Note to self: stop forgetting previous notes to self

So for some reason I thought it was a reasonable plan to attend a party at a photo studio in Williamsburg on Saturday night. Went to Jess’ for a little tailgating with a few ladies, part of which entailed watching, after the Chris Rock special, Sex and the City. (I enjoy this show, just do not enjoy all the Midtown Barbies who emulate it.) So in it, Miranda’s law career intimidated guys so she pretended she was a stewardess and it totally worked with someone. So we thought, what if we do that tonight? As the Playgirls, we had potentially intimidating occupations. We decided on our fakey personas: I would be a secretary. Or should I say, SEXretary. Actually I did say that, more than once.

At the party I said hi to the hottest guy there who seemed to inexplicably be alone. (That's actually him in the Abercrombie-style photo above.) Dervla I introduced ourselves as our fakey personas. He seemed so nice that I immediately felt bad and retracted everything. The guy didn't seem to mind, and in fact seemed quite interested in everything I had to say, the entire night. I did regard this with some suspicion; I mean, you really do not just find the hottest guy in the party (6'4", publishes his own magazine, lives in the east village) as a single commodity. No matter how much of a dick he is. But this guy didn't seem like a dick and even seemed a bit bashful.

Was this the introduction to the opposite sketches? He asked what I was doing the next day, and put my number in his phone, and makeout occurred, and he walked me to my subway and carried my bag on the way there. So Sunday I got onto the old myspaceroo, and looked him up. Guess who is "In a Relationship"? If you guessed me, you are wrong.

I really wasn't that surprised. It was something like finding a bag with a dollar sign on it (an icon which Gene Simmons has actually trademarked) in the middle of the sidewalk, then being suspicious but still hopeful when there was money inside it, then finding out it’s counterfeit and knowing you really should have known all along but still being annoyed that the entire thing had happened in the first place.

My friend Karin says I should message him saying, "Wow, you think we're in a relationship already? Things are going so fast."

One of my notes to self I'd violated: Avoid most guys who are outright handsome, but especially avoid guys who are handsome enough to be models. Here's a long-established one: Drunken makeout is apparently not step one to getting an awesome boyfriend. Here's a new one: If they don't seem that bright, and are a snowboarder, they probably aren't that bright. And are also a snowboarder.

And where did this all happen, folks? WILLIAMSJERK! Note to self: just stop going there. 

I Can't Have Anything Nice

   
This is my bedroom wall now.

Dontcha hate it when you come home after working until 10:30pm and you're in the hallway leading to your bedroom and you're like, "Why is the floor wet? Oh, because the ceiling's dripping. Why is the ceiling dripping? Oh, because there's fog rolling through the transom window above my closed bedroom door." Ohhhh. Something bad was going on in my sealed-off room, where the radiator was hissing at a roar.

I opened the door to a sauna with a dripping ceiling, Ghostbusters-style. Keep in mind that most things I own are kept in my small bedroom, and many of those things are irreplacable and made of paper, which does not fare well in a sauna environment. I threw the window open and cursing vigorously, turned off the radiator, the valve of which which was issuing wet steam like a garden sprinkler.

Now, to assess the damage. The paint on the walls nearest the radiator had melted to a Daliesque effect (either that or I am tripping), the walls are now the clammy crumbly consistency of feta cheese, plaster was missing from a patch above that on the ceiling, the carpet was soaked, the usual clothes pile on top of the radiator was drenched. The '70s Playgirl poster I so loved was all curled up, and most of my other posters had begun to surrender to the moisture attack.

"Can you sue?" asked my roommate. But it's like, even if I could ever get my deadbeat landlord on the phone, what am I going to sue for--the now-stained gold metallic cardigan from the $2 rack at H&M? Or the newly-stained 80s splattered-paint-effect T-shirt I got for free at a church sale? The vintage pulp fiction novels that were all like 10 cents each? The Flaming Lips promotional posters that were free at the DVD release party and that were protected from that misty party night at great pains? Who knows what other discoveries are still to come from this event. Then again, it's not exactly hurricane Katrina AND, as my roommate pointed out, at least my laptop wasn't in there. Then it really would've been time to get out the samurai sword and seal myself into my sauna room with a bottle of sake to end it all.

I got out a bunch of heavy books to try to press the posters flat again and tried to remember why it's worth it to live in NYC.

Q. How sexy is it working in a porn mag office?

(Background info: I work at Playgirl, and a bunch of hardcore porn mags are made in the same office.)

A. It is completely nonsexy and quite depressing. From what I can tell, pretty much every person in the office is outright hopelessly depressed or doesn't realize they are/should be, or is an unfeeling robot.

Imagine staring at underage-looking girls with vegetable matter and various other props shoved in their hoo-hahs, all day long, five days a week. I'm sure this sounds like a dream job to the pervier folks out there, but trust me, one lucky coworker is finally getting out, has been glowing around the office, everyone is jealous, and I doubt he'll ever cast his eye toward porn again.

The mostly-new staff of the mag I work on was impervious to the negativity surrounding us at first, because we're bringing in great contributors, photographers and illustrators to create something totally different, but it's still hard to ignore being surrounded by downers.

That is the short version of what it's like. More to come in some memoir at some point, I'm sure.

"There is no peace on earth" I said

So I went to a party in Jersey City Saturday night. On the subway three dudes were loudly discussing regional slang terms in bad accents, quite possibly with cocktails disguised in their plastic soda bottles. Then came this gem:

"First time I went to the Outback Steakhouse I didn't know which bathroom to use--it said "blokes" and "sheilas." What's that? Then I figured "sheila" endes in an a, it's gotta be feminine, I used my Spanish."

What I loved about this was 1) his exotic experience was Outback Steakhouse, 2) he did not recognize the common term "bloke," 3) he did not realize that the female name "Sheila" would signify a female restroom, and 4) that he was proud that he had used Spanish to deduce something that required no Spanish whatsoever.

Then in Jersey City I had to take a cab from the PATH, and apparently in JC it is acceptable to double up on cab patrons, so I shared the ride with a young buzz-cutted Army Lieutenant, who was home for the Thanksgiving holidays before heading back to the war. As we cruised through the city, now in technicolor with Christmas finery, he remarked, "You know, as shitty as this city is, it's better than the desert." He told me he'd just been taken to task on the PATH train by people who were against the war. I told him that I was also against the war. "Everybody is," he said, like "duh." "But they don't know what your story is, so that's judgemental," I added. Then he came out with, "I get paid $35,000 to shoot people," and I guess I made some sound of dismay, because he apologized. I left with "Merry Christmas, Lieutenant, and peace," knowing there would be no peace, and that guy could very well return home in a box.