"Hi, Banana!"

I know, I know! This is just way too much time between entries, and I promise - I won't let it happen again! In an uncharacteristic break from tradition, these last few weeks have been almost entirely about my kids and my friends, with very little of my attention foolishly devoted to online dating. It's actually been kind of nice to take much needed respite from all the chaos, of late. Don't get me wrong, it's not as if things have been entirely calm and mellow, oh hells no! The pandemonium of the holidays simply stole the spotlight away from the usual virtual dating hubbub for a spell. Simply put, I haven't been writing because there really hasn't been all that much interesting about which to write. Well...there was that one thing with the banana...

What were we even talking about the last time I wrote, hmmm...Oh yeah, my impending date with Carl, which unfortunately - never transpired. At the time, it was somewhat crushing that he decided to bail at the eleventh hour and his swift retreat compounded my already gloomy disposition, the onset of which was brought about by my holidays-induced anxiety. I have to say, though, that leading up to our "date" I was beginning to wonder if Carl was maybe just another greedy playah, since I continually caught him bopping around on the same site as I was, yet I could never coax him into responding to my IM attempts and I would consistently wait for half days or longer sometimes, for him to answer the e-mails I sent. That wouldn't have been such a big bugaboo, except that each time I sent a message, I immediately checked to see if he had opened it since he was clearly goofing off on the same site as I was, and whaddya know, every time I looked, to my dismay I discovered that he had in fact read what I had sent, but for one reason or another he chose not to respond...til much much later. Grrrrr...Seemed he was way too busy making new or maintaining other more important old connections to be bothered with the likes of me. I started to get something of a complex, it was more than just a bit bewildering. There was really no sense in me getting all worked up about it since ultimately, I was forced to have to accept his decision not to meet me, his excuse being that he was afraid we might "fall for each other" (What? I can certainly think of worse problems to have) and the 3 hour distance between us would make dating difficult. Ok, I see his point and I get that, but for the life of me, I could not figure out why in the world he waited til the morning of the day we were to meet, to deduce it. If he would've just talked to me AT ALL, during the week prior, we probably would've figured it out a lot sooner and then I wouldn't have wasted my time getting my hopes up on him. Plus, he was the one who came up with the big idea to meet in the first place, the turdball. Why his sudden change of heart? The only thing that I could surmise was that somewhere in between the time he nearly frantically asked me when we could meet and the day we had planned to actually do so, he must've found some other girlie who came to the table with a better package, whatever, who can say. Nevertheless, great-looking Carl with the sweet bod and the great face and the righteous truck (but still not a redneck) is officially out of the picture.

I still talk regularly to funny and cute Better Jimmy, sometimes for hours at a time, when I'm tucked into my bed at night. He's really becoming a good friend and a confidant. It's such a shame that there is seemingly no way for us to cultivate a bf/gf relationship, I think he really is a great catch. But alas, the dreaded distance shit, again...

There is this one guy, Steven, at the sight of whom, a couple of months ago, my ears definitely pricked. When I read his profile, I immediately recognized his "description of himself" as a plagiarized quote from my all-time favorite comedy, Anchorman. It occurred to me that we could possibly be kindred spirits (absurd, I know), so I sent him a short and sassy note, to which, much to my glee - he wittily replied. But that was it, nothing more after that, zip, zilch, zero. So, right after Christmas I caught him sniffing around at my profile, again and I could not resist striking up a brand new conversation. He did indeed answer my short message and so began an ongoing e-mail dialog which quickly morphed into regular IM-ing and phone calls, an eventual date and then another. Yeppers, tis true - we've gone out already, a couple of times...and I do like him...and he doesn't live prohibitively far away...and he is attractive and tall and athletic and very smart and when he wraps his big hands around my waist, it does send lightening bolts through my middle..."So?" - you may be wondering, "What's the big "But"?" What IS the big "But"?...Well, I guess it could be that he is a tad brooding for my taste, and a bit of a "know-it-all", although we do enjoy lively and insightful discussions about all kinds of stuff...I don't really like his apartment and the fact that I would have to always park several blocks away...And he has this one funky snaggley tooth which kind of upsets the aesthetic balance of his otherwise handsome face (although his head is oddly shaped and his ears are prominent) but the fact that he has maybe the world's most perfect nose and one of my favorite chins, ever - kind of negates the tooth thing. Plus Frances says, "Don't be silly, you can change teeth!" or "tooth", as the case may be. The other thing, and this is where I really hate to hear myself talk, I can be so harsh and critical - he has an absolutely gorgeous body, he's over 6' tall and he's a personal trainer and an ex-competitive athlete, so he's built, which, you know, is sort of a requirement of mine and not always that easy to come by in my dating age range. The problem is that he has a lot of mole-y things randomly dispersed around his body, I mean a few would be all right and I could deal with that - sort of, but there are a bunch, and I don't like it. You know cuz it'll be dark, and I'll be sliding my hands around his back and butt and legs and stuff and I'm really getting into it but I am instantly jarred from my happy place when my hand trips over some enormous growth. (I suck, I am just such a mean old hag. If I keep this shit up I am destined to be alone forever) I don't feel like his slight imperfections are deal-breakers, I mean I am planning on getting together with him, again. I just hope our potent chemistry (which is pretty insane!) can override my fixation on the things about him that bug me...

And now, for the final installment in this here, long-overdue blog entry...

Late one night, I dunno - 11:45, 12? just a few days before Christmas, I bumped into my cute and adorable little playmate, Juan as we both stumbled around - drunk, online. We flirted and teased each other on IM and soon our growing, mutual curiosity inspired us to turn on our webcams, we hadn't done that before...I already knew he was dashingly good-looking (amazing nose and smile!) from looking at his online pics. and the texts that he has sent to me, but it was just a million times better to see him in his snappy green polo - in live, blooming color right there on my computer monitor. He's even cuter than I realized and so animated and hilariously funny, he does the craziest shit with his eyebrows...cracked me up. Anyway, he was making fun of me because I was wearing a heavy winter coat and a scarf and boots and a thermal shirt and I wasn't the least bit motivated to shed any of my many layers because it is always freezing out here in my studio. And after awhile, he said that he'd be right back, and when he returned to his post in front of his computer he was wearing a snowboarding jacket and a scarf and a completely straight face, like it was nothing. I just rolled! See? That's the kind of stuff I love! I'll take goofy humor over mature, philosophical debates, any day. I have definite issues with maturity, which I fear, will do nothing to facilitate finding my perfect man.

By now it was getting REALLY late, like 3:30 or later in the morning, and out of the blue Juan asked me, "Don't you have a banana or something at your house?" I was like, "Yeeesss...Whatcha tryin' to say, there - Big Boy?" But instead of waiting around for him to explain, I raced over to the house, grabbed a banana, ran back to my studio, plunked myself back down in my desk chair, peeled that overripe banana and began to gingerly lick and suck just the very tip. As I slowly slid my tongue down the underside and then worked my way back up to wrap my mouth around the tip and then all the way down to the base and up and down, swallowing all of that yummy banana pulp, every so often - Juan chimed in that he was rawther enjoying my performance. His encouragement got me pretty excited and I honestly found myself lost in the little charade, I shit you not, I was seriously turned on from giving a banana a blow job. The only problem was that the derned banana was so ripe and soft, and I was now working on it pretty hard so it kept breaking in my hand. I was trying to keep the pieces together to effectively mimic the real deal, but the banana wound up mostly demolished and Juan and I laughed when I let all the pieces fall apart in my hands. I had a solution for this minor crack in the pavement though, there was still one more banana over at the house. I retrieved the prop and hurriedly scurried back to my computer, not wanting to interrupt Juan's state of excellence. This time though, I did not peel the banana and it was much more tolerant of my now aggressive oral and manual fondling. I was so lost in this mock sexual act that regrettably I completely missed when my outre antics successfully brought Juan to climax...I gotta tell ya', even though the whole thing was a bit bizarre, it was undeniably hot, I was in quite a state!

We chatted for a little while longer but at around 4:45 when his dad walked through the room behind Juan and messed his hair up a little (webcam, still on) I figured that it might be a good time to say, "Goodnight", and so we did.

The next morning, Juan sent me a text and I have no idea why, but I just really made me smile. Maybe because it showed that he is the kind of guy who doesn't take shit too seriously, which I like and also because I felt like he was letting me know that he didn't think I was a total freak for putting on such an unusual display the night before. Juan's text simply said, "Hi, banana!"