Judging from my email and comments made to me in real life and instant messaging, people seem to be taking either one of these two things from the Worst Date Ever story:
Either way, I’m glad you folks liked it. Thanks!
The scene: The upstairs lounge at the popular restaurant/nightclub Fez Batik, Saturday night at about 10:30 p.m.. The lounge is a junior set decorator’s idea of a scene from Kismet, with persian tapestries hanging from the walls and ceilings and cushions from an old Star Trek pleasure-planet set thrown over low-slung benches and couches. House music constantly thumps in the background and the air is abuzz with Smirnoff Ice-soaked conversation.
Her: Can you really play that thing?
Me: Yeah. Can I play something for you?
Her: Only if you can rock out on that thing.
Me: Funny you should mention that…
(One AC/DC number later)
Her: Whoo! That was awesome! Now can you play Happy Birthday for my husband?
Back when my buddy George and I were in Crazy Go Nuts University, we used to say “Yeah…girls…geez” a lot. I’ve since adopted that lament as one of the this blog’s categories. All dating-related stories will fall under this category, and you can access it by going to this blog’s main page and clicking the “Life” link under “Topics” in the left -hand column. You’ll be taken to the “Life” category. “Yeah…girls…geez” is a subcategory of “Life”; click on “Yeah…girls…geez” under “Topics” in the “Life” section to see all its stories.
From FARK: The Washington Post has a story on Modern Flirting and how women and girls are more aggressive than they used to be.
I dare you to resist visiting a site named BarBitches.com:
The BarBitches pick up where Ann Landers and Emily Post left off, providing modern-day etiquette lessons for bars and other social venues. If you’re not sure how to appropriately interact with others–people you want to talk to, people you want to sleep with, and people you want to get the hell away from–or if you’re just sick of seeing bad behavior when you go out, BarBitches.com is your new bible.
The BarBitches dream of a world where everyone knows how to properly order a drink, signal interest to an attractive stranger, figure out when and when not to make a move, politely signal non-interest, and properly conduct a hook-up from start to finish.
I’ve already finished telling the story of my worst date ever. I have four or five dates that I would consider to be my best, but one in particular is the most tellable, especially since it goes from disaster to success in a very odd way. It’s also tellable because it happened so long ago that anyone involved probably won’t mind my telling the story. Anyone want to hear it?
Correction: The spelling of Kerry-Ann’s name has been corrected from the incorrect “Carrie-Anne”.
The scene:
Last Sunday evening at Kickass Karaoke, upstairs at the Rivoli. I’m returning to my table from performing Nine Inch Nails’ Head Like a Hole. Sitting to my left is a friend I’ll refer to as Dude, and sitting across the table from me are Sam and Kerry-Ann. Meryle and Erik are sitting nearby, dressed for Disco Night, looking as if they’ve fallen out of a 1977 high school yearbook.
Sam: That was great!
Me: Thank you!
Sam: By the way, you should turn ar–
Dude: Shhhhhh!
Sam (sheepishly): Sorry.
Me: Huh?
Dude: It’s nothing. Don’t worry.
Later…
Sam: Joey, I think you should kn–
Dude: Shush!
Sam: But —
Dude: Shhhhhh!
Sam (sheepishly): Okay.
Me: Will somebody please tell me what’s going on?
Dude: Later. Let’s see how this develops.
Me: Whatever. I’m going to buy this round. Who wants what?
Later…
Dude: See the brunette with the black T-shirt? She’s been checking you out all night.
Me: Why didn’t you mention this before?
Dude: Because I didn’t want to interfere. This should just happen naturally. The girls wanted to tell you, but I told them to let it play out — if you knew, you’d act differently and maybe it might not work out.
Me: Mmm-hmmm.
What Dude said sounded like such complete nonsense that I dismissed it as him having a little fun with me.
Minutes later, a skinny punk rock girl would walk directly up to me, make eye contact and start dancing against my chair. You know what happened afterwards.
The scene:
Last night, after the Radiohead concert.
Sam: You know, that woman at karaoke really was checking you out.
Me: Karaoke? What woman?
Sam: The woman at the bar. Kerry-Ann and I were watching her check you out, and we both agreed she was into you.
Me: Why didn’t you tell me? I thought you were my friend!
Sam: We wanted to, but [Dude] told us not to. He was really forceful about it, saying that if you knew, your chances would be ruined.
Me: Wait a minute. When he said it, he used that “if you’re aware of it, you’ll ruin it” bullshit. I thought he was kidding because of that. You mean to tell me that he wasn’t?
Sam (sheepishly): No. Uh…you want me to tell you next time?
Me: Yes, please. Oh, and another thing…
Sam (sheepishly): Uh-huh?
Me: [Dude] must die.
No, Dude, I’m not going to kill you. Even though the Universal Code of Guys gives me the right to do so — and pee on the corpse, too! — under such circumstances.
What you did was with the best of intentions and in the spirit of true friendship. Perhaps you were worried about violating the golden rule of baseball that you should never mention to a pitcher that he’s on a no-hitting streak, because once he knows, he’ll fumble and the streak will end. Perhaps you were worried that by “interfering”, you might make the same kind of mistake that Steve Bartman made (although Bartman would not do so until two evenings later).
But really, “let things happen naturally”? The natural outcome for 99% of bar and club-goers is a state of equilibrium, which is for nothing to happen at all. No conversations, no exchanges of phone numbers, no nuthin’.
When this happens again — and I mean when, not if, bucko — I want to be informed. Please. Have some faith that I will know what to do with the information. After all, outside of 1984, the saying isn’t “Ignorance is power”.
Here are the new rules. Be assured I will do the same for you!
(In case you missed it, here’s the link to part 1 of the denouement.)
In the comments to one of the Worst Date Ever stories, Rick McGinnis guessed correctly that I remained friends with Crabs.
One Saturday night in the fall of 1999, Crabs and I met up at Buddies in Bad Times — the site of the first date with The Waitress — to dance there for old times’ sake.
Crabs came with his new boyfriend, who I recognized from TV.
“Dude,” I said, “I loved it when your head exploded on Earth: Final Conflict!”
“People actually watch that?” he asked, seeming genuinely surprised.
“Hey man, I was young and I needed the money.”
In this story, I shall refer to him as Exploding Boy.
As the evening progressed, more of our friends joined us, and by the time the club was in full swing, we had a pretty good group. The music was excellent, the crowd had a very pleasant vibe going, and for the first time in a long time, I was actually enjoying myself at Buddies in Bad Times. It seemed that the curse had been lifted from the place.
At the end of the evening, after the last song had been played, Crabs went downstairs to fetch his jacket from coat check. I sat on the stage, sipping from a bottle of water, talking with Ryan, whom I knew from my days at Crazy Go Nuts University.
The DJ had shut down the sound system, and the place was lit by the harsh glow of fluorescent tubes.
“Ugh,” said Ryan. “They’ve turned on the ‘ugly lights’.”
We started making our way towards the door when a voice came over the sound system.
“Everybody, get up!” said the voice. “We’re going to dance again!”
“What the…?” asked Ryan. “That sounds like [Exploding Boy]!”
I looked up at the DJ booth. Exploding Boy was in it, with the DJ’s microphone in his hand. He appeared to be searching the booth frantically and throwing switches at random.
“I want everybody to get up,” he said, “because the night’s not over! We’re going to have music!”
“The managers aren’t going to like this,” said Ryan.
Two bouncers raced from the main entrance towards the stairs to the DJ booth.
“Oh shit,” I said. “I’d better go get [Crabs].”
My experience working as a DJ at student pubs has taught me that if you want to get an overly rowdy or belligerent drunk to calm down, one of the best courses of action is to involve his/her significant other. Usually a girlfriend or boyfriend can calm down an out-of-control patron more effectively than any bouncer.
I found Crabs and took him upstairs to the balcony level where the DJ booth was. We arrived to find four bouncers, each one holding onto either a leg or arm belonging to Exploding Boy, who’d adopted the passive resistance strategy of going completely limp so that one is very difficult to move. This was especially effective in Exploding Boy’s case, as he was a pretty husky guy.
“I’m not leaving until we have music!” screamed Exploding Boy. “We…need…music!”
“We’re closed, buddy,” said one of the bouncers. “Go home!”
“You close too early! There’s still time for music!”
“Think we can lift him?” asked one of the bouncers to the others.
“Not when he’s all limp like that,” said another bouncer. “Guy weighs a fucking ton.”
“[Crabs],” I said, “why don’t you talk to him?”
Crabs burst out in tears. “[Exploding Boy], why are you doing this to me?! This is embarassing!”
Crabs lunged at Exploding Boy and pummelled him with a volley of completely wussy, Dame Edna punches.
“Accordion Guy,” said a bouncer through gritted teeth. “This…isn’t…helping…”
I grabbed Crabs by his arm.
“C’mon, let’s just leave. [Exploding Boy] will follow,” I said, annoyed at once again having to deal with what was likely more ketamine-fueled outbursts. “Goddamn horse tranquilizers…”
I walked Crabs out the front entrance. He sobbed all the way. As we passed Christine the doorperson, she looked at me and said “Accordion Guy, did you hit him over a girl again?”
“NO!”
Outside, it was cool, which felt wonderful after being inside a sweaty dance club for hours. I was hoping that the air would help clear Crabs’ head.
“Why is he doing this to me, Joey?” he sobbed.
“He’s not doing this to you, or anyone. He just wanted the evening to go on. Look, it’s still early enough for us to get into one of the boozecans…”
The emergency exit that led to the side of the dance floor opened. A voice came from the doorway: “On three! One…two…three!”
Out flew Exploding Boy. The bouncers had managed to carry him down the stairs, across the dance floor and to the emergency exit, where they swung him by his arms and legs and threw him out on his ample ass.
Exploding Boy landed with a thud and rolled over onto his stomach. He shook a defiant fist at the open doorway, calling the bouncers Nazis.
“We called the cops, fatass!” one of them yelled.
“Like I give a shit!” he yelled back. He stood up, raised both fists in the air and started yelling gibberish about peace, love, music, and “the fundamental right of all human beings to dance until sun-up” at no one in particular.
Crabs ran at him and attempted to tackle him. Exploding Boy swatted Crabs aside as if he were a rag doll.
“I want there to be love!”
“SHUT THE FUCK UP, WE’RE TRYING TO SLEEP HERE!” yelled someone from one of the nearby apartment buildings.
“NO!” replied Exploding Boy, all revved up now that he’d found a new audience. “I’m not going to shut up until we have peace and love and dancing!”
“Be quiet!” yelled another voice from another apartment building. “I’m calling the cops!”
Crabs charged again at Exploding Boy and unleashed another volley of punches, each one no stronger than a sneeze.
“StopitstopitstopitstoptistopitSTOPIT!” he yelled.
“You know what?” yelled Crabs. “I’m going to call your mother and tell her what you’re doing right now. Let’s see what she thinks of your behaviour. Joey, give me your phone!”
“No!” I said, and grabbed Crabs by both shoulders. “For Chrissake, pull yourself together! We…are…grown-ups! We don’t solve problems by telling on each other anymore!”
Besides, it was three in the morning. I’m sure she would’ve loooooved getting a whiny phone call in the middle of the night.
In the meantime, Exploding Boy had gone off on a rant, occasionally interrupted by a number of people who’d taken to yelling out their bedroom windows demanding that he shut the hell up.
“Let’s get out of here and get a coffee,” I said. I pulled Crabs in the direction of Church Street, where there was a 24-hour coffee shop.
“We’ll let him get tired.”
I bought Crabs a coffee. As we drank, I suggested that perhaps cutting down on the recreational chemicals — “I’m not trying to be a killjoy, I like to party too, but…” — might be a good idea.
After we finished our coffees, we returned to Buddies in Bad Times. I knocked on the front door, and Christine answered.
“Hey, ‘ccordion Guy.”
“What happened to our friend? The big guy who wouldn’t leave?”
“He yelled a little more, pissed off all the neighbours and then the cops came and took him to detox. Wellesley Hospital.”
“Thanks.”
“By the way, don’t come back for the next couple of weeks. You three are on the list.”
By “list”, she meant the “banned list”.
“What?! Why [Crabs] and me? We didn’t raid the booth.”
“I know, but the manager said so. Sorry.”
She closed the door and locked it with a very final sounding ker-chunk.
“I hate this place,” I said to Crabs. “Something bad always happens here.”
It was months before I returned.
We made our way to the detox center at Wellesley hospital. Crabs and Exploding Boy were reunited, had a small argument and followed it up with a joint crying session. Once it looked as though sanity were restored, I got in a cab, leaving the two drug-addled idiots to their own devices.
Since then, Crabs and Exploding Boy have quit drinking and drugging. They’re considerably saner, pleasant to hang out with, and have not turned any outings of mine into hellish nightmares since.
Some people wanted to know what happened to everyone involved in the Worst Date Ever stories.
(In case you haven’t read them yet, here are the various parts of the story… <a
Enjoy!)
A week after the Third and Final Date, I was once again at Tequila Bookworm, sitting in one of the tattered but comfortable second-hand easy chairs in the cafe’s back section. I was lazily typing at my laptop, not actually accomplishing anything.
Beside me, in the equally-tattered second-hand couch, sat Hector. He had a coffee in one hand and was lazily picking at some loose couch-stuffing with his other hand.
(Years later, Hector would introduce me to Emily, better known in this blog as the New Girl — while sitting in the very same couch. Needless to say, I have a strong guideline – even now I’m not ready to make it a hard-and-fast rule — to never date anyone I meet there.)
“Um, hello there,” said a sweet but nervous English-accented voice. I nearly dropped my laptop in response.
Hector must’ve noticed the discomfort in the air, but had no idea why.
I hadn’t told anyone what had happened. It wasn’t embarrassment that kept me quiet, but shock. I still couldn’t believe that my dream date had gone so awfully, disastrously, stool-softeningly wrong.
I suggested that we take the conversation away from prying ears. She asked one of her coworkers to take over for her for about fifteen minutes, and we stepped outside. It was one of the first days that could truly be called spring. It was a bright, cloudless day, and the smell of budding plants was in the air. It seemed wrong to be having an “it’s not working out” conversation on a day like that.
“Look…” she said.
I interrupted her. “It’s okay. You don’t have to say anything.”
Especially if it’s in verse, I thought.
The rest of the conversation was simply an admission on both our parts that we weren’t going to pursue a relationship, but remain friends. Under normal circumstances, I would have been devasted by such a turn of events, but that last date’s circumstances were anything but normal. Yes, i was a little disappointment, but what I was feeling most was relief.
A couple of weeks later, I was sitting at the bar with Chris.
She took our orders, and after bringing them to us, announced that she was leaving waitressing for greener pastures.
“I’ll tell you more later, because I’ve got to run right now. Hot date.”
She and the film girl who was always drawing in her sketchbook were an item. Before that, Film Girl and The Artiste — The Waitress’ former boyfriend — had a little fling.
“What are you thinking of doing?” I asked.
“Adult film. I know a director, and he says I’d be a natural. Tell you more later, I’m running late. Bye, Joey!” she said, and ran out the door.
I sat in stunned silence.
“You, my friend, have achieved the dream,” said Chris. “Someday, you’ll be able to point and say ‘See that porn star? I dated her.’ Those are serious bragging rights.”
“I feel soiled, yet proud,” I said, still stunned.
The Waitress never ended up in the adult film industry. Instead, she ended up waitressing at increasingly posh restaurants and dated one of the cooks at one her workplaces. We met from time to time for coffee and conversation, but I saw less and less of her as the months wore on.
A year later, in the summer of 2000, my coworkers from OpenCola and I went to Kickass Karaoke at the Bovine Sex Club. When we entered the back room where the stage was located, I was surprised to see The Waitress there. She never goes to the Bovine. She waved to me from her seat.
I went over to greet her, and we exchanged a hug and a peck on the cheek. She introduced me to her date, a dark-haired woman with angular features. I’ll refer to her as The Designer. I then introduced The Waitress and The Designer to my coworkers, among whom were Deenster and Chris.
After we found a place of our own to sit, Chris whsipered to me “Did you get a look at The Designer’s hands! They’re…man hands!”
After taking a another look at The Designer, I said “You know, I think you’re right.” She was referred to as “Man Hands” for the rest of the night.
Later that evening, Carson, Kickass Karaoke’s host, called The Designer and The Waitress to the stage to perform their number. I laughed when I recognized the number they were singing — Sweet Transvestite from The Rocky Horror Picture Show.
Weeks later, Film Girl (the one who’d been with both The Waitress and The Artiste) and I were having coffee together.
“You won’t believe this, Joey,” said Film Girl, “but my cousin was with The Designer for a while, and it turns out that she’s not fully post-op.”
“You mean…?”
“She’s a woman only from the waist up.”
“And, uh, what about, you know, ‘below the equator’?”
“Dude.”
“Wow, those really were man hands. But you know what? She looks waaay better in a dress than I ever could.”
Earlier this year, I was at Tequila Bookworm with a friend of mine I’ll refer to as Rock and Roll Girl. I told her the story of my worst date ever, and mentioned that the last person I saw The Waitress dating was The Designer.
“Oh, I was with The Designer once,” she said.
“I thought you were only into guys.”
“I am,” she replied, “but I was curious about the boobs. Straight girls never get to play with boobs.”
“You know, I actually understand where you’re coming from. They’re pretty neat things, they are.”
“You know, [The Designer’s] still pining for [The Waitress].”
“That’s because she never made him speak in verse.”
I haven’t seen The Waitress since September 2001.
AKMA wanted to know what happened to The Artiste. Unfortunately, there’s not much, but here it is anyway.
The Artiste found out about my involvement with The Waitress weeks after the Third and Final Date. He immediately became all chummy with me because we “now had a common bond”.
No thank you, sir. The only common bond that he and I have is that we’re both carbon-based life forms. That’s about it.
One afternoon, The Artiste felt like annoying Film Girl (this was after their fling) while at Tequila Bookworm. I wasn’t there, so I have no idea what he did or said, but whatever it was, it was bad enough that Film Girl — a whole foot shorter than The Artiste — knocked him off his barstool with a solid right cross, leaving him stunned, embarrassed and bloody-nosed on the cafe’s floor. For this act, Film Girl was banned from Tequila Bookworm.
“If I were manager of Tequila Bookworm, I’d have given you free coffee for life,” I told her.
I haven’t seen The Artiste in about three years.
Next: What happened to Crabs, or why I no longer dance at Buddies in Bad Times.
Velvet Underground, a slightly gothy alt-rock dance bar.
Drunk Guy 1: Duuuuuuuude!
Me: Dude.
Drunk Guy 1: I love you, man! You play accordion!
Me: Hey, thanks!
Drunk Guy 1: Can I borrow it? I just want to try it out.
Me: Sure.
I don’t really have any trouble with letting people try on the “street” accordion. It’s tough and it’s already taken a fair beating; there’s not too much harm that even a drunk person can do to it. With the “stage” accordion, it’s a different story.
Drunk Guy 1: Here. Take my cell phone as collateral.
He hands me his cell phone. It’s the top-of-the-line Samsung, probably worth 5 times the resale value of the street accordion. he fumbles his way through Stairway to Heaven.
Guy at Bar: Hey, Accordion Guy. Been meaning to say “hi” to you.
Me: Hey there.
Guy at Bar: I dated [New Girl] a little while before you did.
Me: Whoa. Glad to see you came out of it alive.
Guy at Bar: Yeah, got out of it early. Good to see you’re in one piece. Hey, she’s been hanging around again — people have seen her around. Looks like she’s not hiding anymore.
Me: Who wants to hang around with her anymore? Isn’t she on everyone’s shitlist yet?
The story about me and the New Girl travelled quickly around the local goth grapevine, and after that, a lot of people stepped forward with their own stories of how they’d either been burned by her or seen her con someone. Accordion City’s black-clad are a pretty tight community; you’d be hard-pressed to find an local goth who hasn’t heard of her.
Drunk Guy 1: Thanks for loaning me the accordion! Dude, you rock!
Sam: Ooh, you’re such a celebrity, can I touch you?
Me: (Using my Strong Bad voice) “Ladies, line up to my left for make-outs! Dudes, line up to my right for high-fives!”
Any locals seen New Girl around?
The Rivoli, on Kickass Karaoke night.
Punk Rock Girl, a skinny pleather-clad blonde with librarian glasses, the sides of her head clean-shaven and the rest of her hair done up in a single top-of-the-head “Pebbles” ponytail, walked right up to my chair and looked straight at me. I took a final swig of my rye and Coke and stood up to dirty dance with her.
All was going swimmingly (and somewhat cheesily, what with that knee-between-your-partner’s-legs dance) until I felt a tug at the belt loop at the back of my pants. Why is it that someone always attempts to interrupt me from behind when I’m trying to get my flirt on?
It was her girlfriend, a tank-top wearing blonde with enough tattoos to qualify her for the Japanese mob, a mess of piercings and a very annoyed frown that said “Mister Y-chromosome Breeder, you have three seconds to save your nuts.”
I put one arm around Punk Rock Girl’s waist, took her hand with my other hand, and executed a passable tango dip. I spun around her so that she was now beside Angry Girlfriend, and after spinning her around once, twirled her free into Angry Girlfriend’s arms.
The whole exchange felt like a deleted scene from a Fred Astaire / Ginger Rogers movie directed by Tarantino or Kevin Smith.
“Easy come, easy go,” I said, as I returned to my seat.
“Oh, Joe, you could’ve have gone home with both of them!” exclaimed Eldon, momentarily forgetting the definition of the word lesbian.
Sam was still laughing and clapping. “That just made my night. She would’ve totally kicked your ass.”
Thanks for the vote of confidence in my battle prowess, Sam.
Who’s the cat who won’t freak out, when there’s angry dykes about? JOE! Daaaaaamn right.