“Well, that was Stupid! I Can’t Believe I Made it Through that One Alive.”

Do you ever stop sometimes, look at your life decisions and think “Well, that was stupid! I can’t believe I made it through that one alive.” Have you ever had that thought before making your boneheaded move?  As I tear Betty apart for her ineptness and lack of foresight, I am beginning to wonder if I should crawl down off my soap box and take a good look at my own actions.

Let me take you back in time.  A year ago, I pulled a klassic Klassy Kass.  My first morning in London I woke up not in my best friends flat, but beside some boy.  I had twenty quid in my pocket, somewhere in London (which I found out later was an area called Wapping. Seriously, that is what it is called.  That is what my parents used to say the moment before I was beat), with no phone, and wearing what could only be described as a disco ball of a top.  For the next six hours after I left said boy’s flat, I performed what might be considered the most epic walk of shame ever, or as I like to consider it, the REPEATED walk of shame.  I wandered the 410 acre park looking for my supposed friends and repeatedly passed the same family with their young impressionable children.  I could tell I was quickly becoming a life lesson: “Britney, do you see that girl?  Do you want to be her one day, roaming the park in a disco ball top with her dirty underwear in her pocket? No, I don’t think you do. Boys are bad, remember that.” It was only through some extraordinary means that I finally located said friends at a local pub, at which point they declared “It is like The Hangover.  We lost you all day.”  To which I responded quite pointedly, “No, it is not like the fucken Hangover.  In The Hangover they LOOK for their fucken friend!” I digress. Back to the point.  I was in a strange city, off my rocker intoxicated, and I had no means of communication. Definitely a “Well, that was stupid! I can’t believe I made it through that one alive” moment!

I have always said whores should not stand in glass houses and throw stones.  And well, I am a whore and I definitely have pitched a few rocks in Betty’s direction over this Iranian arms dealer online dating fiasco.  Maybe she is correct - maybe you should leave yourself open to possibility and trust.  At least that is what I have to believe because well… I have just booked a three day vacation to Nice, France with Boy from Wapping. How did this come about?  After the repeated walk of shame, Wapping and I met up a few times while I was still in London and discovered that besides wanting to sleep with each other, we had some things in common. As a result, when I got home to my native land, we emailed once in a while, and as the year went by, our emailing became quite frequent.  And  the nature of these emails were likely not what you expected.  They were pure banter and taking the piss as the English say.  Never any suggestion that we might actually like each other; more that we found each other amusing and it made the workday go by a bit faster.  And through a quick email on my part, after his bitching about wanting to go away someplace warm, I wrote:

Sunning in Spain sounds nice.  Actually sunning anywhere! I am going to

suggest something hoping that you pause, breath, and don't go all

narcissistic via email on me. I should be in London somewhere in the

week of the 19th for at least three weeks.  I know Easter weekend is

in there and I could possibly go somewhere fun. Now breath, keep your

composure!  Not proposing marriage and babies (I fear you may be

genetically disposed to producing gingers and that is simply

unacceptable) - I just like the beach.  And if you are good maybe I will

let you even share a room with me.  I am sure most rooms are equip with

lovely couches.

Shortly thereafter, I had a plane ticket booked to Nice with a boy I have exchanged emails with for the past year discussing random stupid people in our respective offices.  And I’m not even nervous?  That is probably the stupidest part of all this.  Should I not be contacting the Canadian Embassy in Nice to let them know if I go missing?  Getting sold into human trafficking is not my idea of a great holiday.  But no, I am embarking, like Betty, full tilt into this without even blinking.  And I just pray I do not fall down a rabbit hole, like Betty, into a strange world of cash in zip-lock bags, multiple names, and over- zealous emotion.  And yes, I am going to pitch another rock: there were huge signs, with glowing neon lights for Betty and her arms dealer which my situation in no way has.  So I am throwing caution to the wind.

I feel I should also give an update on Betty’s situation.  After breaking up politely with the arms dealer Betty was SHOWERED with gifts and flowers almost every day for 2 weeks, including a pair of these.  Then the paper arrived at our house Sunday morning.  There was Betty’s picture with a poem underneath it, declaring his love for her.  I believe it was at this point that Betty called the cops.  Shockingly, they already had his number.  I was floored to realize this. NOT.  I guess he had done the same thing to another girl last year, but when the cops called him, he stopped.  And that seemed to work for Betty until this week when more flowers arrived with a few texts saying he was having some earrings and a grand delivered to the house. Betty has decided we are going to Vegas with it!

So, as I board the plane to London, I wonder if I am a cautionary tale as Betty has become?  Or will I be that story that girlfriends tell each other when they are reaching for hope?

I did not mean that kinda FEAR!!

You know those horror movies where the girl goes to investigate the strange noise in the basement without turning the lights on, despite the string of brutal murders that have recently plagued her small country town?  Those movies where you are so incensed at the stupidity that you actually stand up, flip the popcorn off your lap and scream, “you MORON, RUN out your front door – RUN as fast as you can.”  What kind of brain damage have you endured to think lone investigation is a good idea!! I do realize that this scene is a staple in low-production horror flicks and has become a satire of itself. However, I never thought this scenario would be present in the context of modern love.  And do I realize that in my last blog post, I said love should be scary, but this was definitely not the kind of fear I was referring to!

I am going to take you back to Betty and the Rabbit Hole!  As mentioned before, Betty was married for eight years and still believes in love at first sight. Hence, the acid trip which was her recent Alice in Wonderland romance. Ladies, if there are so many red flags flying at you that they could fill the ball pit at Chucky Cheese, then it is not a tragic Romeo and Juliet romance that you need to fight for. You need to RUN out the front door!  Do not go into the dark basement to investigate the strange noise because you need proof.  Since my last post, Betty’s situation has developed.  I am now going to take you back through the fall into the Rabbit Hole and cover off the other red flags besides the premature declarations of love. They are so numerous, so I’ve outlined them in point form:

1.       On their first date, he brings up the topic of family money. He claims his family has gotten quite wealthy in the import-export business.  But conveniently, his family is based in LA, so meeting them would be difficult. Alright, he was trying to impress her.  But it should have been obvious to Betty that this was a little off due to the obvious lack of dental care. Families with money provide dental care to their children. This is only disproved if you are British.

2.       He claims he is a homeowner.  But he does not live in said home. Instead, he lives in a hovel with a roommate across the street from it. To Betty’s credit, she ran a property search on his name (well, what she thought was his name. See Red Flag #6) and it never came up. When asked about this, he had a very well reasoned response to the lack of name on the title, a reason I personally still do not understand, but it had something to do with not being a Canadian citizen and for tax purposes, he placed it in someone else’s name.  By the way, we are only on date number 2..

3.       Number 2 leads to number 3 involving some very strange explanation about citizenship and heritage.  The story goes like this:  he is an American citizen who was born in Italy to Iranian parents and is waiting on permanent residency in Canada. I believe this was to explain his lack of friends?

4.       He sells Ferraris and BMWs on the side, yet drives a 1982 Honda civic with different coloured rust paneling.  It was actually quite cute.  It looked a bit like paint by numbers.

5.       He does not keep his money in the bank.  It is in zip-lock bags under his bed.  Again Betty, to some credit, asks him about being a drug dealer. But he had a good story to explain this too (because you know drug dealers when approached always fess up to their illegal practices!) Through my own process of elimination, I have concluded he is not a drug dealer, but that he must be an arms dealer.

6.       Gino is not his real name.  He has two names

7.       He claimed to be flying to New York for work one week.  However, there were no flights departing or landing according to the itinerary he gave Betty.  Yes, Betty is still looking for “PROOF”!!!!  Again to give her credit, she did search departures and arrivals in NYC.

8.       While he was “in New York,” he asks Betty to pick up documents from an apartment that is not his.  Not to worry, he has the apartment keys and the safe code.  Right…  This isn’t  sketchy at all!   At this point,  the false itinerary had given Betty enough suspicion that she didn’t run this small but strange errand.

9.       Betty was still looking for more concrete proof that he wasn’t above board (YES, SHE WAS STILL LOOKING FOR PROOF), so she insisted on picking him up from the airport upon his return.  Conveniently, Microsoft has arranged a car service for him!  And when she insisted, he responded “Oh no, I’ll be in New York a day later for work.”

10.   A member of his church group calls to warn her this guy is not all that he says.  No shit, Sherlock!!

11.   How could I forget the biggest Red Flag of them all – the third date ‘I LOVE YOU’

I do blame Hollywood a bit for the reason women are so screwed up - proliferating this idea that love at first site exists. We have all experienced sitting around with our girlfriends watching a movie like Crazy Stupid Love wishing and hoping that one day, at some random bar encounter the douche bag player realizes he needs to change his ways, and we are the one – and it was us, our personality and beauty that converted them.  Seriously, talk about being sold a load of crap! Some might call me cynical.  Betty insists that she wears her heart on her sleeve and therefore is open to love. But as I said before, after date number 1 she should have RUN out the front door and never looked back.  If she had, we might have avoided what happened next.

As it was Saturday morning, I was watching English football with a few male friends partaking in the irrational screaming at the television when the overpaid players missed the net (I am sure my anger issues come as no surprise).  Suddenly Betty is in my living room on her hands and knees so to be avoid being seen through the windows.  Why you ask?  Because the Iranian arms dealer was lurking around our backyard!  He stayed for 15 minutes, roaming from the back door to the downstairs windows and then milling around the carport!  Obviously, my friends thought this was insane until I described the insurmountable mountain of red flags that Betty finally had seen and realized she needed to get out. Then he moved the paint by number car, parked it someplace else, and came back.  Dead seriously, I thought our house was going to be featured on the nightly news.

How women can lose all perspective and logic with a sweet talking professor of love baffles me.  I have seen numerous specials on 60 Minutes featuring women being duped by con artist men.  But watching it unfold in real life still makes me wonder HOW?  It was so painfully obvious buddy was a pathological liar and a con artist.  I guess when you grow up with a con artist and a pathological liar like I did, you gain the ability to spot them from across the Atlantic.  Betty on the other hand, had a nice and kind father who showered her with love and indulged her every need.

In conclusion, I hope Betty has learned a few life lessons from this spurt with love namely that love does not exist after three dates and when a pathological liar tells you he is not a drug dealer, he is most likely an arms dealer!  In the meantime I’ll be sleeping with a large knife on my bedside table, just in case!

LOVE

Love, love, love!  I am not sure if it is some strange gravitational pull due to the moon or the recent passing of the viral Valentine’s Day, but LOVE has become the topic of the week.  I am happy to announce that a large percentage of my amazing girls are involved in what might become or are promising relationships, and I am lucky enough to be living vicariously through them.  Why do I have to live vicariously you ask?  Because I am smitten with a chubby Englishman who plays computer video games and our only communication for the past year has been completed via work email (yes, sad).  Therefore, I am going to be throwing a few of my girls under the bus for this installment and overanalyze their relationships.

We all remember Betty – the sweet, gullible divorcee, who has kindly let my mother and I invade her home.  It has been a year after her divorce and she has started to date on line.  This seems to have worked out for her – she has found herself a boyfriend.  Or as she has described it, she has fallen down the rabbit hole and is intoxicated by love, or so she thinks.  This is why we refer to her situation as the Rabbit Hole, because after two weeks of knowing each other, her man has already said “I love you!”  And Betty has said “I love you” in response.  I hate to ask the question, because I am constantly being accused of being a cynic and a hard-ass, but can you be in love after only two weeks?  I will admit that Betty is an intoxicating figure and one cannot help but be drawn to her energy and positivity, but is that love?  Love to me is dirty, it is mean and it is scary…  okay maybe I am a cynic.  To me, love is something you do not take lightly.  Can you really love someone after only knowing them for two weeks?  Infatuated yes, entertained yes, love – no!  You can’t possibly know them.  The funny thing about Betty’s relationship is that there are already red flags, but to her, a declaration of love after 2 weeks is not one of them.  He speaks of coming from family money, selling imported cars and owning property yet drives a car not even a broke ass kid from Surrey would get into.  How it passed Air Care I do not know.  He owns a condo, yet lives in a low rent hovel with a roommate.  Even if these are life choices to not spend money on superficial things and keep money in the bank, he doesn’t.  He actually keeps his cash in large Ziplock bags in his room.  Yes, you read that right.  Betty has enquired if he is a drug dealer, to which he responded, no. But you know all drug dealers are a forthcoming and honest lot, so he must be telling the truth. Despite all this, Betty is an individual who lives for the moment and forges through life missing all the DANGER signs and has responded by saying “I LOVE you”. And she generally believes she is, and is ecstatic!

On the other hand, we have Hookah who is in a nice, caring, stable, hassle-free relationship with no huge wad of red flags wrapped in a Ziplock bag shoved under a mattress.  Unfortunately for Hookah, she has fallen and it has become very real.  She has what I would argue most are looking for - someone you care very deeply about. And it is scaring the CRAP out of her.  Why you ask?  Because now in a break up, it is no longer about being upset because you lost the idea of a relationship, or you missed someone sleeping beside you, or someone, anyone to go to that office function with you so once again you are not the single girl in the room.  When you get to the point of love, you miss that person and no one else will do.  It is no longer that they fill a checklist of what you are looking for – they  actually take a piece of your heart with them if they were to ever leave.  It is not a minor jump in emotional suicide. It is the jump off the bridge.  And unlike Betty who is living in the crazy world of Alice in Wonderland  (which to even her own admittance is most likely fantasy.)  Hookah is living on earth, in this world and is shitting herself. 

The hilariousness of Hookah’s situation is that she is a hopeless romantic and when single, I would listen to hours of her whining about wanting a relationship where she was in love and had that passionate chemistry, which at the moment she has.  Ironically, and hilariously (for me at least), she is losing her mind!

I realize I may have been very harsh to Betty, her man and their love in my story because who am I to judge what love is and what one considers love?  I have never told a guy I love them and I am thirty-two years old. This is most likely where my harshness towards those who I believe just throw around the word comes from.  But maybe Betty’s Rabbit Hole is real!  Maybe it is the great romance and it was meant to be from the beginning.  Maybe I have been too quick to judge those who are free with their feelings and I am misinterpreting it as flighty as opposed to liberating.  I could be watching a great romance unfolding before my eyes…. but I highly doubt it.

I feel my grounding on this topic comes from the fact that I was single for Valentine’s Day and was lucky enough to spend it with two people I really love - my mother and my sister.  After working in a flower shop all Valentine’s Day watching men scramble into the store at the last minute and hastily throw their credit cards down to save face with their girlfriends, I was happy to avoid what I believe is a fraud of a day.  However, my friends in relationships were not so lucky.  Hookah, as I mentioned,  had her great realization.  Betty received $800 in jewelry which has her trying to figure out if this guy is lying about his situation or if he just trying to perpetuate a lie and if he is, what is his angle? And then there was a friend of mine in a faltering relationship which seemed to never end, but Valentine’s Day was the nail in the coffin.  The man got her a Men’s Health Magazine.  Seriously, he would have been better off if he got her nothing.  Men’s Health?!  Who does that? A man who was dumped on February 15^th is who.

I do giggle when I hear all these stories and see these women who are generally rational and normal go insane and beat themselves up for it. As of late, I have been under a mountain of pressure to date from the people around me. After seeing what these women have gone through this week, I say no thank you.  I’ll take sanity for now.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!

Happy New Year! Yes, I know it’s a little late, but I have been busy trying to make 2012 better than 2011. You would think this would be an easy feat. Well, think again.  2012 is being ... Difficult!  It began alright. My New Year’s Eve was a blast!  I got to wear flats, hang with my amazing drunken friends and make out with a cute British boy!  But oh 2012, you lulled me into a false sense of security because swiftly after my make-out high, I was hit with an intestinal bacteria, bounced a cheque and, to top it all off, I lost a button on my winter coat as it started to snow! I am beginning to believe that I am God’s comedy hour. I can picture him up there in heaven using the clouds as the best barcaloungers ever, inviting the Arch Angel Gabriel over and laughing hysterically at my life! And though I am coming to grips with the fact that the meaning of my life is actually to be its punch line, I don’t feel I need to read about it, hence my New Year’s resolution - no more horoscopes. Last year I religiously read my horoscope clinging to the hope that one day it would read: “it will all work out.” But instead it just kept telling me life was going to be hard. No shit Sherlock! I don't need to be a clairvoyant to predict that one. So basically, my New Year’s resolution is to no longer read the fricken obvious!

I realize most of the world normally makes New Year’s resolutions based on health: drink less, eat less, and go to the gym. Which means for the month of January the gym is insane - and so is its parking lot. Now maybe it is that life might be getting to me and my prescription needs to be upped or that I am generally fed up with people who think they are above common decency or reason, but in some ways I am the spitting image of my father…  there might have been an incident in the aforementioned parking lot last Thursday.  After waiting patiently for 20 minutes, a spot opens up. But a princess driving her daddy's BMW on the wrong side of the street raced up and snagged it. Wel,l you can imagine this did not go over well. I threw my car into park in the middle of the road and gave her hell. The line-up was 7 cars long. I was not the only one being screwed at the moment.  But in Canada no one does anything! We just grumble to ourselves and let it fester. If I was in India at least I would have mob mentality back-up. But no, no back-up for Cassandra and therefore it would have been unwise to pull her from her car by her hair and explain why her behavior was unacceptable. Stupid assault charges.  That’s a HUGE problem with our justice system! What this girl did do is claim she was an instructor and was late for her class. Therefore, when I finally got a spot, I laid into the general manager about his employee. But guess what?  She isn’t an employee!  And she was in the class I was attending.  Unfortunately for me she avoided me like the plague and I was not able to get her alone to finish our conversation.  So unsatisfying!  But really, what was I going to do? Create a scene and look like an idiot? Key her car? All options, yet none viable, which in turn just made me feel weak.  I know getting out of my car and reprimanding her was more than most would do, but in my eyes she still won and I was powerless to do anything about it.  The only satisfaction I received was knowing that the manager was going to speak to her about impersonating an employee.  Even at that, I know he went easy on her. I know I might be overreacting a bit with my desire for vigilante behavior. But sometimes I feel as though the world has fallen apart and if people are going to act like primitive animals, they should be beaten accordingly! Instead, I am sitting here with her license plate number trying to figure out how to mess with her and get her audited by CRA!

I know it always comes back to my father.  But come on, daddy issues prop major industries of society and therefore deserves time in the limelight.  My dad got into a lot of fights when I was a kid.  I really did think it was normal to have the cops show up on your doorstep ever so often.  Didn’t all of our dads beat up the garbage truck driver?! And although I hate it when people fight (I find UFC the biggest buzz kill and basically soft core gay porn), I do recognize that at that moment in the parking lot I was more like him. It left me confused. What is the correct thing to do?  Act like my father, who in the end would have won the parking spot battle, but maybe with some bloodshed?  Or walk away as I did? I do not know because my anger and disrespect towards my father runs so deep that any characteristic he embodies, I counter whether it is a good thing or not. Shedding some of my anger and getting perspective I do see that not all things my father stands for are maniacal.  However the question becomes, which ones that are inherent to me are good qualities and which ones are suspect?

With this type of thinking and self discovery I have a feeling that 2012 is not going to be that great beach vacation I was hoping for.  Bet God is just busting a gut at the moment!

I need to get LAID!!!

All I want for Christmas is to get LAID! Arghhhh!!!  SEX SEX SEX!!!  Ladies and gentlemen, I am back to fantasizing about humping the lamp post.  I may be a virgin again if this streak keeps up.  Is it medically safe to go 3 months without sex?  I am sure the Harvard Medical Journal is printing a report as we speak explaining how lack of sex can lead to cancer.  The only positive point from this dry spell is that I am late and in no way nervous – because I ain’t no virgin Mary; however, tis’ the season. 

For all intents and purposes, this lack of action is my fault.  I have been lying fairly low as a result of being … committable.  I felt it was safer to avoid high stress situations aka: relations with men.  Why? Because they are morons.  Fact not fiction.  Here is some substantiating evidence to my theory: I have been in a bit of an email relationship with a boy from London, Wapping, for the past 8 months.  Let me explain “relationship.”  We bitch about stupid people, the Occupy movement (sorry, redundant), hangovers and why corporal punishment should be used in the school system.  It’s typical light-hearted conversation.  But, let me make it very very clear, we have never chatted about ”us” or visiting each other, or anything that would constitute more than pen pals.  Despite our jovial conversation, he does come out with the stereotypical comments about women every now and again, like today when he sent me this:

Ah, I wondered why there had been radio silence for such a long time. In the typical womanly way you just get pissed off and then cut communication and then go mad at the question "Is something wrong?" I half expect you to answer that question with "If you don't know then I don't think I can tell you!"

What is with men who think that everything in the world revolves around them?  Maybe I was busy, did that ever occur to him?  Women would never assume something like this because we would figure he was busy, did not get our last email or the usual reason which we pretend does not exist: “he is just not that into me”.  What I wanted to write back was this:  “Typically the reason a a woman is mad at you is because you are a moron.”  But because (a) our mothers taught us that if you can’t say anything nice don’t say anything at all and (b) calling a man a moron is stating the obvious, we suck up our anger, take the time, get over it and then resume the relationship.  But no, this was my response:  “Radio silence – aaawwwww… did you miss me?!”

Let’s get back to my point.  Despite men being touched – and I don’t mean by an angel – they still have something I want.  This irritates me.  Normally I get around this is by sleeping around on vacation.  This way, I don’t have to learn their name and there is no chance of running into them while schlepping into Swiss Chalet hung over in my Walmart sweats.  Unfortunately WHOCATING (Being a whore on vacation) did not work this last trip.  Why, you ask?   This family vacation was in Disneyland.  This isn’t exactly the best place to get some action unless Mickey is feeling a bit frisky.  However, I might have had a few ride alongs while in D-land which resulted in flirting with the 17 year old named James who was running the Tea Cup ride.  I know, I know. Issues!  But as I said, I fear this dry spell may give me cancer.  Really, it is  now a health concern as opposed to a want.

I realize I MIGHT be slightly dramatic at the moment because Betty has just past the year mark.  It has been a year since her divorce and she is ready to get back out there.   After being out of the dating game for ten years and now in her early thirties, it was strange for me to hear some of the things Betty thought about, the first of which was the STD testing.  I see an ad for AIDS and whether I have had sex or not, I go and get tested.  I had simple blood work done the other day to check my thyroid and the doctor’s office called me to discuss.  Have you ever had the doctor’s office call you after a blood test? BAH!!!  I freaked, standing in the middle of Kiehls.  I screamed into the phone “Oh my God, do I have AIDS?”  After the nurse quit laughing, she confirmed I was STD free and that I had low iron and the doctor wanted to discuss.  So yes, I totally understand the safety issue; however, most of us just wrap it up, go on the pill and hope for the best.  Betty on the other hand went “after school MTV special.”  She had gone on a few dates and she actually asked him if he would get tested.  I laughed when she told me this, because his response was obviously “no”  followed by “but I will double wrap it.”  Again, men are morons.  But even Betty has realized the sex rules for girls in their thirties have changed.  Women in their thirties no longer need to play this game of “holding out.”  They do what they want.  Why?  Because single men in their thirties are no longer looking for the virgin.  That guy already got married, and the ones that are not married, you don’t want to marry.

I have discovered one very important fact this year about sleeping with a boy on the first date.  I have always been told it is against “the rules,” but when I look at my single girlfriends that either hold out or whore it up like me, I see one commonality: we are all still single.  The only difference is the whores get laid!