::asian freckles::

CAW CAW, ROOAR!

We saw "Up" Monday night. Have you seen it? You should see it, in 3D if you can. You should even go early to catch the trailers! Because there's a trailer for the new "Ice Age" movie! And, yeah, I know, I rolled my eyes as soon as I saw they were making another "Ice Age" movie, except-- are you ready? Are you ready for this? THERE ARE DINOSAURS. There are dinosaurs in "Ice Age 3", and they are in 3D, and I almost shook TheNoah's leg off in excitement as I watched the trailer. Dinosaurs!

But, "Up". It was lovely and adorable and funny and so well-done. There was this part where Carl (the old man) is trying to walk with Russell (the 8-year-old (Asian!) wilderness scout), and Russell is so over walking and is literally being dragged forward, and it was more or less how TheNoah and I were at one point during the Point Reyes camping trip (except I wasn't as vocal about not wanting to walk anymore). After unsuccessfully trying to complain his way to a break, though, Russell suddenly flings himself face-down onto the ground, which I regrettably did not think of doing but have made a mental note to attempt in the future-- and, anyway, the point is, adorable. "Up" is adorable.

You'd have thought it was some sort of heart-breaking drama, though, if you'd watched me watching it. I cried through a startling amount of it. It was just so sentimental-- like in the beginning, right, Carl stumbles upon this boisterous girl when they're both little kids, and then you see them getting married and going through their whole lives together, and through this whole speechless montage, maybe 15 minutes into the movie, tears are pouring down my face and all I can think is: I want that.

It wasn't anything revelatory; I've known since the beginning that this is what I want, this, a lifetime spent with TheNoah, a life shared with him. But it really hit me, then, just how much I want it, how much it means to me. It's the hardest wish I've got, but there's nothing that can guarantee its fulfillment. Not a ring, not a ceremony, not the sincerest mutual offerings of love everlasting-- nothing, there is nothing in this world that can promise more time. And admonishments to just be grateful for the time I have now mean nothing. I *am* grateful. But I'm greedy. More. I will always want more time with him. [1] (Speaking of wanting more time: have you seen this? Thai life insurance ads. Oh my god.)

Anyway. Really, go see "Up" (in 3D!-- it's worth the extra three bucks or whatever they charge for the glasses, or at least, it is the first time [2]), and if you don't know what it's supposed to be about (other than something to do with a house tied to balloons), it'll be that much better. I had no idea what the plot concerned-- I thought it was going to be something like "The Twenty-One Balloons" (which is such a good book)-- and I think I loved the movie just a little bit more because of it.

That's it. You have your orders. I'll try and post a little more frequently since apparently there are still people reading this (other than TheNoah, who I think just checks in to see if I've written about him, and if I have, to make sure that I haven't posted the picture of the connect-the-freckle-dots dinosaur I drew on his back), but given that my current posting rate is something like three a month, don't get too hopeful.

In the meanwhile, do you know who David Thorne is? He writes things to people and posts it on the Internet. I'd start with "I'll spend the money on drugs instead" (a.k.a. Seven-Legged Spider), then "The ducks in the bathroom are not mine", and then Bill's Internet Guide. From there, the choices are plentiful. And that oughta keep you busy until I get back.

   

  

 
[1] It's a little ironic that I should be wanting more time now when until a few years ago, I honestly never thought I'd live past 40. Forty years seemed like a perfectly reasonable amount of time to be alive and curious and interesting and interested. That's love for you, though, always coming in and messing up the plans you've had for years and making you rethink your priorities.

[2] I got a little overenthusiastic about the 3D glasses and put them on as soon as we sat down, and I kept insisting to TheNoah (who kept taking his off) that look! this is in 3D! and how 3D today is so different from 3D when we were kids, when things leaped out at you (whereas today, the depth goes *into* the screen, if that makes any sense), and on and on and on I went about why the 3D stuff we were watching wasn't as good as the old-style 3D... and then finally after a trailer for something, there was a still frame that said "Please put on your 3D glasses now". Whereupon TheNoah gave me a withering look. Whereupon, classic Lora style, I indignantly insisted that everything we'd just watched had too been in 3D. Whereupon TheNoah demonstrated how brilliant he is by responding with absolutely nothing.

Notice of Public Outing

I was going to wait until I had a more monumental/shock-value post to submit, but last night, I guess in an attempt to distract me from my slow and miserable descent into Feverish Ew, we decided to finally make our relationship public to the Internets.

And by "we" I mean "he", and by "he" I mean "Noah Kagan".

So, yeah. We've plastered our status everywhere and it's vaguely tempting to be more obnoxious about it. It's ironic; he's been telling everyone (in person) we've been dating pretty much since Day One, referencing this site and sending them over here-- when logistically, *I* should have been the one name-dropping and bragging. Because, holy crap, it's Noah Kagan.

But understandably, not everyone is fanatical about All Things Online, so not everyone sees the immediate significance attributed to being with someone like him. Like my mom. My mom kept asking me about Noah, what he does and who he is, and the only thing I could think of in reply was, "He's kind of a big deal on the Internet." I could have sent her his resume, sure, but what good is that to someone who has never heard of Facebook or Mint?

Actually, he's kind of a big deal *off* the Internet, too, but probably 90% of everyone he knows, he's met through the Internet (uh, like me (due to this post)). But either way-- some items of interest about Noah, just for your inquiring eyes:

1. Andrew Chen referred to Noah as "the golden child of Silicon Valley".
2. You could think of Noah as the Tila Tequila of Facebook. Except Noah's a dude, he's not bisexual, and he's not a slut or publicity whore.
3. He was mentioned in Rolling Stone for having put together Entrepreneur27 (the article was about Internet-based "baby billionaires").
4. His company made, then sold, the Facebook revival of "Oregon Trail".
5. Everyone who knows Noah knows, at the very least, this: he is passionate about burritos.
6. Actually, the only reason I have a Facebook account to begin with is because Noah made me one. I was two years out of college and Facebook had yet to open membership to non-college students (and I had no interest in Facebook anyway), so he created my account for me. I have never changed the password, which means if his memory doesn't fail him, he could, at any time, log in to my account.
7. He bought me this alligator for my birthday, and-- with the exception of in class-- you'll be hard-pressed to find me without it these days.
8. He is implacably outraged that Two Buck Chuck actually costs $3 here in Vegas. I never hear the end of it.
9. He despises Twitter, and it's a sore point for him that Twitter is how we reconnected after something like two years.
10. Noah once impulsively decided to drive from Austin to Vegas (in the middle of the night) just to see me. He made it as far as El Paso before realizing that flying would get him here faster.

And we're together. It still boggles my mind, but don't think I'm not grateful for it, for him, every single day. He's awesome, and he thinks *I'm* awesome (which is awesome), and I finally have someone to whom I could appropriately give this card.

Love: it's sappy and eye-rolling, true, but with the dismal state of so much else in the world, a good heaping dose of love added to the mix could hardly hurt. And that's all I've got.

Or, "Everything that is past is prologue to this." *

I don't check my stats or referrers but once in a blue moon these days. I used to sort-of care, I used to be motivated to try and generate (and retain) new traffic, except then I came to my senses and realized that if I wasn't actively recruiting new readers, I didn't have to actively produce interesting content. I didn't even have to produce content, period! (Friends, never underestimate the trump power of the Lazy card.) And while it's not that I consider all this to be a worthless read... I don't know. If people wander over here on their own accord-- it's in the public domain and shows up in query results and I've posted the link to it on other site profiles-- that's fine. But I can't justify, in my own head, asking people to come here. When I hung out with Megan in Berkeley, she asked me who I wrote for, and I'm pretty sure I told her I didn't know. I still don't. Every once in a while, I'll write with a particular person or group of people in mind, but for the most part, this is really just a self-involved dumping ground for narcissism. I write for my own amusement, or as some strange little test to make sure that I still exist. As such, I assume that the only people who regularly check in here do so out of a curiosity about or interest in who I am, because you're not going to get a whole lot else out of my posts. My post topics are all over the map 'cause *I'm* all over the map.

But anyway. Stats! I think I've finally stopped getting hits for searches on freckled dog porn, but tonight I saw that someone clicked through to the Annex after a search on the meaning behind Mason Jennings' "Darkness Between the Fireflies" and I got really excited. Dude! That was the second song of his I ever heard (the first being "Butterfly", and of course it was the Pablo Honey who introduced me to him) and it took me a few weeks to warm to it (and him), but when I did? Boy howdy did I warm.

This song in particular, though: I love this song because of how shrug-your-shoulders honest and frank it is, without turning cynical or pessimistic or unkind. Honey, you want to know what this song is about? This song is about not falling for all that fairy-tale schlock and Disney idealism regarding love, but conceding that there is no such thing as "one and only true love".

You should know by now
That someone's always been there
Long before you
You're never going to be the only one

And honey I'm sure
That you've been in love before
Plenty of men have held high places in your eyes

At 24, I've been in real, actual, dig-your-toes-in-deep-and-hold-on love three times, and twice it was Big Big Love, and once it was with someone who had been in Big Big Love with at least one other woman before I'd come into his life. Falling in love happens, but so does falling out of love; the existence of the latter doesn't negate the existence of the former. Just because it didn't last or turn into till-death-do-you-part doesn't mean it wasn't real. Having loved someone before doesn't make you incapable of fully and wholly loving someone else later on, and loving someone now doesn't invalidate the love you had for someone else once upon a prior time. Change happens, change is happening all around us, all the time. And sometimes it's the world, sometimes it's your life, sometimes it's your mind, and sometimes-- it's your heart. What can you do? Other than accept the way of it all and move forward and hope that there isn't much wreckage in the aftermath-- and understand that countless others are going through the exact same thing, so be good and give them the benefit of the doubt should your paths happen to cross.

As for the title of the song:

But jealousy has got no use for me
The past is beautiful
Like the darkness between the fireflies

This is what makes the song. This is what keeps it from taking that jaded tone (well, this and his excellent, excellent (albeit kinda quirky) voice). The literal imagery is easy enough to explain-- fireflies only glow so brightly because of the darkness that surrounds them. In full daylight, they're just another bug with wings; but at night? They become enchanting and alluring as they burn amber trails against the contrasting shadows of scenery.

In this same way, our pasts-- the parts of our lives which are always there, are always surrounding us, but on which we don't directly shine light-- make our presents (the part which *does* receive the spotlight) beautiful and are beautiful in their own way. Without our past, we wouldn't *be* in our present. If you find yourself caring about someone, you have to realize that regardless of how you approve or disapprove of that person's past, that past is what makes them the wonderful being you adore so much right now-- in love and in all other aspects of existence. Why be jealous when it's so much easier (and less painful) to be appreciative instead? You can't change the past and you can only aim for the future; but you can control your present. The present is all we really have, all we really know; it's wasted energy to focus so hard on everything else. So exist-- exist, and enjoy.

*You know, I've loved that monologue for years, but I'd only read it-- I'd never actually seen "Swingers" until last month. So I've never felt justified in quoting it until recently. It's such a great line, though.

Broken hearts can only end in irrational self-imposed ultimatums

I won't go into the details because 1) I'm writing this on a phone and as nice as qwerty keypads are, I still don't enjoy writing lengthy missives from them, and 2) I can't handle the details right now, anymore. I've spent the entire morning-- we're talking the last seven hours, what with time zones-- in tears. For once I'm grateful for the existence of Starbucks because I've been taking stashes upon stashes  of napkins from their kiosks.

But the short version is, these past two months, I've been struggling with the idea of giving up dance, and the thought alone of walking away from this absolutely breaks my heart. Last weekend, I came so close to closing that door and locking it for good that I spent an hour at SFO sobbing either in solitary corners at the gates or in the bathrooms. The reasons I have for giving it up are both valid and not-quite-valid, but either way, they are reasons and they are mine and their mere existence hurts me more than I can put into words.

Very closely related to, or even tied to, this is my recently developed relationship with Washington D.C. I've written a little, or maybe a lot depending on what you've been reading, about how in love with D.C. I've been since the first moment I ever landed at Reagan National back in August. About how conflicted I've been over the sense of home that D.C. provides me when I already have a home, a happy home with a thriving home life, back in Vegas.

Again, I won't detail pages of backstory, but the culmination is: I can't get home today. And it could very well be an isolated crisis-- I've gotten home with no issues all the other times-- but as of this very moment, I'm stranded in Chicago thanks to weathers and mechanicals and canceled flights that have created a sudden and enormous flux of people trying to go west. I can't even get to a city in my own time zone. It's far from ideal, not being home today, possibly not being able to get home tomorrow (there are literally multiple hundreds of other stranded people also trying to get west on flights that are oversold to begin with), but it's survivable-- but this isn't something I can chance happening again. So on top of being heartbroken this morning over leaving D.C. and probably not being able to go back there until November, if even then, now I'm suddenly facing the question of whether this is worth it, worth the consequences of not being home in time should I get stuck on the other side of the country again.

I love D.C. I never meant to, didn't expect to; but what's maybe even more surprising is that D.C. loves me back. I feel it every minute I'm there. It's not a perfect city, but I'm not a perfect person, and I've said all along that I love Las Vegas for *its* imperfections anyway. Vegas loves me, too, but Vegas was a home that gradually and inconspicuously grew to be such for me, whereas with D.C., the recognition was startling and instantaneous. But the point is, there's love and a sense of home in D.C. And the reason I'm making this point is because I want to clarify what it is I would be losing if I decided to stop making trips out there.

I'm attached enough as it is, and it's only been three weekends total. On Saturday, I was thinking about all the parts of D.C. I still want to see and explore, all the surrounding areas I still want to visit, and the number of weekends it would take to do all those things is soberingly-- not impossible, but certainly impractical. The more time I spend in D.C., the deeper my attachments to it grow, and the more I hate having to leave. And I just keep thinking, love isn't supposed to be this hard. Yes, love is about work and compromise and sacrifice, but it shouldn't be *this* hard. And I don't believe in the idea of "one" love, one real and true and great love, so it's not like I can make that excuse to myself, that I'm meant to be in D.C., that I will never find another place that appeals to and embraces me the way D.C. does. On top of which, if I'm going to go the "meant to be" route and throw in flighty ideas of fate and predestination, wouldn't there be an argument to be made along the lines of, if it's meant to be, in two years when I'm done with my civil program, D.C. will still be around, will still welcome me with open arms? Or in two years, the dance scene will still be going strong and I'll fall back into it like I never left. If it's meant to be.

Except even then. Even in two years. I can't leave Vegas. How can I leave? My life is there. I wanted a career there. I wanted to fix it, to save it. How could I abandon that desert, that place that has forgiven me time and time again all my failures and flaws and infidelities? I don't enjoy not being there. Despite the happiness and fulfillment bracketed within the various destinations for which I've left Vegas weekend after weekend these past two months, I don't enjoy leaving home.

I don't know what I'll end up deciding. I have four weeks to really think about things, to think about what I'm willing to sacrifice and to make charts and graphs detailing cost-benefit equations. Four weeks to think about the possible directions my life will go after my birthday passes at the end of December. Though of course all I really want is to make a decision now and be done with it-- only, I know I would choose to give up. No more, I don't want to go through this struggle anymore, I don't want to feel this ache of missing and wanting anymore. I'd rather have nothing, have a peaceful life of calm neutrality. I spent ten years of my life-- if not more-- stuck on the roller coaster ride of following and living with wild and unmetered passion, experiencing the most thrilling of summits only to be hanging on for dear life through the plunges that inevitably followed. I've had more or less three years of peace since having lost that kind of passion, and admittedly, I've missed the euphoric moments, but my god, I've not missed the price at which they came one bit.

It all boils down to, is it worth the fight? And more importantly: do I even have the strength to keep fighting for it?

This post is The Wife™ authorized and sponsored

My roommate's been having a dilemma, and we've been talking about it at length tonight: How do you tell someone that the friendship is over, that the friendship, to be gut-wrenchingly honest, had in fact dissolved some time ago? We debated that silence should be enough; she hasn't written back to the first e-mail, and she has no plans on responding to the second. She thinks that should be a pretty clear-cut message, but someone else voiced the opinion that she should at least write back for closure, write back and say, look, I know we used to be close and I'm grateful for all the good times we shared, but that closeness is long gone, I'm done, I don't want to play this game anymore, if you ever find yourself desperately needing my help in something important then don't hesitate in calling me, but otherwise please don't contact me from here on out.

We decided there should be some sort of official, issuable notice that she could send out. Like:

**** NOTICE ****

To Whom It May Concern:

On behalf of   [name here]  (here on referred to as "the Party"), this is a final notice to inform you that your services of friendship, or any similiar guise thereof, are no longer required or requested. From this point forward, please refrain from initiating or maintaining any form of communication with the Party, including attempts to request explanations as to why or how the previously established friendship with the Party came to a dissolution. While the Party's silence may have been misinterpreted by you thus far as failure on the Party's behalf to receive your calls, e-mails, texts, et cetera, in no way is this the case. It is in the quiet and sincere hope of the Party that you accept this termination of acquantainceship without question. Please be aware that any further endeavors by you to reach the Party will result in an issuance of a Cease and Desist order.

Best regards,

Co. & Co.

Yes, we can both be passive, non-confrontational pansies. But we also strive to avoid drama at all costs. There are worse faults we could have. And besides, our kitchen skills more than make up for this.

Movie spoilers. OOH EVERYONE GET THEIR PANTIES IN A BUNCH.

The first time I watched "Little Black Book", I was peeved. I mean, what-- what the hell kind of ending was that? No! Girl gets boy! Always! That's why it's a *movie*! I don't want real life, dammit. Girl does NOT dump boy (who loves Girl) and tell him that he belongs with his ex.

Three years later and I'm still obsessing over this movie. It's really not that good of a movie and parts of it are painful (much like "Autumn in New York"! Which I own! And paid, like, full retail price for it! Willingly!), but... I don't know. There's just something moving about the scene in the end, when Brittany Murphy's character gives her big speech and does what she knows is best even though it means she sort of gets the shaft-- it's relatable in a painfully honest way. There are countless movies that have those happy little love scenes that make my insides all gooey because, oh, I remember those moments and those feelings and they were good; there are few movies that have those really difficult scenes where someone has to muster up the courage to say, "Hey. This isn't working out. I love you, and it's because I love you that I'm telling you I think this needs to end, and I'm so, so sorry and it's killing me to say this, but I can't be with you anymore."

A few days ago, I finally watched "The Break Up". And, again, the ending frustrated me to no end. They were so happy to see each other again! Why didn't the movie show them getting back together? He'd changed! He was a changed man! He was the changed man she wanted him to be! But no; camera shows her walking away, then credits. What. The. Crap.

I was so mad. I was so, so mad. The next day, I was still mad. And then the day after that, it started to sink in that probably a good percentage of why I couldn't accept the movie's damned storyline was because I related too much to it. When she tells him, after he's finally opened up to her and told her he'll do anything for her, that she just doesn't think she can do it anymore, that she just doesn't have anything left? God, have I known that feeling-- the giving and the receiving.

But-- the ending, too-- I've known even that. The happenstance running into each other, the startled "Hi!", followed by the intensely sincere "Wow! It's been so long. How are you? You look fantastic!" and ending with "We should definitely catch up more sometime." Except-- and this truth makes my heart twinge, just a little-- that "sometime" almost never happens. You've both mended the rips that the separation caused, learned new habits and developed new patterns, new lives. There will be no reconciliation. And... that's okay. That's normal. You know? Not every love is the only one, the last one. What they did is what we-- what most of us-- do. We heal, we learn, we grow, we move on. We find others.

Here is another truth: sometimes, when you do run into that other person randomly, and they do look fantastic and it has been so long-- sometimes, you start remembering all the reasons you fell for that person in the first place. You remember mornings together and sunny afternoons spent outside holding hands, you remember how perfectly their face fit inside your hands. But after those initial thrills of remembrance have faded some-- you remember, too, why it ended. There were reasons for why it ended, and sometimes, a lot of times, those reasons aren't reasons that can be nullified by time.

And then I think of "Eternal Sunshine" and *that* ending, how Clem argues that it's pointless for them to try and be together again because they both know how it's going to end and the ending isn't pretty, how they're just going to get sick of each other-- and Joel just half-smiles and says: "Okay." I adore that. It makes me wonder if I would say "okay" too, and... I think I would. Because even knowing things will be crap at the end of it all-- knowing all the good moments that will come in the meantime would make it all worthwhile. Walks on the beach, trips to Lowe's in the pouring rain, falling asleep in the front seat listening to U2's "How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb", hoofing it-- slightly drunk-- from south MB to north PB: I have known the heights of happiness in the hands of another, and maybe that happiness came at a price, but it's a price I was glad to pay then-- and will be glad to pay again.

America's Finest City of Sin

To this day, if you asked me to tell you why San Diego is such a great place and what exactly it has going for it and why anyone should want to live there, I could talk your ear off until *you* got blue in the face just listening to me. For every one reason why Las Vegas is a terrific place to call home, I could give you ten for San Diego.

It's a funny thing, though: after I left the first time, after the first time I started settling and making a life for myself here in Vegas, I sort... "got over" San Diego. There were a hundred million things in San Diego that I missed like hell on a regular basis-- to say nothing of the people in San Diego I missed with equal misery-- but I was done with the city. I went back on Super Bowl weekend back in 2006 and visited friends and old favorite haunts and as fabulous as every second of that weekend was, I was acutely aware of how I had no desire whatsoever to live there anymore. And people kept pestering me all that Sunday-- why didn't I move back to SD? I didn't have anything going on in Las Vegas at that time (I was, in fact, sending out my resume to countless companies in the Bay Area then, desperately trying to relocate *there*) and clearly San Diego was chock full of things that made me happy! But the more they pestered, the more I got annoyed and the more I strengthened my resolve to be over that city for good.

And then two months later I moved back. But that was because of a job offer that was too good to pass up-- and I honestly had nothing keeping me in Vegas, had no reason to stay, had too many sensible reasons to move.

And *then* the tables turned and I had every reason to come back to Vegas and little, if anything at all, tying me to San Diego. And here I came, and here I stay. I know where I want to go in terms of a long-run career and I have a general idea of what I want to do and how to go about these next two years. This is the place for me-- probably not forever, but for a good, good while.

So-- I can understand that, leaving a place you love and leaving people you miss and who miss you too, leaving and not coming back even though what you left it for doesn't really present itself as all that advantageous. Just as I can understand coming back right after you swore you never would, not again, not ever-- can understand circumstances changing so that you have enough of a reason to come back, as opposed to simply not having enough of a reason to stay where you moved. I can understand all that-- and I do.

That being said: I miss the Cove, Valentine's, kayaking, the OB tide pools, Big Sonic Chill, Bogart Yogurt, my alma mater, the 992 line, Julian, that salad shop on 8th and F, Golden Hill, and-- of course-- Balbloa (the second "l", it's silent). Among many, many other things. San Diego, I love you with all my heart. I'll visit again someday.

I'll go next year, for sure. Maybe even for Herrang!

Well, *that's* a compliment to beat the band: someone I haven't seen in well over a year just spent 30 minutes' worth of international phone time to call me and see how I was doing and to try and persuade me to fly out to Sweden. He even told me he'd match what I'm making at my current job if that's what it took to get me on the plane. And this isn't the first time he's made the attempt-- he's called a handful of times this year, actually-- I just never seem to have my phone on me when he does.

I can't say I wasn't tempted tonight, particularly since I've got that passport and my flight costs just dropped by a ton this morning. But somehow, I can't see my company as being particularly thrilled about me taking off for two weeks.

He thinks he "still" has a crush on me, but given the time factor, I'm pretty sure he's just built me up in his mind, piecing together dusty fragments of memories of me and what-have-you. But all the same, it was a lovely, lovely nudge to my self-esteem. Who would have known that being led by insomnia to tape 2 lbs. of gummi bears all over our downtown office at 3 a.m. would have made such a lasting impression on someone?

And all the words you're searching for don't have a sound

For Halloween this year, I was:

a. a semi-obscure reference to a webcomic
b. from the distant future
c. Cory Doctorow
d. just really goddamned awesome

No one I encountered caught the reference, and most people just thought I was a superhero. Which, when you think about it, Cory Doctorow sort of *is*, so, whatever. I was so thoroughly amused by my costume that I didn't care in the slightest that nobody knew what I was (though-- the glasses from Night Two didn't work the way I thought they would, but the paint on my goggles from Night One kept rubbing off).

S. wore my most favorite ever costume in the whole entire universe of costumes, I am not even kidding: he went as Three-Hole-Punch [S.]. Which should have been immediately obvious upon first glance, but nobody knew what (or whom) *he* was, either, and that just makes me sort of sad. You people have no idea what you're missing.

It's (finally) November and yesterday, while I was contemplating the fact that it was (finally) the last day of October, I realized that this means nothing to me, in the same way that January 1 doesn't mean a great deal to me. But it *is* November now, and it's almost the weekend, and already this month is starting off with good, good things: I might fly out to Chicago tomorrow night, or maybe to D.C., or else take a half-day trip to San Francisco on Saturday-- Toad will be back in Vegas Saturday night-- and on Tuesday, "Ratatouille" comes out on DVD!

And if nothing else, by the time this weekend is over, my most recent interest will have up and moved away. Which one would think would be a *bad* thing, but while I'm not exactly jumping for joy over this, it'll be a little something of a relief. We were never going to be anything real, which I suppose I've accepted when it comes to the guys in that particular social scene, but of course I got a little attached to the way he would look at me and smile, to the way laughter came so easily into our dialogue. And I make no apologies for this-- I knew, always, what the limitations were, but time with him was always nice and it was-- fun-- to have that little flutter in my chest again.

So of course the night it became clear that I actually, genuinely liked him was the same night I found out he was leaving. Et voila. The aforementioned relief will come from the fact that if he isn't here, I can't hope to see him again.

COMPLETELY UNRELATED JOKE TIME!

Q: What has 6 legs, 3 ears, 4 tusks and 2 trunks?
A: An elephant with spare parts.

Q: What did the cat say to the elephant?
A: Meow.

Q: Why do elephants have grey skin?
A: To keep their insides together.

The shoes only added fuel to the fire of dislike

I'm not the kind of girl who's much impressed by your money and how much of it you are willing to freely spend on me. I don't *want* to be that kind of girl, and just as much, I don't want the kind of guy who wants that kind of girl-- I don't want the kind of guy who tries to impress other people with his money and influence. If you've got it, that's great, but it won't make a difference in whether or not I like you-- or in how much I like you, if I do.

I went out on that kind of date with that kind of guy *once*-- more like, I was coerced into it because his persistence won out over my timid excuses as to why I possibly couldn't-- and oh, quite likely never again. He took me to an expensive restaurant (which was okay) and then to an expensive show (which was breathtaking and gorgeous), but in the end, that date will never come close to making the list of Best Dates Ever In My Life. The company always takes precedence over the activity, and if I like your company? Oh honey, I don't need a night on the town. I'd rather go climb trees to rescue stray frisbees and feed the ducks at the lake and tell you stories about paddle boats and summer trips to the R-Ranch. Seduce me with physics stories and math jokes and memories of that one time when you were three and your parents found you hiding, buck naked, inside the refrigerator-- not with champagne. I can't stand the stuff anyway.

(All this to say: if you've asked me out, if you've asked me for my phone number and I express hesitation? Promising me the most glamorous and glitzy night of my life isn't an effective method of persuasion, unless you're trying to persuade me into being really turned off. And I'm going to take a wild stab in the dark and say you aren't.)