We're Back, Bitches

Before we even jump into the topic at hand, we must let it be known that coming up with this post title was a point of contention: one of us views bitches as a term of endearment, and the other sees it not so sentimentally.

Oh well: the girl who's typing is the girl whose vote counts.

So yes, we're back. We took a three-year hiatus, but that doesn't mean we're any less broke or any less single.

We will tell you just how single we are, in fact, but first we must tell you about an epic decision with which we were recently faced. (Did you like how that sentence did not end with a preposition? Oh yeah. That's what happens when two English majors write a blog post.)

Recently, we were presented with an opportunity to take the next step, to take our relationship to another level. Yes, we were faced with a big question: to roommate, or not to roommate? (Dad was wrong: that English degree was worth something.)

A friend of ours remarried his ex-wife, which left them with a bonus house. When he was explaining this to us, we immediately exclaimed, "We could rent that! You should totally rent that to us!"

And we were met with crickets.

Silence.

Nothing.

But apparently we pitched the idea well enough, as he emailed us first thing the next morning offering up the house for rent -- and then used up all of our phone storage by texting us 45 pictures of every corner.

On Monday, we toured the house. It was a nice house. It had a lot of roommate potential. And, it would accommodate our zoo. Now we had to make a very important life decision. And how does one do that?

Over cocktails. Duh.

So, we headed to dinner -- where we were going to have one glass of wine.

Three glasses of wine (and an extensive mental list of pros and cons) later, we headed over to one of our houses. And opened another bottle of wine.

At this point, we thought we should get another opinion. So naturally, we called Mom.

Us: Hey, Mom, can we put you on speaker phone? We have something we want to ask you.
Mom: Oh, sure!
Us: Okay. Mom, you're on speaker phone.

Silence.

Us: Are you there?

Mom: Are you girls gay?!

Us: Silence.

Us: Well, that'd be a lot easier.

Us: But no.

So yes. That's just how single we still are. Our parents think we're gay.

Welcome back, friends.

Same Old Song & Dance

As holders of graduate degrees, we have learned how to analyze the shit of the shit out of something; synthesize old and new information; and apply it across race, language, age, and - in this case - gender.  Let us take this moment to educate: in psychology, there is a phenomenon called "learned deviance."  This occurs when people learn bad things from others; instead of learning positive coping skills, they learn to be better criminals.

Why are we telling you this, you may ask?  We are perplexed as to which came first: Randy's ridiculous behavior or his roommate Buck's blatant disrespect toward other human beings.

Background story:

When one of us started "dating" (again, we use that term loosely) Randy, Randy was adamant about hooking the other up with his roommate, Buck.  We thought this was a great idea: how fun would it be for two best friends to be dating two fall in love with and marry roommates?!  We were thinking double wedding, houses right next to each other, naming our children after one another - you get the picture.  It was going to be grand.

And it was!

When we started dating (yes, term used loosely yet again), things were wonderful: Buck is well-traveled, he is intelligent, he is well-versed in the arts, he is relatively attractive, he is older (more mature, right?), he is a great father, he is a runner and in great shape, he is a dog lover, he loves to cook and drink wine, and the list could go on and on.

Red Flag #1 (it was only a matter of time): "I didn't think I'd like you because I don't date redheads."

Red Flag #2: "I usually only date stupid, vapid blondes about half my age."

Red Flag #3: "You have a unique face."

Red Flag #4: "I can recommend a great aesthetician - my baby mama."

(Red Flags #1-4 were actually said in one sentence - one breath that came out of his mouth.  Awesome.)

Red Flag #5: while one of us was trying to sober up Randy for that high-class charity event, urging him to stop asking Buck to accompany us, Buck finally mentioned that he could not attend because he had an "overnight guest" coming, and he had to clean the house.  After we picked our jaw off the floor, we quickly left the vicinity because we believed it to be "girl code" to avoid situations in which your best friend's man was sleeping with another woman.  Side note: when we returned in the morning, we noticed that "Bobbi with an 'i'" drives a red IROC Camaro, and we therefore assumed she looked like this:

Classy.  And after some clever stalking on a popular social networking site, it was confirmed that "Bobbi with an 'i'" does, in fact, wear shoulder pads.

Red Flag #6: After "Bobbi with an 'i'" went back to southern Missouri/northern Arkansas (aren't they the same thing?), we had not heard from Buck for several days until we received this gem of a message: "I have an opening in my schedule Friday morning at 9:30 if you wanna come by and hang out."  We're so glad you could fit us into your schedule; did your hair appointment cancel?  (Interesting side note: as we were arriving to that "appointment," Randy arrived as well, and Randy and Buck had a "secret" conversation about how Randy had spent the night "elsewhere."  [Another interesting side note: that "elsewhere" was not with us.])

Red Flag #7: Buck and Randy clearly did not notice our blatant disapproval of their extraneous relationships, and one of us went to their house for dinner - and met Buck's "friend."  (Interestingly, she was a stupid, vapid blonde.  Also interestingly, she was not half his age and was instead a grandmother.  Although we are not sure if, at 42-years-old, that is something you should be proud of, and we are also not sure that ultrasound pictures are appropriate for the dinner table.  But we're not judging...  Okay, we're judging.)

After this lovely encounter, we did not hear from Buck for days - until he called, out-of-the-blue, asking us to meet at one of our favorite establishments.  Fueled by half a bottle of cheap chardonnay, we ripped him a proverbial "new one."  (Of course we didn't do that; you should know by now our strength is passive-aggressiveness.)  However, we did have a come-to-Jesus meeting.  But did he listen?  No: when our back was turned, he told his friend how much he loved to be degraded, and how his favorite pet-name was "emotional disaster."  Clearly the message did not hit home.

Moral of the story: we sincerely thought that dating roommates would be an amazing happily ever after; the boys, on the other hand, likely despised the fact (or completely forgot due to their alcohol-induced stupidity) that we actually talked to one another, completely revealing their meandering ways.

And we leave you with this charming picture: walking into yet another of our favorite neighborhood establishments and seeing Randy and Buck sidled up to the bar, accompanied by a girl wearing jorts and a rather portly woman who slings barbecue for a living.  You're welcome.

Organization is a Life Skill

You know what's really embarrassing?   Walking into the bar with Randy and Buck (the roommate, stay with us) and seeing the two lovely ladies who sang like canaries, opened our eyes, and pointed directly at the giant red flags in front of us.

Let us back up.

Us: OMG.  Last night with Randy was so fun!

Cute Spy Girls (friends of ours and, interestingly, Randy's coworker): Randy?!  Please don't tell me you're dating him!

Us: Uh, I'm not sure "dating" is the right word...

Cute Spy Girls: You are way too good for him!  You are smart, pretty, funny, successful, well-traveled, well-read, highly-educated, and nice!    (Um, duh.  We know.)  Why are you dating him?!

Us: Oh, you know him?

Cute Spy Girls: Let me tell you!  He is a hot mess!

Us: Yeah, yeah.  Story of our lives.  Fill us in.

At this point in the conversation, Cute Spy Girls proceed to tell us just how gentlemanly Randy (and his roommate Buck) is.

Story #1: "Let me tell yoooooooou a story.  You want to know about Randyyyyyyyy?  We will sing like the pretty little birds that we are!"  As it turns out, Randy is a little more organized than we gave him credit for.  Hey, when you're juggling 18 women, you better be able to keep a calendar.  Unfortunately, Randy kept his in his easily-accessible cell phone.  One of Randy's more educated "bitches" (his word, not ours....this one was a lawyer) found some salacious texts from another, more mature (read: old.....like, 50's...sorry Moms) bitch.  At this point in the early morning, Lawyer gathered Randy's belongings and not so politely asked him to leave.  Given the fact that Randy has no transportation (three OWI's, no license 'til 2071, remember?), you can imagine what he must have looked like dragging his garbage bag full of crap across town at 2:00 in the morning.  It gets better.  One of his younger bitches (his word, not ours) called and added to his baggage the happy  news that she was carrying his child.

At this point in the conversation with our pretty little songbirds, we realized that Randy maintained an honest-to-God rotation of women.  Our only dilemma now was to figure out which night was reserved for us.

Oh, and remember that fancy, expensive, board-of-directors charity event we attended?

Seven hours prior:

Us: getting excited for our hot date.

Randy: getting drunk (Blue Moon) at his place of employment.

Six hours prior:

Us: talking to our friends about how excited we are about our hot date.

Randy: getting drunker (Vegas Bombs) at his place of employment.

Five hours prior:

Us: calling our moms to tell them how excited we are about our hot date.

Randy: telling the bar, "My bitches don't care what condition I'm in!  They're just happy to see me!"

Four hours prior:

Us: steaming the dress to get the wrinkles out.

Randy: smoking...something.

Three hours prior:

Us: calling friends to solidify pre-event plans.

Randy: thinking of reasonable excuses to tell his Friday-night girls (apparently not us) as to why he needs to switch them to Saturday night.

Two hours prior:

Us: picking out the perfect shoes and accessories to match our smokin' hot dress.

Randy: begging his roommate to borrow something semi-nice and semi-clean.

One hour prior:

Us: having a glass of wine to relax and prepare for what will surely be a fabulous, glamorous evening, hobnobbing with Des Moines' who's who.

Randy: lighting up another...um...coping skill.

The event:

See previous post.

You know who doesn't mind being embarrassed?  Us.  You know who doesn't heed red flags?  Us.  Because yes: despite those cute little songbirds, we went out with him again.  Sorry, Moms.

A Charity Case

As we mentioned in the previous post, we invited Randy to an upscale charity function a couple of weeks ago.  It may be important to note that this was not just a charity event that we attended but one for which we serve on the board, one for which we were underwriters.  Read: it was kind of a big deal.

We had been looking forward to this event for months and had purchased a beautiful new cocktail dress (and looked exactly like the model):

5:00 p.m.: After spending nearly two hours primping and curling and make-up-ing, we went to pick up our date.  (OWI's, remember?)

5:05 p.m.: Smell the Blue Moon and Vegas Bombs wafting off of our date.

5:06 p.m.: Jaw hits the ground as we see what he is deeming appropriate attire - the most torn-up jeans he owns, a t-shirt, and a stupid hat.

5:10 p.m.: Randy asks us if we would drive him to a friend's house to run an "errand" with him.

5:30 p.m.: Walk into a scene straight from Half Baked - in a tiny cocktail dress and five-inch platform heels.

6:30 p.m.: Drive back to Randy's and force him to change.

6:31 p.m.: Randy invites roommate (Buck) to the event.  Repeatedly.

6:33 p.m.: Randy digs out slightly more appropriate clothing (cigarette burn on the pants, a fly that didn't work).

6:35 p.m.: Randy demands that he will be wearing flip-flops.

7:00 p.m.: Arrive at a fancy downtown restaurant to have a glass of wine and schmooze with friends.  (In hindsight, Randy did not need anything to drink other than a liter of water and eight Aspirin.)

7:30 p.m.: Pull into parking lot, and Randy answers a girl's phone call and invites her to the event.  When he realizes she does not have a ticket, he said that we can sneak her into the venue "in his trousers."

7:31 p.m.: Become even more annoyed.

7:32 p.m.: Move from annoyed to pissed.

7:33 p.m.: Move from pissed to furious.

In the hour that we were at the event, Randy had approximately four bottles of wine to our one glass, ate appetizers straight from the platters (sans napkin or plate), wandered around outside during the ten-minute presentation, picked flowers out of the centerpieces, asked the server to "top him off," and acted like a complete ass.

8:45 p.m.: Tell Randy that it is time to leave, despite another hour of open bar.

Did we drop him off at home?  No, no, of course we didn't.  Instead, we decided to take him to our house because his roommate, who is dating our best friend, had an "overnight guest."

Stay tuned for that hot mess.

Lessons in Spotting Red Flags

Where do we even start with this one?  We are pretty sure we just spent the better half of two months dating (we use that term loosely) a cartoon character: there is no way this person could actually exist.  Alas, he does.  And we experienced it.

On May 8th, 2011, we decided to celebrate not being moms by doing the most un-mom-like activity we could think of: drinking on a patio at 3 p.m.  Interestingly, we were the only ones who had this idea, as the patio was empty.  We decided to have one pitcher - yes, ONE pitcher - and then go home.  However, our plans were thwarted when two gentlemen (we use that term loosely) arrived and pulled up their chairs.

At first, we were certain these guys were together; they appeared to be way more into each other than they were to us.  We were wrong.

The next thing we knew, we were sitting around a bonfire in someone's backyard, in the middle of the city, at 3 a.m. on a Monday morning.  Clearly, it was time to go home.

Guess what decision we made?

A week later - to our surprise - we received a phone call at 8 p.m. on a Friday.  The caller - Randy - asked if we were at work.

On the topic of work, let us take a brief respite to tell you a little about Randy:

Career	College degree but not using it: no big deal – in this economy, many people our age find jobs out of their intended field	Completely satisfied with career trajectory as a server at a local restaurant
Transportation	No car: lessening one’s carbon footprint is admirable	Three OWIs
Parenting	Child: as we get older, many people we date are fathers	Has not seen his daughter in three years, nor does he have means by which to financially support her (see above)
Legal	Iowa Courts Online: we were all young and crazy once	2008?!
Health	Addiction: yes, it is a powerful thing, but there are ways to conquer it	Nothing like a year in prison to kick a meth habit
Housing	Living with a friend: great way to save money	An official lease would have shown up on his parole officer’s radar
Domestic Skills	Some parents don’t teach their children to cook	Survives on Taco Tuesdays, roommate’s leftovers, and copious amounts of Coors Light
Clothing	Jeans are expensive; besides, the worn look is in	Holes that show the entire butt cheek are not appropriate for the workplace, even with boxers underneath

Apparently spotting all of these red flags unfurling in the wind is not enough: acting on them is key.

Before that, we needed a date for an upscale charity function, and despite the red flags, Randy was the perfect (okay, only) candidate.

Stay tuned for the date recap - and more on his roommate, Buck.

We've Been Dethroned...

...as the queens of passive-aggressive behavior. Let us tell you some stories:

• As you know, we had not blogged for quite awhile. In that time period, we met several "interesting" individuals, most of whom we subsequently friended on a popular social networking site (perhaps you've heard of it, as it was the subject of an Academy Award nominated film), most of whom were unaware of our virtual authorship. On Friday, we tried to regain loyal readership by advertising our blog everywhere we possibly could, including the aforementioned site. On Saturday, one of these "new friends" proceeded to delete every single comment he had written on our page. Coincidence? We think not. The question remains: why not just delete us all together? Interestingly, due to us being respectful (hey, first time for everything) he had not yet been mentioned in our blog.

• As usual, this is best recalled via actual text messages:

1:16 a.m.: "What r u girls doing?"

1:16 a.m.: "Um, we're at home. We're so cool." (Dude, it's almost 2:00 in the morning. You're 30 years old. It's time to go home.)
2:44 a.m.: "Me and my buddy solvinh th problems of the world. What u doing?"
2:50 a.m.: "Solving the problems of sleeping by moving from the couch to the bed." (Perhaps the better solution would be to turn off the phone.)
2:51 a.m.: "Soft."
2:51 a.m.: "Uh..." (Not surprising.)
3:20 a.m.: "Dude*...I kill on gitar hero." ("Dude?" Really?")
3:39 a.m.: "Oh yeah?"
3:49 a.m.: "You got no chance...I'd fuck you up." (Right.)
4:07 a.m. "Y do u have cats?"
4:08 a.m. "Random. Why do you ask?"
4:08 a.m. "Bc I'm allergic to their damn dander." (What drunk person says "dander" at 4 a.m.?)
4:09 a.m. "There's medicine for that."
4:18 a.m. "I'd be dead if I took that shit."
4:19 a.m. "Abundance of alcohol & allergy meds don't exactly go togetjer."
4:30 a.m. "Were you planning on coming over or something?" (Do not read as hopeful: merely inquiring.)
4:34 a.m. "I'm a guitar hero all star."*
5:40 a.m. "I rock." (Indeed.)

In addition to dealing with passive-aggressive dudes, we had quite an eventful weekend. Remember how we said that we signed up for a marathon? Well, turns out that training for such an event is quite important. We decided to start yesterday. After a day of training (two miles), our muscles hurt, our toes hurt, and our brains hurt. We would already like to quit. Instead, we say this to 26.2 miles: BRING IT.

In order to rehydrate and use a coupon, we decided Sangria Saturday was a wonderful idea. Turns out that our $25 coupon covered the tip. Oops. We also decided that our workout for today would include margaritas (Skinnygirl, of course) at 5:00 in the afternoon.

Finally, today was spent running numerous errands. If you are our friends on a certain social networking site, you probably already know this due to our "checking in." It's not so cool when other people do it, huh? We hope you learned your lessons.

And now, we're going to go check in at the refrigerator. It's time for a refill.

*For all of you Guitar Hero All Stars who would like to expand their musical prowess, we would like to recommend a product: Rock Pedal. We would also like to now give a shout-out to the developer of said product, our college buddy.

We're Too Old For This Shit

You may wonder why it's taken us so long to get back to this blog, the one that has brought us such fame and fortune. (Soon, soon...) Well, we've been very busy - dating our hearts out, slaving to find material for you - YOU. And material have we found. Get ready.

We will start this blog post with the conversation starter we have received from numerous gentlemen (we use that term loosely) as of late:

"Hi."

And in keeping true to literary form, we will update you with tidbits of text messages we have received from various gentlemen over the last four months:

3:49 a.m. (after not having talked for six months) - "Hey, what up? Doing anything tonight?"

2:17 p.m. (after not having talked for ten months) - "I hope you're having a nice spring break. Hypothetically speaking, would you have hooked up with me had I asked?"

11:58 p.m. - "So what up? Out having fun tonight?" - "Hey, not out...in bed." - "Sounds like u need some compnay?!?!"

10:33 a.m. - "What color panties r u wearing?"

11:17 p.m. - "You're getting your Masters degree? Usually the girls I talk to are way dumber than me!" - "What do you do?" - "I just got out of jail."

Just so you know, we have some absolutely amazing material on deck, but we'd like to wait until the relationship falls completely through before we blog about it. It's going to be the best yet. Hang tight: this won't take long.

On another note, Spring Break 2011!!!!!!!!!!!

We decided to indulge our inner sorority girls (SPRING BREAK 2011!!!) and head to Key West for a week of fun in the sun. Some of us wore sun block, and others of us were lucky enough to find aloe:

After delivering emergency care, we headed to the Wannabe-Jersey-Shore-House: Fat Tuesday. Of course we bought the requisite obnoxious coozie: how else are we supposed to keep our Hurricanes cold?

Following that necessary pit-stop, we headed to another must-have of the trip: Rick's fountain. After all, we are a couple of classy ladies.

To complete the Duval Crawl, we hit up a popular place:

We came. We saw. We left. Interestingly, this happens to be one of our parents' favorite bars. Thankfully, they were not there...naked...sitting on bar stools.

P.S. In a fit of insanity, we signed up to run a marathon. 26.2 miles (but we're going to do 26.3). Stay tuned.

P.P.S. We'd like to give a shout-out to the #1 evil step-mommy dearest Gator fan: you know who you are, and we love you one million. (Just to clarify: this would not be the parent who frequents clothing-optional bars.)

Bated Breath?

Even though we haven't heard from you, most likely because it is a sensitive topic and you are embarrassed to ask, we know you're wondering about the aforementioned boob rash and sprained ankle. So, we'll tell you.

Boob Rash: there's a rash on a boob, perhaps from a spider. That's about it.

Sprained Ankle: it's big, and it hurts. That's about it.

The Discovery Channel called us yesterday for further details, but we're holding them off until we get an agent.

What you've really been waiting for, obviously, is the dramatic conclusion to all of the amazing scenarios we briefed you with yesterday. However, you will have to keep waiting because tonight, folks, we talk about cooking.

Lesson #1: they tell you to use rubber gloves when cutting jalapenos. You should listen to whoever "they" are. This is a fact that we know; however, one of us will be sitting with her hands in a bowl of cold milk in about ten minutes.

Lesson #2: while delicious, pomegranates are almost as huge a pain in the ass to cut as mangos. And while said recipe called for four pomegranates to equal two cups of seeds, we will be eating pomegranate seeds for the next week-and-a-half. Muffins, anyone? Fruit cocktail? Omelets?

Lesson #3: how the hell are you supposed to "finely chop" an orange? We are pretty sure that out of the two oranges we "finely chopped," only half of one actually made it into the salsa.

Lesson #4: double-check your shrimp, as "peeled and de-veined" might not actually mean "peeled and de-veined." Also make sure you have someone who is able to handle that part of meal preparation.

Lesson #5: if you are wanting to create a cheap and quick dinner in order to catch a conference call, a.) do not choose this expensive, time-consuming, labor-intensive recipe, and b.) check the date for the conference call.

Boob Rashes and Sprained Ankles

Well, the title pretty much says it all: why we haven't blogged for almost exactly three months. It's been fun, and you can thank us later for sparing you the details.

Remember how we talked not once but twice about our neighbors being careful who they elect for public office? Apparently they don't read this blog. We want to make you aware of a couple of facts:

1. One has to have a college degree to hold even a temporary, stand-in job in a certain business. However, one apparently does not have to have a college degree to exercise power in said business.

2. One can be selected to oversee decisions that impact others in our community despite being brought to court for his own irresponsibility.

Just sayin', readers: just sayin'.

In addition, to our civics lesson for the day, we decided to start our reentry into the blogging world with a few highlights from the last couple of months. Stay tuned for the stories in their entirety:

1. 2:15 a.m. (15 minutes after bar close): "I know you're leaving early in the morning for a 16-hour drive, but I'd like to give you a goodbye you'll remember. I only need 15 minutes." If by 15 you mean three, we think we're just going to keep sleeping.

2. 6:34 p.m. (after the world's longest first date): "If you ever try to mess with my family, you won't live to regret it! Also, you just missed out on the biggest **** you've ever seen!" Shucks.

3. 8:01 p.m. (shortly after our friend gets off the cruise ship in Miami, and four days after we dropped him off at the airport for said company vacation): "So, he totally hooked up with a 21-year-old from Dubuque." Shockingly, we haven't heard from him since.

4. 7:46 p.m. (on a first date): "I don't normally tell people this, but I'll tell you. I work at Adventureland." If only mouse ears were involved...

5. 9:15 p.m. (while hanging out with Thing One): Twinkle Toes says, "Maybe her friend wants to come over, too!" Um, doubt it.

6. 2:15 p.m. (while on a blind date): "..." We wish there were sound bytes, but alas, he did not say a word, so we proceeded to get blindingly drunk.

7. 2:34 a.m. (after being called twice and finally answering): "I am just so attracted to you. Like, I really like you. It's too bad we work together. Do you have friends with you?" Um, do you have any friends with you? Preferably friends who don't pretend to be single and whose cover is totally blown after seeing the car-seats.

8. 7:56 p.m. (during a dinner meeting for which the focus was our mutual work for a non-profit): capital "R" reason for moving to Iowa (and only other local volunteer for the non-profit organization) walks in with his new girlfriend: with jaw hitting the floor, nothing but a baffled stare. (Perhaps there isn't a sound byte to share because we contacted his other ex-girlfriend and unraveled six years of lies.)

9. 6:12 p.m. (on a first date): Why, Rocco, did you feel the unicycle was an appropriate mode of transportation for a 29-year-old? (Sadly, Rocco is not one of our made-up names and is, in fact, the only real name we've ever used on this blog.)

10. 3:34 a.m. (from a boy we met once): "Hey." Again, "hey" is not an appropriate way to start a conversation - especially at 3 a.m. - even more especially when we only met you once.

11. 10:20 p.m. (while we bloggers were on a long-distance call with each other and did not switch over to answer an incoming call): voicemail from Thing One: "I'm never f$%#ing coming over there again!" His anger lasted about 17 hours, as he bought us sushi the next night.

Stay tuned for the sequel! Hopefully it'll be more tomorrow than three months.

Still Broke & Single

We know we haven't blogged for awhile (sorry, Moms), but we experienced such a high level of douche-itude last night that requires an immediate response. After inhaling pounds of burritos and mini-donuts at the Latino Heritage Festival, trying to expand our cultural horizons, we visited a local drinking establishment. Immediately upon entering the bar at 3:00 in the afternoon, we were accosted by 25 loud, obnoxious members of the Des Moines chapter of Douchebags International. We just wanted to enjoy the beautiful weather of our "second Saturday," but this was not in the cards. Instead, this is what we tried so hard, unsuccessfully, to avoid:

• Men who refer to their wives as their "moms."
• Men who wear t-shirts with "Twat Yeah" on the back.
• Men who jump up and down singing every single word of Miley Cyrus's "Party in the USA."*
• Men who dance to Miley Cyrus's "Party in the USA."
• Men who repeatedly sexually harass the underage servers.
• Men who insist on wearing their cell phones on a belt clip.
• Men who lie about everything: their marital status, their children, their job, their age, their fiance's untimely death (sorry, dude - we don't believe you).
• Men who table hop, trying to find the girl who will most likely believe their crap stories, the girl most likely to not call them out, the girl most likely to bring them back to her college dorm room (remember, they have wives).
• Men who attempt to start fights for no apparent reason.
• Men who cheat at cards - and yes, this includes UNO.
• Men who ditch you immediately when your married friend arrives.

Now for the short update as to why we haven't posted for nearly a month:

• Kicking ass and taking names.

That's basically it. Included in this favorite activity of ours is the following:

• Trying to improve our health by eating better and working out. Shockingly, this does not include drinking copious amounts of alcohol and seeing just how much better we can cram into one meal.
• Starting school: teaching and learning. This whole work thing sure takes a lot of time and energy.
• Nerding it up every Tuesday night in Des Moines' premier trivia league.
• Hosting a Fantasy Football draft and talking a lot of trash.
• Not training for a 5k that we "ran" on Saturday.
• Prepping for the Wedding of the Century.
• Participating in a number of pants-off dance-offs.
• Hanging out at Des Moines' oldest cemetery.
• Joining every sports league Des Moines has to offer.
• Traveling to such amazing places as Knoxville and Melcher.
• Moving two apartments.
• Freaking out about money in general, and more specifically auto repairs on our two identical Corollas.
• Trying to find the one spot in the apartment that gets cell phone reception. And then apologizing to all our friends when the new phone resends every message from the last two weeks.

Basically, we've been trying to be semi-productive members of society. But we'll try to blog more. Sorry.

Dinner tonight utilized one of our recent purchases: a grill pan. We were so excited for this and deemed it necessary enough to spend a whopping $40 on it. (Remember, we're broke: that's a lot of money.) Upon cooking with said grill pan for the first time, we are perplexed as to how it's so different from a frying pan. Those fancy little marks sure are nice, though.

Flank steak with chermoula, sauteed squash and zucchini, red roasted potatoes.

*We were the ones who played this at the juke box, trying to empty the bar of d-bags. However, this turned into a pissing contest among different groups of gentlemen, seeing who could play the worst song. Unfortunately for the rest of us, this lasted two-and-a-half hours. Lesson learned.

B is for Booze

We have decided that we are going to take a hiatus from talking about our number one favorite topic (bitching about boys) and are instead going to talk about our number two favorite topic: booze. Generally, we enjoy booze because it makes us funnier, smarter, cuter, better dancers and singers, more outgoing and willing to take chances; clearly, it only strengthens our best features. While we are content drinking on our couches and with our friends, we also subscribe to the following notion: "The family that drinks together, stays together." Thus, we have enjoyed a variety of familial drinking experiences this summer.

Recently, one set of parents visited from Florida, and as we were discussing all of the social events here in Iowa, step-mommy-dearest interjected with, "Does everything here involve drinking in some way, shape, or form?" Um, yes. This was a surprising question, considering that we come by our drinking problems honestly; neither one complained when we pulled out the two bottles of wine we stowed in the picnic basket for our six-hour tour of the Bridges of Madison County. They are good sports and whole-heartedly embraced the drinking philosophy of Iowa: "There's Nothing To Do Here But Drink." In fact, they even attended our friends' half-birthday celebration, which included midnight tree climbing (unsafe), road flares as birthday candles (dangerous), tiki torches at one of the city's busiest intersections (illegal), sprinkler enemas in the sculpture garden (immature), and too many trips down the slip 'n slide (really fun).* Awkward moment: trying to introduce your father to your friends who had apparently decided to take a nap in the middle of the multi-million-dollar sculpture garden. Dad didn't care; after all, we had also been drinking all day.

Because we are such philanthropists - and huge fans of open bars - we joined a second set of parents in Omaha for a charity event in the not-so-distant past. 'Tinis & Tunes was a benefit for the Ribbon Foundation and took place in the parking lot of the hair salon, which was transformed into a beach oasis...sort of. Shockingly, we steered away from our typical drink of choice (wine) and went straight to the liquor bar, chugging down copious amounts of vodka and gin tonics. Yum. These drinks helped us be not only the first ones on the dance floor (remember, we are really good dancers after drinking), but we were the only ones on the dance floor. Did we care? Nope. After all, we were by far the youngest people there and were only doing our young-person duty: we got the party started. Did we embarrass ourselves? Quite possibly. Did we make Mama proud? Most definitely. And, we won door prizes.

Just two days ago, we further strengthened familial ties by bonding over alcohol at our sister's going-away party...which took place at none other than a frat house. In addition to all of the well-wishes for our sister, the evening's activities included a rousing game of Circle of Death, heckling the losers during Catchphrase (yes, pointing fingers and screaming, "YOU LOSE!" did happen), and investigating the source of the persisting vomit stench. Please do not think we were there cougar-ing it up, searching for fresh meat; but what girl doesn't jump at the opportunity to go to a party on Greek Street?!

Perpetuating drinking among family members, we invited Sister and Her Boyfriend over for dinner tonight and cooked a delicious meal of tilapia with a puttanesca relish over parmesan orzo. Oh, with wine, of course.** And Trivial Pursuit.

Tilapia with Puttanesca Relish and Parmesan Orzo

*Interestingly, this same party prompted the hostess the following day to ask, "Where were the grown-ups at this party?"
**If anyone would like to spring for a 28-day stay at a facility in Malibu, please email us.

Disclaimer: we may be drunk, but we ain't stupid: a designated driver accompanied us to each of these endeavors.

I'm Ready For My Close-Up, Mr. DeMille...

To begin, we would like to talk about a recent publicity stunt we somehow pulled off - or, in retrospect, completely failed. A few months after soliciting ourselves for the singles issue of the local newspaper (and our desperate pleas for more attention ignored), they contacted us for an article about being "single in the city." Of course, we jumped at this opportunity: we are shameless self-promoters and had been featured in this publication many times before. We spent endless time preparing: discussed potential questions, conferred with friends and family, read previous articles to see the format, fine-tuned our resumes, picked out the perfect outfit for the photo-shoot that was to be taken while we were at home and cooking, discussed with our stylist the best hair and make-up for photos, etc. We wanted to be presented as smart, sassy, career women; after all, we have multiple degrees, have traveled the world, and have ventured into careers that only the boldest take.

And this is what happened:

Phone Interview: one of us was stricken with a severe case of verbal diarrhea, and here are a few of the little turds that came floating out of our mouths:

• "I played an instrument in the high school orchestra and took a lot of art classes." Really? The violin 12 years ago? And in high school? I guess I've done nothing worthy of note since then... (Have you seen "Never Been Kissed"? Hey, Drew Barrymore is my celebrity doppelgänger.)
• "I pretty much hate this whole dating thing. I want to skip the dating stage and go straight to the relationship." Come and get me, boys!
• "The most romantic thing I've done is made scrapbooks for two of my boyfriends." Obviously that's every guy's dream. Those two guys are lucky I made theirs come true. So lucky, in fact, that they left the scrapbooks with me.
• Quote from best friend/co-blogger: "She chooses to see the good in people, which can be a bad thing sometimes when it comes to shady characters." Truer words were never spoken - have you read the blog?!

Photo Shoot: not the photo shoot we were expecting. Instead of coming to the apartment for a glamour shot of us cooking something absolutely gourmet, we were caught off guard drinking PBR tall-boys, the classiest of brews, in a downtown establishment. We tried to get them to use this picture...

And so we don't get sued...

...but all we heard was "copyright, blah blah blah, lawsuit, blah blah blah."

Clearly this was a huge success: the boys are breaking down the door.

He Sure Has Cojones!

Even though one of us is currently out of town getting paid for one of our all-time favorite activities*, we both felt that this story was just too good to keep from you any longer.

We recently got a call from Political Candidate. Had this been just a few months ago, this communication would not be such a shock; however, since we had not heard from him and since he neglected to respond to a few very important issues that occurred as a direct result of him, this call came completely out of the blue. While we contemplated letting him head straight to voicemail, we decided to take any opportunity to slash his machismo, figured that it had to be that good, and answered. This is the conversation:

Burned: Hello?

Political Candidate: Hi, Burned.

Burned: Hi, Political Candidate.

PC: Do you still have those GED books** that I left at your house awhile back?

Burned: Probably.***

PC: Well, do you think that if you find them we could make an arrangement for me to get those back?

Burned: Maybe.

PC: Okay. Well, if you could just let me know when you find them, I'd really appreciate it.

Burned: Goodbye.

Click.

(Please note how difficult - and liberating! - it is for us to assume a one-word-response persona. If you can't figure out through this venue, we like to talk. A lot. And we sure have a lot to say to this character!) So, after the two of us intelligent women discussed PC's obvious idiocy, we came up with a wonderful solution and called him back five minutes later:

PC: Hello?

Burned: Hi! So, I just found those books, and I'd be happy to give them to you...

PC: Oh, great!

Burned: ...as soon as you give me back the camera! (Spoken in a super peppy, sing-songy voice.)

PC: (Dumb silence.) What camera?

Burned: Oh, you know, the one I bought you for Christmas a week before you broke up with me.

PC: Oh, I don't have that anymore.

Burned: Totally fine! I'll take the money instead.

PC: Um...okay.

Burned: Okay, great! Talk to you later! Bye!

Click.

We must explain, dear readers: we are not spiteful, malicious, vindictive women. Instead, we are actually quite compassionate, kind, and caring. However, we make an exception with PC. This ignoramus accepted an expensive camera****, several other time-consuming and thoughtful gifts, and presents for his two children, all of which totaled a nice sum of money; in return, he gave us nothing but a break-up for Christmas. In essence, he stole from a poor, hardworking teacher - and feels no remorse. All of our benevolence is tossed to the side when dealing with a sociopath.

Because we are fairly certain we will not be receiving $200 from this fool, we generated a few alternative ideas:

1. Write informative messages and draw insightful pictures on every other page of the books and send one to his ex-wife (who we are certain is no longer an ex) and one to his boss.
2. Send the books with an informative letter to the community college to which the books belong.
3. Hand-deliver the books to his office and ask to speak with his boss, or stop by his ex(?)-wife's house and speak to her about the imbecile she married.
4. Hold on to them until the next political election he is daft enough to enter.
5. Keep them forever and ever.

And we are open to any other suggestions you may have! Please, please, please enlighten us!

Brown rice and pine nut tabbouleh

*Judging people - more on this when she returns

**His job entails him working with high school dropouts. (Please keep in mind that the only reason we are defending this is so that we don't look like idiots - if it helps you to envision him as a GED candidate himself, by all means, go for it!)

***They are currently on the floor next to the paper shredder, two feet from where we were sitting - along with two of his library books.

****This is in addition to the camera he most certainly stole from our parents. We only hope his current girlfriends and/or wives are enjoying this new technology.

Stalking: Justifiable and Natural

Apparently fellows like stalking and "will call it cute, whereas they are indifferent to those who ask for the pleasure of their company" (Ramirez, 2007). In case you don't want to look up Ramirez, 2007 (although please do note our APA format), this quote comes from our new favorite guidebook, The Art of Dating: Necking, Petting & Popularity: Wisdom from the 1940s. Given our latest set of shenanigans, we picked up this handy little tool to help us navigate the shark-infested waters of dating.

To start, we would like to inform you of the many ridiculous encounters we have had over the last two weeks:

• The elusive Man of Mystery - yes, the one who spent time in the Thai prison, the one who had a severe accident in the Amazon - was once again culled away to a remote part of the globe where he clearly had no means of communication (something dangerous and sexy, we're sure). He finally resurfaced around 11:30 on Friday night; eager to hear about his adventures, we (one of us) met him at a local watering hole. (We meet at these sketchy locations to avoid the Des Moines glitterati, hoping to conceal his identity - or, more likely, to avoid running into people we know). Should we have gone? Absolutely not. Did we? Duh.
• Thing One - although he may have blown us off for the last two months (and subsequently asked us if WE had grown up yet), we felt the need to take him out for an expensive birthday dinner of sushi and cocktails. As usual, this was decision-making at its best.
• Boy - after he totally avoided us for several weeks, we also felt the need to invite him over for a delicious, homemade three-course meal. Shockingly, he did not blow us off this time. Not shockingly, we have not heard from him since.
• C-Squared - you may think he is new to the blog, but this assumption would be incorrect: this is just the first time he has been named. He is actually the impetus for one of our moves to the Midwest and has a past of causing much turmoil. Although we had both agreed to divulge any new relationships to the other, we found him at OUR dog park with another bitch (whose dog, by the way, sucks).

To reiterate, we picked up this tome to rescue us from our dating misadventures and to help us fine everlasting love, happiness, and security. (Who are we kidding? We were just hoping it could help us get a second date.)

Although this is not a create-your-own adventure book, we skipped over chapter one (the title is "Should We Date?" and our answer is "Duh"). We charged head-first into chapter two, "Dates to Avoid." While we expected to see full summaries of our previous blog entries, we actually read some new information regarding

• Girl-made dates: in case you were wondering, "the girl who asks for a date places herself in a humiliating position." Guys, you should be honoring us with your presence, not vice versa. Now would be a great time to start asking us out.
• Blind dates: these are apparently not a good idea. We may be set up with undesirable characters (but hey, we'd have dates), and we might lose our good names by going out with these individuals (which is why we go to sketchy establishments where we just don't care). Interestingly, blind dates are so bad that "the person you have dated may persist in seeing you again." (Please, please, please inform us as to why this would be a negative.)
• Pick-ups: if you are acting cheap, you will be treated cheaply, and if you had self-respect, you wouldn't make "chance acquaintances." What other chance do we have to make acquaintances?!
• Mail order dates: supposedly making light of dating and not taking "fellowship" seriously is a bad thing and leads to taking matrimony as a joke as well. Perhaps we should halt the blog publication...

...or not. Dating is at least bearable if we can make a joke of it! And as Ramirez reports, "Certain legitimate dating methods may be used," and these will be covered in the next chapter. Get ready, readers, for us to test out all these amazing, 70-year old strategies; stay tuned.

Mmm... Bang Bang Shrimp.

Mussels Josephine, take two.

Daters' Block

Brace yourselves:

1. ONE teacher's guide (Broadway Books)
2. ONE collection of personal narratives (Random House)
3. ONE research study (in progress, DU)
4. ONE scholarly journal article (WPC)
5. ONE poetry anthology (something for youth poets)
6. ONE literary magazine (MSHS)

Not enough. We are striving for further national publication. And we would like to enlighten you, our loyal readers, as to our writing process:

Please notice that we offering you a glimpse into the minds of pure genius. (Okay, that may be pushing it, but please DO notice the two empty wine glasses - after polishing off a good three glasses each - and the scribbled notes in the back of a planner.)

Now, we would like to present you with a hypothetical* situation relating to the topic of our (hopefully published) essay.

Let's just say, for example, that one of us joined an athletic team. And in the midst of her whole-hearted athleticizing, she met Boy. Boy was unlike any other (or at least unlike the last few): he was single, he was Girl's age, he had a college degree, he had a solid source of income, he seemingly maintained only a singular residence, he had no children, and he had a clean bill of health.

So, Girl talks to Boy. Boy invites Girl to athletic party; Girl accepts invitation and spends many hours in engaging conversation, carefree laughter, and, of course, copious drinking. Note: Girl did NOT cook.**

Blah, blah, blah.

Fast forward to end-of-night: Boy kisses Girl; Girl gets butterflies in her tummy and feels like she is 14 again.

Guess what happens next...

Fast forward to now: Wha Wha.

The phone is silent. Popular-social-networking chatter has stopped. A cold, nuclear winter has descended upon the distance between Boy and Girl.

Switching to "I" (warning, rant about to happen): what did I do wrong? Am I too fat? Am I too sarcastic? Am I too smart? Are my boobs too big? (Ha ha - like that's even possible!) Am I too nice? Does he not want to mix athletics with relationship? Is he involved with someone else? Am I "just a teacher"? Am I too socially-minded and liberal? Is it my public-school education? Do I have too many degrees? WHY DOESN'T HE LIKE ME? What is wrong with me?!

Switching to "we" and to "more general" (warning, rant continuing): should we keep our mouths shut sometimes? (Okay, yes. We should.) Do we have to compromise our values and integrity and beliefs to get a date with a "professional"? Are we too opinionated? Do we go into way too much detail on our blog***? Do we need to lose a collective 50 pounds? Do we need to wear make-up to the gym? Should we be wearing stilettos to the grocery store? Should we return a degree or two? (Just kidding - we like being smart.) Are we too intimidating?

We're not passing judgment, and we're not placing blame: we are just straight-up confused.

*Please note this may have happened three hours ago...

**Had Girl cooked, outcome may have been vastly different.

***Not widely read - but thank you, Bitches and Ya-Ya's!

You Asked...We Answered

We have created an additional blog for two reasons:

1.) We are sick and tired of you whining about this blog not including recipes.

2.) We have approximately 32 index cards, receipts, cocktail napkins, and scraps of paper that hold our gourmet recipes and thought a different system might be better.

So, please view Burned: Recipes of the Broke 'n Single for all of our recipes. From here on out, they will be linked to our blog posts, but for now, consider it a work in progress. And stop whining.

Because we responded to your request, now respond to ours: please forward any names, numbers, email addresses, court records, custody arrangements, divorce settlements, or any other information that may make one of your acquaintances eligible in our eyes (keep in mind that "eligible" is a flexible term, although our deal breakers are job, car, independent living situation).

Happy cooking - and boyfriend finding!

The One Where We Talk About the Food

Seeing as we have been on family vacations for the last four weeks, our opportunities to meet eligible bachelors have been relatively limited. Long Island Tea fish bowl races with the 'rents, parties where we are relegated to the kids' table, and Renaissance Fairs with the relatives, albeit quite entertaining, don't exactly make for ideal conditions to prowl.

In keeping in the same vein, we decided to spend Monday evening doing quite the same: creating an anti-male environment by hosting a cleaning product party. This is similar to a Tupperware party, a jewelry party, or a naughty toy party, except these products clean toilets. Essentially, it is an excuse to get a group of friends together, eat good food, and drink a lot. As glamorous as that may sound, it's a horrible men-meeting arena.

While we could bore you to tears - or exploit the inherent humor in hosting a cleaning party - we are going to instead take this opportunity to actually talk about the food we prepared. Coincidentally and due to popular demand, we will now start linking our recipes to our blog. However, after multiple mojitos and two bottles of wine, this will not be happening tonight. In the meantime, though, you can find most of these recipes by typing key phrases into Google. Stay tuned.

Last night, somewhere in the middle of consuming an entire bottle of rum (intended to "test out" the mojito recipe for tonight- hey, practice makes perfect) followed by a bottle of cheap Chardonnay (intended for the party tonight), we decided our menu should be Cuban inspired due to our newfound love of rum and our new kitchen toy, the muddler.

And then we promptly nixed that idea and moved into the other hemisphere with an Asian-themed menu: spring rolls, edamame, peach salsa (yes, we realize this does not fit in anywhere, but one of us, for whatever reason, was really attached to this recipe), and crab rangoon pizza.

Look at these beautiful spring rolls, stuffed to the carelessly-sealed seams with tofu, rice noodles, avocado, carrots, cucumbers, green onions, and basil. We served these with a delicious spicy peanut sauce but were too lazy to take a picture of it.

We tried to mimic the edamame appetizer from one of our favorite restaurants (that we refuse to name until they decide to advertise on our page, which is highly unlikely until we solicit their sponsorship). Because there were no men at the party, we decided to spice things up a bit by liberally dousing the dish with some heat and enhancing our men repellant for a few days until we sweat out the ginger. We promise it tastes better than it looks - at least we assume that's the case...turns out neither of us tried it.

Clearly we are not food stylists or photographers by any stretch of the imagination since this looks like we poured salsa out of a jar or made a chunky tomato soup. However, this peach salsa delicacy required three ingredients (THREE, people!) and was quite challenging - there was, after all, a knife involved.

This evening's main course was another recipe that we shamelessly ripped off from another of our favorite restaurants: crab rangoon pizza. As if crab rangoon weren't unhealthy enough with the massive amounts of cream cheese and mayonnaise, we had to take the filling and spread it all over a piece of bread and douse it with mozzarella cheese and sweet chili sauce. This is the ultimate "I give up" recipe: why don't we just coat ourselves in Crisco and nominate ourselves as the targets in a greased-pig contest? We'd wave the white flag, but it's coated in lard and too heavy to hoist up the pole. Suey!

Excuses, Excuses

In lieu of no new potentials (and, in fact, because of the demise of previous possibilities), we have decided to turn our conversation to one of our favorite past-times, something that occupies most of our waking moments: making excuses for guys' ridiculous and completely unreasonable (and by most standards, completely inexcusable) behavior. Is it an exercise in creativity? Complete fiction? Or delusional tendencies?

On our part: all of the above.

For example, maybe he hasn't called us in the last six months because he is in a Thai prison. Or quarantined with H1N1 (or a hot, sexy, tropical disease). Or, and this one's for real, buying a house.

For example, he didn't tell us he had two children from two previous relationships because someone just made that up - he would've told us if that were the truth.

For example, his lack of communication skills are the result of growing up on the streets of East Los Angeles, and we are completely okay with this because former gang life is an endearing quality and one we seek out in potential mates.

For example, the fact that he has girlfriends in nearly every state of this country is reflective of him not feeling he has a home here, as he immigrated from Guatemala in eighth grade; he is just trying to find his identity as a new American.

For example, he does not really have a drinking problem, despite him passing out and drooling on himself in his running vehicle in our driveway and receiving two OWIs because he does go to work everyday and is very successful.

For example, he wears a Hooters waitress outfit because it's funny any day of the year, not just October 31st. Right? RIGHT?!

For example, it's okay to have two girlfriends of the same name in the same graduate program at the same school because hey, it cuts down on conversational confusion.

For example, you can do whatever you want to do because hey, you were in the Olympics.

For example, you can grab our boobs in public in front of our professional colleagues because we have the same values. (Um...those values are...oops: we need to reevaluate this one.)

For example, it's understandable that he has problems committing to one relationship because he has been armchair-diagnosed with Reactive Attachment Disorder as a result of his crappy childhood. (Keep in mind, this is not an official diagnosis: one of us may have - and use liberally - a copy of the DSM.)

For example, maybe he hasn't called us because he's been out of town. For the last six weekends.

For example, maybe he calls every night at 2 a.m. because we are so amazing, and he is too shy and needs some liquid courage to talk to us.

For example, his stunted social skills are a result of him growing up in a small, rural community; really, man-ginas aren't funny...to anyone...anywhere.

For example, after spending a weekend together, we are sure that their hasty departure had to do with them needing to be back in the office...stat.

For example, we are sure he didn't pick one of us up an hour late from the airport and drop us off three hours early while she was throwing up from the movie theater hot dog (apparently this qualified as a dinner date for the girl who flew from Iowa to California, the girl who paid for the plane ticket and the hotel room), because he had a rough childhood growing up and, again, grew up amidst gang-life in LA.

Interestingly, gang-life and crappy childhoods seem to be great excuses - we mean reasons...REASONS, people - for ridiculous (but oddly acceptable) behavior.

And now for the food that we turn to for comfort in times like these... In ode to our ethnic, alcoholic, maladjusted, gangsta ex-boyfriends...mojitos.

Popularity Contest

It's Raining Men! (Okay...Drizzling)

After cooking dinner tonight, we were unsure of what in the world we could write about: we haven't experienced any significant emotional trauma in the last three days (more so just annoyance, kind of like a splinter that is just underneath your skin), we had an enjoyable weekend, and nothing overly scandalous occurred...shockingly. Perhaps there was a lack of alcohol, good decision-making, a full moon - the reason is unclear, especially because, as usual, there was plenty of alcohol, potentially poor decision-making, and definitely a full moon.

Upon further reflection (okay, one more glass of wine), we realized we did, in fact, have plenty to explain for entertainment value.

• Wednesday night, 11:31 p.m.; Thursday morning, 12:13 a.m.; Friday morning, 12:33 a.m.; Friday morning, 12:43 a.m.: We receive two ignored phone calls, two ignored text messages, and are two super-annoyed girls who have learned their lesson and will not "come over and cook dinner" in the middle of the night.
• Saturday morning, 1:45 a.m.: One of us is called upon, as apparently we are not "girlfriend" material but rather "taxi service." This would be okay if we were getting something (i.e. gas money, people) out of it. Perhaps he should return to that Thai prison.
• Saturday morning, 10:45 a.m.: Piecing together the events of the night before, one of us exclaimed, "I did what?!"
• Saturday morning, 10:46 a.m.: One of us untagged herself from the other's Facebook photos.
• Saturday afternoon, 2:30 p.m.: One of us attends a World Cup party with a new guy and has a blast. (He has a real job, a real house, real friends, and no sign of a girlfriend/wife/significant other. Therefore, in fear of pulling one of our classic moves and messing it up before it even starts, we will refrain from further mentioning him in this venue. See? We're learning!)
• Sunday evening, 6:57 p.m.: Upon waiting for the arrival of the guy we swore we would not mention again, on a patio in downtown Des Moines, we were approached by Lance Eisenstädt (see previous post) who was entering the establishment for a solo dinner. Because we hadn't had enough awkward experiences with him in the last two weeks, we decided to invite him to join us. And had a lovely dinner.

While one of us is flying high on the wings of a potential something good, the other clearly needs to go back to the drawing board.

(Addendum to previous post about where to not meet men: the middle of one of the city's busiest roads while you are chasing your dog - who apparently did not want her picture in a rainbow lei broadcast over the Internet - who jumped out of the window of your moving vehicle.)

Dinner tonight: seared filet with mixed-herb gremolata, roasted seasoned asparagus, garlic naan, and a fresh berry cream tart. (Note: this will not be prepared when trying to impress a certain someone who will not be mentioned again in this blog, as it nearly burned down the entire apartment complex. However, it was very, very delicious.)