A Fly in My Champagne

So Ball Buster and I ride our bikes back to our cars.  It is a long-ass ride and it's now in the 50s.  And I'm in whore shorts.  My scalp prickles with goosebumps.  Ball Buster has reminded me that I used to be a lot feistier in high school,  i.e., I was insanely competitive and over-the-top intense about everything.  Ev er ry thing.  I can't tell if it's good or bad that I've mellowed out (resigned myself to failure) in my old age, so I contemplate crafting a craigslist "missed connections" post that will lure UnHot Topic to an untimely crapping of her pants in hopes of reclaiming some repressed feist.  I get back to my car and change into my third outfit of the day.  In the middle of a public park.  But hey, I'm so used to changing on the side of the highway that this seems pretty tame in comparison.  I shiver in my car, waiting for 4thGradeFriend to come pick me up and take me out for a birthday dinner. 

Since I have fifteen minutes to kill, I try to think of people I can call.  Guess who I think of?   He did get me flowers, right?  And maybe it would be okay to try to contact him on the weekend even though he did not return my text on Friday?  At the very least, he should be aware that I am about to have a super awesome Saturday night without him.  I figure he won't answer.  He does.  He is tired.  Lying on the couch and unable to rally to go out.  I don't buy this, but whatever.  He lets me know he went out with his bros the night before, and again I'm not sure I buy this.  I recount my harrowing Marine encounter and he tells me that those types of things are par for the course with all of the military types around here.  When I tell him about the cute volleyball guys I'd met, he gets quiet.  It is probably because he is dozing off, but I'd like to think it's because he's jealous.

4thGradeFriend (4GF) shows up and I hang up on GPG.  We head downtown to check out a new restaurant.  The place has a meat-centered menu, so neither of us is very excited.  We head to another restaurant where I ate when half of My Gay Couple (MGC) came to visit.  We sit at the bar because service absolutely sucks in San Diego.  I have little patience for the laid back Cali Cool attitude when it comes to food!  4GF and I check out the wine list.  Now, I'm sure this comes as no surprise to anyone who reads this blog, but I do know my way around the wine list.  So I am super excited to see that they have my favorite champagne at a very, very reasonable price.  They didn't have splits or half bottles listed anywhere, so I thought that maybe they didn't sell much champagne.  And 4GF does a lot of client entertaining, so she is also familiar with wine lists.  She decides that it is my birthday so I should have my favorite champagne. Especially since it was on sale.

That's Pam Anderson.  Not me.  Common mistake, as we are both bastions of good taste.

I get a text from Sexty McSexterson asking how my night is going.  Our birthdays are two days apart, and he was out of town, so we had talked about meeting up for bday drinks at some point.  Since I know he is out of town, I tell him that I wish he were here to drink some bday champagne.  I send GPG a text about how awesome and fun my night is.  He doesn't respond.  This irks me.  But whatever, there is Veuve Clicquot to be dranken.  Sexty McSexterson texts me that he is actually in town and had plans that fell through and was hoping to meet up since he lived right around the corner.  I hadn't seen him since Operation Palm Tree Rebound, but I figured things would be cool.  We could either go the friendly route, or he could be flirty, and then I would have a makeout partner for my bday.  Win/win.  Right?  4GF is married, so she is okay if I am trying to get some male attention.

We decide that since the champagne was so good and so cheap, it really made a lot of sense to order another bottle.  The bartender loves us.  We love us.  He brings us bday cake.  We love him.  Then Sexty McSexterson walks in and we pour him some Veuve and let him eat cake.  Things are cool.  We're friendly.  Then he gets kind of touchy and flirty, which I am more than okay with.  Then 4GF runs to powder her nose.  Sexty McSexterson smiles, and leans in to whisper something in my ear.  I am expecting to hear something naughty. "Is it okay if a date meets me here?" he asks.

"No. No it is not okay," I respond, looking at him like he was the dumbest, rudest asshole on the entire planet.  I mean, seriously.  You are going to invite some skank that you are banging to my birthday outing?  This wasn't happening.  And just then some wannabe Real Housewives of Orange County whore wearing a skirt from Express, circa 1999, walks in.

"Is it someone's birthday?" she asks.

"Yes, it's mine," I reply, turning my back to the two of them.  4GF returns and asks who the skank is.  I inform her that Sexty McSexterson had found something better to do, and was apparently going on a date right next to us at the bar.  I expect them to make a hasty exit.  They don't.  They sit next to us, as if this were completely acceptable.  I am fuming.  I had only invited him out because I didn't think he was in the state!  And after I had saved him from staying at home all alone on a Saturday, this is how he repays me?  You'd think he'd at least buy me a bday drink, but he is the tooliest of the toolsheds, and he doesn't.  And I am so tempted to write some really good burns about what he is spending his money on, but I shall refrain.  Because I have class.  And I know he is reading this.  He is lucky I am more passive-aggressive than feisty these days.  But that could change.

Since they are canoodling, we decide it's time to leave.  We get the bill.  I don't expect it to be too bad, since we'd only split an appetizer and an entree, but we both gasp when we see the total.  Apparently, the bottles were actually four times the amount we'd thought they were.  I contemplate putting a bottle on Tooly McToolerson's tab.  4GF thinks we should ask him for $45 to cover the cost of his one glass.  The bartender feels bad, but what could we do other than laugh because that's all people do when they drink champagne?  We giggle and tip him well and befriend his friends who had just walked in.  They take us to a club and we get our dance on.  I am pretty much dry humping some young, shaggy haired, blonde hardbody, but am sober enough to not make out with him.  We dance up a storm and laugh the whole way home about our champagne shenanigans. 

GPG texts me the next morning to see how my night went.  I let him know how much fun he missed.  He lets me know how much he has to do that day.  Awesome.  I delete Tooly McToolerson's late night text and voicemail without a second thought.  Then I delete him from my phone and facebook.  I set about dealing with a difficult, self-professed genius who would like me to write his website for him, but doesn't think he should have to pay for it.  I spend three hours listening to him tell me his life story on the phone.  He uses the word brilliant to describe himself.  Several times.  I make the wry observation that maybe my birthday wish should have been for a year free from all self-absorbed, rude assholes.  To make the day even better, my guy friend points out that GPG likes me enough to take me out for my birthday, but not enough to take me out on a Saturday.  Moving on.  Pffffftttt...