3 Balls and a Magician

This story is intended for mature audiences... that might wipe out any of my friends reading this, but I'll go ahead.  Most of them have already heard this story.

Back in the spring 2005, I finally had a fling with Pockets. As one of my best girlfriends describes, he has girls falling out of his pockets -- so I'd tried to avoid sleeping with him, as you see pretty much every woman who comes in contact with him ends up sleeping with him. Some men, too, but that's only speculation.   Then there was that day, and he made all the right moves and I was in the process of dumping a guy who had treated me poorly, and there we were.  We fooled around one other time in the spring of 2008.  I can't justify the second time.  I only tell you this to set the stage.

Over the summer of 2008, I went back to visit this best girlfriend of mine for her birthday.  At her party, three of us are sitting around, joking about how each of us has slept with Pockets.  And isn't it funny that he has three balls.

Wha?

I somehow had failed to notice that Pockets had an extra testicle.  The look of shock on their faces that I was somehow unaware of this was priceless.  We laughed for a very long time that I could miss something like this.

A couple of weeks later, back home, I meet an interesting man at a local street fair.  He's attractive, intelligent, and claims to be a magician.  I get to know him better - he's a magician by training, also has a degree in architecture and works at a kitchen and bath showroom, and really enjoys wine.  I found that interesting enough to merit dating the Magician for a little bit.

One of the first few times we slept together, something a bit odd happened.  We're enjoying a little cuddling, and the Magician takes my hand, and guides it down to his *ahem* package.

And he says "how many balls do you feel?"

For about 30 seconds, I'm mortified.  Have I missed this AGAIN? Where are all these testes-enhanced men coming from???  But for the life of me, I think it feels like two, so I gulp and sheepishly say "two?"

"Yes!" replies the Magician.  Then takes my hand away, reaches down there himself, fusses about, then brings my hand back and proudly asks,

"Now how many do you feel?"

The Magician made a ball disappear.  He was sooooo proud.  The appropriate response might have been something akin to awe or getting turned on, right?  Maybe offering to go search for it?  Who the hell knows.  I lost it.  For five minutes solid I did not stop laughing.  Finally, the Magician got me quiet enough to explain why it was so funny.  While he sort of appreciated the humor of the situation, he really didn't appreciate being laughed at or compared to Pockets.

Oh well.  He's the one who was making magic tricks out of his balls.  You kinda gamble when you do that.

As it turns out that he was not actually very motivated in life or work, and liked to blame his 83 year old father for why he had not really succeed in life.  So things didn't go very far with us. But he did leave me with a fabulous story.

who doesn't deserve sweetness?

Apparently, me.

Well, it's not that I don't deserve it.   Of course I deserve it.  But when it arrives by the truckload and seems unending, I just don't know what to do with it.

Newfie is very sweet... yesterday, he sent me a note for our "happy 1-month" since our first date.  I should feel ecstatic that there is a man out there who keeps track, and by-golly he's keeping track for me!  for us!  Instead, I feel a mix of guilt and claustrophobia.  Guilt because he's so crazy about me and I'm off making dates with other men -- even though I've been clear with him that I'm not being exclusive.  And claustrophobia because it's unclear to me if Newfie has anything else going on in his life outside of work and me - and I'm not ready to be someone else's everything.  I did that once already, and it wasn't pretty.

So, really, it's not Newfie who is making me claustrophic.  It's the ghost of Grumpy Pants.  

I've got a crush... and the story about Blue Balls...

To be fair to Newfie, I developed a crush on Mr. Nice Guy before I knew much about Newfie.  I conjured an evening to get Mr. Nice Guy to my house for dinner (we have mutual friends).  Mr. Nice Guy is - well - a truly nice guy.  He's the kind of guy that's been single forever, but doesn't appear to be the consummate jackass bachelor.  He has lots of female friends, perfect manners, interesting hobbies and a great job.  Conversation with him is genuine and engaging.  He was the only person at the dinner party to help with the dishes.  Drool.  Oh, and he's a nice Jewish boy.  All these things are blinding to someone like me, and how I miss that he might have issues to still be single at 42.

He invited me (and 400 other people) to his birthday dinner last night, and birthday hike today.  I skipped the dinner in favor of the smaller group activity of hiking - there were only 7 of us who actually hiked.  I wish I could tell him that I have a crush, ask him out.  Am I imagining some intent/flirtation when he puts his arm around me, touches me on the thigh while we are in the car?   I hope not.  I got it bad.  And that ain't good.

And right about 11am when I show up to brunch (before the hike) is when the world reinforces just why I started this blog... There at the restaurant, sitting right across from Mr. Nice Guy is Blue Balls.  I couldn't make up stuff this good.

Remember I told the story about the predator at speed dating (see google-fu)?  And that "other nice woman" I ended up hanging out with?  She really was a cool lady - cool enough to fix me up with a friend of hers I (for reasons to be explained shortly) dubbed Blue Balls.  We went out for several weeks, and at the end of every date, on my doorstep, he would grope me so intensely that he was just about dry humping me.

For the record, if you get that aggressive before I invite you upstairs, I'm not inviting you upstairs unless I actually plan to sleep with you within about 5 minutes of walking in the door.  And I had an issue with Blue Balls - he would not invite me to his home.  I don't trust a man until I see how he lives, see for myself what books he keeps on his bookshelf, if he's smart enough to hide the porn, and figure out where he buys his groceries (a cupboard full of cheap Ramen for a 40 year old is bad news).

I suppose it made things worse for this guy that I had just read the best dating advice EVER.  Don't force a conversation with a guy about where a relationship is going.  Just be clear that you are not sleeping with someone unless you are in an exclusive relationship.  I questioned if this was good advice, until I tried it on Blue Balls.

After a few weeks of Blue Balls getting frustrated with the action on my doorstep, Blue Balls called me and we proceeded to have a 45 minute conversation where he kept saying that we had reached a "plateau" and he was frustrated.  And that he wasn't the type of guy to use this expression, but I was giving him blue balls.  (I guess you ARE the type of guy to use that expression, then.)

I repeated to him: "We're not exclusive, and I don't want to sleep with someone unless we are.  It's not fair to you, to anyone else I might be dating, and definitely not to me."   For the record, there really wasn't anyone else.  But that's irrelevant.

A smart man who really was interested in me would have said "I'm not dating anyone else." 

Blue Balls did not say this.  He emphasized the plateau, his frustration, that he never invited me over because he was a slob, and then he broke things off.   I was sad, in a way.  I wanted "the next level" with him, too - but our definition of next level was completely different.  I hoped he would open up his home and let me get to know him better.  He hope I would open up my bedroom and get busy.  Or at least that's how it seemed in our conversation that night.

About a year ago (maybe two years after our little dating diversion), I saw Blue Balls at a happy hour....  what I said must have finally sunk in, because he came up to me and said something to that effect, owned up to being a bit of a jerk and apologized.  If I was sweet, I would probably revise his nickname - but what fun would that be?  I have a feeling Blue Balls is a decent guy whose hormones made him miss a really important cue.

I'm glad I didn't sleep with Blue Balls anyway - that means there's no issue when I try start something with his friend Mr. Nice Guy.  Right?

the kiss-off

Over the past couple of years, I have noticed an alarming trend in my dates.  I'll call it the kiss-off.  I will admit to three times at least in the last couple of years that this has happened to me... on a first or second date, he returns me to public transit so that I can make my way back home (such is the life of urban dating), plants a very surprising kiss on me, and then disappears.

The first time it happened was with Bike-Co.  We'd corresponded on J-Date.  He had that geek-chic thing working for him.  We met for a drink at a bar that I randomly suggested, and is one of his favorites.  One beer in,and we both seem smitten.  We make our way to dinner, and I've lost track of time and place.  This is one of those first dates.  But we both have to work the next day, and it's still only a first date...  So he walks me to the train, and kisses me passionately.  It took me off guard, and I know I had one drink too many for it to be a perfect first kiss, but my knees melted anyway.  But that was the last I heard from him. Ever.

Kiss-off #2 was slightly different...  I'll call him Smirksalot.  He's one of those guys that doesn't really have a full smile - even in the broadest of happy expressions he somehow seems to be smirking, but it's sexy and it works on him.  I'd run across him, I kind of knew who he was, and I conjured an introduction at a happy hour one night.  The intro was all I needed, he seemed interested from the get go.  We talked about all kinds of things, he was fascinating, intelligent, engaging...  and yummy. He asked that night if I'd go out with him sometime, and then (miracle of miracles) actually called the next day and made a date.  We went to dinner, then a post-dinner drink, and then he made a move.  It was a romantic, passionate move, and I'm a sucker for passionate.  Plus add to the recipe that I was smitten, clearly gullible, but smart enough not to let it go too far.  An hour later (after many more kisses and moments), he took me to my train to get home.  And never called again.  (Though he's still a friend on facebook... odd that.)

Hopefully, I'm going to learn my lesson on this... but there's at least a #3 story.  We connected through eHarmony of all things, but realized before we met in person that we actually knew each other professionally.  He will be known as Cap, as he is always wearing a baseball cap.  I'm convinced he probably wears it during sex, something about always being cold....  But that seems unimportant now, right?  Cap and I met for a first date at the bar of a very fancy restaurant.  At first I was a little uncomfortable, but that quickly faded and it turned out we had a lot to talk about and so much in common.  I really enjoyed talking to him.  The second date was equally great - a nice glass of wine, missing the first showing of the movie because we were distracted and lost track of time.  But we grabbed a quick bite, made it to the 2nd showing.  Then he walked me to my train, and totally caught me off guard with the kiss.  I'll confess on this one, it was not my best showing.  I felt for Cap.  But it wouldn't have mattered.  It was the Kiss-Off.

Someday, someone will explain the Kiss-Off to me.