My Decade

Change the years, and it's pretty accurate....

Happy New Year, friends. At least in 3 hours it will be.

Me and my bestie have an ongoing joke as of late.

She is also single, and left me a message recently saying, "Linda! This is our year!! ... Except I think 2010 was supposed to be. So was 2009. And 2008.... Hmm.... Well, this one IS it!!"

When I called her back I said, "Well. Maybe this is our decade!"

So on this New Year's Eve, here is to the next 10 years! May you all get what you want!!

As for 2011, here is to hope.

Sporty Girl

On another topic, I got a message from someone on one of my sites complimenting my sky diving picture.

(this one- b/c of course you have to put that on your profile)

 He asked to tell him about it, which I did, 

and this was his response:

That's the kind of girl I want! What's your ring size? 

I need to start looking for engagement rings, lol

I haven't tried it yet. Some of my friends inivited me to jump with them a couple of months ago, but I wasn't very convinced.

Great! Flirty! Funny!!

But then... he asked this fateful question:

What's your favorite sport to play?

Damn!! 

I replied, "I hope you have a good return policy on that ring you got for me." Followed by a witty explanation of why every sport needs spectators, not just players. Because I watch so many sports, right?... 

Yeah... Not so much. 

Haven't heard from him again.

FROGS

I've been told you need to kiss a lot of frogs to find the prince. 

(that's a frog ornament, BTW)

But what happens when you can't even find one to kiss?

How do you make it through many to find the many? 

(If that makes any sense...)

Forgive my lack of recent posts. There are several factors.

#1. As 99.9% of my readers were/are coworkers, you know I've been living at the Mall. Ahh, retail during the holidays. How I love you, crustomers...

#2. There is a dirth of activity on my online dating accounts. 

So. 

Here I am. 

Wondering how I find a lot of frogs. 

Any suggestions?

 

Damn you, Panda Express.

You lied to me. 

Exhausting

This is an exhausting thing, online dating.


I had another lunch date today. I don't even know what to say about this one...


I was there for 2 full hours, and this is what I said:


"hmmm"........"oh"........"um-hm".........."really?"...........


He, on the other hand, did not stop talking the entire time.


There was a lot of ridiculousness said in that 2 hour time, but there are two distinct comments that emerged as the true winners to show you all, my readers, what I must endure on these dates.  I literally thought, when he said these things, "I can't wait to blog about this."


Ready? They are doozies...


1.  "If we had sex you would get pregnant because I am really potent."


2.  "President Barack Obama is just an angry black man that feels his people have been wronged for 200 years, so he thinks that while he is there in the presidency he can just take what he deserves."


Those comments really were making me lean towards a resounding NO if I was asked to go out with him again.  But what really cinched the deal was when he told me that Matchbox 20 was the greatest band that ever was. 

 I met a few guys while I was on my trip. 

At the beach in Santa Monica, no less. 

They were walking along the beach, 

and being the new, flirtatious, open person that I am, 

I bravely asked them to take my picture. 

Unfortunately, upon this request, I realized that they didn't speak a word of English.

 And then they wanted to be IN my picture. 

And after the pictures, they both gave me very large hugs and kisses. 

(gotta love the Europeans...)

Here are our pictures....

(I like the thumb especially)

Yikes.

I loved what one of my employees said to me when I showed him the pictures,

and told him the story...

"Linda- Why do you attract the strangest people?"

Why.

Why indeed. 

What do you do when you are depressed and sad over your whole online dating experience and need an escape?

Why you go and visit some of your favorite friends in the whole entire world.  You visit family. You look at the ocean. 

That is sure to cure what ails ya. 

TENNIS

OK. So I said I was going to blog about something else. How un-date related can you get 

than the history of tennis... 

I wrote this for Square Magazine when there actually was a Square Magazine. 

“Take This: A New Look at an Old Sport”

I am not a sport person. I played soccer in 2^nd grade, and my memories of that experience are making dandelion necklaces in the outfield. I have perfected the spectator sport. Meaning, of course, that being the spectator is the sport. So here I am being asked to write about the “everyman” sport, tennis. The problem being that I am apparently not everyman (or woman in this case) and have never stepped foot onto a court in my life. My knowledge of tennis is limited: I know that at times I wear tennis shoes. I know Andre Agassi was married to Brooke Shields. I know the Williams sisters were on Oprah. 

My first approach is akin to Harold Hill in The Music Man. The Think System. I will learn all about tennis, and think really hard about tennis, and thereby will be able to write about it. And if I accumulate all the knowledge, it wont matter that I don’t really know what a backhand, forehand, or ground stroke are. My first foray into research I stumbled upon a YouTube clip of a match where a man smacked the ball, which then smacked into a pigeon flying by, killing it on impact. That wasn’t going to help me educate anyone on the sport, albeit fascinating (disturbing, yes, but fascinating nonetheless.) But as I learn more I gain a steady appreciation for this ten thousand year old game. 

Tennis was played as early as the 11^th Century by French Monks. They would hit the ball with their hand, but for obvious reasons, they thought that uncomfortable. So they wore gloves, which evolved into webbed gloves, until someone came up with the clever idea for the racket which they strung with sheep gut (ew). All this while the sport was gaining popularity with the nobility, who thought those Monks were onto something. But really, where would tennis be without Major Walker Wingfield. In the late 1800’s he patented the rules and equipment for what the game basically is today. But he called it sphairistike. It was a Greek word for “ball game” and thank goodness it didn’t catch on. This coincided with the wonderful invention by Mr. Goodyear himself, vulcanized rubber, which translated to a bouncy ball, thereby revolutionizing the game. 

It is a preppy sport. And a quiet sport. Where is the fun in a sport without heckling, I wonder. There is no “hey, racket racket racket, sa-wing, racket.” There are no taunts for offense during the serve, and you never hear “Aaair Baaaall” when it goes out of bounds. What good is a silent spectator. But then I learn that the harassing is covert. A passive aggressive approach from the inside, almost undetectable. It’s in the vocabulary. The word tennis is said to derive from the French word “tenez” which has many loose translations; play, take heed, or my personal favorite, take this- said as one player would serve to the other. I imagine it being shouted in the grunt of the serve, “TAKE THIS-UGH!” I’d yell. “What was that?” my opponent will ask. “Oh, nothing. Just Tennis,” I would say smugly. 

And then there is the scoring system. My romantic sensibilities think that it is sweet to have a game that uses the word “love” for points. As you serve you yell “Love,” so it must be the nicest game ever, I think. Until I discover its derivative and meaning. It came from the Dutch word “lof”- meaning “something for nothing.” Love is stated when a player has nothing. Love is the nice way of saying, “Sorry, bub. You have ZERO points. But I’m going to be nice about it and we’ll come up with a euphemism for zero. How about Love? Everyone loves love!“ I’m beginning to like this game. 

But I realize that I must actually play it. So I head to the Discovery Park in Pleasant Grove with my brother in law, a former tennis instructor at Ricks College. First we practice holding the racket. Then we practice swinging and stance. Then the rules and layout of the court are explained: the outside lines are for doubles only, you get two tries on a serve (any sport with a “do-over“ built into it is alright by me), and the infamous deuce. When the score is 40-40 you are at deuce, which is confusing, until I read that it is “deux du jeu,” French for “two points away from the game.” Well, if they just said that in the first place, people wouldn’t be so confused, I think. 

It seems forever before I actually get to hit the ball. And when I do, and this is the strange thing- it was fun. The scoring actually makes sense and it turns out I’m kind of good at this. I actually won a match. It was only one out of many, but still. I leave the court feeling excited. I am Every Man- I played tennis. 

OUT OF THE GAME

So after tonights date, I think I'm finally going to be out of the game, friends...


Oh.


Wait.


You thought that... 


No. 


No, I haven't been snatched up. 


I'm taking myself out of the game voluntarily, because I cannot handle the emotional turmoil of going on all of these dates. 


Seriously. 


I know you are all entertained. And I love to entertain you, really I do.


But I've kind of entered my own personal Hell.


I think tomorrow I will blog about something un-date related. 

ANTICIPATION

My Dad would always say that the best part of something was the anticipation for it. The anxious waiting, the daydreaming about the event, the planning and primping that goes into it. He believed that was a part of the whole experience, and enhanced the overall effect of whatever the occasion was.

I am mindful of that as I wait for my date tomorrow. 

I don’t know much about this guy, but we have emailed back and forth every day for over a week. I know that he has a graduate degree (in what, I have no idea), I know that he had a Lord of the Rings marathon last Saturday (yes, total nerd!), I know that he worked at Subway in Heber when he was 16 (I can't judge. I was at Del Taco). 

Random things. 

He sent me this about Harry Potter: 

(he wrote it awhile ago)

Top Ten Shocking Revelations in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

10) Harry realizes the past year of his life was just a dream, when he

wakes up one morning to find Dumbledore taking a shower in the

prefects’ bathroom.

9) Peeves? Gay as a French horn…

8) James Potter left his invisibility cloak in Dumbledore’s possession

merely as collateral for his massive gambling debts.

7) To open the locked room at the Ministry of Magic, one need only

sing the lyrics of a specific Huey Lewis & The News song.

6) In a Fight Club-like twist, Harry finally recognizes that Ron and

Hermione don’t actually exist, except in his mind. Go back and look at

the clues. It makes complete sense, I swear…

5) Dumbledore’s implicit trust of Snape stems mainly from Snape never

giving away that Dumbledore was a big Air Supply fan.

4) Wormtail ate all the Cracklin’ Oat Bran! I thought I smelled a rat…

3) Mistakenly convinced R.A.B. stands for “Raymond Burr”, Harry spends

his entire summer watching old Perry Mason TV movies, but ironically,

in doing so he discovers the vital clue to finishing his quest.

2) Though relieved to find out he is not one of Voldemort’s horcruxes,

Harry is soon dismayed to learn he is in fact housing the soul of

Peter Tork. (had to look this one up- Peter Tork was in the Monkees)

1) A dying Snape, defeated at the hands of Harry, utters his ominous

final words: “Fifty points… from Gryffindor…”

I mean really. Are you laughing hysterically? Because I was.

So here I am in anticipation of meeting him in person.

I can really understand why the Victorian era was able to maintain these sordid love affairs via letters. Because I’ve really enjoyed our emails. 

But what if I don’t really enjoy him?

Which then begs the question- is it these guys I’m going out with that have the problem, or is it me?...

Stay tuned...

It's the FINAL COUNTDOWN- do do do dooo.....do do do do doooo....

LINDA'S TOP 3 WORST DATES- EVER

the countdown begins

As per my promise, I am posting again. I am going to share with you a countdown of my worst dates I've ever been on. Revisiting these in my memories make me realize that I've been pretty lucky in these more recent encounters. (although, one of them does make the list...)

#3

Wheezy Hot Pots. 

Time: About a Month ago

Story: You’ve already heard about him, so feel free to revisit this post for all the gory details. I was going to post just one story per day, but this shouldn't count. So that takes us on to....

#2 

The Legends of the Fall.

Time: 1997, Freshman Year at BYU

At 18, I was still new to the whole dating world (except wait- that was 12 years ago, and I still feel the same way...)

It was a double date that I was set up on with a girl that lived across the hall from me in the dorms, Michelle. 

(Funny how life is- I have tons of pictures of her, and she was part of a tight knit group from that era, but I can’t remember her last name...)

Anyways, I don’t even remember who my date was. Couldn’t tell you a thing about him.

What I remember is her date and the movie... We'll call him JB. (because I think I DO remember his last name, and I'm pretty sure they are his initials).

We went to JB's parents house, to watch a movie. We ended up choosing Legends of the Fall, a movie which every one of us had already seen before, but it was new out on VHS (pause to giggle at that one) and this fellow's  family owned a copy.  

We watched the entire movie. 

And when it was over, JB said, “I am so sorry that I allowed us to watch that movie.” 

I was a little baffled, because we had discussed it, and we had all seen it already. I kind of ignored his comment. 

But then he said it again. “I am so sorry. That is not an appropriate movie." Again, this is after we watched THE WHOLE THING without comment. "I don’t know why we watched it," he said.  "I don’t know why I own it. I should just destroy it.”

Which is what he then proceeded to do. 

First he started pulling out the video tape. Yanking and pulling the ribbons over and over. But apparently that wasn’t good enough. He then starting throwing it hard on the ground. Then he started stomping on it. Then he took it outside, and I have such a vivid memory of this moment- he proceeded to smash it again and again into the concrete driveway. 

I think that was when we decided it was time to go home. 

Poor Brad Pitt. What did he ever do to him?

I'M BACK!!

Oh my goodness! 

Has it really been a month??

Forgive me, loyal readers. 

What can I say? The Fall TV schedule resumed, and all my writing went straight out the window... I mean, what would you rather do- write about the absence of any romance in your life to an unseen/unheard (most likely non-existent) audience, or watch the Biggest Loser while eating Double Stuffed Golden Oreos? (thank you Angela for calling the hotline and suggesting they make the Double Stuff- true story). 

I have had one more date since my last post. 

He owns a lot of guns. 

He left our date, at 10 pm at night, to go meet a guy in a parking lot in downtown Salt Lake City to buy some guns that the other guy had in his trunk. 

He said it was perfectly legal. 

I said it was shady.

He said that when Obama was elected he was sure all his gun rights were going to be taken away immediately (picture me rolling my eyes- A LOT) and so he sold all the guns he had at the time. He made more doing that then he made the entire calendar year at his real job. 

(Does that make anyone else thing that he had a small arsenal at his home?)

I then told him, “I think it only fair to tell you that I did vote for Obama.”

He didn’t know what to do with that information.

Needless to say, he hasn’t called since, and I’m not sad about that fact.

(side-note: realized that besides the post date text from Wheezy Hot Pots I’ve not heard from any of these guys... Which on the one hand I am glad about because I wasn’t too thrilled by any of them. However, there is that little part of me that is deeply offended. Because even if you don’t want them, you totally want them to want you!!)

Because of my long absence, I am going to commit to posting every day this week.

I have some tricks, and some treats, up my sleeve- call it a Halloween special!!

I also have yet another date on Saturday. This one I am kind of looking forward to, which inevitably means it will be a disaster... Time will tell...

Liz Lemmon

Do you watch 30 Rock? 


Because if you do, you would understand how me and Liz Lemmon have many similarities, a fact pointed out to me on occasion by close friends. 


So I kind of have a fantasy of finding an Astronaut Mike Dexter on one of my web sites....So sue me....


You can look her up on Wikipedia and it says this:
"Liz is generally portrayed as something of a geek, so although apparently a skilled writer, she seems to have precious few social skills...
Jack has described her as "socially retarded." 
Liz has tried using Match.com to find a boyfriend. 
She does have some knowledge of cooking, though she admits to only using her oven to warm her jeans in the morning. 
It has become apparent that Lemon has very high standards in men, personified in her imaginary perfect husband, "Astronaut Mike Dexter"." 


Sound like anyone you know? It's like Tina Fey is watching me as she writes her scripts...


In the most recent episodes Liz Lemmon is dating none other than Matt Damon- who is playing a dazzling, albeit awkward, airline Pilot. 


So imagine my surprise and delight when, while sitting at the airport this evening to fly to Los Angeles and visit my sister, an incredibly good looking Pilot chose to sit by ME when waiting for the flight! 
There were many available seats, and even many seats that weren't by people. I also had my feet up on my suitcase, making quite the obstacle to be around me. He asked to step around it, then asked to sit by me. 
Well, Duh. 

He proceeded to pull out an iphone with a super cracked screen.
"Oh no! Your poor phone!" I said. (yes, be proud of me, trying to start up a conversation with the hot Pilot! Yet, I wonder if that wasn't the right approach, as I was obviously being very nosy, looking at what he was doing, and looking down at his phone while he was messing with it...) 


"Yes. Unfortunately, there isn't an app to fix this problem," he answered.
And he's FUNNY too!!! I mean, he's not going to host a special on Comedy Central, but I love stupid humor!
But all that followed this exchange was 


....silence....


I was about to give up on him. To completely immerse and lose myself in the latest issue of Entertainment Weekly. 


And then:


"So where are you headed?" he asked.
And we proceeded to have a very pleasant conversation.
But then he inexplicably, and somewhat abruptly got up, said excuse me, and walked over towards the flight attendant desk, never to be seen or heard from again. 


Yet I feel, that in true Liz Lemmon/Linda Marie form, he may have sensed my anxiety/geekishness when it comes to talking to strangers, especially good looking ones who seek me out. 


Perhaps it was when I asked him if he was a flight attendant? (and I asked this while desperately trying to read his badge, so I know I had a squinty awful expression when I said it.)


Perhaps it was my telling him what a nervous flyer I am? (after stumbling over lame questions about Pilot school...)


Perhaps it was when I told him I sit around on planes, discerning from the other passengers who will be good support in the event the plane goes down? (a side effect of too much LOST viewing.)


He said he was a LOST fan too! That he couldn't wait to get the latest season on DVD!

Perhaps, then, I got a little too nerdy and excited when I started talking about the exclusive content filmed just for the DVD showing Hurley and Ben as island protectors and how I couldn't wait to see it? 


That was when he got up. 


Maybe he hadn't watched Season 6 yet, and didn't know the ending?


SO- if any of you know a Pilot that works for US Airways, is stationed out of Dallas, but lives in Salt Lake City, and has LOST Season 6 in his Netflix queue, can you tell him that Linda is looking for him so she can stop suffering through these ridiculous online dating sites? 

Expectations

So- exactly 2 months in to my experiment and what do I have to show for it?...

Hmmm.....

Do you remember the scene in 500 Days of Summer where he goes to the party at Summer's house, and we have the split screen chronicling his expectations versus reality?

Going into this I had incredibly high hopes.

Here is the split screen of my expectations versus my reality.

Can you guess which is which?

This is my favorite email I have received yet.

It is from the newer site I joined, which is just kind of a mad free for all.

Anyone can contact anyone with no rhyme or reason.

So a lot depends on your profile.

That being said, here is the email I got:

"So, obviously you passed the aesthetics test or shallow men (such as myself) would never contact you, but a buddy of mine was looking over my shoulder and claimed that without a doubt your profile looked to have been written by a guy, it’s just too perfect, minus the incompletion. He claimed that any account with so little information is a dead giveaway. I came to your defense, of course, but now we’ve got a $20 bet going as to whether or not you’re real. So I wondered, just between us, am I about to lose $20?"

This cracked me up!!

I did write back and inform him that his buddy owes him $20.

Most profiles are a paragraph or so saying things like, "I am really fun and am looking for someone who is fun to be with!" and other really redundant things, that you know is the same thing everyone else wrote.

So, since I know you're all curious, here is my profile info, just as the fellas see it.

(the above picture is my main profile pic)

Greeting from LindaMarie27:

I am fun and interesting (aren't we all?) and I love to laugh.

like: burritos from Barbaccoa

dislike: Indian food

like: classic rock

dislike: country (although I did go to a Tim McGraw and Faith Hill concert and it was pretty great- I would just never chose the country station.)

like: reading

dislike: not reading

like: LOST (still in TV mourning...)

dislike: Gossip Girl

like: summer

dislike: cold (winter's alright for a little bit, but man I hate being cold)

like: my cat, Mandrake, aka "Manny"

dislike: horses- they scare the crap out of me

like: Entertainment Weekly

dislike: US Weekly

like: Ray LaMontagne

dislike: Lady Gaga

like: wearing flip flops

dislike: wearing hats- my head is too huge. They never fit.

like: The Rocket

dislike: it's a tie between The Samurai and the Wild Mouse