The 12-Hour Job Interview. From Hell.

I had an interview at on Friday 2 PM, for a really great job opportunity. The interviewer was an acquaintance, Annabel. It went well.

A former co-working of mine, Lisa, was also interviewing for the same job later that day. She recently moved from Manhattan to New Jersey a couple of years ago, with her husband and three children. She contacted me prior to the interview, suggesting meeting for dinner afterwards. She had some personal issues she wanted to discuss.

Great!

I get a call just before our dinnertime. It’s Lisa, all happy and giddy. “We’ve been having drinks at the bar! Can Annabel and some ‘random guys’ we met at the bar, come to dinner too?”

“Sure.”

They showed up a half hour late. Drunk. Her interview clearly went much better than mine!

We ordered. More drinks, of course. Lisa, who was abnormally skinnier than usual, was gorging on mac and cheese. Scooping up the residual with bread. After dinner she spent about 20 minutes in the bathroom, then ordered dessert. Spent another 20 in the bathroom. Annabel and I looked at each other. Hmmm.

Decided to go back to the hotel lobby bar and ‘find the random guys’. I was game. I hadn’t been out in a while. Too bad I was still in my interview outfit; crisp white shirt, black Chanel pencil skirt, black tights, black Prada suede platform pumps, Chanel purse. Upon arrival at the hotel, Lisa and Annabel called the guys, as they weren’t at the bar. Didn’t have the number. “That’s ok, I’ll just go knock on their door.”

I’m thinking, huh??

‘Motel’ comes down. He has a crush on Annabel. He’s single, but his buddies are all married with children. The guys proceeded to keep the cocktails comin’. I’m nursing a rum and coke. (Well, someone had to have their shit together in this fashtunkina group!)

Lisa is spilling and slurring and flirting and texting. Annabel is busy listening to Motel’s game. Then Lisa begins to tell me about those personal issues. It seems that she is not in love with her husband, of 13 years, anymore. She’d been having an emotional affair with her high school sweet heart after seeing him (and his wife) again at her twenty-year high school reunion. But they had ‘broken up’ recently. She was devastated and didn’t know what to do. (She’s asking ME for relationship advise? What the fuck do I know??)

She had been drinking a lot and on anti-depressants since all this began. And not eating.

I guess that’s what happens when you move to Jersey. (I’m just sayin’.)

She didn’t want to touch or be touched by her husband, but wanted to touch and be touched by every other married man in the tri-state area!!

Meantime, she’s making friends with one of the buddies, ‘Dovid’. They were talking for a while. He seemed nice. He was also, you guessed it, married with children. Then I looked over to my left, and Dovid was gone. Lisa got some texts, a phone call. Whatever.

Then I asked, “Where’d Dovid go?”

“He just called me from his room. He asked me to come up. Should I go?”

“Uhhhhh, NO!”

“Why?”

“Why? Because you’re married, he’s married and who the heck is he anyway??”

“I’m not going to have sex with him.”

“Well, that’s not what he’s going to think if you go up to his room!”

“No?”

“No!! If wants to see you so bad, ask him to come back down to the bar and talk to you.”

He came back and sat down.

Not too long after, they disappeared. I guess Lisa gave up on asking my advice.

She came back. Alone.

Five minutes later, ‘Hymie’ returns from the W Hotel bar. Hymie’s an anesthesiologist. Married with children, of course. Next thing you know, wine’s flying, hair’s flying, chairs are flying. Lisa’s on the floor.

“I’m fine. I’m fine.”

Hymie’s like, “It’s the chair’s fault. It gave out from under her. Get the lady another white wine.”

I’m like, “Oy.”

To my right, Motel’s still rapping to Annabel. She’s over it.

Since we’ve closed down the lobby bar, they wanted to go bar hopping. I was done. I should have probably gone home hours before, but I had to hang around to see what happened next.

Meantime we all started walking toward the lobby. Motel and Lisa were ahead. We all stopped at the front doors, but Lisa and Motel kept walking, toward the elevators. We watched them. Walk and walk. The elevator doors opened. They stepped in. And we all looked at each other.

“What just happened?”

“They just went into the elevator.”

“What about bar hopping?”

“I wanted to say good night to Lisa. Tell her good night for me.” Oh well. It’s 2 AM, and I’m still on a job interview. 12 hours now! Way too long as far as I’m concerned. But then I thought, so is Lisa.

Something tells me she’s not getting the job.

Does Anybody Have a Friggin' Towel?

Kissing a guy you don’t like is pretty gross. Nothing helps, even a couple of beers before the date. Even if you did like him, then you kiss him and he licks your face, you don’t like him anymore. Or, he’s ugly. You’re NOT attracted, then you kiss him and he’s such a good kisser that, now you love him!

When I was dating Schmooly I really tried to like him. Schmooly looked really great on paper. He was tall and relatively handsome, had a good job, nice car, same religion and nationality, house. He was a very nice man. Respectful. But he was the one that, on our first date, before we even got out of the car to go to the restaurant, jammed his tongue down my throat so far he was able to taste my breakfast! Can you believe I went out with him again after that? Well, I did. After all my mother really liked him. That’s a good enough reason, right?

So, here’s the thing with that. I’m a bad picker. I did such a lousy job picking a husband, that I was up for suggestions. “Maybe I should take some other peoples’ advise.” I figured I should stay away from the bad boys and go for the good guys from now on. Schmooly was a ‘good guy’. Maybe I wasn’t supposed to be attracted to the good guys. And I wasn’t.

But really, was he so good? Look what he did during the first date.

Anyway, I decided to let that slide and try again.

Bur every time we kissed, it was always the same…

WET.

Yuk.

Even so, I continued to date him, but began to avoid kissing him at all cost. That’s bad. How long could that go on? I figured eventually I would ‘grow’ to like it.

Yea right.

Nope.

I had an idea. In the past I always felt more affectionate after having a few drinks. I though that if I went to the date a little tipsy, I would be attracted to Schmooly. I didn’t really keep alcohol in my apartment, but I had some beer left over from a party. I downed like three cans. Went on the date. What happened?

Nothing.

Not tipsy at all.

Still not attracted to Schmooly.

At all.

Only thing that did happen, was now I smelled like a bar brawl.

I dated this guy Rebbi. He was a close friend of my brother-in-law. He was tall, dark, and handsome. European accent. Except he was a player. Bad boy. I was attracted to him, to a certain degree. Guess what?

Bad kisser!

Who would’ve thunk it?

I couldn’t entirely be into him because after he would kiss me goodnight, I’d walk away wiping off my face. Ugh! I mean, really! I tried and tried, but I just couldn’t do it! It’s really a deal breaker. I ended up only feeling for him like a friend.

How many disgusting frogs do I have to kiss already!

And does anybody have a friggin’ towel?

Ewwww!

Kissing Frogs

So, basically, dating in my 20’s was a pain. It wasn’t fun. It was scary. I was never relaxed. Always thinking, does he like me? Do I like him? What did he mean by that? Do I look fat? Will my hair frizz? What kind of question was that? The hair always frizzed! Will he kiss me? If he does, what should I do? If he doesn’t, what should I do? Why is he smoking pot while he’s driving? That can’t be a good thing. Why does he keep leaving the table to talk on the phone? If I get rid of him early enough, I can still meet the girls at Channel 80. If I’m lucky, maybe Momo will be there. Why is he checking out that girl over there? She’s definitely not as pretty as I am,,, I think.

So, with all these questions running through you’re head during a date, who could have a good time?

After the divorce thing, I was too frightened of men to go out. But once I did it was better. The transitional boyfriend was a good thing. If he wasn’t 11 years younger than me and more into himself than he was into me, perhaps it could have worked out. But that’s a long story too. I supposed I’ll devote some time to it later on. But by the time all this was done, I was 35. Oops. Where’d the time go? Yes, it passed by, with little to show for it but some degrees, some money, and great hair. (They finally invented some really good hair products.) Ok, the hair, you could see, but some more happened in there, that was not visible. That’s the cool stuff.

I found myself kind of bummed out for a while for all my bad luck with men. But then I got cracking. I decided I wanted to have children before I was 40, so I better find their father. I started to give up on the Frank Sinatra dream and hit reality. Like Kirsty Alley in “Look Who’s Talking”. She set out to find a good father for her bastard child. The only difference with me was that there was no bastard child to be found.

I stopped looking at my favorite “bad boy” hotties and started taking notice of successful nice guy types. I still wasn’t very attracted to them, but I decided to ignore that because that always got me into trouble anyway. I started accepting blind dates, joined dating services, placed personal ads, answered personal ads, pursued on-line dating, went to singles dances and events and met through introduction. I thought the more people I met, statistically, the likelihood of meeting a good guy would increase.

This still got me nowhere. But what it did do was make the whole dating thing less mysterious. A desensitization process. It wasn’t such a huge event if I had a date. I just threw myself together and went. I was less stuck up. Before, I’d refuse a blind date. “I can find my OWN dates, THANK YOU!” I was insulted at the fact that anyone would think I would NEED to be set up on a date. After all, I was a creature unlike any other (The Rules). GET OVER IT LADIES!

Dating became similar to job interviewing. You know, if you take each interview too seriously, and are upset over each one you don’t get, you’ll be real sick real soon. But, if you go on enough of them, after a while, they’re all the same. Desensitization. You go. You do it. Go home, eat dinner and get on with your life as usual. If you get a phone call, fine. If not, have breakfast and take a piss. Now I approach dating in much the same manner. Go to the date, then come home and go on with my life as usual. Who the hell cares if he calls again?

After all, you have to kiss a lot of frogs before you find your prince.

The Click

When I was in my twenties, dating was a fun, exciting, and my way to finding “Mr. Right”, who I was sure would arrive. Instead, Mr. Wrong showed up.

I was in search of that romantic love “click”. The kind you see in the movies. The “click” was key. A guy could be tall, dark, handsome and rich, but if there was no “click”... forget it buddy. He could take you on his yacht, to the theatre, to the best restaurants and clubs, but without the “click”… bye, bye Charlie. He could serenade you from your balcony, mail you love letters, send you flowers (yuk! I’m really not big on flowers), but without the “click”, hit the road, Jack. Don’t come back. Hasta la vista, baby. C’est la vie. It’s a wrap!

As a matter of fact the “click” is still key, but now they just call it something different; a ‘connection’ or a ‘spark’.

It happened the other night, on The Bachelor. Jake picked Vienna. He didn’t choose the Tenley because there was something missing, but he didn’t know what. He couldn’t articulate why. Why? Tenley was a better match for him. She was the better choice. But what was missing was the click. Chemistry. A spark. You can’t define it. You can’t explain it. It just be what it be.

Without it, you may as well be petting your cat. (Not that I have a cat! Well. Anymore.)

I come from the generation whose philosophy was; graduate high school, college, get my masters, have a successful career, make lots of money, live in a penthouse apartment in Manhattan, become a famous actress of stage and screen, oh, and get my doctorate. Along the way, of course I will meet a wonderful man who will love me despite all my flaws, because of my irresistible beauty. And because of that beauty, wit, charm and personality, will accept me for who I am. He would think my temper tantrums were cute. And no matter how many times or how hard I pushed him away, he’d return to love me and cherish me all the days of my life. For as long as we both shall live. He couldn’t live without me. Of course, due to my irreplaceable, unmistakable, undeniable beauty and charming personality.

Just like in the Frank Sinatra movies. He’d pursue me no matter how much I resisted and then ask me to marry him. I would have to think about it, but I would say “yes”. He would take me in his arms and tell me over and over again, how beautiful I was and how much he loved me.

Guess what?

That never happened.

BUT THAT’S NOT THE POINT.

The point is, after all those years of going along, getting all my degrees and everything, thinking along the way this Frank Sinatra movie scenario would happen to me - it didn’t. It started to happen a couple of times, but guess what?? That pushing away thing they do in the movies doesn’t work in real life, girls! You know what it does? It pushes them away!

Crap!

Hmm, that is not how every Frank Sinatra movie ended.

I suppose you can assume how it all turns out, because I’m sitting here, writing this idiot blog about being single in New York City. The above strategy did not work. Myself and many other women like me found ourselves still single approaching 35 ... and beyond. Which was not such a horrible thing. But we were horrified and so were our mothers. I just assumed it would all fall into place, as planned. How could it not? After all, I was smart, beautiful, and glamorous with a charming personality and great sense of humor. Then, honey, why was it that all the ugly chicks were getting married?

If you think you’re going to find the answer to that one in this blog, don’t waste your time. We still don’t know for sure, but are getting closer and closer to a solution every day.

Or are we?

Murphy’s Flaw

The other day, it was like I was cursed or something. EVERYTHING went wrong. It was a couple of days after the last snow storm we had. I guess it was only about a week and a half or go. It was getting warmer. The snow was melting. The storm was over. So things were good. Or so I thought.

It was a Wednesday morning. I overslept. I hate it when I do that, because when I do, the whole day seems to bo disjointed. I put on a really cute outfit; skirt, tights, and cute sweater, snow boots, and raced to the Second Avenue bus. On my way to the bus stop, my eyes started to tear. Didn’t think anything of it. But as I got closer and closer to the bus, they were tearing more and more. My eyes began to burn from my mascara. My nose began to run. I didn’t have a tissue. All I could do was envision what my raccoon eyes must have looked like. Decided to use my scarf as a tissue as things progressed. Then, as I dashed to cross the street to make the limited bus, I completely wiped out. I mean, one minute I was standing up and the next, I was on my butt, kissing the sidewalk. Do you think anyone helped me up? Nope. People literally walked over me to cross the street! I have the heel marks across my face to prove it.

Whatever!

I got on the bus. No seats. Of course. I was squinting and sniffing as my make up continued to drop down my face. I’m sure folks thought I was sad over a recent break up or something. I really needed to sit, but there I was, holding on. Mascara face. Eyes closed to ease the burn. I started to sweat. Had to take off my scarf and open my coat. Finally, a woman got up from her seat. I quickly sat down. Ahhhh. That felt good. So good I took a little snooze. They announce my stop. I get up and jump out of the bus. When the cold hit me, I felt a little chill. And a little, um, damp.

I felt the back of my skirt. It felt wet. I tried to look at it, but the skirt was dark brown, so it was hard to see. But I definitely thought it was wet. Was it blood? Oh, I hope not. I get to work and checked it out. Well, I was so wet. Wet. Through and through. So wet, that I had to change into scrubs. So, there I was in scrubs, no socks, and bright white flats. Oh, and I wasn’t bleeding profusely.

No socks; because i had no socks after I took off my tights. White flats; because I only had Prada and Gucci stiletto pumps and the summer white flats, in my drawer. Really cute, huh? So I walked around work all day like that, apologizing for my wardrobe malfunction to everyone all day.

The day was going fairly well. Until later on. I’m running a study, and had a participant coming in later that evening. He shows up late. He is such a sweet man, but he’s really slow. So, the session was taking very long. It was reaching 8 PM and I’d been with him since 5:30 PM. He had to leave before I was finished with him. So, then I had to re-schedule him so that we could continue another day.

I was getting tired of wearing my white leather ballet flats, so I wore my white furry winter boots for a while, without socks. Remember? Had no socks. I also wore them on my way home. So, at around 8:30 PM, after my exhausting stupid day, I made my way home. I waited for the bus for about 20 minutes in the cold, in my white furry boots with no socks. Got on the bus when it finally came. Sat down. Didn’t know if the bus was a local or a limited. But I didn’t care. Broke out my Blackberry and started playing a video game to just relax and forget about my day. At one point, I looked up from my phone. Glanced out the window. Nothing looked familiar and the driver’s announcements were not clear. The bus made a stop. I had no idea where I was!

I asked a woman, “What street are we on?”

“Um, I’m not sure. 89th Street.”

“89th Street?!?!? Oh no! I missed my stop!!”

I ran up to the driver. “What’s the next stop?” He’d just made a garbled announcement. “What did you just say?”

“99th Street.”

“99th Street? Oh crap! This is a limited bus.”

I waited til the bus stopped on 99th and got off. So, now what? It’s 9 PM and I’m still not home yet from my flawed day. Do I grab a cab or take another bus back twenty blocks, or, dare I say it ....... ?

... Walk????

I decided I didn’t wanna spend the cash on a cab, or walk. My foot was starting to hurt, with the stupid boots without socks. So, I walked to the next avenue to take another bus back in the opposite direction.

Are you kidding me? I can’t beleive this day! I just wanted to be home, warm, and cozy and put some damn underwear on!!

Of course I waited for the reverse bus for about 10 or 15 minutes. A nice woman started to talk to me at the bus stop. I told her my sob story. When the bus finally came, she said, “Don’t forget to get off at your stop.”

Thanks nice lady.

I didn’t forget.

But my feet were killing me. I home. Unlocked my door. (Three locks) Locked it behind me. Ripped my coat off. Followed by my scrubs and my boots. I thought I was home safe and sound. But my right foot was really bothering me. I took a look. There was a huge broken blister on the bottom of my big toe. Waaaaah.

I always thought that bad luck came in threes. But when the fourth thing wrong happened today, I knew I wasn’t done. I couldn’t wait to go to sleep to make it stop. I did. And it did. I wanted to wake up the next day and start all over to try to get it right this time. I did. And I did.

Now, if I could only get a do-over like that in life.

What’s That Smell?

My first Manhattan apartment was a walk-up rental on the Upper East Side. It was really cute. It had a small living area, which led into a breakfast nook, where I kept a table and chairs. Beyond the dinette area, was the kitchen. It had a fire escape outside the bedroom, which I used as a balcony. So what if I had to climb out of my bedroom window to sunbathe. So, it had a few flaws.

My frenemy, Malice, was staying over for the weekend. We were going to a formal event on Saturday night, which was going to end late, so I offered her my sofa bed. The party was a blast. We looked amazing and met lots of new people. But when we got home, I noticed a strange odor in the apartment. I didn’t say anything to Malice and she didn’t seem to notice. So that was that. I thought.

Malice slept in the living room and I slept in my bedroom. We had a great night’s sleep to recover from the evening’s festivities. But when I woke up, I still smelled the smell. Still didn’t mention it and prepared breakfast; coffee and fresh bagels. All the while, I wondered where the stench was emanating from. But I didn’t see anything. Tried to glance in some corners, under my bed. But the apartment was so small; it was difficult to be discrete, since Malice was always right there in the middle of the living room. From there she could see the entire apartment.

I was setting the dinette table, when, there it was. On the floor, next to the chair on the far side of the breakfast nook. A …. MOUSE!!!!!!

DEAD!!!

UGH!

Now, you gotta understand. I HATE mice! I frrrrreak out at them. I’d had one or two in that apartment before. The one time, had the super remove it while I was out. But the other time, the super told me he wouldn’t be able to remove it for a few days. What? No way. I was NOT going to live in that apartment for three days with a screaming, dying, dead rodent in the next room. No freaking way! So I had to remove it myself.

You don’t understand. I didn’t wanna touch it. I didn’t even wanna see it while I was scooping it into anything. So as not to see it or touch it while I was removing it, I devised a way. I threw a bag over it and pushed it into a garbage can with a yard stick. Screaming bloody murder the entire time!

I tried to keep it cool. Glanced over at Malice, who was talking, non-stop about how gorgeous she looked last night, and how all the men were ogling her boobs. Good. She had no clue what so ever. I didn’t hear a word she said. All I could think of was …

Shit! What was I going to do??????

I nudged it a bit, with the bottom of the chair. Oy, it was mushy. Ewwww. (God, how long was it there???)

I didn’t want her to know. I didn’t want her to think that I lived in a rat-infested slum for God sakes.

But breakfast was ready. The bagels and cream cheese were on the table. And the coffee aroma started to mask out or maybe mix with the dead mouse odor.

She’s all like, “I’m hungry. Let’s eat. I need my coffee in the morning.”

I’m like, “Let’s eat in the living room.” As she strolls over to the kitchen.

“Ok, ok, why don’t you sit ,,,, um ,,,,, here ,,,, um ,,, on this chair?? As I offered her the chair opposite the deceased.

She sat.

She yapped and yapped all through her coffee and bagels and cream cheese, as I tried not to gag, sitting next to Mickey over there. Is this really happening? Please, someone wake me up from this nightmare, or as least make Malice leave so I can clean this shit up!

Nope. No such luck. She continued to re-hash the night ad nauseum.

Finally, she went home. Never seeing the surprise guest. I went to work.

Oy! I thought she’d never leave!!

Frenemies

I was so excited to go to Puerto Rico for the first time. There was aconference being held there. So there would be me, Puerto Rico, and five thousand singles. Not bad odds.

I‘d agreed to room with a new girlfriend. I’d spent some time with her on the previous excursion to Florida. During which she was an ass most of the time. I wasn’t even rooming with her and she ended up yelling at me on the trip!... More than once! I’m sorry, but with girlfriends, I draw the line at yelling at each other.

Against my better judgment, I’d promised to room with her in PR. But after the Florida trip I didn’t want to anymore. When I tried to get out of it she freaked, “YOU CAN’T NOT GO NOW, I ALREADY MADE RESERVATIONS!” So, I was stuck.

It’s funny about girlfriends; they can be great over the phone, or at the club. But room with ‘em or give ‘em a couple of martinis and it all goes to hell in a hand basket. The whole reason why they’re still single begins to become very clear.

Since my recent Florida trip pretty much turned to shit, I was determined to have fun in PR. So, I went with an open mind. Willing to be considerate of my roommate and ready to meet lots of new people... A.K.A., umm ,,, men.

So, we got there safe and sound, dressed, had dinner, and went straight to the first party of the trip. At the party, my roommate, we’ll call her “Malice”, found a guy she knew, and then disappeared. I started to feel sleepy from the day’s traveling. Couldn’t find Malice to tell her I was going to go up. (Not that I needed her approval to go up, but it was the first night, and I didn’t want to ditch her so soon.) Instead, I decided to explore the hotel lobby. There were some great shops in the lobby very close to the bar and club area. They were all closed though. So, there I was, peering at the 30% bathing suit sale, alone in my ice blue leather slit skirt with matching halter top and white strappy sandals.

All of a sudden I hear a man’s voice say, “Hey.” Being a New Yorker, I was immediately on my guard.

“Hey?” I said, as I turned to see an adorable man smiling at me.

“What are you doing?” He asked with a strange accent I couldn’t place.

“Looking at the sale.” Very cautiously. Didn’t trust him. What did he want?

“Where are you from?”

“New York.” He seemed harmless (and handsome), so I reluctantly turned away from the bathing suit sale and started talking to him a little. May as well waste some time ‘til I find roomie.

P.S., he didn’t leave my side for the rest of the night.

P.S.S., he didn’t leave my side for the rest of the WEEK!

“Avi”. Turns out he was from New Orleans and was also in for the conference. Dreamy.

In a day or two he and his friends and me and mine started to hang out together. But his friends left and Avi and Malice and I stayed on. The first night Avi was there without his “boys”, he’d mentioned calling us later on to find out what we were going to do that night. So, I was expecting the call. I was excited, because this will have been the first time he called. I couldn’t wait to hear his voice on the telephone and speak to him. Malice and I were dressing in the bathroom. She’s in the toilet. There’s a telephone in the toilet. It rings. Before the first ring was complete, Malice snatches up the bathroom phone.

“Oh, yes, Avi ...blah, blah, blah...giggle, giggle, giggle. Meet you at 8. Bye Avi ...

Click.”

UUUUUUHHHHH. Whaaaattttt?? What the fuck!?! I couldn’t believe she just did that! What a fucking bitch! How could she sabotage my first call from Avi! BITCH!

But I kept applying my mascara in the mirror like nothing happened. I should have rang her fuckin’ neck. But instead I thanked her for inviting him to dinner, which I wouldn’t have had the guts to do. So, he was meeting us for dinner. I was happy about that. But at dinner, Malice just monopolized the conversation. I could not get a word in edgewise. Of course they both had and loved dogs. So they had plenty in common. Of course I can’t keep a cactus alive, much less an animal. So they ignored me.

After dinner we went to the bar. Avi stroked my hair, while Malice talked a-mile-a-minute. That was supposed to be our last night in PR. We ended up getting stranded for three more days, due to a volcanic eruption on a nearby island. So I had more time with Avi. But Malice proceeded to pull the same shit for the rest of the trip. It was pretty damn annoying. I mean it got to the point where they were talking over me while I was tanning on a lounge chair between them!

Needless to say, he never called when we got back home. I felt bad. I had asked Malice for advise when I first met him. She told me to go for it.

So, I guess it’s all HER fault.