I started dating.

I went into dating with an idea that I was going to be more open minded than I was in my previous single life. I was what most would call shallow. Okay, I’m what everyone would call shallow. I would deny til I was blue in the face that I had a type. However, when it comes down to it, I like them dark haired, tall, athletic and smart.

However, I vowed this time around I was going to be, well not so shallow. I married a man who’s idea of birthday shopping was going on a shopping spree at Target the day of my birthday. Some of those presents included socks. And well, to his defense (which I’m totally not defending), I did need socks. But I think you get the point, that I married, well who most would call an ass.

So again, in my next go round, I was going to be open minded. I met Bachelor #3, who was cute, but not the height I prefer and not athletic at all. However, he is still the most thoughtful guy I have ever dated. If I mention something even in passing, just once, he remembers it, locks it away and surprises me with someone that takes me completely off guard. I have honestly never dated anyone like him.

We connect well sexually, and even though there were times when I thought I couldn’t get past this whole new open mindedness thing, I would press on, and decide that I really did like him.

Then this weekend happened. I tend to be a bit dominant, and unfortunately what usually comes with really nice guys are pushovers. And as open minded as I want to be, I can not for the life of me, handle a push over. So this weekend I hit my threshold, and I find me kicking myself. I went into bitchy Elanah mode because I know I’m more attracted to male Elanah, who my friends are still questioning.

Why as women do we always find ourselves attracted to the ass? And I really don’t want to hear how it’s not true because it seems to be more of the norm, than liking the nice guy.

As a society, have we been so jaded that assuming the worst in everything is the safer assumption to make? My friend and I went out last Thursday to meet up with one of her old friends.

Old friend is in her late 30’s divorced, single parent, who has been around the single block for a while. She’s out one night, meets this extremely good looking guy who is visiting from Australia, ends up falling head over heels in love with him through phone conversations, etc.

He came back to the states for two weeks (working on a project here), where she falls even more in love with this guy. We got to meet him the night before he was about to leave, and they both looked really happy.

Then we get in the car, and friend immediately says ‘I bet he’s fucking her over. He probably has another family, etc back in Australia, and just using her while he’s here.’

I have to admit that at times I can be overly naive, and all I could do was sit there and say ‘but he seemed so nice, and they both seemed so into each other.’ I like to believe in the best in everyone. Although, at times I have my doubts, I really try to believe in the good of things.

So I’m not so sure who’s right. Are all men pigs and eventually going to cheat, so you need to think the worst? Or are there some truly good people still out there, and hopefully they’re ‘findable?’

On a much less depressing note, I’m going to Austin tomorrow.  Any must do’s and eat’s?

Today has been a weird today. Today I finalized the marriage, ended that chapter in my life, and made a decision to officially move on.

Here’s what’s weird. I haven’t been sad much. I was at first, and then we had the tipping point fight. The fight where he didn’t have time or money and wanted me to drive one of the dogs up to him, since I had nothing better to do (to him, anyway). I lived in the moments of calling each other names. Me telling him he was a piece of shit, and him telling me I was a selfish bitch. I lived in the bliss that I felt the first time he told me he needed something, and I could, with immense relief, utter the words ‘it’s not my problem.’

I forgot about the happy times.

Today, however, it all slapped me in the face. I made the decision last night that I was going to go. A friend of mine completed his the day before and gave me the script and stuff that I would need. Throughout the night I had nightmares. Every relationship, job opportunity, business deal, etc had all been ruined by the time I woke up. Everything had ended, and as I ran this morning, Coldplay’s The Scientist, played in my ear. That song always hit me hard.

I drove to Denton. Denton was where it all began. He had just moved there when we met because he was starting a doctoral program. Where our current house was filled with the shit memories, Denton was filled with the good memories. I blasted The Scientist all the way there. I wouldn’t let myself cry because I hate crying. However, when I saw the TWU towers, the good memories filled my mind, and my bottom lip started to quiver. Within seconds the tears were flowing.

To get to the court house, I basically had to drive the same route to his old house, and I remembered that I really did love him. I remembered thinking he was the smartest man ever, and I remembered how good looking I used to think he was. I remembered driving down that street, so excited that I was about to see him. I remembered that he really did used to love me.

I went through security, pulled up my sunglasses and asked the security guard where I should go to finalize a divorce. I saw the sympathy in his eyes when he saw my tear streaked face. When I see that, I usually burst into a ‘No, no, really, don’t feel sorry for me, this is a good thing.’ However, today, I just stayed silent as he pointed me in the right direction.

I sat in shock as a I saw a room filled with people, decrees flying everywhere, and once moments of joy and happiness all being finalized to end. I know I had always felt hesitant about relationships, but watching this scared the shit out of me.

I read my script, and asked this complete stranger to make it all go away, and grant that the end to actually happen.

In the same town that it all began, it ended.

My favorite lyrics from The Scientist:

Nobody said it was easy. It’s such a shame that we’re apart.
Nobody said it was easy. No one ever said it would be so hard
Oh take me back to the start…

No, not late, late, just posting late today. I had intentions of a great day. Got up and ran at 6 am with a friend, and then got an insane amount of work done in the morning. However, I just woke up from a 4 hour nap. Ooops.

I swore I wouldn’t complain about heat after the fifteenth snow fall this past winter, but people, I am miserable, and I am ready for this to be over with. I seriously can’t think, and anything important, half way funny, etc has been sucked from my brain.

So, with that being said I’m still dating Bachelor #3 and Male Elanah. Friend told me this morning that I needed to add one more. She said that it’s important to have 3. I’ll be honest, I’m having trouble juggling the two. Like the other day I was out with one, and I thought, is he the one who hates mushrooms?  Someone hates mushrooms, but who the  hell is it? Then I’m standing there making dinner wondering if I should add mushrooms to the damn dinner.  Or I might tell one a story, but not the other, and I have this forever fear of repeating myself like my mother.  I also think the neighbors have got to be talking in this family friendly neighborhood.  No cars parked in my driveway are ever the same.   Okay, so maybe they’re the same, but there are multiples.

I, however, am getting a much needed break this weekend as both of them are out of town. Actually they’re both out of town all through next week  I’m thinking this might be the perfect opportunity to find #3. I honestly can’t say I’ve ever dated 3 at one time before. Any suggestions and advice is much appreciated. I’m kind of thinking I need another nap, just thinking about it.  I’m not so sure it’s such a good idea.

Apparently I’ve been living under a rock for the past 32 years, as this term was just brought to my attention. It’s about men, and their penis size. I’m going to nip the other debate right in the butt right now by saying, yes, size does matter.

So the show-er vs. grow-er debate.  And yes, I realize I’m spelling them funny.  However, this whole revelation to me is like Elanie learning about shrinkage.  I’m thinking maybe I was always just with show-ers, or maybe I never really paid attention.   Once I knew the size at the point it really mattered, I maybe never paid attention to it during other times.  The thing is, though, of course I paid attention.  Could it be over all these years, there are so many more show-ers than grow-ers that the odds were in my favor?

But this whole conversation came up at a party when were passing around a picture of, who we’ll conveniently call, baby arm, and well, he was definitely a show-er.  (He was someone who liked my friend and sent her a picture because he was a little proud of what he had).  I sat there like the dumb blonde I can be, and had my friends explain the whole term to me.

After this conversation happened, I had my first encounter with a grow-er.  It was someone I liked, and of course I knew there had to be something wrong with him.  When I reached down for the first time, I wanted to scream the word ‘FUCK’ because there it was, an extremely tiny, tiny penis.  Luckily I didn’t stand up in anger and run way.  I stuck around, and as things got a little more heated, well, let’s just say things started looking up.  In fact, they looked WAY up.

So men, what are you?  And women, what are your men?  I know it’s crazy, but this topic is intriguing to me……

I’m not sure if I’m watching too many movies, or where this bug up my ass came from. However, I would say during the entire year of 2010, I’ve had this urge to go to Italy. Not travel Europe, Paris, etc. Nope, I want to go to Italy.

When the whole, I lost my job thing happened, I received my little unemployment debit card in the email, and it’s sat on my desk unused since May. Of course I request my deposit every two weeks, but I made a pact with myself. If I never had to use it, I would use that money and go to Italy.

Well, my whole good fortune is a whole other topic for another time. But through friends, a new business that’s doing very well, and some other things, I’m going to be just fine for a while. I decided you know what, there’s never going to be a better time, and I’m freaking going to Italy.

So the trip planning has begun. My plane ticket has been booked, and for two weeks in October, I’ll be traveling through Italy all by myself. Of course there’s always the potential to find some hot Italian ass to be my tour guide, but I’m just going to see what happens. I think for the first week I’m going to do a tour. That way as I travel through Rome, Venice, and Florence, I know I won’t miss out on the monumental things. Then the other week I’m going to be on my own and decide if there any other places I want to see again, or just go hang out at the beach.

It’s my own little adventure. No, I won’t be buying a villa. Well, I guess never say never. If you have any must see places, etc…let me know.

So It’s 2:00, I’m just now sitting down to my computer and realized ‘Shit, I haven’t done a post today.’

Life has been good…busy,  but good. Male Elanah and I are are still on a roll. Partially why I’m so freaking behind on today.

And then my friend called me two days ago and the conversation went a little something like this:

Friend: ‘I just scored free Gaga tickets for Thursday, you in?’

Me: ‘Hell yes.’

And so now I’m about to get ready to head downtown, eat and drink something and see Ms. Gaga. Can’t wait.

I’ll think of something better next week. For now I need to get a nap in. Male Elanah kept me up late again last night.

As an avid Seinfield watcher, this is one of my favorite episodes. It’s where Jerry meets the female version of him, and thinks he’s falling in love.

So how does this correlate to me?  Well, Bachelor #3 and I have been doing pretty well.  We still haven’t had the ‘are we exclusive talk yet,’ and I’ll be honest, I’m still avoiding it like the plague.  I like him, he’s a great guy.  I’m just not ready to say that this is it for a while.  However, I was still willing to drop out of eHarmony, and I meant to cancel my account.  I was off by a day, and suddenly I was renewed for another 3 months.  I wasn’t taking it too seriously, but Bachelor #, damn, I guess I’m up to 6 now, came out of the blue.  We had been communicating earlier, then he just sort of dropped off.  I didn’t think anything of it, and honestly didn’t care.

He reaches out to me, tells me how he’s been busy with work, blah blah.  We start emailing, and he seems super cool.  We exchange numbers, and he was headed out of town, so we chatted/texted throughout the 4th of July weekend, and as time progresses, I’m totally digging this guy.

Our big date came up, and oh my gosh, went so well.  He’s adorable, he’s sweet, he’s smart, and well, from an attitude/mind perspective, he is the male version of Elanah.  I swear, so much so, almost to a point where I should be worried he’s done research on me or something.  The things he said to me were things that I have said to my friends in the past.  It was so freaky.  I mean, really, really, really freaky.

So the question becomes: Do opposites really attract or should you date yourself?  I always said I could never date me.  However, I married the complete opposite version of me, and we all see how that turned out.  Is it cool to be with someone who totally understands you?  I guess it can work as long as you both understand your faults and can work on getting past them.  For example, male Elanah and I are both work aholics, so as long as we’re purposely making time for each other……

This could get very tricky.  For now Bachelor #3 is still in picture.  But date #2 is approaching with Bachelor #6….We’ll see how this thing goes.  (Date #2 is usually the date where I manage to find SOMETHING wrong).

Hot Damn, there’s a lot to figure out. Back in the day (a mere five years ago), dating really was so much easier. You had a home phone and a cell phone. Maybe you gave out your work phone, and an email address, but there really wasn’t much more to it.

Now, things have changed. I have to say that I’m in love with texting. There’s no hour long commitment to the phone conversation. You can text late at night without looking like an ass (unless your messages sound like you’re an ass), and you can think about what you want to say next. My friend gets mad at me when I talk about a guy, telling her that we really don’t talk much, just text.  I just have to remind her that her dating techniques are so nine years ago (that’s when she was last back in the game).

However, then there’s Facebook. Which makes it really interesting. Timing the friend connection can be a bit tricky. I’m not a frequent updater, but if you are, you have to be careful of them seeing too much into your life. Then there’s the spying on their page thing. You get the urinators……The girls/guys trying to take possession of that person via Facebook. They make sure to tag lots of pictures, always post something cute, and in a very sly way, make the Facebook world know that they’re trying to dig their claws into that particular person.  I caught some bitch urinating on Bachelor #3’s page just the other day.  As of now, I’m taking the high road, and I will not be lifting my leg over her spot.  We’ll see if that changes.

Then, to make things more complicated, you have the relationship status. Dear God, do you know how difficult it is to figure out when you’re going to announce it to the world? Even when I was divorcing, it was difficult to figure out when I was going to post it. Then if you change your status, do you publish it? Do you just put it out and try to keep it under the radar?

Ugh….it’s all so damn complicated. The good thing about Facebook, though, is that you can catch any lies. So for now, I’m sticking with face-to-face dating, lots of texting, a few flirty emails here and there, and the occasional phone call. Oh, and of course Words With Friends, the ultimate view into their intelligence without trying to make it look like you’re figuring out their intelligence.

Sorry for the delay. Last night I had a bit of an *ehem* girly party, and it , well, I’m still trying to recover. It was one of those mornings where I pulled out my list of purchases, and thought really, I bought all that? Oh, and another one of those nights, when all the wine I bought for the occasion was gone in an hour. And I’m not one to ever skimp on anything. I guess I had some thirsty friends.  Luckily, I have neighbors with similar drinking problems and had back-ups.

However, the topic came up about housework. I’ve already mentioned how much I HATE cleaning. Even if I had all the time in the world, I would hire a housekeeper. I have admitted to myself that I will never clean like they can.

But when it comes to particular housework, it’s not created equal. For example, if I can find a man that’s okay with cleaning out the dishes from the dishwasher, specifically the silverware, and folding and putting away laundry, he’s my match made in heaven.

I love to vacuum. I know there are so many people who hate it, but I love it…carpets AND tile. I hate sweeping, but will vacuum all day. I love starting laundry, hate finishing it. I would rather clean a toilet bowl, then put the silverware away. I don’t know what it is about the silverware, but I hate putting it away.  I will actually just use what I need from the dishwasher, then if it’s time to do dishes again, I’ll just rewash the stuff I haven’t put away.  Some of my silverware is really freaking clean.

So this topic cracks me up because I’m always curious to see the love/hate relationship of cleaning. No, it’s not sexy, crazy, or exciting, but shit, it’s late on a Thursday, and I have a freaking headache.

So what’s your chore of choice? I’m telling you, if anyone answers laundry or dishwasher put aways…..I’m yours forever (I’ll even go to the other side for this one )