Category Archives: Men

I could try to make a good first impression, but ‘crazy’ has really worked for me in the past…

Posted on by under Dating, Men, Single life

I haven’t written in a year, so the obvious place to go for material was Bumble. For those of you that don’t know, Bumble is like Tinder for attractive people with careers, and the catch is that women have to say ‘hello’ first.
I’ll be honest, I have no interest in meeting anyone from the dating app, in fact, I’m pretty sure my mother had a long talk with me about not meeting people from the internet when I was 12. Something about stranger-danger/ they could be shorter in real life and that would be super awkward.
It’s not that I’m against dating apps, I just prefer to meet men the old fashioned way… drunk in a crowded bar.
Anyways, I went and trolled Bumble to see how many guys would answer me if I made a terrible first impression.

MICHAEL – Finance Guy
Info: Likes wine, is 6ft tall
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Did he answer? He did! He said that unfortunately he can’t commit as long as whisky, rye and beer are in the picture. Someone who doesn’t want to commit on Bumble? Unheard of.

CHRISTOPHER – Advertising Guy
Info: 6ft tall, saves puppies, some random other stuff
Distance: 643 meters away
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Did he answer? He did! He said, “Of course I was close, but a good stalker never reveals their secrets” So, he was blocked…

ADAM – No occupation
Info: Master of life, lover of sangria and fireplaces
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Did he answer? He did not. So I will say that it was indeed an arsonist type of love and all for the better, this way my deductible stays low.

JOHN – Director
Info: Love staying active, wanderlust, cooking, food, bourbon, wine, beer
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Did he answer? He did not. Which is all the same because he seemed far too happy with life for my liking.

JORGE – IT Guy
I won’t lie, I may have been drinking with this one.
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Did he answer? He did! As shown above he went straight for my heart with tacos and coffee.

ZED – Finance Guy
Info: Swipe right for free puppy!
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Did he answer? He did not! I think this may have been a scam…

JOHN – Consultant
Info: Likes puns
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Did he answer? He did! He said he was both… so… if that’s your thing let me know.

NEIL – Finance Guy
Info: “Will make you laugh”
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Did he answer? He did not. Typical Neil though, full of empty promises.

CAMERON – Pilot
No info, but had a photo of him and (not his) dog.
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Did he answer? He did not. I bet he’s probably involved in the same puppy scam as Zed.

LIAM – Lawyer
No info, but I have a bit of a soft spot for lawyers.
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Did he answer? As you can see we had a very fruitful exchange, although his advice makes me worry about his actual clients…

I let one of the guys in on my game, he said he answered me because I said something other than “Hi, how are you?” Then he sent me the screenshot below, and I can sleep happy knowing I will never be that girl.
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Trying to be friends with an ex is a special kind of hell…

Posted on by under Men, Single life

I think one of the craziest things about the breakup with Grant is that in a matter of three days he went from being someone I confided everything in, to someone I wasn’t even facebook friends with. During the breakup Grant had said he wanted to stay friends, which seemed absurd considering while he was speaking I was imagining my own episode of Dateline;
“And why on the same day that Grant disappeared had Becca bought a shovel? She claims it was a coincidence, she had simply decided to take up gardening. But it was well known that Becca hated the outdoors unless it involved a patio and vodka. Her alibi was falling apart…”
I couldn’t imagine phoning him to chat about work and pretend like I was ok with everything that had happened. So I said no to being friends… well, technically I said a lot of profanities that added up to “no”.

Right after the breakup with Grant, I was trying to rationalize everything (because breakups always make perfect sense). I needed to figure out what I could have done wrong, so I phoned the one person I knew would tell me. I phoned Parker. I know it seems weird to go to your old-ex and ask how to get your new-ex back, and it was. It was super weird.

My life is not a romantic comedy. If it were, this story would end with Parker and his British accent riding in on a white horse, and us riding off into the sun together. It would be perfect, except I’m terrified of horses and I’m really pale, so the sun is my sworn enemy.
Parker was great to talk about the breakup with because he wasn’t nice about it. He gave me the kick in the ass I needed (not literally, just to be clear, no violence occurred). He reminded me that I’m more Rihanna than June Cleaver, and what Grant considered my weaknesses are actually my strengths. Most importantly, he told me to stop feeling sorry for myself… then he drove off in his white car into the night, alone.

My relationship and friendship with Grant is done, much like this bottle of Prosecco I just drank… But I hope he’s doing well (just not as well as I am) and I hope he’s happy (just not as happy as I am) and I hope he finds someone really nice one day (that’s a lie, I hope she’s insane and writes about him on the internet…).

 

If you don’t laugh at my joke, I will repeat it at least 4 more times just to make sure you heard it correctly.

Posted on by under Men

Obviously I’m hilarious, I’m also a bit delusional though so I might only be moderately funny, either way I crack myself up. One of the things that attracted me to Grant was that he had a good sense of humour and never took anything too seriously. He could match me pretty well for jokes, and it’s important to note that I’m very sarcastic (if you hadn’t noticed). I only mean about 70% of what I say, which is great when people understand that. Grant understood and would laugh, but towards the end he took all of my jokes seriously, which was frightening since I said and did some pretty crazy things.

There was the everyday sarcasm, like when he asked me why I always chose to wear black and I responded, “well it’s because it matches my soul.”  Or how I put a nutcracker holding a knife in the kitchen for him to find in the morning when he got up to make breakfast (it was meant to be helpful).

There were also the more elaborate jokes that he didn’t laugh at, like when I went into the bedroom the night before he was going on a trip. He had just gone to bed about five minutes earlier and all the lights were out, I crept in and began to whisper to him;
Me – “Grant… are you awake? Grant…”
Grant – “What is it?”
Me – “I was just wondering… since you’re going away, I thought maybe you’d like a lock of my hair?”
Grant – “What? Why?”
Me – “Well to remember me, obviously.”
Grant – “No.”
Me – “Oh… ok. Well can I have a lock of your hair then?”
Grant – “What? No!”
Me – “Ok, it’s ok. You just go to sleep, I’ll just cut a small piece from the back, you won’t even know.”
Grant – “No! Stop, it’s enough.”
Me – “Ok, Goodnight babe… I’ll be right back. I’m definitely not going to get the scissors.”

But the funniest thing of all happened during the breakup, Grant suddenly laughed at my jokes again. It was rounding the second hour of the breakup and it was clear at this point the relationship was over. We were sitting in the living room in silence when I made a sarcastic remark and he genuinely laughed. I was caught off guard because I hadn’t heard him laugh at something I’d said in weeks.
I asked him, “Oh, you think I’m funny again?”  and he replied, “I’ve always thought you were funny.”  I asked him to tell me the last time he had laughed at one of my jokes. He couldn’t do it.

In hindsight it was simply another sign I was ignoring that something was wrong. But the upside is that now I have the opportunity to charm other men with my sarcastic and often borderline-crazy humour, and hopefully they’ll laugh… or call the police, either way it will make a good post.

“That’s not what the psychic said!!” – Turns out, not a valid argument

Posted on by under Men

Rumours – I love and hate them at the same time. There’s something that makes you feel undeniably like a teenager when someone has really good gossip for you. Sometimes I’m grateful people gossip because it can save you from awkward situations, like the one in my work meeting the other day.
As I sat down in the boardroom one of the women looked across the table and said “So are you ready for the gala this weekend?”  I knew what was coming next, it was so obvious, but I simply said “Yes.”
She quickly followed up with, “Do I finally get to meet your man?!” A co-worker beside her was visibly uncomfortable. I smiled politely and said “He actually won’t be able to attend, he already has plans in hell.”  Not really, people at work already think I’m a touch unstable, I just said that we broke up. We proceeded with the meeting which included the topics of Valentine’s Day and what couples like to do. I didn’t have many constructive ideas to contribute.

I’m guilty of precipitating rumours with my writing it’s what I’ve always done though (I’m kind of like the Taylor Swift of the blog world, except for the famous, rich, blond and dating celebrities part). The day after the breakup I wanted answers so badly I went to a psychic and had her do a tarot card reading. I didn’t like what she told me, although it’s what I had been theorizing, but how could I phone Grant up and start yelling at him for something the universe said. I walk a fine line, but I have limits to my crazy.

One thing I didn’t expect is that Grant would be telling people what happened during our Chernobyl of a breakup. I sat down for dinner with my friend who recounted the events of that fateful day to me. When I asked how he knew, he said that a girl I didn’t know told him, she had run into a girl at a bar who knows Grant, and heard about it from her. Apparently the girl just wanted to know if I was ok, which is thoughtful for a stranger. If I were actually Taylor Swift I would send her a gift basket of some sort, but I’m not, and I’ve just added vodka and shoes back into my budget, so money’s a bit tight.

I’ve had to work hard to not listen to the rumours and the theories people have for me. I feel like if I start to believe them I will turn into Carrie from Homeland and transform my living room wall into a giant investigation board.
There’re two sides to every story, I have mine and Grant has his. Somewhere in the middle is the truth. I will of course always prefer my version, unless Grant describes himself using the same profanities I do, then maybe I would like his version too.

Being nervous around the person you’re dating feels like reading a never-ending Choose Your Own Adventure book.

Posted on by under Dating, Men

Parker was a man I pseudo-dated before I met Grant (if you’re wondering what pseudo-dating is, it’s basically seeing each other on a regular basis for an extended period of time, hanging out, having the occasional dinners and sleeping together, but never committing to anything resembling an actual relationship). Parker is quite the catch – funny, intelligent, charming, very attractive, kind, employed, athletic and he has a British accent just to top it off.
I pseudo-dated Parker for six months but I was still nervous around him. When we were together I would repeat a fun chant in my head to the effect of ‘be breezy, be calm, stop shaking, I bet he saw you shaking, shut up brain, be breezy…’

I wanted our pseudo-dates to be perfect, and I remember one particular dinner that stands out for this. I had just come back from a weekend away, he picked me up and we went to a restaurant, I ordered a salad and he had a burger. Everything was going swimmingly until about a quarter of the way through my salad when I saw a black hair. Parker was about half way done his burger and I played out two options in my head;
A) I could call the waitress over and point out the hair. She would take my salad and insist on replacing it. I did not want another salad, but if I refused that would mean I basically didn’t get to eat dinner. But by the time they brought out a new salad for me, Parker would probably be done his burger. The hair was also sure to be the only thing we remembered about the evening.
B) I could wait for him to look down and take a bite of his food, then pull the hair out of my salad and pretend nothing happened. It didn’t look long anyway, and this way our evening wouldn’t be ruined.
I chose option B, and I regret it every day. It wasn’t a short hair it was a very long hair. But now I’d taken it out so I couldn’t very well put it back in and call the waitress over. So I ate around the outside of my salad and chanted in my head to ‘be breezy’.

One of the reasons I fell for Grant was because he was the spazzy one.
The first time he phoned to ask me out he opened with “I’ve just given blood and I’m kind of light headed, so I think I’ve worked up the courage to ask if you would maybe like to get a drink sometime? You can say no.”
On our second date we were supposed to meet halfway between our places to walk to a restaurant for dinner. Enroute to meet him he called me and said, “would you be able to please go home and get some band aids, I’ve tripped over the curb and my toe is bleeding quite badly.”  When I met him he wasn’t lying, there was blood everywhere and we had to stop and administer first-aid in the street.
I was comfortable with Grant, I was calm, I was the breezy one without even having to try. And I loved it.

When a guy is saying he’s a ‘nice guy’, I’m not sure if he’s trying to convince me or himself of this supposed fact…

Posted on by under Men, Single life

You know when you’re sitting enjoying a soda at the diner, and a 6’2” good looking, all-American guy walks up to you and says he wants to take you out for dinner and movie? He shows up at your house with flowers and chocolates, and you have your cardigan tied around your shoulders in case it gets a bit chilly later… oh wait… that was 1945.
It seems that a large amount of men have chosen to ‘swipe left’ when it comes to effort and even getting up the energy to go on a date anymore. And I’m looking to blame you Tinder. I’m not saying that Tinder and I never had a thing, but I’m saying it’s taken an already dire situation and made it worse. Laziness and entitlement have joined forces to somehow make it ok for men to approach women, who are perfect strangers, and proposition them for sex. I know this has sort of always gone on, but it’s now gone main stream.
I give you my weekend and the lovely pick-up lines that were used to woo me (this is in an upscale lounge).

Guy 1
Decent looking man, very clean cut, about 30-35, Pilot
Him – I really like your smile
Me – Thanks, I like smiling. It’s my favourite.
Him – Well watching you smile is my favourite.
Me – **blank stare**
Him – Do you like the thrill of doing something crazy and adventurous?!!
Me – ooo, like meth?!
Him – um…. No. Like sleep with a pilot while he’s on a layover in the city…
Me – Oh… um… are you the pilot?
Him – Yes.
Me – No thank you.

Guy 2
Good looking, broody, with dark features, about 30, Actor
Him – Why are you here?
Me – Oh, well I’m staying at the hotel next door for the weekend.
Him – Why?
Me – Because I like it.
Him – I don’t.
Me – Then why are you here?
Him – Because there are hot girls here who have rooms for the night and they leave the next day.
Me – Alright. I’m going to go ahead and turn this way now.

Guy 3
God’s gift to women… if he was trying to punish us. Good looking, probably 32ish, professional.
Him – I’m very successful.
Me – Well that’s good.
Him – But here’s the best part, I’m also really laidback.
Me – Ok.
Him – You don’t find that combination too often, a guy who is driven and successful, but also laidback.
Me – Um… **look away for exit**
Him – So what do you think, should we get out of here? We can go back to my place and put on Netflix. I could use someone to curl up with.
Me – **blank stare** Oh, I’m sorry, were you serious? Yeah, no, never.

I guess the thing is, not one asked to go for coffee, or even fained interest in getting to know me. I suppose I should really be happy that they’re this forward about what they want, it does save me time in the long run figuring out who they really are. But in all seriousness, I wish them all daughters someday.

Coping during a breakup is pretty much reverting back to being 16, except you can buy your own alcohol now.

Posted on by under Men, Single life

I am lucky to be a person that immediately sees the good in a breakup and wishes their Ex all the success and happiness in the world… I’m just kidding; I’m pretty much a basketcase until I’m ready to let it go. There are of course different stages of a breakup, and for me it went, denial, sadness, anger, acceptance and rebounding.

  1. Denial
    1. Pretend the breakup isn’t actually happening
    2. Tell only close select friends that the breakup has occurred
    3. Tell yourself that he will change his mind
    4. Talk about it endlessly with close friends trying to figure when he will call and apologize
    5. Leave all pictures, facebook and desk photos intact
  2. Sadness
    1. Cry
    2. Change profile picture and take down desk photo
    3. Cry more, but this time awkwardly in public
    4. Stare at phone, mentally willing him to text you
    5. Don’t eat, then finally eat and demolish entire veggie party platter
    6. Listen to all the songs that remind you of the relationship
  3. Anger
    1. Talk about how he never appreciated you
    2. Drink prosecco to try to feel fabulous
    3. After too much prosecco, passive aggressively ‘like’ his changed profile photo
    4. After he unfriends you, send him insane text messages channeling all the rage of 1,000 feminists.
    5. Angry cry
    6. Feel like you could be heading for your own episode of Dateline
  4. Acceptance
    1. Drink Bailey’s with coffee
    2. Have sense of inner calm
    3. Laugh about insane text messages
    4. Buy new Taylor Swift album and listen to it on repeat
    5. Get asked by neighbour to “please keep it down” while jamming to Taylor Swift at 8am.
    6. Inform neighbour of the circumstances surrounding the breakup
    7. Get blessing from neighbour to continue to sing loudly
  5. Rebounding
    1. Inform little black book of newly single status
    2. Book girls getaway at fancy hotel
    3. Find clothing previously deemed ‘too low cut’ to be acceptable
    4. Rock red lipstick
    5. Accidentally get red lipstick on fingers and then wipe hands on white shirt thinking it was white napkin
    6. Move on

 

I appreciate the breakup advice, but I’d really just like to watch a lot of Dateline

Posted on by under Men

The holidays have always been my favourite time of year, I eagerly countdown starting in September. The family time, the love, the fancy parties and the fact that you can wear glitter during the day without being questioned. I could never understand why people get so stressed out… but then again, all those years I was always single during the holidays. Single is something I can do well, I built my short lived freelance writing career around it. So I hadn’t dealt with what seemed like a never ending stream of problems that arose in a relationship during the holidays. Turns out, there’s a reason why this time of year has also been deemed “breakup season”.
So here I am, about to ring in the New Year, single, well not totally single, I took back the pizza oven I bought him, so my date for the evening is actually Mr. Crispy Crust. We didn’t make it, our relationship was pronounced dead (by him) three days short of NYE. And for the first time ever in my life, I am heartbroken about it. It seems over the last two days I’ve gotten a lot of advice from a lot of different people, some of it similar, some of it out of left field. But never the less, I thought I would share the sentiments.
1. There are a lot of guys out there, don’t worry, you’ll find one. – Ok, so the thing is, I’m not worried about finding another guy. I would actually be very content getting 10 cats and calling it a day. I bet if I wrote a blog about my days with the cats I would have more followers than my blog about dating. Cat Ladies have much more time to read frivolous writing. It’s not about finding another guy; it’s about losing the one I had.
2. Better now than 6 months from now. – I’ve heard this from a lot of people, and I’m not sure I agree. It’s like when you play Monopoly and it always ends in a fight, but at the same time, you can’t resist playing again, because this time it might actually work out well. I would have enjoyed another 6 months of it, I would have kept unfolding that game board and saying, “let’s see if we can do it better this time.”
3. This is why tequila was invented, nothing a little family drinking can’t solve. – Solid point. I fully agree with this one, and now I know where I get it from.
4. I bet his real reason for the breakup was actually (insert theory here). – The problem with our breakup is that there wasn’t a fully painted picture for me, which left things open to speculation. I have heard just about every theory possible on this one, even from a psychic.
5. You two obviously weren’t right for each other. – I mean, I don’t know, I’m a strong believer that it all comes down to timing, just look at Romeo and Juliet.
6. You should get revenge. – I feel like I go through waves of sadness and anger. During the sadness I have an overwhelming urge to phone him for no particular reason. Then during the anger I have the overwhelming urge to egg his belongings. I have decided it’s best to not act on any urges and write about him instead.
7. We can burn the photos of you guys, would that make you feel better? – To be honest, I thought about putting photos in the pizza oven and turning it on, however, all the photos are digital. That means that I would actually have to get the photos printed just to destroy them. I guess the modern day equivalent is photoshopping him out of the photos, but that seems like a lot of extra work for me. So I’m still undecided on this one.
8. I bet he’ll change his mind. – Well wouldn’t that be awkward after I spend all this time writing about him. But I doubt it, the whole thing played out as more of a series finale than a midseason hiatus.

I’m no relationship expert, but I figure to have a successful second go with an ex you’re suppose to stop dating the rebound…

Posted on by under Dating, Men, Single life

The thing about playing games is that sometimes the other team has a plan you don’t know about. So when you get cocky and think you’re the one dictating how things will happen and who will win, that’s when you get blindsided. That’s what happened with me and Brent, I was confident that I was in control and then bam – suddenly I was the one wondering what happened.
Breaking up is a tricky thing and I do not know what went on between Brent and his ex. But, I will say that there is nothing worse than breaking up with someone and thinking you’ll be the one that comes out on top… and then you’re not. Suddenly they’ve rebounded, they’re happy and they’re not pining for you like you thought they would… that can suddenly make you want them back, sometimes for no other reason than to prove to yourself that they still want you.

Although I felt uneasy about where things were going between Brent and me, I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt. We were still seeing each other on a regular basis and when we were together everything was great… until he got sloppy.
We went for lunch on a Sunday and then went back to his place to hang out. When I walked in I noticed the giant keyboard that was sitting on his dining room table. I honestly didn’t think twice about it, it’s the reality of him being in a band with his ex. But then I noticed the freshly burned candles on the table where the keyboard was. I never questioned him about the candles because I wasn’t sure if I was jumping to conclusions.
Two weeks later it’s a Friday night and we agreed to meet at his place to hangout but I ended up being delayed. He phoned me to say that he was super tired and could we rain-check. I said sure, and that’s when he told me that he was leaving for 4 days to go camping with his “band”. Well the thing is, the other people in his band have Monday-Friday jobs, except for the keyboardist, she works 4 days on, 4 days off. Now I was angry because I was sure he thought I must be an idiot. Four days go by and just like he promised he texted me when he got back to make plans;

Him – How are you?
Me – Great. How was camping?
Him – Glad to hear it. We didn’t camp we actually rented a cabin on the beach, mostly just drank. Are you sticking around this weekend? We should hang out.
Me – That sounds fun, did the whole band go?

Even though he had wanted to get together he never responded back to me. But it was a day later when I got my actual answer of what was really going on – being on tv you think he would try to be more careful…
I had his show on, passively listening when I heard his co-host say; “It’s always hard to travel with someone. Brent, you just got back from a weekend trip with your significant other. How was that?”
He changed the topic mighty fast. I went back and listened 4 more times to make sure I heard correctly, then I texted him;

Me – I didn’t know you were just on a trip with your significant other. I actually wasn’t aware that you had a significant other.
Him – ummm what?
Me – I heard your co-host say this morning on air that you just got back from a trip with your significant other.
Him – Hahaha no, we were talking about a road trip from hell that I took with an ex.

That’s the last time I heard from him – he was denying that he was seeing someone else and I was too over it to care anymore. A quick look on the keyboardist’s facebook page (btw its 2013, probably should figure out how privacy settings work) showed me that they were very much together. And oh, it had just been her birthday – I think my favorite post on her page was her friend saying that she “hopes Brent spoils her rotten”. Right… so turns out that he hadn’t just recently started fooling around with her again. They were fully back in a relationship and somehow I ended up the “other woman”. I was never upset that he was back with her, I was upset he didn’t even have the decency to own up to it. I was upset he didn’t give me the choice of whether I wanted to continue seeing him while he was in a relationship with someone else (NO).
I don’t have anything I care to say to him, maybe just thanks for the blog material and I hope your girlfriend isn’t a reader…

Flowers won’t keep me around, but let me lip-sync to 90’s hits and I’ll be yours forever…

Posted on by under Dating, Men, Single life

I was actually hesitant to accept Brent’s initial invitation for our first date, to be fair I was confused if it was even an actual date. Our work had brought us together on a project and afterwards he ended up emailing me to see if I wanted to go for drinks sometime. Since he picked a Saturday night, I felt safe enough to assume it was a date and not a casual ‘business drink’. A few months earlier things had ended (not well) with a man that I quite liked, and the dates I had been on since hadn’t been great (I’m positive one guy was totally high during our date).  So I wasn’t holding my breath for anything special.

The reason I stuck things out for 3 months with Brent was because he showed so much promise at the beginning, but especially on our first date. He let me pick where I wanted to go for drinks, so I picked my go-to after work spot, which is an oyster bar. I didn’t think twice about it until I showed up 10 minutes late and he had thoughtfully ordered a tray of oysters for us – I’m allergic to shellfish (my bad). Even though I told him I was fine without food he insisted on ordering something that I could eat.
During the date I told him that I’m not sure how I’ll ever be able to live with someone again after living on my own for so long. I was very concerned about having to use cutlery at home when I ate, and what would happen to my nightly lip-syncing performances of 90’s hits (fyi – tonight was Mariah’s classic, Always Be My Baby). He looked me straight in the eyes and said; “the right person will never let you change that.” And then followed it up with; “we’re going to go out again, and the next time we go out I want to hear about you. Not about your work, not about your friends, I want to learn about you.” Then he drove me home and waited until I got in the door before he drove away (a sure sign that he didn’t want me to be attacked before he got a second date *bonus*).

As we continued to see each other he picked up on my favorite habit of seeing how uncomfortable I can make a situation with sarcasm and oversharing, and was happy to keep me on my toes. I’m not even sure what date it was but we had gone back to his place after dinner.  I had decided to wear nylons that had black lines running up the back of the legs. He leaned towards me and said; “your nylons are very sexy.” In my most seductive voice I replied back; “thanks, they’re control top…” Not missing a beat or breaking character he said “that’s hot… and is this a pleather skirt? You’re spoiling me tonight.” I started cracking up after that.
On a different occasion we had come up with an inside joke about pineapples (best not to ask). To keep the joke going I had stopped into the grocery store so I could text him a picture to show him they were on sale. A few days later I was watching his tv show and he actually managed to work the word ‘pineapple’ into the conversation with his co-host. He also mentioned it on the show’s Twitter for good measure in case I wasn’t watching.

So it was the little things that kept me around for 3 months, because the little things made me smile in the middle of a work day. The little things also make it a bit easier to deal with the big thing that was being ignored, “the keyboardist”.