Rated Ex

Every once in a while, an old boyfriend will contact me. Sometimes to comment on something they read on the blog, sometimes when they run into a mutual friend and want to reminisce, and sometimes to remind me that I once invited them over to watch porn in my parents' bedroom.

(Wrong…on…so…many…levels…)

Yesterday was one of those days.

It is my own fault, I suppose. The guys I dated, I dated for years, so I have long and embarrassing histories with all of them.

There was Tim (not Canetto), who I began dating in college and went on to date for six years. I think we knew it was time to end the relationship when things began to get stale. And by that, I mean that I tried to get his attention one morning by tap dancing naked in front of him while he read the paper. He lowered the paper, said, "That's nice, dear," then raised the paper again and continued reading.

Then there was Rob. Rob was younger and shorter than me. We worked together for the same organization, though we were definitely on different paths…I was focused on my career and going back to school and he was focused on Rolling Rock. I don’t really remember why we broke up, so I did what anyone would do. Through the magic of Facebook, I recently asked him to refresh my memory. He provided the following recap. (My comments are in parentheses):

"It might have been the height issue. I mean, I’ve always been attracted to tall, voluptuous women and sadly, you just didn’t fit the bill. Wait, no…that’s not it…"       

"Now I remember -- you were wickedly intimidated by both my ambition and success. Nope, that’s not it, either. Although I think I’m getting closer…" (To be fair, he did a brilliant job as NRA’s Eddie Eagle mascot at trade shows and events.)

"Sadly, I think it came down to my inability to handle your blatant and outlandish immaturity. I wanted you to grow up and really make something of yourself. Instead you lived with dudes, went out all the time and never really acted like you cared about me! I’m think I’m on the right track..."            

"Wait. It just hit me, you were asking why you broke up with me…I’m dumb." (He’s funny.)

"Honestly, we dated what? Three years? I’m sure the end was crummy." (Just the part where he let the air out of my tires, actually. The rest was pretty civil.)

"Now that I think about it, we had a good run. Whatever the reality was, when I think of you I smile. Not a gross “I just took an upper-decker in your guest bathroom” smirk – but a big Cheshire cat toothy grin." (For the record, I’m not entirely sure that he did not take an upper-decker in my guest bathroom.)

P.S. If you do write about me, be sure to mention my circus-like penis. (I have no idea what this means.)

UPDATE: Thanks to DC Blogs for the link today. That reminds me...if you are not yet following Lilu on Twitter -- do so immediately. She is one of the top 20 finalists to be MTV's first TJ (Twitter Jockey) and she is hilarious.

No Nudes Is Good Nudes

In 2003, we remodeled our (gloriously, Brady's-esque '70's) kitchen. (When I say "we" remodeled it, I mean "we" paid a lot of people to do it). These things always take longer and cost much more than you think they will. Also, we were new to having a mortgage and a bit freaked out about the cash outlay. Ergo, we decided that we should get a roommate for a short time during and after this renovation to help defray the costs. (Important aside: Nobody over the age of 25 should have a roommate, and once you are out of the roommate situation for good, you should never, NEVER willingly go back into it). Hindsight is 20/20.

So is heinie sight...but we'll get to that in a minute.

Canetto posted a notice at his office and almost immediately we found someone to rent our room. He lived in the DC area during the week for work, and then went home to the NYC area on weekends, where he owned a home. He worked long hours and essentially just needed a place to sleep during the week. He was also willing to live with us and pay rent during our kitchen renovation. Perfect, right?

He was not a bad roommate, just a little odd. He tended to know everything about everything and Canetto and I just took to not really socializing with him much. One day, he found us in our sun room and told us that he was engaged -- to someone he had met six weeks prior. This woman was from another country, so the whole situation just kinda screamed "green card" to us.

Shortly after his engagement announcement, we were going out of town for Memorial Day weekend -- at least part of it. We probably told our roommate that we'd be back SUNDAY about five times, because he told us his girlfriend would be visiting and we didn't want any surprises.

We came home Sunday evening, as scheduled, and tried to pull into our garage, but both sides were blocked by cars (his and hers, we guessed). I stormed into the house, upset because I wanted to unpack and relax. I called our roommate's name...no answer...looked in his room -- nowhere. So, I went up to our room and looked out the window, onto the patio and swimming pool below, and there our roommate and his girlfriend sat --at our table next to the pool. I remember thinking, "wow...that's an odd bathing suit" and having to do a double-take once I realized that her flesh-colored bathing suit was actually flesh-colored FLESH! Yup. Totally naked -- sitting with feet propped up on the table and smoking a cigarette.

My first reaction was to laugh, and of course to grab Canetto -- which I did. Now, to be fair, this was a very attractive woman (again, lending credence to our green card theory, as our roommate was no prize), so when Tim peeked out the window -- he looked back at me and asked, "is it okay if I look again?".

We decided that the best way to handle this was for Canetto to pretend to be surprised as he walked into the back yard and "caught" them. (How noble of him to volunteer for this duty, eh?) He did this, and she got startled, screamed, and ran inside to get dressed. The more I thought about it, the more grossed out I got. I started thinking about all the other places in my house where she may have had her naked butt (er, "dufty doodle") while we were out of town. Was she having coffee while sitting naked at my kitchen table? Watching TV on my sofa au naturel? ACK!

He moved out shortly thereafter. We spent a lot of time superchlorinating the pool that summer.

A Girl Named Dirty

My dad had a nickname for me growing up -- "Dirty Dancing." This was before the so-horrible-yet-we-all-loved-it movie starring Patrick Swayze, so the name had nothing to do with that.

From what I understand, the origin lies in a commercial that was airing on television when I was little for a doll called "Dancerina." I thought it was "Dancin' Rina" and called the doll that every time I begged to get one for Christmas. My father thought this was adorable and began calling me "Dancin' Rina" or simply "Dancin'"...although, somewhere along the way this morphed into "Dirty Dancin" and sometimes just "Dirty." (Yes, other little girls were their dad's "Princesses" or "Angels" -- it's like mine knew there would be a blog called Brutalism in my future even back then...)

And of course, because he had called me "Dirty" my whole life, I took it as the term of endearment he intended. Although, it was pretty funny when new friends came over to my house and asked me in a concerned manner, "Did your father just call you "Dirty"? (To which I'd reply, "You mean yours doesn't?")

I suppose I should put it in context by letting you know that this is also the dad who re-named our body parts with nonsense names to make drying off after a bath more fun. Arms were "armadillos", legs were "legotomies", feet were "tootsies," your chest was a "chest of drawers" and your butt was a "dufty doodle." (He also called popcorn "tropical popical" and hot dogs "trotty dogs." There was really no rhyme or reason to any of the nonsense language...it was created purely to make us giggle.)

And of course, I have passed this on to my own kid (that we nicknamed "Pants," by the way...Princess really is overdone...), and it warms my heart to hear her calling all of these things by their "correct" names.

What about you guys? Any good nicknames? Or am I the only Dirty out here?

P.S. Spell check just erroneously concluded that dufty, legotomies and trotty were not spelled correctly.

Ease My Troubles, That's What You Do

You know how there are times when you hear about something that is so awful you then have to share it with other people because passing along the details somehow eases your burden? I refer to this as the "displacement of horror" -- if you don't spread the heinousness, you're in danger of spending the rest of your days curled up in a fetal position downing Dimetapp highballs and speaking in some crazy moon language.

With that, I share with you a few things that have recently come to my attention:

1) While searching the Meetup site for potential Dilettante activities, I discovered the NoVA polyamory meetup. For those not familiar with "polyamory" (please let that be most of you), it is the new word for swinging. Not only do these folks get together at a dive-y diner in the area, but they also all feel perfectly okay about posting their photos to this site (including one man in nude tights and high heels who appears to be leaping into the air). Although, my corneas began to spontaneously combust after I saw that, so I'm not entirely sure.

One of the many things I question about this group is do they not even have one marketer in the bunch? If you are trying to attract new people to this meetup/lifestyle and someone is on the fence about whether or not they're going to take the plunge, is this the photo you want on your front page to persuade them? I mean, I'm no sexual deviant, so maybe I just don't understand the "Grandma and Grandpa at a church dinner" fetish.

2) A gentleman in Iowa was discovered pleasuring himself outside an Arby's restaurant. Therefore, my new favorite euphemism for masturbation is "doing the jamocha shake."

3) On Memorial Day weekend, we took my mom and her husband with us to meet some friends at a sunset celebration at Mt. Vernon. We figured it would be nice to stroll the grounds with a glass of wine, imagining what it was like to live in Washington's day and think about all of the decisions that had been made there that affected the history of our country. And as we were doing this, we walked by one of the outbuildings on the property that had a sign stating simply, "dung repository."

I may have just found my Brutalism tag line.

Dimetapp cocktail?
Brutalism