, but I certainly knew it shouldn't be like that!

With that, he looked down at me, eyes glimmering and whispered, "I love you." 

I'm still not sure what alarmed me more about that statement: the fact that we had only been dating a few weeks at the time or that this was his response to that vaguely terrifying kiss. 

Of course, I blurted out the first thing that came to mind: "I'm really cold."

I put Shakespeare to shame when it comes to romance.

That first kiss was so scarring, there never was another. I constantly made up excuses - I'm sick, you're sick, my teeth hurt, I burnt my tongue - until we broke up a little over a  month later.

 In hindsight, I don't know why he dealt with me for so long. A senior in high school dating a girl who won't even kiss him for over two months?  The poor guy must have really liked me.

Actually, I didn't have another kiss for almost two and a half years, not until after graduation, a debacle detailed here.

Second Star to the Right and Straight on 'til Morning

I'm really lucky in that my family and I are incredibly close. I spent most of winter break at home, avoiding phone calls from friends in order to spend more time around the house. 

On the same note, I had an amazing childhood, complete with a tree house, being terrorized by the neighborhood dog and epic games of jailbreak and kickball.

The downside of all of this is I have a massive Peter Pan complex. Occasionally, I'll spend random weeknights up until the wee hours, fretting at the prospect of growing up. It's not that I hate responsibility - I've had plenty of serious internships and jobs - I guess I'm just worried  that I'll never be that genuinely happy again. 

I'm also scared my house is going to stop feeling like home. I didn't appreciate it at the time, but last summer was probably my last 'real' summer of working as few hours as possible, lounging around the house and maximizing time at the beach.

 Now that I have an apartment with a year-long lease, I'll probably spend this summer down here,  working something similar to a real job (to the tune of 40 hours a week). Next Christmas, I don't expect to be home long, as I'm hoping to study abroad for our January term. The next think you know, I'm graduated and apparently supposed to enter the real world.

I've talked to my mom about this and no matter how many times she says home will always be home, I'm always terrified that that moments'  going to come and it'll be a threshold I can never go back  from. 

You know, it's entirely possible my parents did too good of a job.

Then again, with my luck, I'll probably move back home after graduation and stay there until my late 20s or my parents kill me, whichever happens first.

International Man of Mystery

Life's been a bit boring lately. I've moved back into my apartment at school and along with it has come a healthy dose of drama (messy roommate issues, of course). I'm hoping things will get better after a sit down talk, so I won't write about it (yet). I'm trying to approach it rationally so the less crazy dwelling on it, the better. 

I also have my first day of work tomorrow. Without giving away too many details, I'm working for a governmental committee. My boss is an absolute sweetheart and has already called me several times to see how my holidays have been. The schedules going to be a pain (I havent seen the 'waking up' side of 7 am since high school), but it should be a great networking opportunity. 

In other news, this guy from my 'past' sent me the ever-romantic Facebook IM trying to make plans for this weekend. To appreciate the humor in this, a bit of back story is necessary. 

I'm vice-president of a campus group that frequently attends conferences held by large universities. While there's definitely an academic element, anytime you have 2,000 college students in a hotel, shenanigans are bound to ensue. At a conference we went to in November,  the host university rented a club.  

Our school has a reputation as a bit of a party school, so we hosted a pre-party. I'm about as white as it comes to dancing, so I prepared myself by skipping around the hotel room with a bottle of jager. Some military cadets were crammed in the bathroom around a bathtub full of beer, not a girl in sight. A couple was making out in the closet and people were jumping on beds. If this was the pre-party, it certainly bode well for the rest of the night.

By the time we made it to the club, I was the better side of drunk. One minute I'm dancing, the next thing I know, I'm making out with some random boy. After what feels like an hour later, he looks at me, laughs, and shouts gleefully, "I'm gay!" Vaguely terrified, I run away.

Unable to find my friends, in true drunk girl style, I find myself dancing with another guy.  Luckily, my friends were slightly more sober than I was and found me, dragging me home before I made an additional spectacle of myself. Angry at the time, I shouted my room number over my shoulder, while loudly calling my friends cockblocks. I was in rare form.

After falling out of the taxi, our boys put me to sleep in their room (we had connecting hotel rooms). Who knows how long I was asleep for, but suddenly, I heard knocking on the door. Apparently, the boys found an after party, because I was home alone. Creeping to the door, I found my dance partner. Apparently he was good with numbers.

I started to pull him into my room next door, until I realize there was a random guy in my bed. I didn't think I had  been that drunk, so I frantically looked around. Much to my relief, my roommate was passed out on the bathroom floor. 

Never an exhibitionist, I pulled my dance partner into the hallway and up the stairwell. One thing led to another and before I knew it, I was the better part of naked. I guess I had some sense knocked into me after being pushed against the wall, but I looked this fellow square in the eye and informed him I was NOT that kind of girl and I would NOT sleep with him. I'm sure I was quite convincing in bra and underwear. However, he took me for my word and we agreed this had just been a one time thing. He wouldn't even tell me his name and I gave him a fake one. 

Two weeks later, I get a friend request on Facebook. Oh, hello guy from the stairwell. I still have no idea how he found me, but after we got past the awkwardness of my fake name giving being uncovered, we talked a bit and have kept up over break. He goes to school nearby and now wants to go on some sort of date this weekend. 

He's certainly nice enough, but I definitely had my beer goggles on that night. Plus, I see face-to-face conversation being limited at best. There's only so much time you can fondly look  back on a thirty minute ordeal. 

"Oh, haha, remember that time you did some serious searching on Facebook to find me after you wouldn't give me your name?" The future grandkids will love that story.

Rest In Peace, You Wascally Rabbit.

After almost eight years, my bunny died today.

 I know that the death of a childhood pet is part of growing up for most people. I just didn't expect to be this upset. 

When we first got him he was about as awkward as I was, a scared little ball of fluff in the back of the cage. For the first few weeks, I'd sit down in the basement and do my homework on the floor with the cage open until he felt comfortable enough to approach anyone. 

After countless fights with my parents, breaking up with my boyfriend and getting rejected from my top choice university, I cried into his fur while he licked my face and tried to eat my hair. 

And during insomnia filled breaks from college, I'd lay on the couch while he snored in the corner.

He'd be acting a little weird lately and while I knew he was certainly getting old, I was optimistic it was just a stage. Then tonight while hopping around the basement, he laid down. As I was getting up to pet him, he started having a seizure and died while I was petting him and yelling for my parents. 

Rest in Peace Bugsy. I hope bunny heaven is full of bananas and cheerios. 

2009, so far you've been nothing but bad news.

You Want to Put WHAT In my Mouth??

An Open Letter to All Dentists:

I appreciate all that you do - personally, I would not want to stare into the mouths of strangers all day (even if they did pay well). This is why I generally limit my contact with strange mouths to dimly lit hallways after much liquor consumption - after all, alcohol kills germs and everyone knows the dark kills ugliness. 

HOWEVER, if you are going to scrape apart my gums while trying to scrape goo off my teeth, do not yell at me for  bleeding, apparent evidence of not flossing enough. 

That's like a doctor yelling at you for breaking your ankle if you fall 20 feet: "Should have drank more milk...."

It's 2009. We've put a man on the moon and I can lurk strangers with my iPhone. There has got to be a better way to clean teeth.

In other news, I think my bangs are an absolute disaster. They looked amazingly cute upon leaving the hair salon. When left to my own devices, however,  my hair looks like a mix of a 14 year old emo boy and 1985. 

Looks like the next few months will be spent avoiding cameras and untagging pictures on facebook at record speed while awaiting the bangs to grow out....

On that note, it's raining and icing out. I'm going back to bed.

Morality for Beautiful Girls

It's only five days into the new year and already I've found a resolution I really should have included: No homewrecking.

No, but seriously.

It's not something I'm proud of, but in 2008, I inadvertently ended one relationship, hooked up with one guy with a serious girlfriend (that I was unaware of) and engaged in countless flirtations  with attached menfolk.

I'm all for female empowerment, but few things feel worse than being the eternal mistress. It essentially boils down to a "Hey! You're awesome, but not awesome enough to date" slap in the face. Plus, I'm sure I'm not sending the best romantic karma into the world.

What really grates on me is that these guys push the issue even if I offer resistance in the form of "Hey, remember your girlfriend?" it seems to have no impact. They just don't seem to care. Now I'm not one to group all guys together, but when did it fall to me to be a pillar of morality?

I can't be trusted alone in a room with a freshly iced cake, let alone with  an attractive man. 

It's only January 5th and already I've had this resolution tested three times. 

1. The Flying Dutchman. This one's an on-going issue. Back in February, I was at a conference and met this incredibly attractive, charming Dutch guy. We had an amazing night together and (of course), I had to leave the next day. The entire 10 hour drive home was spent exchanging really cute text messages at extremely high international rates; I was utterly charmed. When I brought up us being Facebook friends, he admitted he had a confession: He had a girlfriend, but it was long distance, as he went to school in the Netherlands and she was in UCLA so they weren't that serious.

Well, ten months, countless inappropriate behavior via webcam and many attempts at sweet talking later, they're still together. This summer, he was in Los Angeles, working for the Dutch government. He offered to fly to DC, wine me, dine me, take me to an event at the Dutch embassy, the whole shebang, if only it ended with...well...she banging, pardon my pun. 

Now he's looking to go to grad school in DC and has excitedly told me of his big plans for his arrival here in the fall. Apparently there was some sort of language issue, because I don't think he caught my sarcasm about  how much his girlfriend will surely love him being in the US. I've already decided I'm not going to answer his calls when he gets here.

I frequently debate sending his girlfriend a tell all facebook message, but her family flew to the Netherlands to spend Christmas with his family. That's a lot of foundation to shake.

2. The Irishman. Maybe my problem here is international types. I knew  this guy when we went to middle school together. Inevitably he left, returning to his native Ireland. Reunited by the glories of the internet, we've started talking lately. A lot. Our conversations vary between the dynamics of the European Union and our mutual attraction.

He's going to school in New York and we've talked a lot about me coming to visit. The other day we go into an argument; apparently I'm being a tease because I wasn't planning on visiting for a few months (after he's single; I have little faith in the strength of most college relationships). He wanted me to visit at the end of January, so long as I wouldn't mind not going to parties (he wouldn't want his girlfriend to find out). 

His rationale is he would love to date me...if only I was in the same state. But because I'm not, there's no reason we can't "enjoy" one another while going on with our normal, at home lives. I've always hated this saying, but the situation really can be summed up with "You can't have your cake and eat it too."

3. The Southern Gentleman. This one's actually occurring as I type this. This one is another on-going, long distance flirtation. We used to talk nightly and joke about dating when he moved to DC for a government job. We'd be like something out of the West Wing. 

He got a girlfriend in mid-November and clearly the content of our conversations changed. That is, until tonight, when he tried to initiate some AIM dirty talking (oh baby, nothing is quite as sexy). 

The guy's supposed to crash in my apartment for the inauguration, but I'm tempted to text him tomorrow canceling his reservation.

I know this is a bit long, but I'm just so frustrated. I don't think I'm stuffy or a prude but it seems like my thoughts on fidelity are like something out of Camelot when compared with popular opinion.

First let me begin with a bit of a preface: This is my second, recent blog. I started blogging as a way to share my (mostly amusing) weekend conquests with friends in one, concise location and not much more. However, I'm trying to expand my network a bit and to be entirely honest, while funny, the image of a drunken trollop isn't exactly an accurate one of me. Not really wanting all my friends to read anything too personal, I've started this blog. I'm keeping the old one and still posting the most amusing weekend adventures.

You can read it here: Green Line Coed

Now onto a bit of substance.

Maybe I'm a bit late, but I figure a post about resolutions is certainly in order, if only so I can look back at this on December 31st, 2009 and chuckle at my ambitions. 

For this, I think its necessary to quote my favorite blogger, Ms. Bridget Jones.

Resolution 1: Will Obviously lose 20lbs. The standard female resolution

Resolution 2: Always put last night's panties in the laundry basket.  In my case, will stop throwing my shoes about the apartment upon arriving home from the bar. Locating said shoes is tiring, especially when they're under furniture, and I don't know how much more the walls can take.

Resolution 3: Will find nice, sensible boyfriend and stop forming romantic attachments to any of the following: alcoholics, workoholics, sexaholics, commitment-phobics, peeping toms, megalomaniacs, emotional fuckwits or perverts. While men like this certainly make my love life more...interesting, I think a shift from 'interesting' to 'stable' may be in order. In my defense, I've never had a fling with a peeping tom...to my knowledge.

So here's to a new year, a new blog, new hair (something resembling bangs for the first time since I was 8...), a new wardrobe (professional clothing? ack) and a new start.