The Company I Keep

Last night, I received a last minute invitation to play wing girl to one of my friends that is far more reclusive and anti-social than I could ever hope to be. She was supposed to be set up on a blind date (here's the kicker) but the 40 year old guy she was being set up with said he felt more comfortable if it was a double date but the mutual friend doing the setting up felt that she'd be intrusive as part of a double date so she decided to go the safe route and turn it into a group date. Really kids- we are not 16 anymore! Bloody hell, if you're in your mid 30s and into your 40s and you don't yet feel comfortable with one on one dates, you deserve to be single, and should be but for crying out loud, do not inflict yourselves on the rest of the world! But I went to support my sweet little friend and not give her yet another excuse to get out of a date.

I feel confident in saying they will not be going on a first real date any time soon.

Anyhoo, the guy wrangles up 3 friends to be his wingmen, and my friend is supposed to find 2 more to even things up but she and her friend have the brilliant idea that if there's only 3 girls the odds are in our favor and it'll seem less like a date. We are now the dating equivalent of 14 year olds trying to sneak in a date via hanging out- yay. And so everyone can escape easily, it's decided that we'll all meet up at The Festival of Trees even though we're all coming from the same town- that's cool- escape routes are a necessity for blind dates. Too bad there were no established codewords and obvious suggestions went unheeded.

My friend and I show up last because, well- she drives like an old lady bless her heart! We walk up to the group and I felt ill at what I saw, to be quite honest. In the end the guys turned out to be nice, but I'll tell you what- going on first impressions, these guys had all been scoured up from the bottom of some rank barrel long forgotten! There was a cocky bald guy with a gut, an overweight guy with what appeared to be a bad toupee, another very overweight red-headed guy with a really bad haircut, and a skinny guy with an 80's do and a bulbous nose. The friend doing the setting up and arranging of this fantastic hang out blind date session was an attractive brunette in her early 40s. My friend is this cute petite brunette, and then there's me- the blonde amazon. We were quite the group.

I'll just tell you right now- I hate crowds. People are obnoxious, loud, they step on your heels, they're oblivious, they block walk ways, they breathe nasty breath on you and cough in your face, they pick their butts and adjust themselves in front of you, they lose all common sense, and they shuffle along slowly like confused, hesitant cattle going to their slaughter. I hate it! I just don't do well with it and try to avoid it at all costs. It makes me not very pleasant to be around. And when I'm not happy, I don't bother putting on the happy face. I was not happy. And I've never walked so slowly in my entire life. My legs hurt from going too slow- how often does that happen?! Fortunately I realized my friend was avoiding her 'date' and talking to all the other guys so I intervened. I put on the happy face and forced myself to make new friends.

The red-headed bad haircut guy found cooler friends to hang out with so I only had to entertain the toupee guy (who actually wasn't wearing a toupee) and the bald cocky guy. Occasionally, the 'date' guy would wind up at my side and I had to redirect him to his actual date and then just find myself so enthralled with the interesting things the other guys were saying that I was just oblivious to all else. Holy crap- I've never had to work so hard in all of my life! Being fake is hard work. but then I actually started having fun- especially in talking to the bald cocky guy. Mind you- I'm not attracted to him or remotely interested in him but he was the most entertaining of the bunch. And of course since I am me, I get along best with colorful characters and oh boy, was he colorful, right down to his many tattoos! He's a reformed alcoholic manwhore- see it makes all the more sense now. And turns out the 'toupee' guy is his brother. The two of them are quite funny. Then the red-headed guy joined up with us again and the 3 of them kept me entertained for the rest of the night and I was able to hold my own against the combined wit of all three. I had entertained myself at the cocky guy's expense by rephrasing his words throughout the evening to relate a story he'd just told to another member of the party that caught only the last bit of it. He got me back at the end of the night though.

We left the Trees and went to Village Inn for cocoa. The setter upper was by now feeling left out because me and the brothers had laughed the entire night away, and like Mr. Darcy's aunt, she had to know what was being talked about so she could be part of the conversations too. Earlier, the brothers had told of being tortured by their sister- she'd made them dress up as girls and they'd been traumatized for life. Then they had the audacity to tell me that I'd never had any experiences like that. So I told them how my brothers had wanted me to be another brother and so when I was 4 they made me learn to pee standing up (my mom caught us on day 3 of standing to pee and except one time at Girl's Camp, I've not stood to pee since.) So there we are drinking our cocoa and she wants to know what she's not been hearing all night and so cocky guy tells her I pee standing up and told them I was flexible from it. I wanted to die of embarrassment, but serves me right I guess- not quite what I'd actually said but he rearranged my words to use them against me and get me back.

By the end of the night, I was actually glad that I went and forced myself to make nice with the toys, I mean boys, of Misfit Island- they're a little rough around the edges, somewhat awkward at times, verging on inappropriate for mixed company, but so funny and actually the 'toupee' brother was the nicest of the bunch- a gentleman in the rough. He's a very nice guy and if you take the time to get past the big belly and bad hair, you find a real, genuine guy just doing his best to not be a dooha while being a manly man with his buddies to cover the fact that he's a giant teddy bear at heart! Thanks for buying my cocoa guy who's name I never caught. As for his cocky brother- he's a bit jaded and rough around the edges and in looking at him and talking to him you see this cocky jerk of a guy but when you get to know him you find that he has overcome some monumental difficulties and is basically starting life over again and he too is a marshmallow inside but he hides it so much better with sarcasm and a hint of bitterness. The guy with the bad haircut is quite content with his lot in life I believe. He is content with his friends, probably wants a girl in his life but is in no real hurry to snag one. He just goes with the flow and comes and goes as he pleases. The date guy, well, I don't know about him because I made it a point to talk to him as little as possible and send him to his date but from what I observed, he's very nice, intelligent, shy, reserved, somewhat unsure of himself or how to communicate with the opposite sex effectively, but he does have a good sense of humor and a quick wit. These guys are friend material but for me, nothing more. So toupee bro, if you read this, you're nice but please realize there is a difference between friendliness and interest. I was only being friendly. Same to you cocky bro and bad haircut guy, and blind-date guy.

Besides, I have Tom to keep me happily occupied and entertained.