:: Life on Planet Dan-E ::

:: Wingman ::

There's this guy at work that seems to have appointed himself as my "gay wingman/dating coach." He's a proud native New Yorker. Outgoing, garrulous, brazen, and believes everyone should bask in his "fabulousness." He also has a drinking problem, loves smoking weed, and is on probation for a domestic dispute with an ex-boyfriend (the details of which I didn't care ask about). You could be judgmental, but we're friends and some nights after a long day and a couple of beers, he's one of guys I talk to about my female problems, so what does that say about me?

Every now and then after a few drinks, he makes it a point to meet women and then introduce them me. I'm just sitting there trying to find something to hide behind. I'm not opposed to meeting women, except he has a knack for picking out the ones that are married, have boyfriends, or is so drunk that she'd probably go home with Scott Peterson.

I don't know if it’s a New York thing but he's generally blunt in his observations of me, especially when he goes into this bizarre (alcohol-induced) Queer Eye meets Dr. Phil mode. I'd normally dismiss his drunken ramblings (like when he tells me to cut six inches off my hair and shave my goatee; no way I'm cutting my hair, and I'll trim my goatee but if I go clean-shaven I'll look like I'm 17) except he pointed out some of the very same neurosis that I blogged about in the past. And it's not all critiquing, he does point out the positives as well, without being like, creepy or anything.

He knows about The Hostess, only because he saw us leave work together and asked me the next night about what was going on (nothing... I think) and if anything happened (we had dinner once, drinks once and lunch once). His conclusion? She likes me but she's probably as neurotic as I am. Interesting choice of words since since she sometimes compares herself to Monica from "Friends."

This should be interesting.

Labels: dating, girls, the gay wingman, the hostess

:: Miscellaneous Ramblings by Dan-E at 12:46 AM [+] :: | 0 comments
.....

:: Dreams and Nightmares ::

Everyone has dreams and nightmares. Sometimes you remember them, many times you don't. I don't recall ever blogging about this and I wouldn't, except last week, I had two very different dreams revolving around the same theme in one night. That along isn't blog-worthy, except last night, I had the same two dreams.

Remember the post about The Curator? In my dream, she came back to my restaurant to visit me, except she's with her date who turned out to be some old, bearded guy wearing a black trench coat and a beret (...in Miami. It’s too damn hot to wear trench coats and berets here). She walks in, gives me a big hug and a kiss, and says, "by the way this is..." (I don't remember the name). I forced some awkward conversation until I jolted awake feeling angry, bitter, and wanting to break something.

I went back to sleep and the second dream involved something resembling a porno scene (not that I would know anything about that). Except in this case, I was prominently involved and I wasn't some random pool cleaner or plumber, and she wasn't some porno-hot blonde with a giant, fake rack. The woman was someone I've never seen or met but in the dream, she was some I've been dating for some time (kinda like that weirdo future flashback from the TV show "Lost" where Jack and Kate are talking at the airport and you discover that the scene is from the future when Jack "we have to go back [the The Island]").

I walk into my little studio (which is a little depressing in retrospect; am I still living here in the future? I don't have a house yet? It's my own fucking dream and I can't even conjure up a nice little one-bedroom? What the fuck?) and there she is, dressed in a lacy, black tank top and thong and she couldn't be happier to see me. We started making out, then I ripped her panties off and [--CENSORED--].

(Oh calm down. For Pete's sake's people it was just a dream. And I've been at this too long to tarnish this blog with some explicit narrative of some graphic love scene that didn't even happen. You wanna read that shit go to some sleazy adult web site. Clitoris.)

It was great, I was great, she loved it, and things were awesome... until MY ALARM WENT OFF and I jolted awake feeling angry, bitter, and wanting to break something.

By the way, the girl in the second dream looked a lot like this (Please don’t ask me how or what search engine or what keywords I used to find that photo. I don’t know who she is or who the girl in my dream is. I just thought I’d help you, um, visualize my dream. That’s my story. I'm serious.)

Indelicate parenthetical humor aside, I had those two dreams in one night, on two separate nights and roughly the same thing happened both nights. Anyone know anything about dream interpretation? This happen to anyone else?

Labels: big ass, boobs, dreams, girls, naked, nightmares, porn, sex, the curator

:: Miscellaneous Ramblings by Dan-E at 1:02 AM [+] :: | 0 comments
.....

:: No Go ::

It's a quarter 'till nine and she hasn't called, which is what I figured might happen. I told her had plans for Saturday and to call me when she woke up. She warned me in advance that she's flakey so didn't change anything I had already planned; play tennis this morning, watch some tennis (did anyone else see this morning's Federer match? Absolute classic. I ended up watching that till 6am and saw parts of it again when it was on this afternoon), go see a movie with some friends and grab some beer at the Abby afterwards.

No big deal. Except I'm curious as to what she might say when I see her at work tomorrow. I don't have any emotional investment in her and cases like that, I just brush it off with a "whatever, no big deal" and let it go. In the past, others have advised me to call her on it, don't let her be like that, etc, "and you can do that without being a dick about it." Um, how exactly?

Anyway, off to the movies.

Labels: dating, the hostess

:: Miscellaneous Ramblings by Dan-E at 8:39 PM [+] :: | 0 comments
.....

:: Is she Interested or is She just Nice? ::

If there's one aspect of dating (one of many, really) that I've been bad at, it's reading women's signals. My restaurant recently hired an attractive new hostess that all the straight guys that work there are drooling over. If I didn't have all this neurosis to deal with I'd probably be drooling along. We talk like friendly co-workers do: hi how are you, how was your week; did you see "No Country for Old Men" yet; good night dork. The other guys are more obvious about flirting with her.

She's in her early 20s, energetic, and quite gregarious. So I don't read into anything when she tells me about her family, friends, and other stuff since she shares that stuff with pretty much everyone. Now, here's where my confusion starts and the reason for writing this post:

Management decided to let her train as a server to replace a guy that quit. I wish her luck and help her when I can without actually doing anything for her. At the end of her first night of training, she asks me if we can walk home together (we live a few blocks from each other) and say "sure." I want make a small detour to Pita Plus on Washington to get some take out. She agrees immediately. We end up eating there and talking some more (she talks, I listen). When our food is up I get ready to pay (for my own stuff, since at no point this whole time did I think this was a date of any sort), except she starts reaching into her purse and says "I'll get this." "Huh? What? Why?" The clerk interjects tells us we don't have to pay until after we're done eating (I'm there all the time). "You don't have to buy me dinner." She just shakes her head.

During dinner, she asks me if I can help her study for her waiter test. I get this brief moment of nostalgia where I'm back in college but once that passes I say "sure, if I'm free that day." No big deal, as long as it doesn't interfere with the Football Playoffs. We keep talking, we get to movies and I ask her about "Cloverfield." I mention I'm thinking about seeing it this weekend and unprompted, she says "I'll go see it with you." I raise my eyebrows. "Sure, if you want..." "...if that's what you were getting at. I always do that; some of my friends might say we're going to do this and that and I'll say 'sure I can make it' and he's like 'we weren't gonna invite you. this is guy's night." I just reply, "sure you can come."

The whole time, I was just enjoying her company, but that's when I realized something: Is she nervous? Why would she be nervous? She was always energetic and chatty but she seemed even chattier than normal. Or maybe I was tired and my perception was off. Anyway, we've so far established that I'm helping her study and we're going to see "Cloverfield" and I did almost nothing to prompt it. With me so far? (I'm still trying to figure this out myself.)

She notices the clerk cleaning up his counter and she stats digging in her giant bag for her purse. Again she offers to pay, again I protest. I don’t recall doing anything to deserve a free dinner, and I’m not used to stuff like this happening. She finally says, "you can get it next time we go out." Wait, next time? (I'm not kidding when I tell people that I'm not good at planning ahead. After I post this, I might watch Australian Open Tennis, I might go to sleep, or I might take dump. I just don't know. Or maybe she assumes a lot.)

She pays, I finish my shawarma pita and we walk home. She said some odd questions and comments that night; "Is this your normal walking pace? I walk fast, too. Are you religious? I like to walk around my apartment naked.” And this: “You know, when your hair is down, it really changes the structure of your face." (That's what she said, verbatim. Naturally my response was a confused "um, really?")

When we get to my street, I tell her good night and thanks for dinner. We kiss on the cheek and walk to our apartments. The last two blocks I'm wondering what exactly happened that night. I worked a 13-hour double and while I enjoyed her company, she has a lot of energy and I was drained.

The next night, it's business as usual. The TV is set on Fashion TV and "Midnight Hot" comes on. There are always thongs, usually there's sideboob, sometimes there's full boobage. There was a feature with a curvy brunette wearing a black thong and a see-through halter. Good thing it was late and the crowd thinned out because the four straight guys on the floor were ensorcelled by the model and none of us were getting any work done. We were standing around each other - possibly drooling - and if you saw us you'd probably laugh at how ridiculous it was.

I snap out of it when I the hostess smacks my arm from behind and says "alright boys, that's enough." She said "boys" yet I'm the only one that gets hit; what's up with that? I just turn my head, give my innocent smile. I turn back to the screen and she says sarcastically (I think) "if you're wondering, yes I'm jealous." None of us reply because now the model is bent over a coffee table and we’re catatonic. It stays like this for a minute till the manager sees and yells "get back to work!"

Anyway, I'm supposed to meet her Saturday to help her study and see "Cloverfield" (as long as she doesn't flake. She told me she's flakey and I made other plans anyway). As I went to bed that night, I'm wondering: Is she just looking for new friends? She just moved here. Is she just nice? Does she have a crush on me? What does that even mean? Is Saturday a date or are we just hanging out? (Yes, I'm THAT lost. Sad, isn't it?) Either way, I fall asleep with a goofy smile on my face.

Labels: big ass, boobs, dating, girls, hair, I'm an idiot, please just shoot me, the hostess

:: Miscellaneous Ramblings by Dan-E at 1:17 AM [+] :: | 0 comments
.....

:: Server Stories: Restaurant Blues ::

It gets busy every year during the Orange Bowl since Miami becomes overrun with college football fans in town to support their teams (playing in one of the many anonymous, meaningless, BCS-mandated Bowl games. Seriously, what's the names of these Bowls? Bell Helicopter Armed Forces Bowl, Konica Minolta Gator Bowl, San Diego County Credit Union Poinsettia Bowl. It's only a matter of time before we have the Tampax Bowl Presented by Valtrex... but that's neither here nor there). However, the kitchen managers seemed to forget that little detail this year since during a busy Friday night, we started running out of fish. If you work in a seafood restaurant, this is a problem. We have twelve different fish on the menu. By 10:00p.m. we were down to four. Our introductory spiel, which normally consists of rattling off specials, was reduced to telling everyone what we had left:

"Welcome to Seafood Grill. About the menu, there are a few items are currently unavailable. They are grouper, red snapper, swordfish, tuna, whole yellowtail snapper, mahi mahi, lobster, and whole pompano. The fish that are available are trout, salmon, tilapia, and wahoo. Wait, I'm sorry, we just ran out of wahoo. (This is where I try to avoid eye contact and force a smile to hide my abject embarrassment. And not just because I had to say “wahoo.”) Oh, and our soup of the days is New England Clam Chowder. I think we have some left. Now, can I get you some drinks?"

Most of my customers were good natured about it, even the ones that walked out. A few found it funny (especially after I mentioned that someone was getting fired that night.) This happened a couple of times before and it was actually worse ("welcome to Seafood Grill, would you like steak, chicken, or shrimp?") and I try to laugh it off but my buddy Chuck wasn't as amused. After his third table walks out on him, he walks up to me and says "people have written bad country songs about shit like this."

I had a "oh, what the hell" moment and started making up lyrics for a bad country song (is there anything more redundant than “bad country song?”), sounding like Willie Nelson on acid (as opposed to weed). Chuck thought it was funny and contributed a few words here and there. It got funny enough (or perhaps we lost our minds) that I had to write it down. This is what we ended up with that night:

I'm workin' in a diner and we're runnin' out of food
The customers are cranky and they're acting kinda rude
The waiters are all angry, the cooks are all pissed off
The busboy says he'd rather watch a porno and jerk off

CHORUS:
I got the blues, the blues, the restaurant blues
I really hate this job, but I don't know what else to do
It sucks the life right out of me
I drink so much I always pee
The blues, I got the blues, the restaurant blues

The manager is looking like she really wants to cry
Bartenders are drunk, the hostess has gone bye-bye
The owner's on a rampage, he's steamin' from the ears
All I wanna do is go home and drink some beers

Chorus

That's all we have so far. It's a little rough, there's room for editing, but I think we have something.

Labels: anger, drinking, humor, music, rants, server stories, songwriting, waiting

:: Miscellaneous Ramblings by Dan-E at 1:03 AM [+] :: | 0 comments
.....

:: Short list of ways to make women happy ::

I just had to share this great email forward I got. Enjoy:

Someone finally came up with a complete list!
It's not difficult to make a woman happy.

A MAN ONLY NEEDS TO BE:
1. a friend
2 a companion
3. a lover
4. a brother
5. a father
6. a master
7. a chef
8. an electrician
9. a carpenter
10. a plumber
11. a mechanic
12. a decorator
13. a stylist
14. a butler
15. a sexologist
16. a gynaecologist
17. a psychologist
18. a pest exterminator
19. a psychiatrist
20. a healer
21. a good listener
22. an organizer
23. very clean
24. sympathetic
25. athletic
26. warm
27. attentive
28. gallant
29. intelligent
30. funny
31. creative
32. tender
33. strong
34. understanding
35. tolerant
36. prudent
37. ambitious
38. capable
39. courageous
40. determined
41. true
42. dependable
43. passionate
44. compassionate

WITHOUT FORGETTING TO:
45. give her compliments regularly
46. love shopping
47. be honest
48. be very rich
49. not stress her out
50. not look at other girls

AND AT THE SAME TIME, YOU MUST ALSO:
51. give her lots of attention, but expect little yourself
52. give her lots of time, especially time for herself
53. give her lots of space, never worrying about where she goes

IT IS VERY IMPORTANT:
54. Never to forget:
- birthdays
- anniversaries
- arrangements she makes

YOU MUST LET HER:
55. dress you up like her own personal ken doll
56. point out your flaws and change you as she sees fit

AND FINALLY:
57. never attempt logic in an arguement since she's always right
58. you must give up your friends, poker nights, sports nights, etc.
59 and if are out, you must let her know exactly where you are at any given point that night


HOW TO MAKE A MAN HAPPY
1. Show up naked
2.Bring beer

Labels: girls, humor, naked

:: Miscellaneous Ramblings by Dan-E at 12:21 AM [+] :: | 0 comments
.....

:: The Reason Behind my Resolution ::

I don't go out drinking often but when I know it's gonna happen, I usually load up on food so I get a nice buzz, while everyone around me is wondering why the ceiling fan is still while the room is spinning. (And I don't have to worry about a DUI since I don't own a car.) I might start with a couple of glasses of whiskey (or whisky) on the rocks, followed by a couple of beers (and maybe a couple more). If you remember this post, I can put away a decent amount of alcohol, though that tolerance only comes after eating a large amount of food.

After working New Year's Eve, a few of us went out for drinks at this bar next to our restaurant, where we're friends with their staff and they hook us up with discounted booze. I ate some chicken piccata beforehand but I wasn't sure if it would be enough to ward off the drunkenness. I was enjoying my night with some pool and bar chatter, until one of my co-workers decided to order us a round of Jäger shots and Heineken chasers. I normally hate Heineken but who am I to refuse a drink, right?

Unfortunately, I stuck with whiskey that night and they served it in larger-than-normal tumblers and went easy on the ice so by the time the Jäger shots came around, I was feeling pretty good. What happened after that was a blur.

I vaguely remember some large woman hitting on me and my buddy telling me, "you even try to go home with her and I'll punch you in the face." "Why?" "It'll keep you from going home with that beast." "I was just talking to her." "Yeah, whatever. Shut up and drink your beer."

I somewhat remember some greasy looking Latin guy constantly staring at me. Probably because of my long hair and apparently, Latin guys think long hair belong on women only. He did this for a few minutes before I got sick of his stare and I walked up to his face (with a pool stick in one hand) and asked very gently, "why the fuck are you staring at me?" He recoiled slightly. (I was literally six inches from his face, partly because the music was really loud and I wanted to make sure he heard me. Which was stupid because I didn't even know if this guy spoke English.) He simply put his hands up and said "sorry mang."

There were a couple of other things that I really don't care to talk about. However, this is what happened the morning after:

I woke up to my phone alarm blaring a few inches from my head. At first I wondered where I was. I figured out I was in my apartment but only after realizing that it looked different because I was lying in my bed backwards.

My clothes were in a small pile on the floor next to my shoes, yet I still had my socks on. I smell cigarettes, which is weird since I don't smoke. I turns out to be my hair, which is lying across my neck. Even though I had my hair down all night, I woke up wearing a ponytail and I don't remember when I put it up. Luckily, I still had my boxer briefs on.

I laid in bed for a moment to recall the pervious night (and because I left my legs next to the door) when my alarm goes off again. I hit the snooze button and I look to see what time it is. I'm not sure why but I set my alarm to go off at 3:19pm. When exactly did I set my alarm and why 3:19pm? I lay my head back to figure this out when ten minutes later, it goes off again, and I suddenly realize I have to at work in 90 minutes.

I drag my ass out of bed to the bathroom, where I think I smell Jack Daniels somewhere; only it's just me peeing. I limp to my fridge, chug a can of Monster energy drink, take a shower, and pound another Monster while my hair dries.

Once I get to work, I’m treated to sorry sight of waiters and bartenders in various states of hangovers. (Except for the one bartender who was fine since all he did was smoke pot all night. Yeah, that one.) I find the guy who ordered the Jäger shots and tell him to never order that shit again. His reply?

"I bought Jäger shots? When did I do that? I don't remember that! Are you sure it was me?"

Yeah, you were the one told me to get my ass over to the bar to do shots. Just before you told me to stay away from that one chick who was hitting on me. Remember?

"No."

You don't?

"I remember you walking up to some guy with a stick like you were about beat him to death with it."

Oh that. "Yeah." I wasn't going to kill him. I just didn't like the way he was looking at me.

"Whatever. I was sure you were gonna kill him because you had that look on your face again."

I did? [Pause.] Whatever. No more Jäger.

"I'm okay with that."

Labels: alkie, drinking, drunk, I'm an idiot, regrets, whiskey

:: Miscellaneous Ramblings by Dan-E at 11:51 PM [+] :: | 0 comments
.....

:: One of my New Year's Resolutions... ::

... No more Jägermeister. Ever. My friends and I went out drinking after work during New Year's Eve. I was fine till one of them ordered Jäger shots.

Everything after that was a blur. Seriously, what's in that shit?

Labels: alkie, drinking, I'm an idiot, please just shoot me

:: Miscellaneous Ramblings by Dan-E at 11:56 PM [+] :: | 0 comments
.....