Okay, once I got back to Las Vegas I drove over to The Freakin Frog.
I had myself another draft Alaskan Smoked Porter then I had a new beer for me:
(bottle) Dark reddish brown with a complicated aroma that seemed to include cola. Started out bitter but finished very sweet. A very thick mouthfeel and a very nice flavor that made me drink very quickly. Quite yummy, but perhaps not as yummy as the $15 I paid for it would indicate.
Later in the night I took a cab up to Main Street Station to check out their brewpub. A reading of their beer list was not very appealing to me. Only two of the dozen or so beers seemed worth trying. One was a cherry stout and they were out of that.
The other was a porter, and it ended up being the best beer surprise I had all week.
(draft) That first taste nearly overpowered me. I still can't believe that this beer comes from a brewpub catering to the flavor-impaired masses. Very chocolately, very roasty, very delicious. One of the best porters I've ever had.
I ended up having two of the porters, one while I waited for PigtailGirl to arrive and another while we sat and talked. She'd called right after I'd arrived at Main Street Station and wanted to get together without her friends "cramping her style" in her words.
This was of course intriguing.
At a certain point it was pretty obvious how the night was going to end so we actually both relaxed. There was no more pressure to be charming, and we were in no hurry.
We took a cab to the Rio and I talked her into trying a couple of actual beers instead of the foofoo drinks she'd been drinking. I myself had a couple pints of Newcastle and she tried Newcastle and Fat Tire before settling on (yuck) a Stella.
The next morning I drove PigtailGirl (no longer a descriptive name) up to her hotel and then returned my rental car.
A thing about this - I really really really needed it. Being treated like shit for months - whether intentionally or not - can do lots of damage to a person's ego, and my own self-image was never that great to begin with. I've never been a one-night-stand type of person, and I don't expect to become one in the future. Sometimes people and circumstances just merge and combine and it just feels right. I don't know what PigtailGirl's story is, and she doesn't know mine. There was no need to get into any of that.
Do I feel a little guilty? You bet your ass I do.
But it's not the same guilt I felt when I was with MixedSignalGirl. Back then I felt like I was betraying and belittling my feelings for someone else by being with her. This time my guilt is because I was in part just using PigtailGirl and she really deserved my full attention instead of just serving as a placeholder.
Of course the situation may have been reversed. I could have been used as well. If so, that's okay. It was a great night, and I think we helped each other get through some shit, even though we didn't discuss what the actual shit was.
