I think it's official now. Everybody knows.

Here's the deal: I can keep my big fat mouth shut, but only as long as I'm not asked.

Tonight, someone asked.

Someone looked into my eyes, and sensed the truth, and asked the obvious question. Even though she already knew the answer, she asked the question.

What was I supposed to do? Lie about it?

No fucking way. Not about that. Not about her.

I answered the question. I told the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

And now, now everyone on Earth knows.

And it still makes no difference.

I'm still alone. I still miss her.

All is still as it should be.

Dammit.

...I totally forgot to write about the other cool thing that happened last Friday night.

The first, and coolest by far, thing was getting to see MixedSignalGirl again. But the second thing was kinda neat too.

I got to the parking garage for Louisville's Fourth Street Live at 7:00 or so. I got there early because (a) I was hungry, and (b) I was bored at the tournament.

So I took the stairs down to ground level and just when I walked by the elevator some lazy people got out of it.

One of the girls was very hot and, more than that, she looked really familiar to me. I mean really familiar, if you know what I mean. Hint hint. Nudge nudge.

Anyway, I ended up behind the people at the ID-checking line, and then I walked around them to go to The Red Star Tavern. All along the way I wracked my brain trying to figure out who the hot girl had been.

Then, I was sitting at the bar at The Red Star, and she came in with her group.

Since I had a few minutes to kill while I waited for my food to arrive, I stared at the hot girl and tried to remember who she was and how many times I'd boinked her.

Finally, I figured it out.

I'd never boinked her. She was one of my cousins!

My third-cousin, actually. At least I think that's the way it works. Her mom and my dad were first-cousins, so her mom would be my second-cousin, and that would make the hot girl my third cousin. I think.

So, when she walked into my general vicinity, I asked her if she was who I thought she was.

She was indeed. Took her a second to recognize me though. She probably thought I was just some creep trying to hit on her. Well, I wasn't. I was some third-cousin trying to hit on her.

Plus, she'd never seen me all evil and shit before. Plus, I hadn't seen her since my grandfather's funeral back in 1991. The reason that I'd remembered her so easily was that she was hot, and I'd had a crush on her back in school.

We'd graduated the same year. She's aged even better than I have, if you can believe that.

We chatted for a minute or two, then she went back to her group. One of them is probably her husband. I hate him.

It's okay to lust after third-cousins, right?

Yesterday, for lunch, I had four french fries and a Newcastle (2914) at The Pub. After that, I was completely stuffed, but I wasn't sick.

Yay!

So, armed with renewed confidence that my innards would function correctly, and bristling with excitement over HatGirl telling me that she'd be at Rich O's, I went there.

I arrived a little after 9:00. HatGirl and LuckyFucker were sitting out front. This told me that Rich O's proper was full. Probably with idiots and/or weirdoes, but full in any event. Like I cared about Rich O's proper when HatGirl was sitting out front.

HatGirl!

Yay!

I joined them and checked out the beer board. Rogue Chocolate Stout was still on. There was also a Brooklyn Chocolate Stout that I'd been looking forward to trying. But I just couldn't bring myself to have either of them. See, the last beer that I had, last Saturday, before I exploded all over myself and my bathroom, was a BBC Dark Star Porter (288). It wasn't the beer's fault that I got sick, but I still felt some kind of subconscious reflexive aversion to dark and rich beers.

I had myself a Wostyntje Mustard Ale (89) and it was very yummy.

We sat and talked for an hour or so. LuckyFucker rambled on about some ninja show he'd watched. HatGirl expressed concern about what to do with her little dog. They're going on a trip, and she doesn't want to leave the dog. So I suggested that she just take the dog with her.

"But I can't take her into places," she pointed out.

"You can if people think you're blind," I suggested. "In fact, I suspect that people already assume that you're blind, when they see you with LuckyFucker."

Zing! Take that LuckyFucker!

Anyway, I thought it was funny.

After my friends left, I went on into Rich O's proper. It was pretty packed, mostly with semi-regulars. I talked to MusicalYuppieDude for a bit, and to WomanRepellant for a bit. MusicalYuppieDude noticed that I'd lost weight. I told him about what I'd gone through to accomplish that feat. He agreed that it probably wasn't worth it.

I ended up sitting on the sofa with a bunch of people that I don't know. I had another Wostyntje (99) and then I came home at 11:30 or so.

Oh yeah - at HatGirl's birthday party, GlassesGirl had said that she might show up with my "long lost stepbrother" in tow. That had caused some speculation as to who she might mean. It turns out that she'd meant it literally. I did, for a brief period of time around 1990, have a stepbrother. When my dad remarried after my mom died, his new wife had a son. J-something. I only met him once. Anyway, that was who GlassesGirl was talking about.

Hopefully this is the saddest news I'll hear today.

I've written before, here and here, about Dino, my neighbor's dog. The last time I mentioned him was last month. I'd been talking to my neighbor's daughter, and she'd told me that Dino was feeling his age quite a bit, and that he'd probably be gone soon.

I told myself then that, the next time I saw lounging in his yard, I'd walk over to see him.

I never did see him, so I never took that walk.

And now it's too late.

My neighbor told me this morning that she'd had poor Dino put down. His arthritis had progressed to the point where he couldn't even walk anymore, and he was in constant pain. And now his pain is over.

I'm sad. He was the first living creature to greet me after I moved into this house. I'd been out shoveling snow and he came running across the street at me. I remember thinking for a second that he was going to attack me or something, but all he wanted to do was try to catch the flung snow before it hit the ground.

To anyone driving by that day, I must have looked like a real asshole, throwing shovelful after shovelful of snow at that dog. But I couldn't have missed him if I'd tried, and he had fun, and so did I.

He was a good boy.

...I'm still alive.

I even felt good enough to go to work today. But then people started talking about food, and one guy even *gasp* started eating food right in front of me.

I got sick again, and came home.

Supposedly there was something in the paper this morning about this stomach flu that's going around. I guess some people are vomiting up to twenty times a day. Well I don't think I quite hit that mark on Sunday, but I wasn't really counting.

And right now, right now I feel fine.

I'm actually hungry. I found some crackers, and the thought of actually eating them isn't making me queasy. I might just get brave and try a couple.

Meanwhile, I've lost almost two belt notches since this started Saturday night.

Did you know that guys can have an Aunt Flo too?

Well, they can. And do. She just doesn't visit guys with the regularity that she imposes on women.

Think about it.

My Aunt Flo and my Uncle Ralph paid me a surprise visit last night.

I don't know if I've got food poisoning, or if there's some stomach flu going around that I haven't heard about, or what. I think that just about the only thing I know for sure, right now, is that Pepto Bismol doesn't work if you can't keep it down for more than ten seconds.

I feel like crap. I feel like puke.

And speaking of... I gotta end this entry.

She and three of her friends came in together. I saw her immediately, mainly because I was watching the door. I always watch the door in that place. I don't think she saw me.

They went straight to the bathroom to fix their hair or check their makeup or whatever girls do in there together. I like to think that they practice kissing on each other, like in the movie Cruel Intentions. That was hot.

I hadn't seen or even talked to MixedSignalGirl in months. I had no idea what to expect. The last time I'd talked to her, we hadn't been on very good terms. She'd pretty much freaked out on me. For good reason.

I then spent a few minutes trying to decide whether I should leave before they came out. I also thought about being sneaky and calling her from someplace where I could see the reaction on her face. Or maybe I'd buy the girls a round of drinks from "the gentleman at the bar" so I could see her reaction when she saw that it was me and not really a gentleman.

But what happened instead was that she tried to sneak around behind me when she left the bathroom. I pretended that I didn't see her. She came up behind me and put her hands over my eyes and put her lips up against my ear and whispered, "Guess who."

"Grandma?" I ventured.

"Wrong," was the whispered response. She licked my ear.

"Definitely Marilyn," I said with certainty. Marilyn is MixedSignalGirl's mom.

"Wrong, but funny," she answered.

"Miss, I saw you come in," I said. "But I'll keep making wrong guesses if you promise to keep licking my ear."

She removed her hands. I saw uninterrupted soft skin on all ten fingers. Whew!

I turned around and gave her a long hug and a quick kiss. Man, it was good to see her! She looked fantastic, and I told her as much.

By this time, her friends were looking at us in horror from their booth.

She asked me if I wanted to come over and join them, but she knew that I wouldn't do it. Crowds aren't my thing. Crowds are even less my thing when most of the people in it would just as soon slap me as look at me. So I declined. She didn't insist.

So I stayed at the bar and she went to join her friends. I did end up buying them a round of drinks. Some foo-foo things for $9.00 each. I had another beer myself and managed to enjoy it.

A while ago I remember being a little freaked out because LaptopGirl was sitting thirty yards away from me, with only two walls separating us at Rich O's. Well last night, last night MixedSignalGirl was thirty feet away from me, and I could see her, and I could hear her laughing, and I could still smell her perfume on my shirt.

It was surreal.

When I paid my tab and stood up to leave, our eyes met. I mouthed the words Hard Rock and she nodded. I'd meant it as an invitation, but she might have taken it as a warning, because I sat at The Hard Rock for an hour or so, and she didn't come in.

Later, while I was at Rich O's, I got a text message: Thanks for being nice tonight.

So I sent back: I came very close to asking you to come home with me.

After a half-hour that somehow lasted a million years, I got a response.

I'd have come. But thanks for not asking. You're still my hero. Later.

Later?

I hope so.

So a while back, I had my tongue in this girl's mouth. I had my tongue in her mouth, and I was struck by the realization that I was wasting my time.

I wasn't thinking that it was fun, that she smelled good, or that she was hot, or that it was a pretty good ego-boost for me at a time when I really needed it.

Nope, I was thinking that it was a waste of time.

Of course, that didn't stop me from slaking the shit out of that girl. I am a single straight guy after all.

Anyway, a couple of days ago I saw the girl again. I was eating lunch. She was working. She came up to me and, after the required Hi and How are you doing?, asked, "I'm embarrassed to have to ask, but what was your name again?"

Ouch.

Like I said, a waste of time.

For her too, apparently.

I'm off work until Tuesday!

Tomorrow is the start of the Bank Pool division of the Derby City Classic, which I play in every year. I'm actually looking forward to it this year. Unlike last year when I was sorta dreading the thing, and it showed up in my play. Or lack thereof.

This year my mental state is much better than it's been for a long time. Problem is, my actual game is pretty shitty.

My practice sessions have lately taken one of two distinct flavors. Either I don't miss a ball for several hours, or I don't make a ball for several hours. Unfortunately, the latter outnumber the former by a fairly wide margin.

Oh well though. It should still be fun. And it will almost certainly be better than going in to work. I will miss going to the bar and seeing my friends *coughHatGirlcough* though.

It continues to amaze me that you still function in public. If I'd done what you did, I'd never show my face again. You make me ill, but I've been asked to stay friendly with you, so that's what I'm doing.

---

Never, ever, ever, show me crap like that again. If that was a plea for pity, then it fell on deaf ears. Or blind eyes. Whatever. I tried to help, before it was too late. I was ignored. Also, grow up.

---

You should know that I will never answer the fucking phone if I don't know who you are. Since I don't know who you are, that means that I will never answer the fucking phone. So give it up. Find another way to contact me if it's that important. If you know me, then you can probably guess why I'm like this.

---

I just got tired of playing whatever games it was. I didn't know the rules, and I didn't know what the winning goal was supposed to be. Why not try the honest approach next time? Neither of us are twelve years old.

---

I gave you the benefit of a doubt for a long time. I even defended you from your critics. Well, I was wrong, they were right. Your sole purpose in life is to make every other man seem like a true gentleman by comparison.

---

I know what you're considering. Do not do it. I am not that type of person. Perhaps you should be seeking the company of the guy in the last paragraph.