Worship me you pigs!

So! The posse has been circulating a bit. Some have men close to home. Some are dating through technology. Some are serial dating. Some are locked in. All are finding out what they like and what they don’t like. What they will tolerate, what they won’t. What blows their skirt up and what makes them say, “eh?” with a shrug.

The founders of the Catch and Release program have often provided public service announcements, and are now considering some continuing education courses for clueless menz.

Guys, what’s wrong with a little woo? You know, paying attention to a girl… doing little things that make her feel special. Just coz girls are a bit more independent these days – able to pick up the check once in a while, don’t mind asking you to accompany her to a function – doesn’t mean that some old fashioned manners won’t still sweep her off her feet. And rest assured, your rewards will be great. You will be shocked at how great they will be.

Remedial Woo Syllabus

Lesson One: Free woo
Sweet text messages*
Holding open a door will get you far
Be a Man, hold her hand

Lesson Two: Essentials of woo
Leaving voicemail without obscenities
Defining "real dates"**
18 pet names that will make her swoon

Lesson Three: Kick up your woo a notch
How to give a sincere compliment***
"Listening" for Dummies
Wooing bloopers: if SHE don’t think it’s wooing, it ain’t****


* A simple, “I think you’re wonderful” will have her melting before lunch time.
** Dinner and a movie: passé? Think again!
***Best to date: I feel like I won the lottery with you
****One of the posse members got a rifle for Valentine’s Day from her beau. Any other posse member would have shot him with it for considering that an appropriate gift for any occasion. But this guy was tuned in and we’re 99.9% sure he got his own wooing that night.

Reasons he’s not calling you

I pity the telemarketers scheduled to work on Wednesday nights. That is the night where all dating-aged women across the nation are waiting for the phone call. And not the one to switch their long distance service. Apparently there is something known as the 4-day rule that is programmed into the male DNA. It has to be, because when have they ever followed any other rule willingly?

When a boy turns 18 and goes to register for the Selective Service, he is advised of the 4-day rule as part of the process. Under penalty of being shunned by all deerkillin', heartbreakin', fartmakin' men (Yo! Amber!) a guy may not call a girl for 4 days after he gets her number. Why? We took a small poll, and according to our (two) sources, 3 days makes you look desperate and 5 days makes you look too uninterested. Huh? So Saturday digit exchange=Wednesday phone call.

Let me just clue ya’ll in, we females do not hate it when our crush can’t get enough of us. And if you’re texting and calling us one hour after you secure our phone number (Tips for the clueless: Just calling to make sure you got home ok. Or: I’m just wishing I hadn’t left town and was still with you.) and continue this communication for three weeks straight, we absolutely do not think you look desperate. As long as we’re reciprocating. (No stalking freaks, please!) And, by the way, four days of silence gives a girl’s mind a lot of time to wander. And four days of girlfriends’ input on a topic like this can never be good for a guy.

Reasons he’s not calling:

• Dropped his phone in the river fly fishing and simultaneously forgot how to use e-mail to ask you for your number to reprogram into his new phone


• He’s working (aka: getting paid to play solitaire all day) and is totally exhausted


• He can’t let you see him without his baseball cap until he’s gotten hair plugs installed


• He’s looking for the perfect orchid to match your porcelain (Kranberry: like a toilet) skin


• He’s given up airheads and has therefore worn through three composition books planning the perfect date to dazzle you


• He’s honestly lost your number and is wandering through the village like the prince with the glass slipper listening for your heavenly laughter (Amber: more like donkey braying!)


• After correctly deducing Amber’s predelicktions, he’s suffering from a number of complications from BCS wax:

All night BCS “spa” wasn’t so sanitary (SHOCKING!) and he developed cellulitis and is now sitting in Dr.’s office every day for three weeks getting antibiotic shots in the butt.

He's in the hospital after breaking his leg while fainting from the pain

He's still carefully picking all the wax from his netherregions after he chickend out

He made the mistake of sitting down in the shower before yanking the wax off and has been stuck there for 4 days (Blush: the irony of the 4 Day Rule is that it will always bounce back to cause you trouble) because he either can't reach his phone without castrating himself or is too embarrassed to call someone. Because who would he call? His friends, who no matter how close they are, they ain't gonna help him with THAT. Nor does he want to call strangers (911) to help him with THAT.

• He is composing the perfect sonnet, but can't find anything to rhyme with "nantucket"


• Special section for our favorite roofers and other laborers (temporary or otherwise):
  Maybe there was a nail gun accident
  Maybe the contractors locked him in the portopotty
  Maybe he really does think slower than concrete dries
  Maybe the portopotty fell over while he was in there with a groupie who "just stopped by to see when they would be opening and oops my skirt blew up, etc" and he's now in a neck and back brace


• He's waiting to ask Amber out in person so he can see the hairball trick again


• He's chicken coz we’re so obviously way out of his league


• He can’t afford to shell out $75 that Blush and Kranberry make whenever they karaoke


• He's had a batman phobia since childhood.


• During one of the many full-body hugs, he figured out that (one of the posse members) bought her boobs at Victoria’s Secret and they are removable.


• His friends told him we sing like braying donkeys


• Coz he's a MAN. He doesn't plan ahead. Ride with the Wind! Bee freeeeeeeee! Nothing can tie me down! He has no idea what he's supposed to be doing right now (unless some woman tells him). How's he gonna know what he's doing tomorrow or next weekend? Huh? Don't be such a nag!

Sports Fishermen vs. Roofers: The lesser of two evils?

The seasonal outdoor laborers (roofers, loggers, demo crews, etc) have moved on to greener pastures, and apparently the next seasonal migration of men to our region are sports fishermen.

Reasons why sports fishermen are so much hotter than roofers:

1. Red sea turtle boxer shorts coordinate in color AND theme with red Hawaiian swim trunks
2. Have enough discretionary income to pay for guided fishing tours
3. Better dancers because there are no oversized shoulders to throw them off balance
4. Higher IQ: Remember, no license required to become roofer, unlike becoming a fisherman (Hee!)
5. Much sexier making out on a boat than in a trailer/hotel room with 8 other guys
6. Their real jobs don't have purposely misspelled words in the company name like "(Insert construction term here) R Us"
7. Better wardrobes which are bought at Academy instead of found in dumpster (Amber: presumably)
8. Keys to yacht more impressive than keys to rusty cement truck
9. Fish for dinner is still better than whatever you can scrounge up at the Circle C convenience store
10. Lounging around on a private fishing boat is much more enjoyable than perching atop a roof wearing a hard hat

It ain't dainty, fo sho!

It is dainty to be sick if you have leisure and convenience for it.
Ralph Waldo Emerson

The last few months have been a little hard on the posse medically speaking, and let me tell ya, it has been anything but dainty! While Blush wins for length and variety of illnesses (including cellulitis, bursitis, and a throat infection, not to mention the tests for suspected gout*, mono, a thyroid disorder, disfunctioning liver and step … all of which resulted in 22 office visits, a trip to the ER, six different antibiotics and wandering the city like a nomad looking for nurse friends to give her a shot in the butt every day for 3 weeks), Amber wins the Wednesday Happy Hour Gross Medical Condition of the Week Award:

As diagnosed by Dr. X, who, if you didn't know, has a master’s degree in electrical engineering, so of course he's brilliant in my book.

Dr. X: You have a bit of food stuck on your tonsil.
Amber: *mortified* Oh! I'm sorry! Let me go get some water … and a harikari sword

Dr. X: No no no, it's nothing that you would know about
Amber: *sniff* gonna keep the sword handy
Dr.X: and water probably won't dislodge it anyway
Amber: *sniff* tequila?

Anyhoo, seems like I have a very rare, and disgusting, tonsil
condition. A hole that traps food. Seriously. But not like a
zit, because according to Dr. X, it's not a zit coz it's not entirely closed up.
Yuckomundo!

So after Dr. X and his trusty lab dude both tried and fail to scrape my tonsil out of my throat with various pointy sticks (No! Shine the light on her tonsil, not her nose! Ms. Amber, relax and try to suppress the gag reflex.*Editor's note: Never knew that was a MEDICAL instruction* Her tonsil, her tonsil! Hand me that wire loop! Not her nose! Ms. Amber, relax please.) they decided it was a job for a specialist.

Incidentally, Amber and Blush are both patients of Dr. X, although he doesn’t know they are practically sisters (They have been asked that so many times at the Slice of Heaven, they just roll with it now. “Yes we are” is much easier than getting into some long drawn out conversation with drunken roofers.). If Dr. X did know about their kinship, it might change his diagnosis since Amber believes that we are all getting these weird infections from the soap in ‘Heaven.

*When Dr. X said I had gout, I asked him, “Is that really even a disease? Isn’t that just something you read about in Civil War novels?” He was highly offended and rattled off the textbook medical description for gout, which to me sounded like the teacher on Charlie Brown: Whaaaaaa whaaaaaa whaaaaa. Whaaaaa wha wha wha whaaaaaaa.

Roofers

The Slice of Heaven is located in an area that has seasonal work which occasionally calls for demo crews, roofers, contractors, and other various outdoor laborers to decend upon us. They sniff out 'Heaven like bloodhounds on a coon. While we have found them to be mostly good ole boys, they do have a few peculiarities. How can you spot 'em?

You might be a Roofer if:

• Your shoulder span is greater than your IQ
• You chase natural disasters looking for work
• All of your t-shirts are missing sleeves because your shoulders don't fit
• Your answer to "can you conjugate a verb" is "Conju-what?"
• Your regular housing arrangements include 8 guys to a room
• Getting dressed up means wearing your cap with the company logo
• You know to the ounce how much you can bench press
• Your definition of the good life: when your paycheck covers your bar tab
• You think buying a woman a shot is the ultimate romantic gesture
• Words that are synonymous to you: Parking Lot/Toilet
• You think "I'm just gonna sit here and look at your tits" is a great line
• Your last-ditch, roll-the-dice line is "If you're not going to be nice to me, I guess I'm going home to jerk off and go to sleep" (hey, bubba, don't let the door hit you in the ass on yer way out)
• You sit around in shithole bars and make fun of the shinglemakers
• Your aftershave bears a striking resemblance to tar shampoo
• You can maneuver the ramp at the Slice of Heaven with a beer in each hand and a woman on your back!!!

Post-Weekend Wrap Up

The Slice of Heaven rarely disappoints for an evening of unlimited mocking, and Friday night was no exception.

Among the most memorable:

The Ham Lady

She wore a dress that was mostly backless, except for these criss-cross laces making her look like …. a ham. She was also wearing these obviously new “come f*&$ me” shoes. And she was on a date. Like a first date. One thing to find out that your friend/crush/etc. shares your affinity for colorful locales (Amber: shithole bars) and suggest it as a lark 6 or 7 dates in, another thing to take someone there for a first date. On the other hand, maybe it’s better to find out up front their ability to mock. So Amber and I made up this whole conversation that we thought must be running through the Ham Lady’s head about what kind of nasty place he’s taking her to, and if he thinks the enchilada dinner makes up for this, he is sadly mistaken, and there she had went and bought brand new $14.95 shoes and had her 23-year-old daughter strap her into the ham dress and everything.

WELL! We were delighted to see that after a couple of beers the Ham Lady was totally into the Slice of Heaven. She was dancin’ in her chair (One karaoke singer was serious about working the crowd and said if people didn’t want to get out on the dance floor, they could just dance in their chairs. I appreciated his permission to do so.), and she was singin’ along and clappin’ and who-hoooin’. Amber looked at her and declared, “Another Slice of Heaven success story.”

Sammy Hagar and Sandra Dee

There is a little game The Posse likes to play called “Guess the Song.” Let me tell you, we failed MISERABLY on Friday night, and it is always so delightful when we are surprised. First up was a Sammy Hagar look-alike with wild blonde curly hair, a Hawaiian shirt and white shorts (he’s not at all concerned about the Labor Day rule). His duet partner was a sweet shy woman with a blonde ponytail and innocent white blouse. We were rubbing our hands together with anticipation….We could see some totally raunchy rock song coming up that was guaranteed to make Ms. Innocent blush. We were totally floored when they sang Johnny Cash and June Carter’s “Jackson.” And there’s Sammy Hagar acting like he’s stomping his foot western-style, but really he looks like some kind of mentally challenged heron raising his leg up and down and pointing his flip flop totally out of sync with the beat.

ZZ Top

The next little surprise was ZZ-Top-looking dude singing “Purple Rain.” But, like, a super-old ZZ Top with a meth problem. And Amber reminds me that at one point I was going to pull a humanitarianism and go back him up, but I was terrified that things would crawl out of his waist-length beard and into my invisa-bra (which is another story for another day). Ewwwwwwww. People got out their lighters to hold aloft, more for sympathy than for adoration. But ZZ Top did make the most of his time while waiting between songs and advised us all: “Don’t waste yer life!” I’m not sure if he has any openings to become my life coach or not.

Math Club President

Then there was the Math Club President and her Soccer Mom Side Kick. MCP, a very young woman, was wearing a plain blue sweatshirt and navy walking shorts. She had her kinky hair pulled back in a sensible pony tail and had on big tortoise shell glasses. Her SMSK had on a very short denim skirt and a just to throw us off, a conservative polo-type shirt. The shirt… so incongruent with the way she kept squatting in the denim skirt as she sang, and I was concerned about the suitability (Amber: What?? There’s a dress code now??) of her underpants that were in danger of being on display in ‘Heaven. What would her mother say?! (Amber: We KNOW what Blush’s mom would say! Hee!) We were so busy drinking in the juxtaposition of MCP not only being IN ‘Heaven, but actually singing, that we didn’t even have time to Guess the Song. We would have totally blown it anyway, because they belted out “Welcome to the Jungle” like they had been singin’ it in their basement since 1987. Unfortunately, that didn’t mean that they were ever on beat. Even more unfortunately, MCP left before her match made in heaven (hur hur) Audio Visual/Physics Club President sauntered in, resplendent in his khaki shorts, short-sleeved button down TUCKED in which is pretty much a hanging offense at the Slice, and black plastic rimmed glasses straight from a movie starring1960 NASA nerds.

Bride and Groom

OH! And let's not forget the wedding party! A stout middle aged couple who had finally realized that it was cheaper to maintain one trailer than two. The whole wedding party was from Michigan and all were clad in tourist T-shirts excpet the bride who's "going away outfit" consisted of capri pants and an ethnic-print blouse with some wooden wind chimes hanging from the neckline. And she still had the Diamonique hair accessory perched right above her very round bangs and right below the 1963 bouffant. So the couple was sitting around, minding their own business, when the Karaoke King calls them up to the stage to sing the Island Mating Call. They have no idea what's coming, but are being good sports and waddle up to the stage. The groom is not lettin go of his 47th beer of the night by any means and brings it right on up. As soon as the bride sees the lyrics begin to roll, she gasps in horror and shakes her finger at the wedding party who has surreptitiously signed them up to sing "Let's get Drunk and F*&%." The groom doesn't even blink, but bellows out the song in between swigs of beer. Unfortunately, he doesn't gaze into his bride's eyes as he serenades her because he has to concentrate so hard on the words rolling past to take notice of her.

Plane tickets to wedding destination: $750. Honeymoon suite: $200. Three rounds of drinks for the wedding party: $180. Wedding reception at the Slice of Heaven: Priceless.

Friends

I don’t know how many times this year I have said, “I have the BEST friends EVER!”, but I do. Maybe being divorced has caused me both to rely on and appreciate my friends a lot more. Maybe by this time in my life I have weeded out most of the deadwood that was bringin’ me down. Maybe because of the bumps and bruises we all have, we are more tolerant of each other. Maybe this is Karma payback for that day in late 2000 when I decided that no matter how people treated me, I was going to try to be the kind of person I had always admired (although this is very much a work in progress).

At any rate, who else but the best friends in the world would:

• Offer to run over your ex and split the $10,000 fine
• Pick up your kids at a total stranger’s house on a moment’s notice and care for them indefinitely
• Have the honesty, compassion and wisdom to tell you, “I don’t know what to say.”
• Come over to keep you company while you cry AND bring wine
• Listen to you sing every song on the radio during a 14 hr road trip and not change the station
• Back you up on karaoke
• Ask a guy anything for a quarter
• Teach you how to curl your hair and fix your make up after the age of 15
• Not only not complain about how often you stay over, but buy you new bedding
• Know that dessert at your house will be Girl Scout cookies AGAIN, but come over for dinner anyway
• Teach you how to buy and wear a bra
• Listen to stories of people they have never met and keep all the names straight
• Offer up their homes for a rendezvous
• Cheer when you walk into the bar at Ladies’ Night
• Keep a secret
• Ask you at the beginning of your rant if they are supposed to just listen, agree with you, play devil’s advocate, offer advice, or help blast the jerk of the moment
• Offer your clueless self insight on alternative lifestyles
• Invent a new category of Extreme Amusement: The Mockolympics