Tonight I went to see God of Carnage, which is a play staring James Gandolfini (Michael), Marcia Gay Harden (Veronica and Michael’s wife), Hope Davis (Annette), and Jeff Daniels (Alan, husband to Annette). It has gotten rave reviews, including 6 Tony nominations (everyone in the cast was nominated).

The play was outrageously funny, but it took awhile for me to warm up to it. I think I was more distracted by the two guys behind me laughing at every frackin line the first 15 minutes and they weren’t that funny to justify that kind of laughter. It’s a short 90 minute play, sans intermission, and it’s about two sets of New York parents trying to sort out a playground brawl between their two sons (basically one son got a serious beat down). The play A.D.D.ed at times to other subjects which ultimately made it more interesting and hysterical. At times I was doubled over in laughter-the kind where you just can’t speak and are silently laughing because it’s so funny. So, my advice is catch it if you can.

I knew going into it, I was going to celebrity whore it out and wait for them all to come out, take pics and get autographs (got all 4 btw, but for the life of me, I couldn’t tell you which is JD’s or which is JG’s). For those who have never done it or who aren’t from New York basically you wait behind police barricades until they come out of the theater, sign some playbills, and are escorted by security into their SUVs.

FAVORITE post-stage interaction was with JG. I didn’t ask JG the question I was dying to ask, which I’m sure he’s been asked 1,000 times. I don’t think I need to tell you what it was, but for those slow on the uptake, I was DYING to ask him what he thought happened to Tony. Did he or did he not get whacked? Instead I asked him what was in the “Rum” they were drinking on stage. At first he said “nuthin,” and then smiled this killer Tony Soprano smile and then said “ice tea,” which is what I suspected. I can totally see how Tony got the ladies. He falls into my “sexy ugly category.” He’s super charming in person and out of all of the stars, he’s arguably the biggest and he was by FAR the coolest! He posed for pics with people (of course I didn’t ask for one-totally should have). He even hugged and kissed an old lady and was like “hey ma, hope you have a good night.” Then some old lady stood on her tippy toes and kissed him on the cheek. Now if I see Carmela one day, my sighting of the Soprano nuclear family will be complete as I was once at a private birthday party of someone I didn’t know who knew Meadow and A.J. and they were there. Meadow is rail thin and A.J. is on the pequeno side.

JG has lost a lot of weight (still a big guy, but he’s took off some serious poundage). But here’s one thing I noticed, the man has no back fat. I won’t say which actress had it because I’m not willing to throw either one of them under the bus as they’re both thin and sweet, but I could tell one had back fat. It’s not fair, not only do men not have to give birth, but they also don’t get back fat! Death to back fat, I say! You can save Venice, save the whales and save the children all you want, but my goal is to eradicate back fat for women of the world! FU, back fat, FU straight to the bowels of hell!

Moving on to Marcia Gay Harden. She’s is fifty and FABULOUS! I want to look that sexy at 50, hell I want to look that sexy NOW! I’ve been in love with her since she started playing this messed up, but powerful lawyer who plays in the big boy’s league on Damages (highly recommend that show). Anyway, she was the one person not to use an SUV, which I thought was cool because although she lives in New York since Damages is filmed here, the woman still had the option, but instead she wandered off into the New York night.

Fifty and Fabulous!

Hope Davis was also sweet and I had a bit of a conversation with her.

Hope Davis is a sweetheart!

In fact the only person I didn’t have a conversation with was Jeff Daniels, who barely spoke to anyone and could not have looked anymore pissed off to see people. Sadly, the only good pic I got of JG was when he came out the same time as JD. So, JD plays this self important uncaring lawyer who is glued to his cell phone. Ironically, he was my favorite character of the lot, but perhaps that’s because that’s the industry I have lived in for the past 8 years and have seen a lot of “Alans” in my day. However, I must say he was my least favorite off stage. It’s like dude, get out of character and suck up 10 minutes of signing playbills and if you’re still “in character,” then think of it as doing the work that lawyers due, which is push paper. Anyway, I’m posting a picture of him that shows his general demeanor during the signing.

JD's general happy demeanor during the signing.

But go see God of Carnage, if you can! Tell Tony M. Madison sent ya. Bada-Bing!

Our fair city has been known as the Concrete Jungle, the Asphalt Jungle, and even the Lipstick Jungle. I still to this day do not understand why those yahoos at NBC canceled Lipstick Jungle, way to go geniuses, way to go. Cashmere Mafia was one thing, but Lipstick Jungle, you blew it dudes. Anyway, it’s not a stretch to say that the City can seem like a zoo. After all, who can begin to count the amount of crazy monkeys we’ve sat next to on the train, the irate apes we’ve dealt with at the office, or the grouchy grizzly bears that we can all be sans our morning cup, or two, of overpriced Starbucks cafe (sidebar, at $5 a pop, do you think they secretly slip a roofie of liquid crack in the Colombian blend? I’ve often wondered). Apart from movies and T.V. shows, even stores promote the image of New York being a city full of predators. A recent trip to the Alexis Bittar store, a jewelry store located in Soho, displayed a full grown adult male stuffed lion (pictured here, unfortunately not pictured are his majesty’s giant stuffed cojones that are still intact), which made me think that we New Yorkers are a competitive lot vying for precious resources, be it space, a rent stabilized apartment, a table at the newest hot spot, admission behind the velvet ropes, single straight emotionally available men (assuming they exist and aren’t some mythical urban legend), or the perfect pair of our favorite designer shoes or jeans at a sample sale in our size. Bottom line, it’s a jungle out there!

Even in its quieter moments, the City can at the very least seem like we’re all cooped up on an animal farm. Who hasn’t felt like cattle being herded into the corral while getting on and off the subway during rush hour? I particularly feel that way when I randomly find myself Uptown and walking off of the 86th Street station on the Lexington Avenue line, sometimes I feel like all that is missing is a lasso and a branding iron. Although I’m a fan of cowboys, I’m not the biggest fan of tattoos so I’m rather thankful that no cowboys are on the loose armed with branding irons. Although the Naked Cowboy in Times Square is a whole other story!

With friends in town from L.A. who had brought their 4 year old daughter, I thought it was the perfect opportunity to suggest a trip to the Bronx Zoo. At first, I was afraid that they would want to spend a larger part of the day there than I did, but I’ll be the first one to admit that I was like, “um, do you mind if we could also squeeze in seeing the tigers and the gorillas?” They almost had to restrain me from walking out with a stuffed animal at the gift shop. I’m surprised that I was so into it, having just gotten back from Africa and all, but the Bronx Zoo rocks! I’m ready to go back. Any takers?

For a smattering of what’s available at the Bronx Zoo, I’ve included my first youtube video. If you hold out and watch all the way through, you’ll see actual film footage at the end rather than still footage. It’s not Tribeca Film Festival worthy and I’m sure I won’t be winning any awards for cinematography anytime soon, but I hope you enjoy it and come with me on my next trip to the Bronx Zoo (it’s sure cheaper than a ticket to Africa).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uiiMbx_0oc

This weekend a college friend of mine, we’ll call her, “J,” was visiting me.  The weekend started out innocently enough.  We headed to the Boat Basin for lunch and then onto Central Park to enjoy the absolutely gorgeous New York summer like weather and the half naked men.  There was a little chillaxin time thrown in before we headed to dinner at Café Cluny in the West Village followed by stop offs at Waverly Inn, The Spotted Pig, Employees Only and Cabana (where the bouncer was sweet enough to let us cut the line…I’d like to think it’s because we were charming and beautiful, but it’s probably because he took pity on us since by that time our dogs were barking and we needed a cocktail and a seat). My goal was to take “J” to places known for celeb sightings, but we didn’t have any such luck. All in all a busy, but fun night and entirely on the up and up.

Today, however, was a bit of a different story.  Again, we were blessed with fantastic weather and “J” and I set off to meet “K” for brunch in Noho and shopping in Soho.  She had stated that she wanted to purchase um, a discounted “designer,” bag.  As any New Yorker knows rather than trying to locate Africans that are FOB (fresh of the boat) who walk around wheeling dollies loaded with giant boxes with blankets draped over them in midtown (seriously who are they kidding, everyone knows the boxes are filled with fake fendis), the natural choice would be to go to Chinatown and do business with the illegal FOB Chinese (I know this because I’ve spoken to people in the Chinese community who have told me that all your DVD sellers, your sellers of “Rolexes” and “Pradas” are illegals, but that’s a fascinating story for another time).  So, we knew we were going to have to make our way down to Chinatown post brunch. 

So, after popping into some art galleries and high end boutique jewelry store (BTW, what is up with Alexis Bittar’s current collection? Not a fan) and with “fakes” on the brain we just so happened to stumble upon Babeland and our search for “fakes” started a little earlier than anticipated, if you catch my drift single ladies (and ladies with crap boyfriends/husbands…hate to burst your bubble boys, but the consensus among ladies is you frequently don’t get the job done…someone had to say it).  For those of you not in the know Babeland is a special store for ladies in particular (I warned you this blog would at times be a bit “tawdry,” but I figure if Marie Claire can talk about Babeland so can I).  I will leave it at this to say that one product was apparently featured on Oprah (that shocked me…the $185 price tag was also a bit of a sticker shocker) and for those environmentalists out there who hug trees on Earth Day instead of loving the one you’re with, there are ecofriendly toys available for purchase (I kids you not)!  Since when are “good vibrations” bad for the environment?  I shudder to think what the Beach Boys would say.

Where it all began to get a little "seedy."

After spending sufficient time in Babeland largely getting a kick out of certain products and getting slapped around by “K” who kept testing out accessories on me by beating me with them (I’m amazed we weren’t kicked out), and trying to figure out what the point of some of them were, we headed down to Chinatown which is where the story gets interesting.  I’ve been down there thousands of times and have been approached and asked if I wanted to buy a bag, I never do, so I always say no.  Well since one of the members of our crew did, we said yes.  And although I’ve heard of the rumors of back rooms, false walls, and the like, I’ve never cared to explore them so I’ve never been seen them in action…that is until today when I became a passive observer of the criminal underworld.  I can confirm that the urban legends are no longer just legends, but will be forever legendary for the 3 of us.

So, at first we were approached by some guy who then radioed on his walkie talkie to his “business partner” and we were escorted to a van with tinted windows where a Chinese woman was sitting inside with lots of “product” and some odd power source for light (I think she had a battery for the sole purpose of hooking up this handyman’s type light).  We crawled into the van and she shut the door and locked it and gave us three stools to sit on (the proper seats had been removed so basically we were in the perfect child molesting kidnappers car).  Not being in the market for anything myself and along purely for the investigative journalist story potential and while the others were examining the merchandise, in the back of my head I was thinking, “ok this is how it happens…this is how we’re going to be sold into white slavery and end up on a slow boat to Moscow or some other European or Asian country where kiddie porn and S&M reign supreme and we’re spending the rest of our lives in the red light district getting addicted to heroin to get through the day and doing the “me love you long time” routine to married men there to support the sex tourism industry.  It’s a good thing we don’t have our passports on us.”

Luckily we got out alive and were quickly approached by someone else.  I should mention that this is a highly organized operation and they all communicate by walkie talkies and have look outs (I’ve heard they can shut down operations, i.e., hide the goods, quicker than you can say “does this say Prada or Prado?”).   Which begs the question do they ever have to say in Cantonese on their walkie talkies “can you hear me now?”  I have always thought the bag people and the DVD ladies were super easy to spot (it’s like spotting European tourists in Time Square or on Fifth Avenue, which is to say easy) so I’m not sure why the fuzz hasn’t put the kibosh on this with a sting operation, but who knows. 

Although we visited several shops three stick out in my mind.  One is literally in the subway system.  It’s behind a locked door (security is uber tight at these places). I wonder if the NYC transit authority knows this is going on. 

The second shop was a highly sophisticated outfit where we were passed off to various people via the walkie talkie system and walked about 5 minutes from our original location and were let into a locked store that was the money laundering “front” for the real money maker.  It totally looked legit.  It was a dress shop (kinda one of those everything is $15 and under shops)…the girl walked to the back of the wall where boxes of men’s shoes were located…selected one pair of men’s shoes and NO JOKE pressed a secret button in the shoes and a door opened.  I was like OMG, WTF, those are totally inspector gadget go-go gadget shoes!  I thought I imagined it but when we passed on the selection of the products and came out empty handed (a common theme of the day), another guy asked us if we wanted to see another room and he used the go-go gadget shoes too to get in.  Incroyable!

This was the closest I could get to go go gadget shoes.

The third store that stuck out in my head did so only because there was a sign that said “we are not responsible for lost or stolen articles. ”  I thought about writing graffiti style “no, but you sell them.”  I would’ve loved to have taken a picture of that, but I figured considering the circumstances they’d probably freak out if I whipped out my camera (these days I’m refusing to leave home without a camera). 

Anyway, no laws were broken as no purchases were made, but it was sure one heck of a fun day!  And to think the Italians were basically driven out of Little Italy as an effort to break up the mob only to be taken over by a highly sophisticated Chinese outfit.  Oh and if you don’t think there’s a Chinese mafia that exists then you need to google the deaths related to the rival el cheapo bus services from NY to Boston. 

So there you have it my first foray into the word of the Chinese underground.  

There are days when I wake up loving this city just a little more than I usually do.  It’s like when I wake up feeling like it’s Valentine’s Day and New York is my Valentine who just gave me a giant princess cut diamond engagement ring (btw feel free to tell my future finance that’s the kind of ring I want).  My mood rarely changes on these days, even when I have momentary lapses of rage like when I’m at work and there’s a 30-90 minute period of time where I could rip my hair out (or better yet someone else’s) because someone is moving too slowly or is being incompetent or is just generally grating on my frazzled New York nerves!  Today was one of those insanely lovely New York days where even though I hadn’t slept more than 4 hours in two days due to the not so pleasant sound of garbage trucks repeatedly visiting the business across the street from me at all hours of the night making it impossible to sleep (seriously Bloomberg where’s your noise violation citations now?). Side note, when I first moved into my apartment I had apartment rage after about 3 sleepless nights of hearing the garbage trucks.  On the third night I reached my breaking point and threw open my window at 3 a.m. and yelled like some psychopath “MUST YOU BLOODY DO THIS NOW?  EVERY FREAKING NIGHT YOU’RE HERE.  IT’S NOT HUMANE!”  Just like the Madagascar penguins, the garbage man’s attitude was all “smile and wave boys, smile and wave,” because he just looked at the lunatic leaning out of the second floor window and then smiled and waved.  

 So, after two restless nights, I was hopped up on coffee (I was practically freebasing the stuff at one point) and I was walking to work and passed by an AMC TV pilot being filmed called Rubicon.  Although it wasn’t like seeing Don Draper on set, I still thought to myself how cool it is to live here.  Sure, sometimes we get so used to seeing things filmed in New York that we’re like “whatever, I’m hungover and late for brunch, I don’t care,” but it’s one of the things I try to still enjoy and try not to be jaded about (I’ll save the jaded part for dating).

Flash forward to three cups of coffee later and I’m willing myself to go to an international pro bono event that I had been excited to attend.  I took the 4 train and expected to be in Grand Central in no time.  Au contraire…I didn’t step off the train until an hour later.   I “may” have dosed off for 5-10 minutes after the train conductor announced that we were stuck in pergatory, i.e., between 28th Street and 42nd due to a sick passenger on the train ahead of us.  My memory flashed to an A.M.NY article that claimed that a lot train delays due to sick passengers are a result of skinny girls who starve themselves and passout on trains.  It was dinner time.  You do the math!  I wanted to point out to anyone who would listen that I hadn’t slept in 2 days, but I wasn’t screaming for a medic?  But it’s NY and no one cares, which is one of this city’s greatest attributes and greatest downfalls.  So I decided to shut my eyes and took a nap and I was awoken to a panhandler’s Comedy Central stand up routine in which he was impersonating the train conductor’s sick passenger announcement and the sound that the train doors make when closing.   Then he started saying he needed money/food for his kids, you know, the typical New York panhandling subway spiel (there’s another woman who has been riding the Lex line for years and who uses different names, sometimes she’s Andrea, sometimes she’s Colleen, but she’s always a widow with two kids who recently lost her job and always has a better manicure than I do and who once had the chutzpah to ask me if I could give her dollars in exchange for her panhandled change.  Do I look like Chase Bank lady?).  But here’s where Mr. Comedy Central does a weird thing…he whips out a picture of his “dead wife” wrapped in a ziplock bag and says, “this is my wife…I spoke to her on the phone on Easter, she hung up the phone and dropped dead.  Right there…she dropped dead.” Almost in the same breath, he turns to some white girl who gave him money and said, “Thanks white lady…you’re not bad for a white woman…you and me could go out and maybe get married and then create another little Obama.” Letting the “not bad for a white woman” comment slide for a moment, um, I thought you were the grieving widower?   While he was emptying people’s pockets, the subway started to move and I started thanking Jesus for getting this show on the road because it was taking all I had not to jump off at Grand Central and hail a cab back home and crawl into bed.  Unfortunately, we move all of 30 feet before the conductor got on the horn again and said, “so, um, yeah, we had a sick passenger on one of the trains ahead of us at Grand Central…they took her off and then the train directly in front of us had a woman on it that had a seizure.”  There was about a 3 second pause and then the entire train started laughing.  I even said to the guy next to me, who by the way was laughing like Santa Claus with a bowl full of jelly, that it’s unfortunate and we shouldn’t laugh, but it was funny.  And I thought about how all type-A most of us here are and how we can’t stand delays and then something like that causes all of us heartless bastards to have a collective laugh because seriously, what are the odds?  

I caught the eye of this hot latin guy at the end of the car (I was mid-car so no chance of conversing) and we started smiling and holding eye contact longer than is appropriate and then played the eye looking game for the rest of the trip (kinda made me think of the Vince Vaughn, Owen Wilson Wedding Crashers church exchange about the, um, eye flirting).  When I exited the train at Grand Central I knew we would lock eyes again and when we did he waved bye.  I had considered staying on the train and continuing onto the UES with him, but that would’ve been awkward and stalkerish.  Side bar, I have got to come up with a plan of how to deal with these situations.  Maybe I’ll make up business cards to slip to hot guys like they do in the bars in the movies and say all sultry and suggestively, “call me.”  Speaking of movies, one thing that has bugged me is the filming of the first kiss between a couple…the “I’m not sure if we’re going to kiss, but we’ll both lean in and then pull out and lean in and pull out” kiss and then we’ll have the most amazing first kiss ever?  Has ANYONE ever had that happen?  I doubt it! It might be awkward and it might be bad, but it’s not that cliched first kiss thing.  Ok, off on a tangent again (sorry, lack of sleep)…so I got off at Grand Central and I ran smack dab into another camera crew.  It’s possible I’m going to end up in some random movie or tv show or SNL skit sometime in the future looking vaguely confused and extremely tired, but thankfully still tan. Anyway, moral of the story is even though it’s a chaotic and unpredictable place, there’s no place else I’d rather live.

I’ve come to realize that white people, aka “my people,” are kinda yawnsville.  Don’t get me wrong I love argyle, J.Crew, and Nantucket as much as the next white yuppie, but we, as a people, are un peu vanilla. And as much as I adore the J.Crew I-just-spent-the-day-at-the-country-club look, I couldn’t help but be hypnotized by the Indian Slumdog Millionaire dancers at the Oscars with their pretty saris swirling around (not to mention all of the colors in the movie itself).  I don’t care if the saris looked like someone went berserk with an infomercial bedazzled gun, after seeing the dancers I was ready to movie to Mumbai, give up eating cows for curry, and enroll in a Masala Bhangra dance class.  Jai Ho!  And not to mention, how has it NOT occurred to the American fashion industry that saris are THE BEST answer to having a “fat day.”  With a country full of fat people where the Biggest Looser is a hit show, I say Saris for everyone!  It’s the new moo-moo for this millennium.  Think about the kinda mileage you can get out them during the Holidays.  That’s my plan for an economic stimulus.

We already know that I love the latins, a love which I know is not necessarily shared by my people.  But dit-moi, how can you watch Vicky Cristina Barcelona and NOT think Penelope Cruise going loca isn’t, in some way, something that you secretly wish you could do because it’s just so damn sexy to see her and Javier Bardem argue in Spanish.  Doesn’t it sound so much more passionate in Spanish?  And btw, am I the only one who loves Penelope Cruise in Spanish movies, but not so much when it comes to movies in English?

However, despite my love for the latins and sari clad women, I sometimes wish I was an old black southern woman (“OBSW”).  I love them!  They know life’s struggles and ain’t nothing in this stage of their life that is going to phase them.  They know how to discern what’s really important and how to cut through the forest of unimportant B.S. that so many of us get hung up on.  These lovely senior ladies have a way of way of expressing themselves with their cute little sayings and their accents that makes it adorable even when one of them is dressing you down.

I was most recently reminded of my secret desire to be part of the OBSW club after “Smitty,” a security guard at one of my favorite stores, befriended me when I was stocking up on some basics for my solo African honeymoon. First of all can I just say what a cool nickname Smitty is?  I have 20 or so nicknames, but nothing comes close to being as cool as Smitty.  Smitty just sounds hardcore.

At first I thought Smitty was a bit of a nutter.  She started telling me about how when she meets a customer she doesn’t like she’ll imagine that while the “bad customer” is sleeping, she’s standing over them whispering in their ear telling them to stay away from her.  She’ convinced it works too as she’s never seen a “bad customer” back.  Then she told me that she had the gift of prophecy and various soothsayer-like things.  When she told me that I was thinking, “what kind of loon am I talking to?  This is way too New Orleans Madame LaVeau/Interview With a Vampire voodoo scene for me, but I better be nice to her because I don’t want any bad juju, especially when I’m heading to Africa and planning on meeting my future husband on my safari.”  However, after talking to her for over 20 minutes, I’m now convinced that my girl Smitty needs her own Daytime TV show.  I could totally see her telling whiney people from the burbs to stop complaining and get on with it!  Move over Dr. Phil, Mama Smitty is in town!

Picture the following monologue spoken with a charming southern accent when describing a mopey old customer who recently lost her brother (her accent was slightly stronger than Brad Pitt’s in the Curious Case of Benjamin Buttons.  Perhaps more akin to the older woman we see in the beginning of the movie), “I said to her, what you think you’re the only person to have lost someone? I’ve lost my muthah, my 2 bruthaahs and sistuh and my husband.  My husband died three years ago and still I haven’t found a man (pronounced like “maaaan”) that I so much as want to have a cup of MacDonald’s premium coffee with, but you don’t see me layin down and dyin do ya?  You think I’m going to let that botha me, I ain’t gonna let that botha me.  So I told her you can either be miserable and go jump in the grave with your brother and die or you can start living.”  I’m not quite sure Smitty knew that she was coming dangerously close to lifting the “get busy livin’ or get busy dying” line from Morgan Freeman’s character in Shawshank Redemption, but I felt inspired to get busy livin.  

So, in the words of my girl Smitty, start livin!

A thousand apologies for the lapse in time from my last post.  Sorting out my travel plans to what I’m terming my solo honeymoon has been more difficult than I initially anticipated, not the least of which involved the USPS nearly losing my passport en route to the Zambian embassy in DC and my near homicidal like rage over this (trust me my response wasn’t limited to a simple frustrated Seinfeldian “Newman”).  So, needless to say I was left with little time and inspiration to put pen to paper or in this case fingers to keyboard.  But on this Valentine’s Day, having furthered the cliché of what “white people” like (see http://stuffwhitepeoplelike.com/2008/01/23/19-travelling/ ) I feel inspired.

You may remember that when I last left you, I was in love with “Kenneth,” my sweet talkin South African travel agent based in New York.  I am sad to report that Kenneth is dead to me now.  Word of advice guys, if you say you’re going to call a girl and you have a “special plan” that she’ll “really like” and you never call, you risk banishment, or in this case loss of a great commission. No girl likes to sit by the phone, willing it to ring Kenneth, you cheeky git!  Kenneth lost out on mucho dinero by not calling me back, a fact which became painfully obvious as I signed off on the final total with a different travel agent (who yes I did facebook stalk) before ever stepping foot en Afrique.   However, I am able to justify my expenditure by realizing that while some people choose to have offspring, I travel.  And at the same time South Africa has been my dream destination for my honeymoon.  And not to go too negativo on the fat arrow carrying baby’s holiday, but who knows when that will ever happen, sooooo I’m taking myself on my own honeymoon.  Yes, you heard me!  Hear me now and believe me later, solo honeymoons will become the new black!

I’ll be traveling solo in Zambia, Zimbabwe, and on a safari in Kruger before hanging with a friend in Cape Town.  On my solo honeymoon portion of the trip, I’m hoping I’ll meet my future husband.  See here’s how the scenario plays out in my head, I’ll be enjoying an African sunset and a cocktail at the hotel bar in Joburg as Toto’s Africa song is playing softly in the background and I’ll happen to turn my head and I’ll notice him saunter in.  He’ll, of course, be tan and have that well manicured rugged look going on, the kind that can only be manufactured in that Out of Africa movie kinda way.  He’ll saddle up next to me at the bar and order some manly drink like an 18 year old single malt Scotch neat and strike up a conversation.  We’ll realize that we’re both going on the same safari the next day.  He’ll be in the ballpark of say 34-37, his name will be something like Jackson or Forrester or Vaughn and at some point in his life, like me, he will have been educated in Europe.   He’ll be ex-peace corps a/k/a a trustifarian (I have a theory that only affluent kids can afford to spend two years post-university kicking around third world countries) and after a brief stint in the corporate world he decided to return to doing international development work and has spent the last 10 years saving Gorillas in Uganda (a little Gorillas in the Mist anyone), digging wells in Rwanda (cuz it ain’t the Hotel California, it’s Hotel Rwanda), helping refugees in Darfur (Lost Boys of the Sudan, peut-être, I think my heart just skipped a beat), and teaching people how to cultivate their own maize in the Congo (come on shake your body, baby do that Conga).  He will have managed to do this while not turning into a dirty hippie. And maybe he’ll be a widow whose photojournalist wife died English Patient style while on assignment in Sierra Leone.  The widow thing adds a tragic element to his generally privileged life and shows that he’s not a commitment phobe, thereby preempting the question that my father asks me when I tell him about a guy, which goes something like, “well, if he’s so perfect, why isn’t he married by now?”  That’s Dad’s standard question as he’s uber suspicious of any man over 30 who is still single.  When I point out that I’m still single, he tells me that’s different because I was focused on higher education until I was 27.  Gotta love dad!  To his credit dad’s instincts have been spot on!  Anyway, Peace Corps boy and I will realize that we’re in love as we’re sitting around the boma after a solid day of game drives and we will quite literally drive off into the sunset.  Don’t you just hate me at how perfect my love affair with my future husband is going to be?

And now that I’m planning my solo honeymoon, I think it’s only fair that I register for it a la Carrie Bradshaw, don’t you?  I’m not above doing it, especially at this age!  After all in light of the amount I’ve had to dole out for engagement parties, bridal showers, weddings, and baby showers, I think it’s only right.  Oh, and here’s a news bulletin for those of you single and baby free, there is now something called “push presents,” which a new mother gets just for having the baby.  What kinda scam are you married and parental people running?  By my count that’s three presents for getting married and two for having kids and you’re going to begrudge this charmingly adorable well traveled single lady a gift for her solo honeymoon.  Communists!

So, be on the look out for my registry announcement. It’s coming to a mail box near vous!

Facebook, love it, hate it, but just like a marriage that is too difficult to leave, it’s here to stay, for better or worse.  First of all, let’s just get this question out of the way, am I the only one who looks at people from high school and wonders like a Grey’s Anatomy amnesia patient waking up for the first time, “who is that?”  I’ve squinted at the ½ x ½ pictures that are so small they make passport pictures look like 8 x 10s next to a name I don’t remember and tried to recall whether I once walked down the same hallowed halls as the mini person staring back at me.  Either they’re deliberately perpetrating a fraud and lying about going to my school or I’m looking at the warning signs of the early onset of Alzheimer’s.

Personally, I feel as though FB and I have had a whirlwind romance.  I loved FB at first, but like all relationships that start off well I’ve grown tired of some of its annoying habits.  You know things that were cute at first, but have started to annoy the living daylights out of me, not the least of which is I’m unable to stalk the one ex who I’m curious to know whatever happened to him and more importantly how the hussey he married is aging because he’s not on here.  Sigh.  And just between us, word on the street is the early 90s were her best years, but I ain’t one to gossip, so you didn’t hear that from me!

Nevertheless, Facebook is a cornucopia of information, which as a casual stalker, makes stalking, er, um black ops reconnaissance a lot easier.  I know friends who have unearthed hook ups, shack ups, break ups and the like via FB.  I know friends who have used FB to make their ex’s/people with whom their status is ambiguous a little jealous by having others penning intriguing “to be continued” cliff-hanger type wall posts (and in case you’re wondering it worked to their advantage).  For those of you Facebookers who claim you haven’t FB stalked, to you I say, “liar, liar, pants on fire,” or in the words of the father of my unstalkable ex, “tell the truth, shame the devil.”

I am surprised at the level of information that some people share, which is to say the airing of the dirty laundry, the likes of which is more appropriate for a Jerry Springer show or a bad country western song (seriously announcements of divorce proceedings or questions of paternity are more apropos for Maury or Springer.  Word of advice, if you can visualize hearing “go Jerry, go Jerry” being chanted in the background, then the content is probably not FB appropriate). I also don’t get the constant back and forth updating of the “relationship status” from things like “in a relationship,” to “it’s complicated.”  A) We’re not in the 8th grade.  At this point no relationship in our lives should be that volatile and B) What does that even mean?  If I’m dating someone and he posts an “it’s complicated” status, you can be bloody well sure it’s gonna require a five family sit down and it won’t be complicated for much longer.

My real beef with FB though is the posting of old high school pictures. Hello FB Powers that Be, I lived through high school once, I don’t need to keep reliving it!  How am I supposed to reinvent myself when I’ve got constant reminders popping up that there was a time in my life when I kept Aqua Net in business?!  Although at the time every high school girl’s M.O. was the higher the hair the better, I can confidently say I’m not particularly proud of the fact that at a certain point in my life I had 4 inch teased hair.  So, thanks, but no thanks, I’ll pass on the misty watered colored memories of the way we were.  If I knew that 15 years later someone would be populating cyberspace with unauthorized pictures over this thing called the Internet, I would’ve pulled a no-paparazzi-accused-convict-walking-to-the-courthouse-move and placed a hand in front of my 4 inch hair.  

In case you’re wondering, I blame Al Gore!  After all he did single handedly create the information super highway!  I’d like to romanticize my youth, but it’s very hard to do that Al when I’ve got a picture of me with giant highlighted hair and evidentiary proof that not only did I own a pair of Eastlands, but I wore them with…wait for it….white socks! I suppose I can thank the Heavenly Father that no one has started putting up pictures from the early 80s when neon reigned supreme.  FYI, before anyone gets any cute ideas, I consider such actions grounds for defriending. 

I suppose you could call me a bit of a hypocrite though because now after the repeated posting of pictures circa 1988-1993 on FB, if I see a picture in which I’m tagged and there are others in it who I know, I am dropping the tagging bombs like napalm over nam because if I’m going down then I’m taking everyone with me.

I feel a letter being penned to FB in the near future!  Until then, I’m going to claim that all pictures of me have been photoshopped and in the words of Shaggy, “it wasn’t me.”

After my last blog entry, a friend insisted that I visit Colombiancupid.com (a site that she “researched” before we headed off to Cartagena). I miss my UN diplomatic dating style of yore, so I decided to throw caution to the wind and logged on in the hopes of finding my media naranja (which for all you out there stuck in gringo land roughly translates into my other half, it’s a slang expression that’s all the rage in the Spanish speaking mundo).

Aye dios mio!  After reading some ads, I’m convinced I have a better chance of having a foreign affair at the International House of Pancakes or by way of celebrating the moments of my life with an international house coffee moment! I couldn’t help escape the feeling that I was dealing with some sort of illegal mail order bride scheme.  Take for instance Tony, who btw is “fond of Mexican food,” and prefers that his lady have “some spoken English.” I agree Tony, it helps if you both know the same language, it takes two to tango there papi.  My guess is the only Spanish Tony knows is chalupa.  The mail order bride feeling was further solidified when I noticed that they have English to Spanish translation software.  Proceed with caution amigos, things get lost in translation.  Just ask my Chilean friend Fernando, who wants “a sincere woman, that like him to do the sport, to have children and to do well together.”  WHAT does that even mean?

I was particularly unsettled by the fact that Jesus who is 41 and from Texas, not to be confused with Jesus 33 from Israel, is looking to marry someone young enough to be his daughter as he’s only interested in ladies who are 20-35.  And FYI, “Magic,” also a Texan, is “just as comfortable in shorts at the beach as in a tux at a formal.”  Really Magic?  Because I know that I’m sure as hell not as comfortable in a ball gown as I am in beachwear!   I mean does anyone in the movies ever say “let me slip into something more comfortable,” and don a tux?

29 year old Nicholas from Colombia (South Carolina that is), thinks he’s “very attractive” and is in search of a woman who is “good looking, hard working, and a giver.”  Can I get an amen from the ladies that it’s music to our ears when a man specifies that he wants a “giver”?  Reading between the lines here, Nico is looking for a maid or a sugar mamita who can afford one.

I suppose it’s not much of a shocker that the authentic and uber caliente Colombians live in Miami or nowheresville, FL.  The best looking one was 34 year old Juan from Miami who wants to date anything from a fetus (18…hola can someone say barely legal) to someone more age appropriate (37).   I’m tempted to ask What Would Jesus do in this situation, but I think we know (see Dallas Jesus above). Anyway, Juan is hot enough that I may be willing to overlook his potential pedophilia like tendencies. 

Perhaps my favorite posting was from Len in LA who writes, “Am I musical you ask? I can move a little bit. All my tan skinned friends steal my sh&t on the dance floor…it used to make me a little loco.”  Um, borderline racist profile!  And please no profanity, Juanes!

As of now, my best hope for global love is “Kenneth” my hot sounding and funny South African travel agent who I might use to book part of my SA trip.  I love him because he’s a straight shooting bloke who tells me what’s bollocks and what’s not.  Sorry Nico, but that’s the kinda man I like, one who takes care of ME, but at the same time doesn’t blow smoke u know where!  Seriously, the only smoke I want to see is the smoke billowing up from Victoria Falls.  Kenneth’s office is only two blocks away from mine so I might have to have an in-office consultation to discuss details.  He did suggest that I might enjoy having cocktails.  Ok, he said it in reference to the rest period on safari, but that’s a minor detail.

Maybe I will meet my international man of mystery in South Africa and be swept off my feet by his bastardized, yet irresistibly cute accent!  But seeing as how it has the highest HIV rate in the world, I think the only thing this Sheila will be kissing is my safari guide’s butt so as to ensure I don’t get eaten by a Lion.

Until then, I plan on doing my own “research” by going to rugby and cricket matches (btw, am I the only one who finds it extremely annoying that we’re the only former colony where those sports and high tea never caught on)?

It seems as of late, I’ve become a bit of a facebook junkie.  I blame the recession for my new heroin like Internet addiction.  With a slow down in the economy, I’m forced to find ways to entertain myself  to fill up my non-billable office face time.  So, one day when I was on facebook I saw an ad for a site called something like meetlatinopeople.com and I thought, hmm…I do love South Americans, Latins are romantic, and I do need to start something in the pipeline for Valentine’s Day since that chubby arrow carrying bastard seems to have missed archery shooting practice the last few years when it comes to me (thanks a lot Cupid).   And although I’ve dipped my toe into the match.com and eharmony dating pools on occasion those sites are dead to me.  So, I wondered if it would be kosher for me to sign up or if that would be the equivalent of a goy infiltrating Jdate.

I jokingly passed the site onto a few friends and asked for their input.  One of my girlfriends from the DC area encouraged me to go onto USmilitarysingle.com as “US MilitarySingles is where the real action is because the ratio of men to women is off the hook.”  As much as I love a man in uniform, I’ve had enough long distance relationships to last me the rest of ma vida.   I asked a married guy friend of mine who couldn’t get enough of the latinas back in his single days and loved to be called “papi” by his, um, lady friends for his opinion.  His first response was “wow-if that sight was up when I was single, I would’ve been on it! You should go for it!” 

So for giggles I decided to check it out.  I made a fake profile, i.e.,  just enough of one to allow me to browse the members.  Oy veh.   Where do I begin?  Como se dice, the site is mega B&T.  Where were the caliente Argentinian and Chilean men?  The guapo Cubanos and Colombianos?   Evidently still in South America.   And P.S. I wasn’t the only gringo/gringa on there trolling for hot latins.  Quelle suprise!  I question the ethnic background of those guys who claimed to be of “mixed race,” because they were mas blanco than I am so I decided that “mixed race” is code for white.  

One of my favorite cheesy ones was by a guy who claimed to be a doctor, but had one too many buttons undone on his shirt (btw, not sure which is worse…exposed chest shirt guy or naked picture guy,  you know the ones where a guy is in his boxers showing off his “awesome bod” by taking a picture of his reflection in a bathroom mirror).   Somehow I’d love to tell guys like that to “button it up paco, if we want to know what’s under there, we know how to find out, no need to flaunt it for us or draw us a map!”   Another favorite of mine was by a guy who must’ve been using a tripod on a timer to take his picture because he was taking pictures in front of a bed where someone else was sleeping!  I could tell that he was using  time delay because the person who was asleep had changed sleeping positions.  C.R.E.E.P.Y.!  My all time favorite though was the drag queen’s profile.   I think that one is pretty self-explanatory.

Needless to say, if I want Latin love then I’ll either book a flight to South America or Miami or at the very least listen to a Juanes C.D.