Guys' Night Out

I am looking sharp, wearing a black collared shirt and blue jeans. My face is shaved, my hair is cut and gelled, and I am ready for anything that happens tonight.

Out with my friends, a Coke in my left hand, a cue in my right, rested on my foot. I have owned the table for the past few games, and I am waiting for my next shot. Aside from myself, there are three of my friends circling the pool table, discussing the week’s events and the women scattered about the pool hall. A petite, early twenty-something blonde from across the floor comes up to me and speaks.

“Hi, I’m new in town, and my new roomies and I were looking for some cute guys to party with after we get outta here. (Giggle Giggle)”

I divert my eyes for a second to look over her left shoulder. One of her friends waves at us. There are five of them in total, three brunettes, and two blondes. They are all in their early twenties, and all extremely hot. I wave them over.

“Why don’t you and your friends come and play pool with us for a while?”

She smiles at me, “That sounds good to me! (Giggle)” she says. The nine of us play pool until closing time, and then go back to the girls’ rented house for a while.

Things like this never happen to me.

More likely is a scenario in which, in a last minute effort to get out of my apartment for a few hours, I call fifteen or sixteen of my friends. I do this knowing full well that out of the people that I call, only two or three of them will want to leave their homes for a game or two of pool.

We get to the dive bar that I hate, but my friends love. One of my friends is wearing a faded t-shirt, torn blue jeans, and a hat that looks as if it hadn’t been washed since he received it as a birthday present in junior high school. Another wears a brownish-bluish hoodie over a stained, formerly white, t-shirt. The hoodie is smattered with paint from art projects and grease from working on his car.

After a number of times trying to look decent for these outings, and seeing my friends look as if they were homeless, I have become complacent and given up. I am wearing a pair of camouflage shorts, decade old sneakers, and a black hat to cover my uncut, uncombed hair. My face hasn’t been shaved in four or five days, and my shirt has the words ‘This Is What Cool Looks Like’ printed across it.

After snatching defeat from the jaws of victory on the pool table, I take a seat on a bench a few feet away and await my next embarrassing game. My friends taunt me, and I blame the loss on the leaning, poorly maintained table.

After a few minutes of watching my friends play, I notice one of my friends actually talking to a woman. She isn’t the cute little blonde that I was hoping for. Instead, she is in her late thirties, her hair is gray and thinning. She is missing a few teeth, and bears a striking resemblance to someone I once saw on a Discovery Channel special about methamphetamines.

My turn to play finally comes up, so I stand and start walking to the table to put my quarters in. Joe stands next to me and bumps me with his elbow.

“Dude, she thinks you’re hot!” Joe says, laughing.

“Great…” I say in disgust. I take one of my rings and hurriedly move it over to my left ring finger.

“Alright Joe, let’s hurry up and play, I wouldn’t want to keep my wife waiting!” I say as loud as is reasonably possible, making sure she notices.

I sit down and wait for Joe to break, she comes and sits next to me. I pull my hat down and scoot away from her. She turns to me and tries to start a conversation.

“So, what’s your name?”

I try to keep the answers as short as possible. “Jake.”

“How come I don’t see you in here more often?” She asks, obviously flirting with me.

I hurry a response that I vaguely remember in an attempt to get her to leave me alone.

“(Blah blah blah) wife (blah blah blah) two kids (blah blah blah blah). (Blah blah blah blah, blah blah) happily married (blah blah). (Blah blah blah, blah blah blah) seven years.”

She inches closer to me, gives me a two-toothed grin, and puts her hand on my knee as she says, “Your wife isn’t here, is she?”

Trying to be as nice as possible, I get up and walk into the restroom, praying that she is gone by the time that I get out. Stalling for time, I splash water on my face in an attempt to get the circus-freak-attracting pheromone off.

Ten minutes later, I finally emerge from the restroom to find a friend from work had joined our party. Justin was an odd character that I had only hung out with once or twice. He said his hellos, and went about his business with the group of guys he came to meet.

I sit down again. Apparently not getting the clue, the crack head sits next to me again. She leans over and whispers in my ear, “You know what I like to do to guys?”

Before she could get another word out, I say, “Hey, you see my friend over there?” I point in Justin’s direction.
She looks at me, confused, “Yeah, what about him?”

“That dude thinks you’re hot! You should go talk to him!”

Finally getting the clue, she takes leave. The party animals that my friends are, they decide to head home.

“Guys, it’s only midnight!”

“I got things to do in the morning, man. I gotta run.”

“He’s my ride, sorry Jake.”

The next evening, I get a call from Justin.

“Jake, whatcha doin’ tonight?”

“I’m just gonna kick it at home tonight.”

“Dude, that chick that was hanging out with you guys was a freak!”

“You’re telling me!”

“Man, she didn’t get outta here ‘till noon today!”

Not fully grasping what he is saying, I continue the conversation. “She wouldn’t stop trying to hit on - wait, what did you say?”

“She didn’t leave here ‘till noon! She made me breakfast this morning and everything!”

In shock, I eek out, “Tell me you didn’t…”

He did.

He then proceeds to tell me the whole story. After ten or twelve too many drinks, he took the poster child for drug rehab centers back to his place for, what I will henceforth describe as, ‘relations’.

“Dude, she does this thing with her tongue-“

“Man, I don’t want to know! You should probably see a doctor and get tested, and then a shrink and get tested!”

I’m not sure what I find more disturbing, the fact that he actually had relations with the girl, or the fact that he is bragging about it.

“Jake ya gotta take what you can when you can. Anyway, we stayed up ‘till about four this morning and-“

“Justin, I think I’m gonna puke.”

I hang up the phone and run into the bathroom. I still get nauseous when I think about Justin, the side show, and their ‘relations’.

An Ode to Jake

A few days ago, my girlfriend and I were leaving a local coffee shop after breakfast. Upon opening my car door to get inside, I happened to glance at the front window of the shop. I saw a gentleman, about 5’10” tall, brown eyes, black hair, Hispanic. He carried an aura of confidence about him; he seemed like the type of guy who could and would accomplish anything he set his mind to.

My girlfriend glanced at me with a somewhat puzzled look, confused as I took a couple of seconds and stared into the window.

“What is it, Jake?”

I turned to her and smiled.

“God, that’s a handsome devil in the window!”

Still confused, with her mouth agape, she turned and looked at the window. Noticing that the window I had been ogling for the past few seconds was opaque and rather reflective, she turned back to me more confused than before.

“All I see is you, Jake.”

I turned back to her for a second, and smirked. As soon as she saw the smile on my face, she knew what I was going to say, but that didn’t stop me from saying it.

“Exactly!”

She looked at the ground in front of her, put the sunglasses she hand in her hands over her eyes, sighed, and shook her head. I turned my head towards the window, looked at myself for another second, and then got into my car. I took a grin with me that I carried for the next few hours.

How do I love me? Let me count the ways.

People have asked me time and time again if I am as cocky and vain as others observe me to be. I often repeat the phrase, ‘If I could, I would run across a grassy field into my own arms.’

Often sarcastic, occasionally inappropriate, always opinionated, I am my favorite person. I bathe in the glow of the intelligence that I possess. I carry it with me like a protester with a placard, holding it above my head for all to see. I love sharing the knowledge I have with the people around me.

I have a great sense of humor, if I do say so myself! Sharp, witty, and poignant, I have always had an intrinsic ability to make those around me laugh. Not afraid to be self-deprecating, my friends always have a great time in my presence.

I am ridiculously good looking. And let’s be honest, as much is you value the company of friends and family who are less than attractive, it’s always better to be seen surrounded by beautiful people. Being around attractive people makes you feel better about yourself. I make people feel better about themselves.

By no means whatsoever am I perfect. Every time I think about my attributes, I think about my flaws, my vices, and my errors. I look at these things the same way I look at my favorite work of art.

I stare at my favorite painting and admire the work. I look from afar and notice the time, skill, and soul that the artist put into the canvas. I begin see how much of himself he conveys through his hand. The closer I get to the work, and the more I begin to stare, the more flaws I begin to see.

I see sections of canvas that have frayed over time. I see portions of the painting that have faded, and streaks where the artist put a little too much pressure on the brush. I see the things that some might consider imperfections, and they make the picture more beautiful, they bring the picture to life and make it more real.

I love the picture that is me. I love my frayed canvas. I love my flaws. I believe they bring me to life, and make me a human. To hate the imperfections, is to hate the painting as a whole. I would love me if I weren’t smart, if I wasn’t funny, if I wasn’t attractive.

But I don't have to worry about that, because I am smart, I am funny, and I am attractive, and more than anything else, I love me because I am humble.

12:06 PM

“Watch, look to the left, over by the payphones.”

She had a daily routine that she followed religiously; I could practically set my watch by it. There had only been rare occasions since I had first seen her that it had changed.

“What the fuck is the deal Jake, are you stalking her or what?”

“Dude, just shut up and watch!”

Her daily early afternoon routine involved a large cup of coffee and a stroll into the basement of the student union to watch the drama majors perform monologues and improvisational comedy sketches, badly, I should add.

Today was no different, she had her coffee in her right hand, her backpack was on, and she was completely oblivious to my existence. She passed by the payphones across the hall from where Joe and I were sitting on this day, the same place I sit everyday at noon.

“12:06 P.M., I swear to Christ Joe, she shows up and passes the same spot within 4 minutes of 12:06 everyday,”

“So what?”

“So what? What do you mean ‘so what?’ You don’t think that’s a little fucking strange dude?”

“I’ll tell you what’s fucking strange man, the fact that you know that.”

“Don’t you think she’s cute?”

“She’s cute. So why don’t you just talk to her?”

“I don’t get to class in time to sit anywhere near her. I have class at Old Chem and then have to bolt up to AME.”

“How about now? Why don’t you catch her now?”

“What the hell am I supposed to say? ‘Hi, I know you don’t know me, but I have had my eye on you for a few weeks now’? Do you have any idea how fucking odd that sounds?”

“That doesn’t seem odd at all.” There were more than subtle undertones of sarcasm in his voice.

“Goddamn smartass.”

Admittedly, it did sound kind of odd that I knew what time she pass that particular point in the hall, but it was entirely coincidental. She wasn’t the only student in Tucson who had a lunch routine. I would usually grab a cup of coffee and a pastry or bagel from the same small stand that she would frequent. I would then take a seat on a bench down the hall.

Over a matter of a couple of weeks, I slowly started to casually observe her lunch routine. I had first noticed her in my engineering 181 lectures. She was impossible not to notice. An attractive young female tends to stick out in a group of students that is predominately men and women who could only be described as such by the anatomical definition. I really hate to categorize people into stereotypes, but out of the 300 people in our lecture, no more than 50 of them were female. And out of those 50 women, only about 15 of them were anything you would want your friends to see you in public with.

She was 5’4”-ish, with shoulder-length brunette hair, blue eyes, and great legs. Physically, she had absolutely everything I was looking for in a girl. The fact that she was as engineering major let me know, that at least intellectually, she was my type.

A few days had past since I had pointed her out to Joe, with him unsettlingly quiet about the event. I walked into our engineering lecture to a surprise. Whether it was to be good or bad was to be determined.

“Jake! Over here, yo!”

I looked to the front of the room to find Joe sitting two seats away from her, with a single seat in between.

“Dude, I saved you a seat! Right here buddy!”

I begrudgingly took my place next to him, giving him a dirty look in the process, but giving him high-fives in my head. This was the opportunity that I was looking for; I had just wished that it wasn’t as contrived as it was. Considering the standard format for the lecture, it was also the perfect environment.

I will admit, this wasn’t the first time that I had taken a seat next to an attractive woman in one of my lectures. I will also admit that this wouldn’t be the first time I had tried to get one of them to notice me. Three times before, I had tried to strike up conversations with girls in lecture classes. Three times before, I was shot down or ignored before any substantial progress had been made.

The problem I faced was the fact that the professors in my other classes were almost strictly professors. They had few distractions in their personal or professional lives, and had plenty of time to prepare lectures and notes for their sessions. This means, in short, that these college teachers were actually teaching things that weren’t in the textbooks to their students. This ensured that the young, cute, impressionable females that I was trying to corrupt were paying attention and taking notes rather than talking to me.

This challenge simply did not exist in my engineering lecture. The few of us guys who were confident, thin, attractive, and all-around, normal enough to hit on the 15 desirable bachelorettes in the class were free to do as we will. The professor who led the lecture section of the class was completely overwhelmed with overseeing a project that was to be taken to a national competition at the end of the semester.

In the occasions that he did make it to class, his lectures were almost strictly taken from the text. There was little to no reason to take notes, because everything we were being taught we had already read over. He had little to no time to prepare, and neither did the substitute profs who filled in on occasion. The meat and potatoes of learning in the class happened in the discussion section, when we were in a group of 30, rather than 300, with a professor who had time to prepare.

Most of us did the honorable thing and showed up to lecture, even though we thought it was completely useless. Personally, I was afraid that the project would be completed and the professor would come back to actually teach us something. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to realize that the students weren’t really paying attention. At least a third of the attending used it as an opportunity to take a nap between classes in an air-conditioned building. Most of the rest caught up on their homework in other classes, or worked on the crossword in the Wildcat. Some kids actually took notes, which means that they truly didn’t understand the text, or they didn’t read it.

I took my copy of the Wildcat out of my messenger bag and feigned a lost pen. After a sufficient fake search, patting my pockets and glancing in my bag once or twice, I leaned over and bumped her with my elbow.

“Excuse me…”

She was thumbing through that week’s issue of ‘People’ magazine when she looked up and smiled.

“Yes?”

“You wouldn’t happen to have a pen I could borrow, would you?”

“Maybe…”

“Maybe?”

“What do you need the pen for?”

“Writing…”

“I know that, I mean what are you writing?”

“The crossword.”

“How ‘bout we do it together? I’m kind of bored.”

“That works for me, what’s your name?”

“Kate.”

“Kate, my name is Jake. It’s a pleasure.”

“Same here. What’s with the smirk?”

I have an uncontrollable reaction to some things. The same way one would laugh when they are being tickled, or flinch when someone swings at them, I have the tendency to smirk when I am attracted to a girl, (or when I think I am getting away with something that I shouldn’t be.)

“Nothing, it’s nothing.”

We spent the next 40 minutes ignoring what we were supposed to be doing, making jokes at the others expense, and filling out the crossword to the best of our ability.

“Do you not know how to read, Jake?”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“Transceiver! It’s E-I not I-E!”

“It’s I before E-“

“Except after C, dork!”

“Engineering major, not English, remember?”

“Me too, remember?”

“Let’s see, 33-down, ‘Pain in Jake’s ass’ four letters, begins with K-A. Hmm, would could it be?”

She cocked back and punched me in the arm.

“Dammit woman!”

This was now noticeable enough to get the attention of the professor, who was at this point, reading his lecture directly from the book. He glanced up for a second, and attempted to discover the cause of the disturbance. Kate and I both slumped in our chairs and shut our mouths.

The prof leered at us for a couple of seconds, and then continued to read.

“What is it with women and punching me?” I whispered to her as she tried to hold in her laughter.

“I’m willing to bet that this isn’t the first or last time a girl has punched you.”

Class ended, Kate and I packed up our belongings and walked outside with Joe close behind. We parted with the usual ‘nice to meet you’ and ‘I’ll see you around’, then went our separate ways.

Joe walked up behind me and lit a cigarette. I waited until she was out of visual range and did the same.

“So, how did it go, man?”

“She is an insufferable, stubborn, sarcastic, cocky, pain in my ass.”

“Really? That sounds a lot like someone else I know.”

“Yeah, who?”

“Who do you think, dude? You! The way you describe her, she actually seems like she would be your type.”

“Joe, I’m thinking she is definitely my type.”

“So, what’s the next course of action?”

“We are going to lunch tomorrow.”

“Was it your idea or hers?”

“Actually, I just thought of it. She doesn’t know it yet, but we are going to have lunch tomorrow.”

“So, I take it you got her number.”

“Well…no, not, exactly.”

Joe gave me a confused, blank stare. It was akin to when you pretend to throw a tennis ball for your dog to retrieve, and he can’t seem to find it.

“I don’t follow Jake, we don’t have a lecture again this week, how are you meeting for lunch?”

“Damn, I really need to quit smoking…”

“Jake! Don’t change the- Uh oh…”

“What?”

“I’ve seen that look before. You have something up your sleeve, don’t you?

“Joe, you should know this by now, but once in a great while, you need to expedite things a little by arranging coincidences.”

“Arranging coincidences?”

I have never believed in karma, or kismet. I have never been the type of guy who was ever willing to let ‘fate take its course’, if you will. There are only two types of events in this world that takes place with a human being involved. There are entropic, or random, unplanned events; and there are planned events. Not events planned by a creator or some sort of spiritual being, but by one or more of the participants.

If someone trips on a rock, it’s entropy. If someone sticks a foot out as someone else is walking by, it is planned. Everything a human will experience falls into one of these sets, but there is room for a gray area. If someone walks down the sidewalk and trips on a rock that someone purposely kicked into their path it is both entropy and order. It is a planned or arranged coincidence.

In the dating sense, there may be times in your life where someone you might be a little interested in has the tendency to show up at really odd times, or more often than they did before. A good deal of the times when you are meandering about in your life and you happen to ‘run into’ someone who has caught your eye were planned out well in advance without your knowledge.

There is a caveat to be aware of. There is a very fine line between arranging coincidences and stalking someone. When setting up a ‘chance’ meeting with someone, you need to make sure it is a public place that they go to regularly and often. If you know, for example, someone happens to go to the same coffee shop everyday at about the same time, it would be a great opportunity to bump into her. It should be somewhere you have seen them before, a place where they frequent. Setting up an accidental run in with someone isn’t about knowing where she is going to be, it’s more about increasing the chances of encounters by frequenting the places she frequents.

On the other hand, if you start following someone to figure out their routine, have their phone tapped, bugs placed in their house, and a tracking device placed on their car, it’s a pretty good bet that you are the definition of a stalker. In review: running into a girl between classes, in public, is acceptable. Running into a girl on her driveway at 12:30 AM as she is throwing her trash, not cool.

It just so happened that I had a good idea where she was going to be at 12:06 the next afternoon.

I got out of class a little early, ran over to the union, grabbed some coffee and sat at the normal bench. 10 minutes later, at 12:09 PM, she walked by.

“Kate!”

“Hey, what’s up Jake?”

“I was supposed to meet a friend here for lunch, it looks like he flaked. He was supposed to be here 10 minutes ago.”

“Where were you going?”

“I dunno, it was my turn to pay, so some place cheap! You eating alone today?”

“Yeah.”

“Want some company?’

Our first date was lunch at the Taco Bell in the middle of the union. Neither one of us ate much. We both spent a majority of the hour together talking about or respective backgrounds, and it turned out that we had a lot in common. She was the elder of three children, two girls and one boy. She was born and raised in Palo Alto, and her parents had recently separated.

The thing that I found most intriguing about her was that she got my sense of humor, and she had one that was similar. She was smart, funny, and ridiculously hot, everything I am looking for. We exchanged numbers and planned on meeting up later for dinner and bowling, out of all things.

Three weeks, 9 dinners, 12 lunches, 4 breakfasts, and twelve flowers later, we were somewhat of an item. From the moment we started spending time together, absolutely everything seemed perfect. Every meal with her, every movie, every hole of miniature golf, every joke that we made at the other’s expense was perfect. The only thing left to do was to introduce her to some of my friends, and one night in particular seemed like a perfect time to do it.

Joe and I had recently had an encounter with a sophomore who happened to be the treasurer of U of A’s chapter of Theta Tau, the engineering fraternity. He practically accosted us as we were walking out of our physics class.

“Guys! Hey Guys!”

We both looked at each other with a ‘do-you-know-that-fucking-asshole?’ scowl on or faces, and then turned towards him.

“Yeah? What’s up?” Joe still looked confused when he answered.

“My name is Steve, and I was wondering if you guys have pledged.”

Having listened to a few of my frat buddies speeches from time to time, I was ready to walk away.

“Steve, I am meeting someone for lunch, then studying for a test I have in 2 hours. You are going to have to get to the point, rapidly.”

“I think you guys should join Theta Tau.”

“I already have friends Steve, and I don’t really want to pay for new ones.” Joe piped in with his two cents.

“Just hear me out, guys.”

I glanced at my watch and realized that I had been released from my last lecture a few minutes early.

“You have two minutes.”

“Theta Tau is a fraternity exclusively for engineering majors; we are a professional fraternity that focuses on building networking skills for the future. We are having a little membership get together next weekend and we would like you two to attend.”

“Why us? There are 200 engineers in that physics class, why choose us?” Joe was still confused.

“Well, quite frankly you two seem to be two of the most socially capable people in that room.”

“So essentially, you picked us because we seem to be cooler than everyone else?” It was just as I figured, even in a professional organization, acceptance was based on looks.

“Well, yes, and the fact that you seem quite popular among everyone in class, and could possibly bring more members to the table.”

“What’s in it for me?” Joe took the words out of my mouth.

“Free food and booze for you and a date. And if you don’t like us, just don’t come back.”

That’s about all I needed for the sale to be completed.

“I’m in.”

“Great! It’s next Friday at 6 PM, business casual. We are trying you out too, you know! Invite any other engineering majors you want.”

Steve handed us a couple of fliers with the when and where and went on his way.

“I’ve got a bad feeling, about this, Joe.”

“Then why did you agree to go?”

“Free booze dude, free booze.”

The day of the event came along, and I ran to Dillard’s for a new pair of shoes and pants. They were quite possibly the most expensive pair of dress shoes that I have ever purchased, putting me back at least a hundred bucks. I was looking to impress that evening, joining a frat didn’t really appeal to me, but one never knows if their mind will change. Kate and I had never done anything where we weren’t wearing t-shirts and jeans, so this was an opportunity for me to impress her as well.

The place where the party was being held was within mere walking distance of all of our dorms. Joe’s dorm was next door to mine, so we met up and walked to Kate’s together.

“So dude, have you and her…?”

“Have we what?”

“Oh you know, consummated the relationship!”

“That’s none of your fucking concern, dude!”

“So, I’ll take that as a no.”

We met Kate and walked the mile and a half to the house just off of campus, arriving at least 40 minutes before the event was to begin. As it turned out, we weren’t the only people from our section of our engineering lecture that were invited to partake in the festivities. Four others, three guys and one girl, were also there as potential pledges.

The guys were relatively unknown to me, but Camille, the girl, was a good friend of mine, and as it turns out, one of the other 15 smoking hot girls in our lecture. Kate went to the bar and grabbed a couple of drinks for the two of us.

“Camille! How are you doin’ hon?”

“I’m great, and you?”

The two of us carried on for a few minutes. Kate came back with our drinks and a scowl on her face. I introduced the two, we parted ways, and Camille kissed me on the cheek as we started heading to our seats for dinner. Thankfully, we were on opposite ends of the dinner table.

“What the hell was that, Jake?”

“What was what?”

“That little show with what’s-her-name? I saw the way she looked at you!”

I took a glance into her right hand, and it appeared to me that her drink was already more than halfway done. It was a Long Island that I could smell from 50 feet away, both from the glass and now, her breath. A few things became apparent to me at that moment. First, to the best of my knowledge, she was completely unaware that I had female friends, and I had no idea if she was the jealous type or not. Second, I had never seen her drink before.

“How many of those have you had, Kate?”

“This is only my second…”

“Christ, we have only been here 40 minutes!”

Dinner was a buffet, I wasn’t feeling too well, so I bypassed the food and out of courtesy, served Kate a plate. But when I turned around and walked back to the table, she was out of eyeshot.

“Where did she run off to, Joe?”

“I think she went to get another drink.”

“Son of a…”

As much as I wanted to say something to her, I kept my mouth shut. In my opinion, there was no point in drawing attention to us unless she was drawing attention to me. She hadn’t done anything to embarrass herself, or more importantly, me. I just figured that she was letting off a little steam from the midterms we had that week.

She sat down and ate, and the frat’s VP gave a small presentation about who they were and what they were about. Kate picked at the plate in front of her, visibly buzzed, but at least now slowing down. The dinner portion of the evening ended, and the fraternity president led all the gentlemen on a tour of the house, leaving the women alone.

Alone with an open bar.

The tour concluded, and a few of us went out back to smoke a cigarette. Four of us gathered and started talking about dues, activities and such, then our significant others. A classmate in my discussion group informed me that he had recently started hanging out with Camille, and mentioned that she was fond of me as a friend.

In suit, I started talking Kate up, and telling everyone how great I thought she was and how compatible we were, even after a short amount of time. I took a quick glance at my watch, to realize that it had been at least 30 minutes since the tour had started.

“Speaking of Kate, I wonder what she is up to…”

At that moment I heard a scream that changed the mood of the evening irrevocably.

“You fucking bitch!”

I burst through the back door and ran into the kitchen to find exactly what I was afraid was going to happen. Kate was staring down Camille and backing her into a corner, and as interesting as a cat fight would have been, I didn’t want to see one between these two.

“That’s it Kate, you’re done.”

I grabbed the drink from her hand, put it on the counter and as gently as I could, grabbed her arm. I quickly thanked everyone, and walked out of the door.

“What the hell is your problem?”

“I don’t know… I just don’t like to see other girls flirting with you…”

“I have a lot of female friends, if that is going to be a problem, then we are going to have a problem.”

“I know, and I know you wouldn’t do anything, I just… It’s been a long fucking week and I have been feeling a little insecure lately. I don’t… I don’t fucking drink that much normally and when I do, I have a hard time, ya know?”

“I know, this week sucked for me too babe, its ok. Let’s just go home.”

“I’m sorry…”

“I know, it’s ok…”

We started to trek back the mile and a half to her dorm, her shoulder on mine as not to fall over. She stumbled here and there, but not enough to bring her to the concrete. We passed a bus stop under a streetlight at about the midway point and she sat down on the bench. I stood beside her, rubbing her back and trying to comfort her.

“I’m sorry about tonight babe…”

“I know, I know, it’s ok…”

“I just love you so much, Jake…”

This was an interesting turn of events, considering that the L-bomb had never been dropped with us outside of the content of 24-hour restaurants or Magic Mountain. So I did what every guy does when his girl says something that he knows she is going to regret or forget in the morning, I changed the subject.

“There’s a 7-11 right here, do you need any water or anything babe?”

“Please stay here.”

I stood beside her and continued to rub her back as she held her head in her hand. At that moment, something happened within me that changed the way I saw her. I’m not sure if it was her behavior at the party, the fact that she said that she loved me, or the fact that the streetlight made me keenly aware that her hair was dyed and she was not a natural brunette. I am fairly certain that a great deal of my sudden loss of interest had to do with the fact that she took this opportunity to throw up all over the hundred dollar dress shoes I had just purchased.

To this day, I still don’t know how much she drank that night, unfortunately, I am all too aware of how much she ate.

The Morning Show

It had tried to make it become a force of habit. On the rare occasions when I did have my dorm room to myself weekday mornings my freshman year, I would always attempt to do the same thing: take a shower, get dressed, turn on the radio, and start working on my studies.

Of course, not only would I need the room to myself, but also I would need to wake up in time to lounge about in the morning before my classes started. This alone is a rare enough occasion to limit the morning study session to a weekly event, if I was lucky and feeling particularly ambitious. Most mornings, even those that I did have to myself, involved hitting the snooze bar 6-8 times, rolling off the bed and hitting the concrete floor, falling asleep in the shower (if I had time to take one at all), throwing on whatever clothes I had clean and getting my ass where it needed to be, approximately 2 minutes before it needed to be there. This is a tradition I still carry with me today, sans concrete floor.

I knew that the activities and pace of the morning would be indicative of the day that was to follow it. If I somehow managed to drag myself out of bed with enough time to study, and get the occasional cup of coffee and éclair on the way to class, I always felt more alert and had a better attitude that I did if I was in a rush. Bolting out the door and barely getting to class on time was a sure sign that paying attention that particular day was going to be rather difficult, especially when falling asleep in the middle of my classes.

When I did manage to get up early, my favorite activity when studying was listening to the local morning show on my favorite rock radio station. It was your normal, average, everyday morning show, hosted by two smart-ass guys in their early thirties. They talked about how much they hated the movie they saw the night before, the odors that emanated from their cohorts in the booth, and how much they hated the band Oasis. They would have guests such as bands that would be in town for a short stint, girls that could bend themselves into interesting shapes, and the occasional midget. Of course, none of these claims could be substantiated unless they posted pictures on the Internet.

Like every other morning radio show, they also had the propensity to give away prizes to their listeners who call in and answered a trivia question, identified a song that had just played or the likewise. One morning in particular, one of the hosts came on and announced a rather simple contest to win.

“The 99th listener to call in and correctly give us the name of the city that U2 hails from will get a limited edition copy of their, as of yet, unreleased ‘Best Of 1980-1990’ album!”

This to me just sounded too good to be true. I was never a huge fan of U2, but everyone knows where they are from. A fourth grader could answer the question. Not to mention, it was a chance to get free shit. I, like every other red-blooded American male, will jump at the chance to get free shit. It doesn’t even matter if you want the free shit, you will try to get it.

U2 wasn’t necessarily a band that reached out and said ‘buy me’ whenever I walked past their albums on the record store shelves, but I would listen to a free copy of their greatest hits CD. I’ll be honest; I really wouldn’t care if they were giving away a Chinese version of ‘Ishtar’ on Betamax, I would have tried to get my cheap hands on it. One never knows when they have to show a foreign exchange student who has an obsolete piece of technology how bad some movies could be.

I picked up the receiver and frantically dialed the phone, getting a busy signal at least 6 times before I got through. When I did manage to finally get through, I was in shock to hear my voice echo in the dorm room, emanating from the sound system inside of it.

“Hello… Sir, would you mind turning your radio down a bit?”

“No problem.”

I cranked down the volume almost all of the way so I could hear what he had to say. I was still in shock to hear my own voice over the radio, but I was even more shocked to realize that there was no tape delay. The conversation was going out over the airwaves live.

“So, what’s your name?”

“Jake!”

I was chomping at the bit; I had already known that they wouldn’t have put me live over the air if I wasn’t the 99th caller. I was a shoe-in to win. I had never been that excited before, I had spend a good portion of my life winning academic and athletic accolades, but I had never won anything important.

“Alright Jake, you’re the 99th caller! Can you tell me what city the band U2 is from?”

“Of course I can! They are from Dublin, Ohio!”

My nerves got the best of me; I think the host of the show just let it slide.

“What was that?”

“I said they are from Dublin, Ireland!”

“That’s correct! A copy of U2’s next album is yours! Now tell me Jake, what is Tucson’s number one rock station?”

“That would be K-… uh…”

At that moment some things became blaringly obvious to me. I had spent the past few months listening to and enjoying a rock station that had been the only station I had ever listened to in my, as of then, short tenure in the city of Tucson. I left the station on in my car as I drove around town. I left it on in my dorm room when I was there alone. I had listened to it at parties and other social gatherings around campus from time to time. It was preset number 2 on every radio receiver I owned.

In this short period of time, I had become an avid listener of the station. I had not, however, bothered to learn the call letters to my new favorite broadcaster.

“Uh… KROK?”

“Uh, no.”

“KZGL?”

I knew that wasn’t it. KZGL was a radio station in Flagstaff. At this point, I was grasping at straws.

“No, not KZGL.”

Getting more and more nervous, I started blurting out any four-letter combination beginning with ‘K’ that came to mind.

“KORN.”

“Korn?! Now you’re reaching! Let me help you out, it’s KFMA. Now, what is Tucson’s number one rock station? ”

Tripping over my words, dying of embarrassment, I tripped over my letters, and for the first time, demonstrated my dyslexia.

“KAFM!”

“Dammit Jake, you are killing me. Try it again, it’s KFMA. What is Tucson’s number one rock station?”

“It’s KFMA!”

“Thank you!”

Now thoroughly embarrassed, I grabbed a cup of coffee at the student union and tried to slither my way into my first class, as cool and as calm as I could possibly be. If need be, the event would not be spoken of for a few years, but apparently, I wasn’t the only listener of KFMA in my circle of friends.

I walked in to class greeted by six or seven of my friends, standing, clapping and cheering. My face turned red, which, believe it or not, does happen to Hispanics. I sat down and slumped in my seat, trying to dispel the scene that was developing in a lecture hall of 260 students.

“Jake, what’s your major again?”

“Aerospace engineering, why?”

“I would really reconsider that, buddy!”

“Fuck off.”

Over the next few months, the event somehow found its way into my dating life. I am still unsure as to whether every female I was asking out in this particular stretch of time was listening to the morning show that particular day, or if my chances were being sabotaged by my friends. One thing is for certain, over the next few weeks and months, I heard the following phrase far too often:

“You’re the jackass who got the call letters wrong, aren’t you?”

It was beginning to happen so often, that I began to start most of my conversations with women by posing one query in particular.

“I have an off the wall question for you.”

“Ok, what is it?”

“Tell me, what is Tucson’s number one rock station?”

Insight

It is a situation that has played out over and over in my long, tumultuous dating career. I am sitting on the couch, watching a movie or my favorite sitcom. My right arm is draped around the shoulders of a girl whose head is on my chest. She looks at me and smiles, I get a little uncomfortable at the stare that she starts to give me, then she says the words…

“Jake?”

“Uh huh?”

“What are you thinking?”

Being that I am male, there are only three possible categories of true answers that can possibly fit the question. The first, and most common for most men would the standard ‘nothing’. Men, unlike women, can actually be thinking nothing and be quite happy for sometime, requiring quiet time for our heads as well as our ears.

Although ‘nothing’ is the most common verbal answer to the question, it is most likely not the most common actual answer. In reality, at most given times, there are two types of things that are occupying our minds. The first would be something so vulgar, disgusting, or rude that if it were to come out of our mouths, you would never stop kicking us in the nuts.

I have been told that it is as of yet inappropriate to talk to girls we are dating about such things as dreams of their sisters doing things that are beyond description to a squad of female college cheerleaders. This is especially true in the early stages of dating. Unfortunately, honesty only goes so far when dealing with women. I learned this the hard way, forcing me to get in the habit of wearing a cup on all of my first dates.

It is said that a man thinks about sex once every 8 seconds. In truth, this is an approximation. Once every 8 seconds is an average, when the approximation takes into account the time we are asleep and not in REM, the number drops to every 5 seconds, and the average duration of the thought is 3 seconds, which means 60% of our thoughts are about sex.

In all honesty women, the thoughts are usually about us and another woman, or you with other women, or other women with other women, or us and you and other women. Well, you get the point.

The second type of thought that mills about in the brain of ours is usually the type that makes us look like morons. They are things that are so ridiculous that if we were to actually admit them to a women, they might have us declared clinically brain dead and try to have us euthanized. They are things that you might overhear guys talking about when they are hanging out with other guys.

Take my brother and me, for example. We are two smashing young men of intelligence that is far beyond average, yet every time we hang out, we tend to get into the most ridiculous conversations imaginable.

“You’re a fucking idiot.”

“You’re telling me that you think that the professor got more action than anyone else on that island?”

“Ok, think about it, jackass! There are two single women on the island and three single dudes. The skipper is a fatty and Gilligan is functionally retarded, who do you think is going to get the most tail?”

“Mr. Howell!”

“Fuckhead, his wife is there, and she looks like she is quite a ways past menopause, of course he is going to get some from his wife!”

“No dude, I am talking about him nailing Ginger and Mary Ann.”

“What would Ginger and Mary Ann possibly see in his old ass?”

“Money, dude!”

“They live on a fucking desert island, asshole! What the fuck are they going to do with money? Not to mention, do you really think Mrs. Howell is cool with her husband banging a couple of other chicks?”

“They can do it when she is out picking berries or something.”

“You know how fast information travels in a small town? Think about how fast it travels in a community of seven! This whole thing is stupid! The show didn’t make any sense anyway!”

“How so?”

“Who the fuck takes a trunk of goddamn clothing, a chemistry set, or encyclopedias on a three hour tour? How far could they have possibly gone out to sea in those three hours? What kind of professor was he?”

“How would it matter what kind of professor he was?”

“How the hell would a philosophy professor know rare languages and chemistry?”

“Ok, you have a point."

“I know I have a point.”

Besides waxing intellectual about the sexual exploits of the castaways on Gilligan’s Island, (and in public, scaring away potential dates), we have argued over the directing prowess of Spielberg and Kubrick; debated who would be a better running back, Spider-Man or the Hulk; and discussed who would be the victor in a no-holds-barred fight between Superman and Jesus.

These things that we find important are mere trivia for women. These are things that they just don’t appreciate, and if we tried to explain what kinds of Kryptonite have what effect on Clark Kent, the conversation would just get lost in translation.

Besides the gratuitous, ‘nothing’ answer, there is always the I-am-trying-to-score-points-by-telling-you-a-bold-faced-lie answer…

“I’m just thinking of you, babe.”

This is only true in rare occasions. In the case it is true, it rarely if ever involves our feelings for you. We aren’t thinking of running across a field, hand in hand, with our as of yet unborn children in tow. There is no white picket fence surrounding a two story house in the suburbs, and I guarantee you, there is no minivan in the driveway.

The overly sweet answer of ‘I’m thinking of you’ has a way of backfiring horridly. One lie leads to another when you expect us to elaborate on the thought that wasn’t in our head in the first place.

“What about me?”

I am now engaged in a conversation that I did not want to be in when we sat down for the movie. I try to kill it as swiftly and vaguely as possible.

“Oh you know, stuff…”

“What kind of stuff?”

“I was just thinking about how beautiful you are…!”

…When you’re quiet.