George Michael and the Dating Iditarod

Here is E doing "Father Figure" on Wednesday night. Note a) the wine glass in his hand, which he sipped from during the performance and b) the audience holding up a table candle (left) and lighters (right)...

(Instead of running with my weekly fun run, I am blogging and lying in bed and petting my dog. I am SO tired. Besides, I finally had the "permanent" stitches, which my legs have been slowly rejecting over 6 months, removed with a scalpel Thursday, and my plastic surgeon said not to exercise for a few days anyway. So there.)

I just finished a week of meeting 5 (count 'em!) 5 new guys - 4 from the online personals site I'm on. I'm exhausted. I also drank beer or wine every night this week, which is also a (bad) first. Wednesday, my one night off, was a perfectly timed respite: this funny, great-idea theatre piece followed by karaoke with E at a tiny bar/restaurant/club in Uptown.

But it's also my very, very busy week at work. These crazy weeks come around 6 times a year, and basically ruin my life with constant fires to put out and constantly being behind on the many, many phone calls to make... and these weeks test my poor dog's will to live. She spends hours at home, alone, plus, topped by the dates and the drinking this particular week, I've often been asleep within minutes of getting home and washing my face. Poor girl.

Without going into detail on the dates themselves, I'll just say that meeting this many people at once has been really, really good for me. I was telling a friend - it makes me just not really care about looking or acting any certain way, and I can be myself all the more (too tired and worn out to be anything different), which I think is what dating is ultimately about.

I also have noticed the range of what people act like on first meetings. What they ask about, what they assume, and what they hide. It's definitely been interesting. There is one guy still to meet, with whom I have been trading phone calls and emails.

Then, it may be back to the damn "drarwring" (say it like Mike Myers, please) board, or maybe not. I need a couple of days to process, and with the holiday next week, and busy work stuff, my social calendar is full anyway.

Food

Tonight, I served food at a soup kitchen on Chicago's far north side. It was so weird and good and fast (course I came late, too - work was horrible...horrible!) and I can't see why I wouldn't do it once a month with my cousin Andy's church group. He was so great to tell me about it and invite me.

I put the bread and the grapes or a banana onto the trays, assembly-line style, and pushed each tray out to the people delivering them to the clients as they came in. There was also meatloaf, chicken, rice, vegetables, salad, and two baked desserts on the tray.

It's the kind of place you don't even think about existing until a few minutes into being there. A soup kitchen. Serving 200+ meals every single day, quietly, out of a delapidated old storefront to all kinds of people, all ages and ways of dressing. And what about the people who work there all the time, too? It's a whole new world.

Here's the sorta good, crudely related news: I myself am eating again! The hellish work day today brought back the old stress-eating patterns and I ate the last 1/4 of a bag of doritos, a salad, a bunch of trail mix, and then a riblet and cottage cheese tonight. I wanted candy, but that'll have to wait.

[I am STILL, unbelievably, thinking about dating guy all too often, like all the time. Will it ever stop?! Jeez. I hope he's happy. I wish I could leave it at that thought, but my mind goes on and on.]

I have struck up conversations with a few lovely new guys on the same site, and, just as luck would have it, dating guy has inactivated his profile on that site, so I can happily browse and no longer have to look at him viewing my profile or just showing up in my home page as a possible match every time I log in.

Exercise: Swam today; still can't find my lock. Will have to search room and car, or, more likley, buy yet another damn $10 lock.

Putting off: cleaning bathroom, returning library books, writing thank you cards, emailing guys back, crocheting.