Attorney at Flaw. Part Deux.

… If there is a next time.

The Attorney called the following week.

We played telephone tag for a few days. He’d asked to take me out during the week. Given that I was still hungry from the last date, I was a bit hesitant. I also thought that we should make a plan for a date and him not call me to go out that day or the following day.

By the time we actually connected, it was Thursday night. He asked to go out this week. I pointed out that the week was pretty much over. And that I’d already made weekend plans. This did not go over very well with the counselor. He got a little huffy.

Hmmm.

I suggested we make a date for the following week.

He wanted to go out on a Monday night, in Long Island. I should take the Long Island Railroad to the venue and he would drive me back to the city afterwards.

Um. Let me think about this.

Um. In my nude patent leather peep-toe Christian Louboutins? I don’t think so.

Nope.

I told him that weekdays are a little tricky because of work the next day. He snapped back, “Well, that’s why I’m being nice enough to drive you back home afterwards.”

Well, what a gentleman.

“I’ll have to get back to you on that.”

I continued to try to pin down a day for the following week, but he kept saying, “Well, you can let me know what day is good for you.”

Then I would say, “Well, Thursday is good.”

And he just kept telling me I could let him know.

So, that’s sort of how we left it.

I know the guy for a week and a half and he’s already having a diva fit on me.

I’m certainly not going to call him and tell him again that Thursday is good for me, am I?

Come to think of it, Thursday is probably not good anymore either. And neither is Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday!

I was going to go for a third date to try and figure this all out. But is it really necessary?

Am I done?

Do I need to learn any more?

So, is it me? Am I being too critical? Too demanding? Too ‘The Rules”?

Or is this just an Attorney at Flaw?

Please let me know what you think.

I Have Good Socks in the City

Since I broke up with my job, I’ve been staying at Mom’s in Long Island. I have a whole wardrobe there…here, so it’s comfortable. But my good clothes are in Manhattan.

I’ve noticed, though, since I’ve been here (in LI) that my clothes here are really a lot worse than I originally thought. My LI closets are usually where I bring my city stuff to die. If I’m not wearing the clothes in the city, I take it to LI. Then I think about it for a couple of years, until I donate them.

Problem is, I look like crap when I’m staying in LI.

Everything I’ve worn in the past two weeks is either too short, too tight, or too holy. And I don’t mean the religious kind.

I put on a T-shirt. It’s a belly shirt.

I put on a pair of jeans. They’re mom jeans.

I put on a robe. There’s a huge hole in the but.

I go to put on some socks. My big toe pops out. Or I wear them and they end up off my foot in my shoes after I walk a couple of steps. Ugh! They’re too loose, too tight, too polyester and make my feet freeze.

I have good socks in the city!

How the LIRR Helped Me Find My True Love

I am sitting on a Long Island Railroad train to Penn Station, Manhattan. Spent the weekend on Long Island with Mom. I love Long Island, but I hate the Long island Railroad. I mean, it’s great that we have the LIRR, but I have the right to hate it, don’t I? I’ve traveled on it for the past 30 years. The LIRR is the reason why I now live in Manhattan. I was so sick of using the damn thing that I moved out of Long Island because of it!

I hate it for several reasons; it is expensive, during rush hour you can’t get a seat, even though you paid an arm and a leg for your monthly ticket, if it drizzles out the trains stop running, it is seldom on time, ticket prices increase every year and service stays the same, you can’t get a parking spot in the parking lots of the stations, changing at Jamaica, the gap.

Shall I continue?

I suppose that’s enough for now.

My relationship with the LIRR began many years ago, when I would spend the summer at temp jobs in the city. I’d travel in with my father, who commuted daily. He was very regimented, to say the least (OCD is more like it). We’d have to sit on the same seat in the same car every day. The smoker car. Well, actually, when I first started riding they ALL were smoker cars. You could cut the smoke with a knife.

After a few years, smoking was limited to a certain couple of cars, “The Smoker Cars” or just “The Smokers”. The smoke was even worse in there. And through the tobacco haze, there I was, I inhaling all the lovely toxins that the smokers exhaled. It didn’t really bother me at the time. I’d grown up with my father’s second hand smoke all my life.

I remember, a woman would bring along her five-year-old daughter every day. In the smoker. I think back on it now, and can’t believe she did that to that poor child! I can just imagine what the girl is like now; wrinkled, grey skin, and hacking up lugis.

Back then, I’d wear my most fabulous pumps with my most fabulous outfit and walk through the streets of the city that way. All the time, trying to catch up with my Pop, who was power walking in his most fabulous shoes and most fabulous suit. Never slowing down for a moment. I was mostly behind him the entire way. We’d stop for coffee and a cinnamon bun, and continue on our way.

Pop taught me a lot, those summers. How to maneuver the city as well as the commute. It was an education. He educated several of us over his 40 years of commuting; me, Sookie, our across the street neighbor (and my first crush) Tommy, and our cousin Sam.

Years later, after Pop retired, I’d do the commute on my own. That’s when I taught myself how to use the subway system. It was a difficult commute, as I had to get to the Upper East Side once arriving at Penn Station. So, then, sometimes I would drive instead. That was also no picnic either. Sometimes taking two and a half hours door to door. I would think, “Which was the lesser of the two evils? Driving or training?” Both sucked.

After twenty years of this, I tried reducing my commute time by moving to a town which had the shortest LIRR commute, like Rockville Center and Merrick, Long Island. I also looked for apartments in these towns, but walking distance from the train station, so to lessen the commute time even more. But even this was not good enough. Better. But not good enough.

That’s when I decided to bite the bullet and try my luck in Manhattan. That’s when the love affair began.