Once upon a time, I vowed I would update here.

Days passed, and no updates occurred. I had plenty of time to update, and yet I didn't. Like I've tried to explain to some people, being at work and having very little to do seems to suck my will to live... and, consequently, update.

I feel like I might be coming down with a cold; one of my coworkers has a cold and is not here today. I've been feeling a little bit something since Saturday morning, but I just figured I was probably snoring hard-core or something after drinking with Ben.

So anyhow, what have I been up to lately? Well, a lot and not a lot. The long weekend was fairly dull overall, but that was okay. Monday I got together with a bunch of the zone folks over at OFK's parents' place. We were originally going to play volleyball and have a barbecue, but as some of you may recall, the weather was poo. So instead, we watched some tv (Firefly, to be specific), played some video games, and played some cards. I'd brought Killer Bunnies and some of us played a few rounds of that. After dinner I played a few hands of Asshole before taking my notebook and going outside.

I had it reinforced that day how much I dislike relying on other people for things that I can do myself. To whit, I hate mooching lifts off of other people, and I hate having to rely on other people for lifts. OFK's parents live in the backwoods, or at least backwoods enough that I couldn't even think of busing home (nor do I know the bus system for where we were, if it even extends that far, which I doubt), so I had to wait until someone else was ready to leave, and willing to drive me home. Generally at these gatherings, there's someone who leaves early, but not that day. Instead, I was out there until OFK left, actually, and he was the last to do so. Personally, I'd been ready to go home after we watched an episode or two of Firefly. I'd gotten picked up at 2:30, and it was just one of those days where I kinda wanted to sit under blankets and read or cuddle my kitten or watch television or something -- ideally on a DVD player that wasn't skipping, but that wasn't anyone's fault.

I don't know, I just found that my mood took... not a plummet, but a bit of a turn. I was enjoying the socializing and I really enjoyed that Mad was teasing me and I was teasing her in return, and it was a lot of fun, but after dinner... I took my notebook outside and sat on the step in the twilight and wrote. Towards the end, I couldn't really make out the page, but I kept writing until I'd filled my notebook, some three years or so after I'd originally started it.

I started it after The Ex- and I broke up the first time -- the time he'd told me that he wanted to see other people shortly after he'd come home for the summer. It's weird to think that it feels like I'm so far past those years of my life, yet they're not that long ago, really. I do love that there's finally some significant years between myself and the fiasco that was the UBFM relationship. We broke up when I was about 18 1/2, and here I am approaching 24... it feels really good to have that so far behind me.

I've been fairly immersed the last little while in getting out and meeting people, and while it hasn't necessarily been a rousing success, it's certainly been good practice and so on. Some people I chat with for awhile before I meet them; others it's been just a few brief email exchanges or something and then a meeting. It's been good for getting used to keeping conversations going with people I don't know very well, or at all. *shrug* I've also had fairly good luck in that I haven't met up with anyone who was a total asshole or anything of the sort. A few have toed the line of being assholes online, but that's easy enough to avoid.

I have lost my taste for the whole event, though, I have to admit. There are a few people who I have yet to meet, and I'm willing to do so, but I'm not holding out any great hopes that they'll be anyone spectacular, as bad as that might sound. Lavalife has taught me not to be offended at the brush-off, and not to feel too depressed if things don't pan out, 'cause after all, there's bound to be someone interesting around the next corner.

Anyhow, so the week between the last two weekends wasn't anything terribly exciting, at least not that I remember. Last weekend was somewhat hectic, though... Saturday I had lunch with one guy, a really awful coffee with another, then it was off to OFK's place for gaming excitement. Saturday wouldn't have been so bad if I'd had more sleep, but last-minute plans with Ben involving seeing Shrek 2 (my second time) and getting wasted (not necessarily my original intention, but a good result nonetheless) kept me up fairly late.

Ben indulged quite heavily on whiskey, I partook of a couple of martinis (one chocolate one and two after eights -- creme de cacao, creme de menthe and vodka) and we had good conversation the whole time. There was also a pizza that I ordered and Ben shared, and then later his insistence on having nachos -- whereby we each each about five, and he deliberately abandoned them in my fridge, the bastard. As promised, those are going out with the garbage tomorrow morning.

While we drank, I kept note of various subjects I wanted to address in this site. A few were amusing, like my constant knocking of my first two martinis, before I was drunk, and our waiter's complimenting of Ben for his good taste in whiskey and his ability to consume it in vast quantities (the guy said that he usually considered his customers to be wimps, but Ben was redeeming them).

Oh yeah, and another moment of brilliance on my part. I have a habit of saying weird things that get overheard by other bar patrons or waitstaff in various establishments. A few examples that come immediately to mind:

1. Out for a late night snack at what used to be a diner with Ben. A group, led by our waitress, files past us to a table a little ways away. Ben and I are discussing what kind of a tip to leave, and Ben wants to leave a sizeable one. I say, "Not quite so much... The service was good, but it's not like we got oral sex out of it." Unbeknownst to me, a final member of the group was coming up behind me and happened to walk past at that exact moment. According to Ben, who was facing her, she cracked up.

2. Out at another diner with a (at the time) coworker and a friend, who was in the washroom. My friend A was facing the room in general, I had my back to it (although we were both sideways to the restaurant proper, which makes sense in my head, but probably not yours). We were discussing oral sex and hair maintenance, and I was saying that during oral sex, I like to involve the testicles and so on as well, which is tricky when a guy has hairy balls. I said something to the effect of, "I just ask them to shave that up, and who's going to complain? I've never had a problem." (Okay, so I can't remember the exact comments, but I do remember the subject matter). Anyhow, our waitress was cleaning the table beside us at the time (which A could see, but I couldn't, since it was behind me, although if I'd looked up I might've seen her in the surrounding mirrors), and she snorted audibly at that comment. I apologized if I'd offended her, and she was totally blase about it, saying she overheard a lot of weird conversations in her job, and I think she even said she agreed with us.

And that brings us to 3, which happened Friday night. I don't remember what we were discussing that brought the subject up or why, but Ben and I were talking about underwear, and he suggested wearing thong underwear, or that guys looked ugly in thong underwear, or *something.* Dammit, I can't remember now. Anyhow, I said something like, "I look bad in all underwear," which apparently our waiter overheard and I think Ben said he did an about-face on his approach to our table.

The fun thing is, I really don't care that people overhear me. I find it amusing. :)

So Ben and I also spent time assessing one another's character and trying to decide what we needed to fix in order to be the perfect specimens that we're only moments away from being. Okay, so that's not quite true; basically, we wanted to figure out why it is that we keep date losers and jerks and people who don't treat us well, and what it is about ourselves that's "wrong" with us to stop this trend. I told Ben the same thing I've told anyone who's discussed it (yes, we love to analyze your character, dude, and we all hate you because you're too awesome and perfect), that he needs to stop dating girls with no spines, with chemical imbalances, who treat him like shit, take advantage of him, walk all over him, and don't treat him with respect and so on. Hell, I talked to his dad about this last year when I was babysitting Mark (true story!), and even his dad was in accord, as Mark has been, too (not that I'm trying to speak for either of them). Plus lots of other friends, but anyhow, that's off-topic.

I announced a lot that I wanted to get laid, and Ben was agreeing with the general statement, that spring has brought on twitchy feelings in many of us. Of course, I know that what I'm looking for isn't just no-strings sex, or a quick fling, which I could find fairly easily. I want the respect and the caring and the committment and the trust that goes into a proper relationship.

Tangent: I was thinking about that at the barbecue last Monday. Basically, sometimes I'll wind up hanging out or being casually flirtatious or something with a few of the guys in the group. It's harmless and understood by everyone involved and so on, and to the best of my knowledge, no one minds it (and if they do, I just hope they'd speak to me about it). At the same time, I recognize it for what it is on my part: part fun, part amusement for everyone involved/around, but also partly borrowed affection. Sure, at this point, I might be getting my head or back rubbed, or I might be making jokes with someone about our torrid affair, but when the moment ends or the joke's over, or the day wraps up, I know that they go home with their boyfriend or girlfriend, and I go home to my kitten. Don't get me wrong, I love my kitten and so on, but sometimes it'd be nice to have someone to talk to that doesn't bite me and try to gnaw through to the bone for no particular reason.

*sigh* Okay, moving on. I grouched someone out the other day. He was alluding to the comments I had made while drunk (about how I kept announcing I wanted to get laid) and saying that here I was, going to lesbianism and celibacy and so on and how I hadn't met him yet... and that's coming off smarmier right now than it did in the conversation. Anyhow, while I knew that it was a joke and so on, personal experience has taught that all too often (i.e., 95% of the time) there is a kernel of truth to those kinds of jokes and I am utterly tired of it. Lavalife has taught me that all men want to do is fuck, and they don't care if they know your name, your personality or much else beyond the colour of your underwear. They are also all insanely talentented at oral sex, love to go down on women, won't stop until the woman is screaming in ecstacy, and despite whatever your lovelife has been like previously, they are the REAL MAN for you.

Don't get me wrong, this isn't how I actually view men, although I'm partly leaning that way -- hence my need to hang out with more friends who aren't ... I was going to say morally reprehensible, but that's a judgement call I don't actually believe. I don't think there's anything wrong with that kind of hookup, it's simply not what I'm looking for and I'm tired of explaining that to guy after guy. I'm also tired of then having to explain that to guys who originally claim that's not what they're looking for, then turn around and reduce what they want to "just sex, no seriousness/relationship/whatever." *minor scream*

Okay, where was I? Yeah, so, experience has taught me to be cautious of any guy I meet on lavalife who starts making jokes about sex, or even sometimes friends who do the same thing. So I grouched at this guy somewhat, and he defended himself and called me Jennifer, and I asked him not to, then we argued a bit more and he signed off by saying, "Talk to you later, Jennifer." At this point, if I'm feeling less-than generous, I will conclude that that final bit was a deliberate asshole moment, 'cause if I've asked/told you not to call me Jennifer and you persist, you're doing it out of assholeness. I had an acquaintance in high school who used to do just that, and it drove me nuts.

Granted, people here at work call me Jennifer all the time, but I'm inclined to put it down to ignorance/stupidity. If I sign my emails as Jen, I answer my phone as Jen, and my work cubicle says "Jen," what else can you say it is? Okay, so I'm listed in contact lists and so on as Jennifer, but listen to what I call myself, would you? Argh. It's almost getting so that I want to change jobs so I can start afresh, 'cause despite my correcting people... *sigh* I hate people.

I had a bunch of weird dreams the last while, but I don't really have time to go into them -- it's time for me to head home. I start my running class today, so I want to make sure I eat something good and not terribly heavy, and I don't want to be wolfing it down at the last minute. Plus, I want to go hang out with my kitten, evil demon spawn that she may be and so on.

Here's hoping the rain doesn't combine with my already-questionable health to make me sick. :P And that I don't keel over and die in my brand-new running gear, either. Having money is bad. :P