Okay, morale is near abysmal right now. Thursday night, I went out downtown with some ladyfriends. I should also point out that these ladyfriends are, as some might call it, damn good looking, so as a group, we held our own for making good look good. Anyway, one of them suggested a party for downtown residents being held on the rooftop bar of a West 6th club. My prior West 6th experiences have left a good deal to be desired, but they talked me into it with things like, "Single guys don't go to East 4th, Alexandra;" and "You're not going to find someone by going somewhere quiet and ordering a glass of wine;" or "If you rule out sports bars and club-like establishments, you're ruling out huge segments of the single male population." These all sounded very threatening and unsportswoman like of me, especially after repeatedly being told I should "Do it for the blog," which has apparently become my new life mantra and which singlehandedly upstages YOLO.
So, there we were, in summery outfits and cute sandals, and here were the other attendees: guys wearing those really squeaky white sneakers who somehow got lost from the set of Jersey Shore, a pregnant woman (really?), various women who whose entire work wardrobe was absolutely straight from the Rave clearance rack (and here's the pot calling the kettle black, but there was no way these women lived downtown), and my personal favorite, our bartender, who was wearing a bandeau bathing suit top, some kind of underwear/bathing suit bottoms, a long "shirt," a full-body tattoo, hair in a pulled-through messy bun, and, no joke, had a tooth growing out of her nose. Others can attest to this, and at first sight of her, one of my friends turned to me and asked, "Is she wearing any clothes?" I tried to keep my clearly bad attitude in check and just order a drink, so I asked for a mojito. "Oh, we don't have those." YOU ARE A BAR, what do you mean you "don't have those." Okay, I said, I'll take a margarita. I get it handed to me in a plastic cup, no salt. Definitely not.
So, no Wedding Date Prospects (WDPs) at that gathering place, that's for sure. We meandered throughout the area, judging our staying potential at each new place by entering said establishment, walking in a parade line from the door to the very back of the bar, staring intently at each group of people as we walked past, and giving a collective "stay" or "go" vote, which were usually not too hard to agree on. We spent some time at Bar Louie, where the patrons next to me were two pretty cute guys drinking a beer and talking. (To clarify: they were talking to each other, definitely not to me.) I waited for a good while, doing things like stirring my drink with focused intention, crossing my legs, quietly staring at the stupid soccer game that was on (it's always soccer, I literally know nothing about soccer) and they . . . didn't talk to me. My friends were whisper-ly urging me to say something to them. Definitely not! Every relationship I've had has been me making it happen, and this project is about putting myself out there but finding someone to want to step up. Is that taking full advantage of this? Perhaps not. But I absolutely was not about to make the first move. Details of why this theory is unfortunately solid continue below.
Eventually we ended up at Dive Bar, where I'd never been, and which was definitely a dive bar. After being coaxed into doing shots (which I literally needed a TA for: "First put salt on hand. Next lick hand. Last drink shot, in one piece, not in your usual four."), playing skee ball, requesting songs from the DJ which may or may not have included "Call Me Maybe," I bought a round of shots and asked the cute-ish, single guy at the bar sitting next to me if he wanted one. We talked for a minute about shots (this project really brings out the deepest in me), which was gut-wrenching for me, both to have to actually talk about shots, and to now bring myself to admit I was out in public talking to a stranger about shots. "I was just going to ask you the same thing," he said, and I even managed to hide my eye roll. Because dude, whatever, you definitely weren't. But okay. Go with it, don't be a snarky smartass, Alexandra. So he said sure, he'd like a shot, so I bought an extra one, gave it to him, he drank it, mumbled something like, "Thanks, I guess I'll have to get the next one," promptly TURNED BACK AROUND, and did not even look at me again. SIR, I am pretty sure I just BOUGHT YOU A DRINK, and you are at a bar ALONE, so you're not even turning back to resume talking to your friends, you are turning around to talk to NO ONE so as not to have to talk to me! UNACCEPTABLE! THIS is evidently why you do not initiate any interactions with guys ever! FAIL! "Do it for the blog" can go to hell!
So, after spending 20 minutes crying in the bathroom about just about everything, having to be talked through reasons why I'm "pretty enough, not a failure, gonna figure shit out," etc. by my friends, I was definitely not going to find WDP at this point, since I had no makeup remaining on my ridiculously blotted face and looked as though I'd been hanging out with the likes of tooth-nose bartender. So instead, the DJ fortunately began playing some deliciously terrible 90s rap, which of course bolsters ANY life situation from flatline to fabulous. I proceeded to dance like an idiot, my apparent M. O. in life, and help myself to other people's beer. Which I don't even like. Maybe we'll need to redeem "Do it for the blog" on the condition that it includes partaking in obnoxious, unreasonable, out of character experiences that, if nothing else, make for a good story. Oh, and convince me that now is an ideal time to learn the basics about soccer.
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