Chapter 1: The Aspiring Author

One of the great and interesting differences between the sexes is the phenomenon of the birthday. Women take pride in knowing each others’ birthdays, creating surprises, and giving gifts that are not alcoholic beverages and thus inappropriate for celebration, no matter how allegedly thoughtful they may be. Men find it incredibly important to honor another man’s birthday, but categorically refuse to remember exactly when it occurs, unless it is a holiday you already remember, like your own birthday. They can usually narrow it down to a season, and good friends who have known each other for many years can eventually develop a sense for the month.
Recently, I began to sense that my long time teammate Staunton was approaching his birthday, and along with Young Lad endeavored to celebrate it with him on the Saturday nearest to what we guessed the actual date might be. Young Lad was placed in charge of planning the event, and took the process exactly as far as “We’ll start drinking at our place” and then invited his friend Doc Martin -- the last living artifact of the era Kurt Cobain still roamed the earth -- over to make sure there were enough men in attendance to play a proper game of beirut. After several rounds and a unnecessarily long discussion of where we should go out that evening, Thaddeus, Staunton, and Young Lad gave into the wishes of Doc Martin and agreed go to a night club featuring light effects, bottle service, floor space dedicated to dancing, and music defined by a rhythmic baseline, memorable portions of other better songs, and scratching sounds. By even suggesting what would soon prove to be the among the worst places in the county to actually meet and talk with women who have a modicum of self esteem, Doc Martin had set into motion a chain of events that could only produce one inevitable result: “Let’s just go to The Club.” Young Lad made the arrangements, I called the cab and began rationalizing what I knew was a bad decision by reminding myself that Staunton needed and deserved boobs in his face since it was, in fact, reasonably close to his birthday.
After travelling a few more abusive miles in the back of a mustard yellow Ford Windstar that had already seen hundreds of thousands, we arrived at our destination. We were greeted like kings by a harem of beautiful but classless women before being reminded by a man who could not fit a belt around his neck that he would need to see our IDs, and to please not forget about the cover charge which would provide our group the opportunity to pay three dollars for water, six dollars for domestic beers, and twenty dollars for blue balls. Young Lad selected a table close to the stage and the bar so that Staunton might better be able to see and drink despite the cumulative affects of both alcohol and time making his head heavy. Several dancers approached our table and offered an enhance our experience at The Club, Staunton accepting on my behalf, while I declined them all until a nice looking young lady approached the table wearing the tattered remnants of clothes that when new would have made a pirate hooker blush and jumped into my lap without so much as a handshake or an introduction.
“I’ve had the worst day and I just want to sit down,” she began. Since it is a well known fact that clear heals provide very little arch support, I decided to do the best thing I could for my new friend and let her rest on top of me in while I engaged her in what I assumed would be innocuous conversation. I asked about her dog, drunkenly guessing that all strippers must have or want dogs. Jackpot! I had found a subject that seemed to cheer her up, but quickly lost control of the conversation as it meandered through innumerable, insufferable subjects before arriving inexplicably on the literature of Ayn Rand. Much to my own amazement, I was discussing the lack of practical applications for Objectivism in every day life with a woman who chose to earn at least part of her living by willingly being objectified (John Galt would be proud). I was so enthralled that I did not even respond to “Atlas Shrugged changed my life” with an appropriately snarky comment; so much so that I actually asked for a way to reach her outside of her work in order to continue the conversation. She obliged. For free.
Staunton, Young Lad, and I arrived home, having long since lost Doc Martin to a girlfriend who thinks seeing other women dancing for money is inappropriate but still allows him to use the internet. I decided that before going to bed, I would test out this new number in my phone by calling, only to resume my earlier conversation about favorite books, favorite authors, and eventually my new friend’s ambitious undertaking of a novel of her own. The Aspiring Author had chosen me, out of all the intelligent and trustworthy men she had met through her line of work, to open up to, and told me that she wanted my feedback on her masterpiece before shopping it around to publishers. Never in my life have I been more flattered while stifling a laugh. I cannot wait to see the Author again to get a copy of her work, and I have already started guessing at the title of her semi-autobiographical, future best seller.
Fingers crossed for Love in the Time of Gonorrhea.

Prologue

Even numbered years have always been good for me; I graduated on an even year, learned to drive on an even year, my brother is getting married on an even day of an even month of an even year, etc. So I am going into 2010 with high hopes and unique quest: to stay out of any serious, committed, exclusive, or involved relationship for the entire calendar year. Few would imagine this to be a challenge worth documenting, but as a recently self diagnosed, love sick, chronic serial dater, the events of the coming year could be interesting and certainly should be entertaining, and will be the singular purpose of what is written here. I intend for the next three hundred and sixty five days to be a time of philosophical introspection and personal growth, not simply chasing indiscriminate women. At least not entirely. I want to leave behind my unabashed poondoggery in favor of a more cultivated and sophisticated taste. Unless she’s hot or Native American or something kinda cool and exotic like that.

What follows is the collection of the Misadventures of the willfully single narrator, Thaddeus, and his close friend, token sidekick, sometimes caddy, and constant wingman Young Lad. Like the two main characters, anyone included in the stories here will be given appropriate pseudonyms to mask their identity for their own innocence (or lack thereof). Destinations and locations will be intentionally obfuscated and many pertinent details will be intentionally omitted or preemptively forgotten due to the influence of alcohol. Also, I am allowing myself some degree of poetic license to keep things entertaining and anonymous. The spirit of this public journal is entirely in jest and hopefully uplifting, and so in that spirit, I implore anyone commenting here keep to my same standards of anonymity and show just a little decorum. Of course I do expect people to uncover their secret identities and take some offense to what is written here, and I apologize now in advance and probably never will again.