MASH

In my boredom of waiting for a man to text me back so that I could zoom around with him on the ocean of love (yeah, I'm corny), I started reading old blog posts of my favorite blogs including Kissing and Other Disasters.

And APPARENTLY the internet has a MASH game, and since I love MASH, because yes I'm still enjoying the memories of my childhood I needed to play.

But a crash course for those who don't know. Mash is a game where you write down a lot of potential choices and then you pick a number and you cross out a choice every time your number hits. So eventually you're left with one in every category and your future written for the world to see.

Here's my future.

You will marry THEMARINE. Oh Dear God, I just put him in as a joke and now my life is forever joined!? Well He's got a great smile, thick eyebrows, his personality, and an AWESOME group of friends going for him, so I'll deal, as long as it means many more nights running through Dupont till 5 AM throwing people in fountains and singing bad 80s music.


This is him right after he snorted a line of pepper with my friend R. They won $2.50 a piece for this bet. (30 mins later I took two shots of salt water in order for his best friend to pay for my Red Velvet Cake from Afterwords Cafe in Dupont Circle, So I'm not really judging him for this).

After a wild honeymoon, you will settle down in Aruba in your fabulous House, because he wont want to live in Texas, and Mississippi is just too backwoods for even my southern sensibilities, even if he does have a lucrative future in the construction industry. I'm going to need to start working on my beach bod.

You will have 2 kids together, and those poor-unfortunate-short-children will sport my giant hands, feet and teeth AND his thick eyebrows, button nose, and a certain affinity for tattoos. They will forever be made fun of until the end of times. I see getting a lot of blame for their troll like appearance when they reach puberty, but they'll be descendants of Robert the Bruce and the 1st governor of Puerto Rico, so they can shut their traps, it's all about the Pedigree.

The family will zoom around in a Blue Pontiac Vibe. No van driving, soccer mom here. With its sleek lines and roomy interior, I'll be able to fit our whole family and all the baseball gear ever needed! Yes, I will be the baseball mom everyone wants to be.



You will spend your days as a Film Editor, and live happily ever after, hopefully working along side Mira Nair or Paul Verhoeven, but if they're not making films in Aruba, I might be stuck editing SCUBA diving tourist videos... damn my life and how hard it sounds.


If you'd like to play the MASH game online visit this website http://www.espin.com/mash-game.php

Prince Charming

Tall, dark, and handsome. The perfect qualities of a perfect man, so everyone tells you from the moment your old enough to understand the three words. And let me tell you, he had them all. I saw him everywhere, in the dining hall, in the District, on the metro bus, on the shuttle bus, everywhere.

Every time I saw him, it was the exact same situation.

I'd be chatting with a friend and see a tall lumbering figure out of the corner of my eye. I'd look and say, "damn he's tall." I'd look again and say "damn he's attractive." (Originality is my strong point).



He had to be at least 7 feet tall and he had piercing brown eyes; hair that said, "I'm too cool for a comb," and one of those very very 2000ish-soul-patches, which while slightly ridiculous, doubled his devil may care appearance.

During winter he was a sight, walking around in a brown leather bomber jacket with a long and flowing autumnal scarf striped with color. It could be 88 or 12 degrees and still he'd wear the exact same outwear.

From seeing came bumping into. No not bumping into, SLAMMING into. I'd put down my Tasty Dining Room (TDR) tray and turn around, run right into his chest, stand in shock, murmur apologies, and run away as fast as possible. The same thing happened when entering buildings. I'd be freezing my southern butt off and run into Hurst (American University classroom building) and slam into someone exiting. I'd look up; it'd be him, and I'd freeze and run away, because even Snow White ran away from her Prince Charming, sure it was because his step mother wanted her dead, but in my case my mouth became hostile, turning against me, refusing to work. My vocal cords were of no help either producing mere squeaks and croaks.

...

After months and months of my slamming my head into his chest, we flowed into a smiling acquaintance, both never stepping over the line to introduce ourselves, until one fateful winter day. I was wasting time before a class sitting with a book in the lobby of Hurst. The change of classes started, and I looked up. Tall, dark, and dreamy was walking by and out of the building; he smiled his big, loping grin and out he went.

I looked down at my watch and saw that I needed to go to class, so, I packed up my book grabbed my bag and stood up, planting my face into his chest.

His big-leather-bound-autumn-scarfed-chest. In case you've never walked face first into a tree, let me describe it for you. It's big and unyielding to your nose.

Of course my nose starts to bleed, because that's what my nose does. He apologizes profusely with his dreamy accent (which I had never heard before) and sticks out his hand.

"Hello I am Prince Charming, and I have a story to tell you."

With one hand on my nose, I outstretched my other one and introduced myself, and because I had one hand holding my nose, I sounded less like an enticing college co-ed and more like a creepy male chipmunk.

"There was once this Nobel Laureate named Dario Fo. He was casting a play with his director and sees this headshot of a beautiful woman. He tells the director, this woman is the woman I'm going to marry."

"Haha, don't we all."

"No no, wait. The director ends up casting her in his play and Dario refuses to talk to her. He ignores her for 6 months because he can't bring himself to talk to her because nothing he could say would be as beautiful as this woman. She however, gets horribly fed up and one day after rehearsal, she grabs him and throws him up against a wall and kisses him with such passion it is still today unrivaled."

Yeah I'm still sitting here hand on bleeding nose and mouth agape trying to breathe as my head tries to ascertain where this story is going.

He continues, "he proposes to her on the spot, and they've been married now for 50 something years."

"Wow, that's amazing."

"I know, so tell me about you."

I think I gagged. I can't be sure, but I do know after this passionate story told by this beautiful man the only thing that sputtered out of my mouth was, "I like hockey... and uh.... yeah, I can't really follow that, but I uh, I have to run to the bathroom before I run to class."

"We'll talk later. I see you everywhere." He smiled and shook my free hand.

...

A year later, I run into him again crossing Dupont Circle, his tall frame making even the trees seem short. We stare at each other as if we've just seen a Flying Purple People Eater and stop for a brief chat. His shaggy hair blowing in the wind he smiles, "what happened? I never saw you again, we really should. Hey, you want to get dinner with me?"

"Like a date?"

"Yes."

"I'm so sorry, I can't," I grimaced as I thought, 'I'm dating your much shorter twin who knows it's not ok to have a soul patch and who doesn't make it impossible to follow a story,' "I have a boyfriend."

His grin turned sad, "All the good ones get away."

After some brief conversation about what we were doing, we hugged, and he walked away, my eyes following his ex-serbian-national-basketball-playing-frame down the street, watching the future that could have been.



--Note: Prince Charming is now happily married, living in NYC as a PHD Candidate.--

21 Ways to Not Pick Up Guys at a Bar

1. Bring your yoga mat to the bar, past 10 p.m., how "hip," also known as female version of douche, also known as hitting everyone around you, every time you turn around. There's only so many times I can be smacked with a sweaty mat until I punch you ma'am.
2. Tell him you want to be the father of his children, and you have a great surrogate friend, they don't have to do anything, you'll even provide the sperm.
3. Drink Shirley Temples (and not the dirty kind).
4. Go with your mother, who may or may not be wearing a fanny pack
5. Go with your father, who may or may not be carrying a shotgun

6. Wear those comfy sweatpants, or PJs, not the sexy ones.
7. Go to a gay bar, and be straight.
8. Tell him you’re glad to be with a man again since you just got out of jail.
9. Be 80 at a 20 year olds bar (I'm just saying everyone needs to pay attention to the age range of the bar they're in, and the classy range. If you're wearing cut offs and a belly shirt and everyone else is wearing cocktail attire, you're in the wrong bar.
10. Be the wasted cougar pouncing on boy meat.

11. Look/ dress like Snooki
12. Offer to do his tarot reading at the bar and tell him tonight he's meeting the love of his life, who just happens to look like you.
13. Insist that you have his perfect companion, your gay best friend. "Oh, you're straight you say? You might want to tell your glitterati pants that."
14. Tell him you want to do a naked painting of him starting now.
15. Tell him you want to make a dildo out of a mold of his penis. (Actually possible, I'm not making this up)

16. Tell him he reminds you of your mother.
17. Ask if he wants to get married. Right now.
18. Ask if he wants to be your prom date.
19. Ask if you can suck his blood because you’re a vampire. Pull out a knife and a goblet while asking.
20. Ask if he’s ever been tasered. Because you’re into that.

21. 5 words. Forget to bleach your moustache. While they're creepy on men, they're even doubly sketch when they're on a woman who's on a man.

-Post written in conjunction with readers and EA!

How Kryptonite is killing my Superwoman

"I watched the world float to the dark side of the moon
After all I knew it had to be something to do with you
I really don't mind what happens now and then
As long as you'll be my friend at the end

And if I go crazy then will you still call me Superman?
If I'm alive and well, will you be there holding my hand?
I'll keep you by my side with my superhuman might
Kryptonite

You call me strong, you call me weak
But still your secrets I will keep
You took for granted all the times
I never let you down"

- Kryptonite, 3 Doors Down



Over 5 years ago, I met a devilishly charming guy and fell heels over head for him (yeah, try falling down, while upside down; it's difficult) and entertained a complicated and confusing and satisfying(I think) relationship that never goes away (It's like Joan Rivers just when you think she's going to kick the bucket...). To keep people from intimating who he is, I'm going to call him Mr. Kryptonite, which is a far cry from the array of nicknames he's been dubbed in the past.

In those 5 years we have dated/hooked-upped with/cuddled with/flirted with/been in relationships with a shit ton of other people, but somehow, when the forces that made the heavens and earth align and something causes other interactions outside of us to end... aka the explosion of a distant planet. Debris hits my world, and I'm left standing there with a giant green rock and a severely diminished "Go Forth and Conquer the Dating World" Mentality.

And believe you me... I have an amazingly large "Go Forth and Conquer the Dating World" Mentality. Try coming from a town with only 1000 other people, you learn too much about potential boyfriends.

So here again the Kryptonite has entered my world and thrown my dating life into a shambles. What I previously thought was good and right is now subpar and depressing in comparison to the could haves and the should bes. Even though all of the odds are against it, and the odds that it will happen are equal to someone being in a plane crash twice. It's like a bad dive in a soccer game. I know I'm going to end up with my hands thrown in the air going, "seriously!?" Everyone knows it's messed up, but everyone also know it's going to happen irregardless.

I think the psychologist in me would say that, 'the main part of me savors being weak and vulnerable, because for the most part I've beaten that part of me into submission,' like a circus bear on a ball wearing a clown costume, which is why I keep finding myself holding this green rock in my hand. But that sudden injection of massive vulnerability also throws me for a loop. When I went to see him the other day, my palms went sweaty, my heart pounded in my chest like Ricky Ricardo playing Babaloo, and afterwards I think I was nauseas (still up for debate on that one).

Due to the "Go Forth and Conquer the Dating World" Mentality I've experienced my fair share of heart ache, as well as, being the bringer of it. So I've built myself a tower to protect me from being vulnerable, and from my tower, I perch looking for shiny pebbles in the world below, which aren't going to upend my world, like Kryptonite does. And you know how hard it is to uphold your tower when someone knows everything about how you built it and has the blueprints in their pocket?

I'm not going to bore you with the story of our first kiss or boring flirtations or how everyone around us can feel the tension (Seriously, people, everyone). I just want you to know this for future reference. He's the trump. He's Mr. Big. He's Heathcliff and Mr. Rochester and Mr. Darcy and Professor Bhaer rolled into one person and at the end of the day for all the aches and annoyances he's caused, due to how good the good is when it's good, I'd probably give up my left foot if he needed it, which would piss all of my friends off, but 'hey he needs it, and I didn't like walking all that much anyway!'

And this drives me crazy, but clearly my nose and those damned pheromones and my body don't care about history or feelings. They just know about the here and now. Maybe one day I'll give them a history lesson that they'll actually pay attention to.

El Politico

I have officially made my way through the trifecta of DC dating.

1. State Department (aka Mr Perfect for his girlfriend)
2. Aspiring Businessman (aka Dick MacDickerson)
3. Capital Hill (aka El Politico)

If this isn't a current trifecta, I'm making it one.

In this great moment of my life, I would like to thank all those that got me where I am today... Except for Dick MacDickerson, because he can bone a goat for all I care.

But I'd like to know when can I stop? Seriously, no, but really. Where does the love metro stop? How many lines are there and shouldn't I be able to transfer from the crazy train to the nice train, again,
or the devilishly handsome train...?
or the swarthy millionaire train?
I really hope I didn't grab the unlimited fare card when I boarded... because I'm seriously tired of dating right now...

A couple of weeks ago I went out on a date with a guy I had drunkenly (You don't have to confirm that I'm a superstar) kissed several times in Madhatter (one of my finer moments as proved by the thumbs up of my friends).

To admit that I was wary of the date would be an understatement because need I remind you (1) I was inebriated when I met him and (2) He met inebriated me before sober me and inebriated me likes to talk more than sober me... so he was up for some sincere disappointment if he thought I was about to chit-chat his ear off, but since he was a friend of a friend of a friend OR a friend of a girlfriend of an acquaintance depending on how you look at it... and since I realized I'm not getting any younger and this might be the prime of my life... I went.

Now, I have gone out with some choice people that I've met in bars, we have Dick MacDickerson,
Mr. Perfect for his Girlfriend,
Mr. I'M SO FUCKING IN LOVE WITH YOU (ask Blair, this was an experience way beyond our years, and I'm so sorry she had to listen to this all the way back to the metro),
then there was Mr. Continuously on a Diet,
MMA Fighter of Everyone else's dreams,
and Sir SigmaChi (This list is about as long as my legs, and while they're not Rockette length, they're not short either so I'm cutting myself off - kind of how I cut the majority of these men off after date one).

The date went quite well actually I'd give it a 4 out of 5 even though I awkwardly chose Pizza as my entree and used my hands at a pretty high class restaurant, when he did not have pizza and therefore I looked like a picky child who didn't want to eat grown up food. I'm not sure whether it was done to make me look less like an infant or if it's an actual etiquette thing, but he ate his asparagus with his hands, which he insisted was the proper thing to do..

And for the first time, of dating someone I've met in questionable origin.. I'm gonna say that El Politico is a decent bloke. A right ole good chap. One of the good guys.

And we have a lot in common for the most part...
I'm Quirky; he wears pastel animal pants and admits it.
I like singing Shania Twain songs; he suggests country songs to his rock band (actual band not xbox).
I like food; he likes food.
He likes to party with his homies; I like dancing with my homies.
I love my family; he loves his family.
I play scrabble; he appeases my addiction.
I drive a car; he drives a car...
You get the point, right?
On and on and on like Alice's Restaurant (if you don't know what that is, look it up).

But what makes this fellow stand above the pack is his ability to admit his flaws from the get-go, his tendency to take my well-being into account (instead of taking me back to his place the night we met, where I'd be horribly drunk and vulnerable. He sat with me till dawn in Dupont Circle letting me sober up, allowing me to get in a taxi, to get to my car, to sleep in my car for a few hours, to drive home - Yes. I am classy.), as well as, his civility and the fact he wore a suit on our first date.

Hello, I think I hit the big leagues. Up until this date, my dates either wore khakis and a polo or blue jeans and a button up. One extremely classy yay-hoo actually wore athletic shorts and a cut-off t-shirt, so I'm going to take a moment to pat myself on the back for the little step I made in my dating life.

.
.
.

O.k. done.

So as I see where the last piece of my trifecta leads me, I'm not sure. I know we have future date plans, but I'm actually pretty nervous due to my inability to deal properly with my Mr. Kryptonite (aka a really long blog for another day) and how he always shows up at just the right moment to mess up all my current plans and have me sitting there at home, alone at the end of a few months saying, "Shit!" to myself over and over again, while I shove cotton candy ice cream down my trap.

Sometimes I just wish Mr. Kryptonite would stick around, but bizarre elements from another world rarely stay around...

Mom's Blog

So I recently told my mother about being ditched via text message by dick macdickerson, and she had a marvelous little motherly gem which I'll share with you. Granted, yes, it's my mother essentially telling me how awesome I am, but it is relevant to those who think that there are many more fish in the sea.

"There are lots of fishes in the sea and you just have to have the right one take the bait and hook! and he will never want to be let go!!!! and he will never let anything come between the bait and the catcher of said "fish"!

You will know a keeper when you find one! And if he is tooo fish brained to know a keeper when he finds one (i.e. you), he is no catch at all! Throw him back and forget him!!!

Me, I prefer a fish who will swim after me, around and through all obstacles in the way. Not stopping to play with the dolphins (floozy-woozies) but going past the sharks (really really floozy-woozies that you would not want to bring home to momma), and across the ocean if need be, while letting me know he cares enough to take the time to "catch" me!

Getting caught by a keeper is soooo much more fun!
So I say, good riddance to Mister Text message breakup weinee breath man, You've got bigger fish to fry!"

And by jove if my momma ain't right. If we waste our time on focusing on the losers who swim with the floozy-woozies and who are more focused on increasing their personal wealth or so focused on becoming the next head of JP Morgan, etc... that they don't take time to appreciate the people in their lives, it's not worth the trouble even bait your line, because if all you have at the end of the day is a pile full of money and no one to spend it with/on then what are you aside from Jefri Bolkiah. And seriously while you may party and drink and booze till your little heart is content, the relationships/friendships/love you're missing out on is your own. damn. fault.

So the key, I believe, is to focus on the keepers when you find them and ignore the floozy-woozies (not that I'm knocking it, sometimes it's nice for some floozy-ing and woozy-ing) and the people so career focused they can't take time to stop and smell the roses, because seriously, if they aren't making time for you now, they're not going to make time for you later, and in the end, they weren't a keeper to begin with.

P.S. there's a marvelous little book written by a lady named Jillian Lauren about being part of Jefri Bolkiah's Harem. You should check it out!

George, Oh how I knew him...

So I recently returned from a cruise to the caribbean on the Royal Caribbean ship, Serenade of the Seas, which went to two of my favorite islands, Aruba and Curacao, hopefully one day this blog will be called Married in Curacao (one can dream). Anyway, while on the trip I met some killer people including Antish, Jorge, Jorge, Emilio and George. (yes Jorge and Jorge... and George)

Now everyone was pretty baller, and my family and I had a great time, but what this trip has taught me is invaluable.

George was a young teacher from Connecticut, who would meet me on the field of trivia battle. I came with my army of family and he came... by himself (it's like David and Goliath, except we're not evil). Every trivia George, solo, would put up a feisty fight against us, and in some cases he would kill us bare handed and at other times, we handed him his head on a plate. But one day George arrived and my army had dwindled to just myself and a cousin, so we joined forces, where together, we killed the other foes and won crappy blue things. Thus started our friendship. After playing trivia with George instead of against him, the curtains were dropped and it became quite apparent to me that aside from being horribly intelligent, he was horribly awesome-kick-ass. The only flaw I could determine on George aside from being equal heights, which isn't his flaw (I'm blaming my dad for being abnormally tall and diluting my mother's short genes) was the fact that he lives in Connecticut.

Not that I have anything against Connecticut, aside from it's distance in regards to DC, which is TOO FAR.

I am the queen of Long Distance Relationships. QUEEN. My first boyfriend was long distance (I was under 16, he didn't have a car and the 30 miles was a huge gap in my mind). My 1st manfriend was long distance when I came to college and that ended beautifully, by beautifully I mean not. at. all. Next came the end of the semester boys who would edge into the summer, where things typically petered out. There were cruise staffers, which I'd keep in touch with, and they'd profess their love and desire to visit me, but how awkward is it to invite a guy you've only known for a week to spend a week with you in the dorms? Then the cruise staff love of my life, which ended when my parents wouldn't let me take cruises without them to visit him, and they hid my passport. Then the LDR from Hell (still hate the state of Tennessee). I've seen LDRs start and fail and I've also seen them flourish and last for years on end. So I know what works, doesn't work, and why I'm not about to try it again.

At one point in time during my college career, I actually developed a 2 hour documentary on Long Distance Relationships, which I'm sure my Producing Class thoroughly judged me for (I've had some development gems - Rubbed Raw, A shitty toilet paper documentary & Winded, a short script about Rhett Butler returning to be someone's guardian angel. I'm surprised I wasn't blackballed by the serious film students...).

My lesson of George is this.
I refuse to be a long distance relationship kind of girl any longer, and while George was this amazing guy/catch, a real keeper if you will, I couldn't do it. Much to the chagrin of my brother's girlfriend, I refused to give George my number. And much to George's chagrin, I refused to take his. Because I'm not the kind of girl who can believe that her LDR-manfriend isn't finding closer-distance-chicks when they get drunk or frisky or just be themselves, because at the end of the night, I recognize that I too, would prefer the company of someone closer versus cradling the phone to my ear.

This isn't to say that I'm refusing to date quality men. It's a refusal to nudge myself into something that for me, never works out. I'm going to admit it. I can't do it. It's not a talent I have. And as I sit here pondering what life could have been like had I just said, you know what. Totally doable! I can also imagine what my life would have been like had it not worked out.

My brother's girlfriend reprimanded me about the number. She said, "you know you're not following your own advice to put yourself out there..." and she's right, but I'm also following my gut in the fact that I know me well enough to know the heart break at the end of the day in this case, just would have been too brutal.

Now don't take this post the wrong way, there are cases where LDRs work brilliantly and some couples can make them work and still share a deep love and connection. What I'm saying is that for me to have a LDR work, it would need to rest on some serious trust, love, regular communication & feelings-sharing (not that I'm all too good at feelings-sharing myself), and a shit ton of visits.

Maybe you have some suggestions? If so, I'd love to hear them.