Moment Magnitude

Memoir is Faulty

My memory is faulty. I have written that before. I have said it out loud too.

As anyone knows from watching any of the myriad police procedurals on television (whether filmed entertainment or "reality"), eyewitness accounts are unreliable.

And then there's James Frey. Poor James Frey. Right. I haven't read A Million Little Pieces. But I have read some of the sturm und drang swirling around the many fictitious accounts he set forth as part of his monster-selling memoir.

I wonder, has anyone checked The Smoking Gun - the on-line outfit that "outed" Frey's lies? How straight up and honest are they? How accurate are their sources? True, they collect all sorts of "official" documents, but I am a skeptical reader. Hmmm...

And then there's Oprah. She gave him a good tongue lashing. And to Frey's publisher too, Nan A. Talese (musn't omit her middle initial). I sit on the German Book Office advisory board with the eminent Ms. Talese, although she has not attended any meetings in the last two years. She came once, though. Tall, imperious (to me), I remember that she aspirated her vowels.

I saw her more recently, at a distance, at The Moth Ball, accompanying her husband - okay, the genius author, Gay.

But basta, as my nonnas might say.

Last Saturday night, the gang was out party-hopping, night-crawling. I caught Liz Taylor Jr. at Moomia, sporting her brilliant, new Jimmy Choo handbag. Yes, it did smell good. Better, almost than that new car smell.

I chatted with Surfer Girl, mobile-to-mobile, before heading to Moomia, expecting to catch up with her irascible self through the course of the night. That was not to be.

Liz Jr. dashed out after a couple of hours at Moomia, I thought to meet up with Surfer Girl and head up to Pacha. I went to Pacha - god, I hate that place - I vow never to go into that cavernous, dark, grotesque, "fun house" again.

Surfer Girl and Liz Jr. were nowhere to be found - as I if could have spied them in that miasma.

The next morning, after I inquired, they each sent me emailed missives about their shenanigans that night. Mind you, they were together. Here is what each wrote:

First, from Surfer Girl:

Dear Hooker, old buddy of mine,

My best friend and her husband decided to hang in the city for a while after the hockey game, so after dinner, I ran up to meet them and talk them into staying in for the night at my place.

We met Liz Jr., and the boys at 007 (never heard of it) around 11 p.m. It was packed, so we went to Pastis. As we were walking, we ran into Liz Jr's friend, the UK-Guy, and his friend, Cute-Guy. As we were now one big happy group, we stormed Pastis and took over. Three drinks later, we went off to Cielo. At four in the morning we were getting kicked out, but none of us were ready to be done with the evening. At the corner, we ran into guys handing out fliers for an after-hours club.

The six of us jumped into a limo, and off we went. Half of us dropped out. I made out with Cute-Guy at one point in the club. I might hang out with him this weekend. I would have brought him home, but my friend (see start) was staying over.

Cute-Guy had to take the train back home to Princeton, and it was about eight a.m. by then. The three of us who were left stayed to dance some more, watch the freak show, until ten a.m., or something like that. So yesterday, my friend and I lounged all day and into the night, watching movies on the television, smoking ciggies, and drinking Gatorade.

Now, what I want to know is: What happened to Surfer Girl's friend's husband? And who the hell is this Cute-Guy with whom she was snogging?

Second version, from Liz Taylor, Jr.:

Honestly. It started as an innocent dinner at Giorgione 508. We came to meet you (at Moomia), but when we got there, the place wasn't hoppin'. I was ready to leave when you arrived - and I had to meet up with Surfer Girl who had just left to get her girlfriend and her husband.

We went to Double Seven (Oh, that place - now I get it) still cannot find info on the place). They were full to capacity and didn't let us in. So we walk down the street and guess who I bump into? My heart was pounding, I lost equilibrium, and didn't know what to do: it was no less than UK-Guy (Liz Jr. had gone on a couple of dates with him - so far).

Surfer Girl "jumps" all over him, introduces herself to his friend Cute-Guy, and off we go to Pastis. But there is a line stretching around the corner. I walk up to the front and get everyone in - because "I'm good like that." But I got into trouble  because Surfer Girl made a drunken scene at the door. Chris, the bouncer came over to me. "Girl, you can't do this." So I looked like the asshole.

No matter. Surfer Girl asks UK-Guy for his Black Amex and gets the tab started. We had a great time. Some dirty old man hit on me, and UK-Guy rescued me, taking my hand, and going for a little public display of affection. I'm not one to kiss on the street, much less in a bar, and much less at Pastis.

We got kicked out of Pastis (I'm assuming it was closing time), then went to Cielo, had a little dance-off, more kissing, and got kicked out of there too (closing time too). Stranded on the sidewalk, someone handed us dinky fliers for an after-hours club. A ghetto stretch limo pulls up, and we in we hop - off to another club. Don't even ask me what time it was, it's a blur.

We arrived to a smelly, dark, $30-cover charge of a place. They served no liquor, what? Next time, I'll carry a flask or a bottle of Veuve in my new, bright orange purse.

We grab a couple of Red Bulls and bottled water and watch the people: gays, lesbians, young and old, ghetto peeps, yoyo's, Chicanos, Jerseys - name 'em and they were there, dancing to most ridiculous music. I guess it made sense to them, probably they were all on drugs.

I checked my watch. It was 6:30 a.m. I had a meeting that same day. UK-Guy walked me to a cab and sent me home.

Surfer Girl and her friend stayed. I found out later that they left the club at 11 a.m.

So: Close, but not identical accounts. I believe everyone survived to live another day. Another day in the city.

For a quality memoir, stop muck-raking about and read this one: Ann Marlowe's just released The Book of Trouble: A Romance.

Surfer Girl's Discontent

Surfer Girl Serialized. And conversationalized.

PART TWO.

After a long evening at Employees Only, December 12, 2005, celebrating Liz Taylor Jr.’s birthday, she wrote.

December 13.

Okay, first of all. You are hilarious. And who knew that dirt weed could be so good. I know there is documentation (see photo) of just how good it was last night. My last memory was you and me on the bar stool cracking up over nothing. Or was there something? Who cares. It was funny.

Whatever it was. In a world full of crime and hate, I am innocent. I swear I am. Catholic school girls are good girls.

I think I am EWI right now, that is emailing while intoxicated. My walk from Starbucks to work was quite sobering since it is fucking tundra weather outside. Don’t go outside today if you don’t have to. Don’t go.

Write when you wake up, you dirty rotten stay-out.

December 13. I popped a response.

Jeezus-H. Can you say wicked stoned? That fellow sitting next to me? George? George who? Time stopped. All I saw was you. It felt like we were eyeball-to-eyeball for hours. The bed was spinning by the time I got in it. And I awoke at the crack of 1 p.m. Nice.

I’ll be up all night catching up writing. I cannot fathom how you made it to work today.

Fucking penance. And fuck that.

We'll have to try to be mellow-er next time. Right.

December 15.

Next time we hang, I have to tell you about my baby-jesus stealing fetish. I am craving it right now.

December 15.

(Me:) One of my Los Angeles gal pals, visiting me years ago, thought we should remove all the baby-jesuses out of the yard crèches – and replace them with…yams. In Cliffside Park. Can you even? I am so game for your fetish. Hit me with your rhythm stick.

December 30.

While I was in my hometown of Middletown, on xmas eve, I drove by my old church (the fucking cult hell-hole that it is) because I wanted to steal their baby-jesus. To me, this would be the greatest baby-jesus theft of all time, since those Catholic fuckers owe me for a lifetime of guilt with which they cursed me.

Mind you, I had to give some homeless woman money the other night because I needed some advance karma. Like when I saved three turtles’ lives on Dune Road last summer on my way to surf, just so I could be a super bitch to idiots that tried to pick me up. Dude, if they were hot, there would be no questions asked, but apparently I have this idiot-hit-on-me switch that I can’t seem to turn off.

So anyway, back to stealing the baby-jesus. I parked my car in the lot of my old Catholic grammar school, St Mary’s (what a fitting name) because there are gigantic pine bushes to hide my XTC-Terra from the road. I ran across the street and ditched in the woods to back-door the manger.

No. Seriously, I am not even kidding about this shit. I am thirty-three years old. Had I been busted, my parents would have laughed the rest of their lives away.

There I am, I was doing my best ninja impression, sneaking up on that manger, when I freak. Some guy was sitting in a car in the parking lot. Now of course, I think this guy is watching the manger for sick demented fucks like me, but then I think it was some priest getting his xmas blowjob by some slutty altar boy.

I dropped down and did my squirrel impression and froze there for a good five minutes behind a tree. Anyway, my xmas was ruined because when I looked, I saw that the motherfuckers wired all the statues to a tree behind the nativity. I was pissed. Next year I am going in with wire cutters and baby-jesus will join us for next year’s parties. I promise.

From an (earlier) November response, more appropriate here.  (Remember? Because I get to, dammit.).

Right of Catholic school passage (Middletown? Mater Dei? I was a wannabe-slut at St. John Villa in Staten Island, yo). You are almost duty-bound to steal a baby-jesus from a crèche, for chrissakes.

Back to December 30. That day was rich and rife.

Deep thoughts by Surfer Girl. A cat always falls on its feet and when you drop a slice of peanut-buttered bread, it always falls peanut-butter-side-down on the floor.

If I stapled a slice of peanut-buttered bread on a cat’s back, and threw pussy out the window of a fifteen-story building, which side would it land on? Pussy’s feet – or – peanut-buttered bread?

I will lose sleep if I don’t find the answer. Must try this tonight after I find a kitty in my ‘hood.

December 30.

I live with two fifteen-plus-year-old cats (at the time I did, alas). Don’t.

Try a Paris Hilton lap rat instead.

Four Eyes

I got this one at The Gym.

I was bent forward over my outstretched legs, mid-way through Pilates, which I do solo, no equipment (that contraption called "the reformer" makes me think of nuns and noogies, no thanks), just me, self-taught, three years now, learned further from the remastered DVDs of the 1970s black-and white series. Pretty hardcore, pun intended.

I heard an "oomph," and looked over to see Baby Girl plop down on her tight bottom, her hair pulled back, something tied around her head, a thick thread, maybe, to keep sweat from dripping into her eyes.

She looked up, recognized me right away, and smiled.

"Girl." She said it with two syllables. "Gur-rul."

"What're you doing?" I asked her. "Working out for three hours straight for eight days in a row, like you do? And then get sick with a cold? Again?"

"Dude." She wiggled close to me and dropped her voice. "I have to tell you something."

She spread her legs apart, as if to stretch her inner thighs, but instead explained that he had bruising on both. On the inner thighs. She didn't have rough sex recently, no. But vigorous sex, yes, with a super-fit fellow, who apparently could either pound away for an hour and a half (all I could think of was the first degree burn, and the boredom) or do it while maintaining a squat position for the same amount of time, almost. Something about on a sofa, on it, but not quite.

Okay, I thought. Sex in your twenties. Baby Girl is doing what makes sense, working it out, going for it, moving it through her system.

But then she edged closer and whispered.

"We were at this apartment. He was dog sitting. And the owners, well, I think they trained their dog. 'Cause we got into it again. And he was doing his business. Down there."

"You mean the human was going down on you." I wanted to make sure I understood her right.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah. But then, I felt something else. Like on my butt. More licking. And then I looked up. And two sets of eyes looked up at me. But one was the dog! And the dog had those buggy-eyes, you know? The ones that stick out, that bulge out, you know?"

"Stick out?" I asked. "Was the dog sort of small?"

"A little. Maybe medium." And she approximated his size - the dog's - with her hands.

"Long hair or short hair?

"Medium?"

"Sounds like a Pekingese. Or a French Bulldog. But they have short hair."

"Yeah. I don't know. But anyway. That dog. It was licking me! I think the owners trained it. You know, to participate..."

"Oh no. The poor animal."

"I don't think so. Later that night, in bed, that dog came up on me, and you know, kind of humped me."

"No." My laugh contained a hint of pain, sympathetic anguish for the poor dumb beast.

But then Baby Girl and I looked at each other. Our eyes grew wider. Yep, two sets. And we doubled over and laughed. Laughing Pilates. A double workout for the core.

Surfer Girl Serialized

The following ‘graphs comprise extracts from email exchanges I have had with Surfer Girl. I have taken liberties. I will hear no end to it, But I am going in, hell be damned.

I have edited the extracts. I have added annotations and the odd riposte as I see fit. Because, Surfer Girl, this is my sandbox. But I relinquish it, in part, because you have made me laugh so hard, so hard that I wheeze, snortle, weep, and sometimes run to the loo. Yes I do.

Abandon all faith ye who enter here.

PART ONE: THE SET-UP.

It begins, as far as I’ve saved it, in early November 2005. Deep breath, dive, dive, dive.

November 9.

Aloha Holly,

Liz Taylor, Jr. told me you were asking about me last night at the Frenchtuesdays party. I feel so touched and warm inside to be adored by my numerous fans. I am so sorry not to grace you with my presence and make you laugh as I do. I am still in shock that Comedy Central has not contacted me yet to do my own show…but any day now. So anyway, we are all going out for drinks and bitch-bonding next week. I have your cell and contact info, so one of us will call you. It will be good times. See you next week (phone number redacted.) Feel free to drunk dial anytime or to schedule a wake-up call.

November 14.

I was so hungover on Sunday that I drank a 24-ounce Corona like the lady that I am and passed out by three p.m. I finally awoke from my hangover slumber at 7:45 this morning. My parents would be so proud of me. I am NEVER drinking again…until Wednesday.

November 14.

Okay, Hooker (Surfer Girl took to calling me that, a reference to my thigh-high, neoprene-lined, stiletto-heeled boots),

I just put my name and Liz’s on the guest list for that party Wednesday (The New York Observer gig at Cain) so we will meet you there. Uhhhhh, the performing artist, Rob, looks hot. I think I might have to give him a lap dance while he’s playing. Would that be inappropriate behavior?

To which I responded, “Not if I get to him first.”

And then, “I accept your challenge. This means war, woman!!!” 

She continued: My mission for tomorrow night is to find out the piano player's sexual preference. I could care less if he's married. He looks very well-kept, which sometimes means "gay" in this city. If he has a wife, Liz, you are going to distract that bitch while I go in for the kill. Holly, if I see you going for him first, do not be surprised if I tackle you in the middle of this shindig. Let the games begin!

But I caved, “Take piano-boy. I can find me others.”

November 15.

Holly, you quitter! I can't believe you just handed the piano boy to me...he's probably gay anyway. Okay, we will all join forces and start the sexual justice league. Headquarters will be at Pastis, where I will install a red sex phone for when the City needs our services. Instead of fighting crime, we will fight abstinence. I am going home early to work on my latex superhero costume, with cape, of course. Some of my super powers will include: flying, x-ray vision, invisibility, transformation, and palm-reading. Liz, why don't you start designing my comic book? Holly, you write it. And L-Diva,help me design my costume. I am quitting my job today. I think this is my new calling in life. I have had it with this five-day work week crap anyway.

November 22.

(The Frenchtuesdays event that night was pending at Duvet.)

Dear Holly or Hooker or whatever your porn name is, I am definitely attending the party this evening. Liz will join us later, after the U2 concert. I will show up around eight-ish to play with you and meet your brother-buddy (The Savior). I am going to the East End, Friday afternoon, but I have to go to New Jersey either tomorrow night or Thursday morning for Thanksgiving with the family. Are you going to be out east this weekend or is the car still sick?

My response: The car should be zoomable (and baby does rrrrzoooom).

November 23.

I had such a great time with your "bro," and all of your other friends. You are hilarious, but we knew that already. Okay, sister, I will call you Friday early afternoon on my way out to the beach. We must all debacle (since when is debacle a verb, I wonder) together and you should come and meet some of the local surfers. Oh, by the way, Liz and three of her friends from the Dominican Republic showed up after U2. We partied some more at Duvet, and then went to PM. I left at four a.m., and I am now designing drunk, at the office. Oh well.

(More to come...)

Ciao Roma

I deleted Il Romano's number from my phone. That's the sure sign it's over. My habits are environmental. If it's there, if it's available, I'll indulge. So I delete. In a weak moment, I cannot scroll down and press "call."

La Latina said during our last Girls Night In, "When make-up sex sucks, you know it's over."

I didn't get that far with Il Romano. My choice. He pursued for a couple of days, maybe a week, and in that time, he was unabashed. He swooped in, hands all over me, kisses, (vain) promises. The attention was nice, the back-body rubs better, but I didn't feel it. We never had actual mons-to-mons sex. To which I admit: good for me.

A funny thing happens to me after I have lip-smacking, bone-numbing, mind-altering sex. My agent's partner, after she read a passage that described the same (in my fledgling, yet unborn fiction), not only averred, but insisted on scientific evidence that supports a fundamental change in a woman's neuro-chemistry once she's had mind-body-boggling sex. Hormones, endorphins, I don't know. I haven't done any research - yet.

But how else can I explain the onset of fuzz that clouds otherwise very smart women's brains - after they have had that kind of earth-shattering sex?   

"Why does sex make me stupid?" One my girls asked me. "I mean, why would I look at the guy, look at everything he does, everything, and think it is just so fabulous? Just because we had great sex?"

I didn't interrupt.

"I mean I say the stupidest things, like, 'Look at the way he ties his shoes! No one ties his shoes the way he does. He ties his shoes, wow! So cool.'"

At which point, I stopped and stared at her, waiting for her then-glazed eyes to refocus on the here and now.

I said, "Well, sometimes, I'd rather talk to my shoes." She snapped out of her fugue. She laughed. She knew what I meant.

Sometimes, when I am out and about, engaging in cocktail chit-chat at some function or other, it occurs to me that the person to whom I am listening is less interesting than my shoes. In fairness, I have some pretty, interesting shoes.

La Fete du Jour

How's this for guts? This is a photo I received today. Yes, me, taken maybe seventeen or eighteen years ago.

Today is my birthday. There, I wrote it. I'm not big on my birthday. I prefer lower-key dinners or drinks, that begin after this date, January 19, and stretch for a week or so afterward.

One birthday, it may have been 1991, I was visiting a New York girlfriend who at the time, lived in the hills of Berkeley, CA. I took her dog and went for a hike up on one of those magnificent parks, but not before the phone rang. It was Mom, singing Happy Birthday, as she does every year. But I had forgotten it was my birthday.

I prefer to celebrate others' birthdays.

Still, I know that my friends want to acknowledge the date of my birth. And last week, a stylish woman I know sent me the following:

       One Word Description: Describe me in one word. Just one word. Send it to me only.Then send this message to your friends and see how many strange things people say about you.

I indulged. It seems appropriate for a birthday. I sent it to some forty individuals, from closest friends to strong acquaintances, with pointed inclusions and notable exceptions. The response rate was close to fifty percent, so I figure I did as well as a presidential election. Only about half of the American population shows up to vote for president, right?

Here they are. I've taken authorial liberty and added annotations. Because, after all, it is my birthday.

Sharp! (From one of my girlfriends in Boulder, CO, exclamation point un-redacted.)

Sophisticated (I got this one twice, from gals in the NYC coterie.)

Volcanic (From a girlfriend I know when we both worked at Columbia U.)

Dynamic (Another from the coterie.)

Vivacious! (Cousin T. He added: Joyously unrestrained. Oh my.)

Energeticupbeatwittyrealisticcreativeintelligentfriend (Can you tell this author is a downtown artiste-type? Brava.)

Pistol (From one of my girlfriends in science. I want to say "science" the way Thomas Dolby did on his single, She Blinded Me with Science.)

Intelligent (Ah, this from the top production editor with whom I worked during that Colorado stint. The "one word" I gave her in return is "heart.")

"Sociodextrous" (Quotes and all, a well-crafted "word." From a well crafted source, who provided an ad hoc definition: as in skillfully deft in any social environment. Bravo.)

Catty (Ooh la-la, this one from a Frenchman.)

Novel (From an Americaine writer in Paris.)

Confident (From one of the L'Acajou habituees. Alas, it closed.)

Clever (L-Diva.)

Intriguing (Hot Momma.)

Protective (La Latina.)

Animated (Another from our L'Acajou days. Sigh.)

Bleu (This is strong, from my sort-of mentor on the Front Range. My "one word" response for her is "challenge.")

Magnetic (The Voice of Reason, she followed up, and added: Unique and Extraordinary.)

Sagacious (The coterie again.)

Impossible (GV Wonder. Suck it up!)

Remarkable (My one and only friend from high school, yep: Monmouth Regional High School in Tinton Falls, New Jersey, Exit 105 off the Garden State Parkway. She's remarkable.)

Brilliant and Intelligent (Datomantrix.)

Bubbly (The coterie.)

Self-actualized (From another of the gals in Boulder, a good one, since I often josh that we Manhattan women are not allowed to live here unless we possess the following: a wardrobe whose main "color" is black, a cat, and a therapist.)

Cocktails later today? Maybe. Or not. I'll see where the day takes me.

It's winter in New York. Winter shots, au courant. Voila.

         

Joyeuse fete, peut etre.

Nice and Easy

Frenchtuesdays, a Members Only - and a guest - event last night at Fizz.

Jean Phillipe and I cabbed up ensemble. Funny, when we arrived at the entry to the throng-filled, main rooom, for a second, or maybe two, everyone paused, and looked at us. I almost struck a pose, but instead, scanned and made eye contact with friends, then began the greet and kiss routine. I found that I couldn't take five steps without air-kissing an acquaintance.

The evening turned out to be, in the simplest of words, "nice." I experienced no stress (no lifeline requirements), no trepidation (no exes), and no expectations (not seeking right now, thanks). Just nice.

Quick catch-up with some of my girls. A hero. Surfer Girl agreed to do a first-pass logo for the NYC-based, film company-partnership I'm starting, with, well, a partner (!). Well holy shit.

Last weekend, Surfer Girl was getting lah-di-dah, body treatments at Gurneys, in Montauk, when she and a friend decided to drive up - ferry across to Shelter Island, then Greenport, then Orient Point, then across the Long Island Sound, then drive - to Foxwoods Casino in Connecticut. Last Saturday evening, wicked weather forced a steep temperature drop, an icy freeze-over, wind, and snow. The following day, a balmy ten degrees Fahrenheit, they zipped back down to the East End. Now that's balls.

The male-half of a new romance I've watched develop sat down and told me all about his new-found love. It sounds right, it looks right, and it is filled with hope and optimism. Simplicity. Just...nice.

Of course, I wore my thigh-high, high-heeled boots. My winter, stepping-out footwear, they are neoprene lined. Too cool. Or, in truth, toasty. And my higher, thigh-high, python-print stockings. Yowzah. Nice, and not so, at the same time.

Music, dancing, laughter, we called it a night at midnight.

Simple. Easy. Sometimes, that's just enough, that's just right.

(Then GV Wonder writes to say I should add a link to a website - which I hope does not exist - called www.mydaughterisfuckingabigblackgorilla.com to drive traffic here, to Moment Magnitude. Consider this a test.)

Scratch the Surface

Just another night out in Manhattan.

January fifth, Prima Downhill asked me to join her at First Thursdays, the drink-em-up for the Vermont ski crowd (not to be confused with Frenchtuesdays), this time held at Bogart's, an after-work booze joint on 39th and Park Avenue South. I rallied. And I don't ski.

Most of the flu symptoms subsided, and I knew that several of my girls, and a couple of heroes would be there. I opted to walk, since I hadn't had the stamina to hit the gym in a couple of weeks. Yes, that damned bug was nasty and pernicious.

Bogart's is located on a glass-enclosed corner, tough to miss, smokers milling outside the main door, the requisite hulk of a bouncer keeping a weather-eye. I took a deep breath, exhaled through the cigarette smoke, and pushed through the glass door. Here I go again, I thought.

The place was jammed, patrons and waitstaff alike punching hockey elbows through the throng. Surfer Girl and Liz Taylor, Jr. stood on one side of the center, circular bar, in their own nook. I bee-lined. Idle chit-chat, checked the available talent. Nothing spectacular.

The Lieutenant Commander swooped in, right away making comfortable, easy, and familiar patter. Then, at some point, after some friends left while others hovered, a tall, attractive, age-appropriate, slightly-silvered, animated fellow and I started to chat. Okay, flirt.

A proverb I found once in a Chinese fortune cookie read, "Scratch the surface of a man, and you will find a book."

We got into it, so much so that some of the core-corps tried to interject, only to given the raised index finger: "Wait. Wait one minute (or ten, or more)."

Here is an outline of his narrative, not Roman, more modified-Arabic:

1. He works for Metropolitan Transit Authority. Uh-oh. Not a popular bunch after the local Transit Workers Union strike last month.

2. He claimed he was trained as a rocket scientist. Not exactly, I discovered. He has a masters in aerospace engineering. I modified Senator Lloyd Bentsen's line when he debated Dan Quayle, "I know rocket scientists, sir. And you are no rocket scientist." In truth, I do know rocket scientists: astrophysicists, theoretical, and experimental physicists. But that's another story for another time.

3. He's working on a fledgling side career as a stand-up comic. He was handing out fliers for his next gig.

4. He skis Vermont, needed a ride, and doesn't drive standard. No stick.

5. He went to Monsignor Farrel High School in Staten Island. Aha! I started secondary in Staten Island at Saint John Villa High School Academy for Girls. That's the full name. "So you were a St. John's girl," he laughed. The venerable Arch Dioceses of New York, where the word Co-op means something completely different from real-estate. Insider information, the connect.

6. Last year, he dated a bunch of women at the same time. Described deep sex with more than one woman within a twenty-four period. Admitted that he hurt at least one of them, and ended the central relationship a month or so ago (cf. The Depilitator). Now, he's trying to work it out, work out the difference between passionate love-making, and how to be in a one-on-one loving relationship. Uh-oh.

Evidently, he hove to his line, his penitent position. After a cursory ending to his story, he begged off, he had early meetings Friday. Which was fine. I was a willing audience, I needed nothing more. And I did enjoy the various compliments he paid me.

"You have to know that you are very attractive," he said, then added, "I wanted to meet you at a First Thursday last summer (Bastille Day?), but I had my girlfriend then (had I met him before?)"

A wee validation. A period at the end of a run-on sentence. A small moment. And two uh-oh's: pay attention to those inner uh-oh's.

Somehow, Ski-Bump-Babe, the Lieutenant Commander, two others, and I (a surprise hit of pot on the way) wound up at Rodeo Bar (goodsweetjesus, I hadn't been there in forever) listening to a kick-ass band, eating barbecue ribs at midnight.

When I got home around one in the morning, Il Romano called, responding to a voice message I left him, and since he was close to my building, after a gig, he stopped over for a little while. He almost got my clothes off a second time, before I begged off (my turn, not ready, not quite yet, working my way around to it, maybe). As I kissed him goodbye, I opened my eyes and saw that his were closed, and that his eyelashes were very long against the tops of his cheeks. I saw him out, "Amore, amore."

More. Maybe. Maybe more.

My Old Man

I feel one hundred per cent better today, hanging with my home-boy-cat, Jake, engaging in the fantasy of adopting a girl-cat doppelganger for my beloved Aida. One of many sites, called City Critters, allows wannabe adopters to trawl through pages and pages of potential kitty companions.

It's got to be like online dating - something I've never tried. I've looked over some of my girls' shoulders while they checked email for winks (no nudges?) in response to their posted profiles, but never felt the need to take the plunge myself.

And that brings me right back to Datomantrix. A self-proclaimed, avid, online dater, I believe her profile includes words to the effect, "Too much fun for you." But she may have changed that. In any event, besides her inherent good looks, she gets - and there is no other way to say it - plenty of hits.

She schedules her meet-and-greets, the first dates, in quick order, sometimes more than one in an evening. Impressive. I know I would mix up names. I'm sure I couldn't keep the names and faces straight.

Listening to her after-stories, it seems as though a quarter of the dates yields some kind of success. A few cocktails with a new man, and she loosens up. A kiss, an accompanied walk home to her door, a shared cab ride and some canoodling, and yes, sometimes an invitation upstairs for more. A hot and heavy make-out with a much younger man, hours of oral sex with another ("He was the best!" until there is another, then: "He was the best!"), or the whole enchilada ("Ohmigod, I am so exhausted today - we did it like four times last night!").

A note of explanation. Datomantrix was married once, when she was too young, in her very early twenties. She had a child, a girl, who is now a young woman of legal drinking age. Unlike some of the rest of us, Datomantrix did not have wild or salad days as a twenty-something in the city. I believe she's making up for lost time. (I remember an early, grey morning in 1986, after I spurned a one-night-stand, he sneered at me, "You're nothing but a man-eater.")

Have any of Datomantrix's fellows lasted? Not yet. Is she looking for a steady? I'm not sure. It's a quantity thing, not a quality thing.

Sometimes a man will linger beyond a date or two. But at some point, when they begin to act needy, demanding, or want to see her when their schedules permit - and for one reason only - she backs off. The emails, text, and voice messages fly. She'll write, "This isn't working for me anymore," or "I've found someone else," or "Stop calling or texting me every half-hour. It's over." These can elicit the wildest responses.

At least once a week, a Datomantrix email will sear across my inbox. She's got a new story, and for me, a never-ending source of voyeuristic, salacious entertainment.

The Voice of Reason sighs. "I'm not a serial dater. I'm just looking for someone who goes beyond date number-one. I would like to date a man more than once. Who's not in the mob."

And then there's that: "Not in the mob."

Tonight, I'll go to the gym, then stay at home with my companion of more than fifteen years. So what that he has light, red and white, striped hair all over his body, that he has a tail, and that he purrs and meows? And sneezes. He's my boy.

Paean for Aida

My cats have been with me for over fifteen years. They are brother and sister litter-mates. Jake is the ginger tabby, Aida is the tri-colored, patched tabby.

Jake's nicknames are Jakester, Stretcher, Jake-o-matic, Jaker-boo, Boopster.

Aida's are Zu-za, Lula, Lulabelle, Lulabelle-bee, and Silly Potato.

They answer to their proper names. Super affectionate, I tell folks, "They're dogs in cats' bodies." Whenever I come home and open the door, they run to me. They lay down and love to have their bellies rubbed. "They're dog-cats," I say.

One of the hallmark heartbreaks in my life told me, in a derisive tone, that I should get a cat. I think he intended that to be a lesson for me, that I needed to learn how to care for another living mammal. That was in 1990.

I read up on caring for cats as a single person (although my family had cats on and off), and realized that it would be better to have two. Companions. Someone told me that a single cat, a solitary cat can get lonely. And weird.

"What is one cat going to do all day? Watch Oprah?"

I knew that when I adopted, it would be an orange, striped, tabby male. I put the word out to my friends. I hadn't committed to adopting two, but the decision was germinating in my mind.

My dearest friend from university, an artist, a painter, phoned me on a Saturday in the summer of 1991.

"Hey there. What're you doing? Are you sitting down?"

"No. I'm laying down. I'm a little tight in the temples."

"Well. We're up visiting friends in Orange County," she said. "We're on a farm, and I'm sitting with a litter of eight-week-old kittens. A couple of them are orange and white striped tabbies. Males."

I thought, wow.

"That's the cat you are looking for, right?"

"Yes..." I started. "That's true."

"Do you want one? We'll bring him to you on the drive back down to the city."

"Actually, no."

"No?"

"I can't have just one. I need to have two. A male and a female."

"Hold on a minute," she said. "Do you want me to pick out another and bring you two? Are you sure?"

"Yes. You decide. I trust you." She was a cat professional, compared to me. She had two beautiful Maine Coons. And she had impeccable taste.

A few hours later, she brought me two somewhat bedraggled kittens, domestic short hair, sort-of breed. And I fell in love. Since then, they have been de-flea'd, vaccinated, neutered, vaccinated again, had their teeth cleaned. If something could come out of them, unbidden, by accident, I cleaned it up. They have moved with me six times. They lived with me during my three and a half year stint in Boulder, Colorado. I used to tell my staff there, "I'm the vice-president of cleaning the cat box."

But they are city cats. And I'm glad that we are all home.

---------

Today, I had to put Aida to sleep. In the last three days, she suffered systematic organ failure. I rushed her to the animal hospital, and they injected her with a hydration solution, as I waited the next twenty-four hours for test results. We learned that her liver and kidneys had failed. Her last hours were agony, as I watched my innocent, beautiful, loving, baby girl deteriorate. The decision was clear, and it had to be quick.

I took her first thing this morning, and I held her as the doctor administered the first anaesthetic. I spoke her name in soft tones, and all of her nicknames, and Hamlet came to my mind, sudden, but so right. I modified it, of course. Bill won't mind.

     "Now cracks my wounded heart. Good-night, sweet baby,
      And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!"

The second lethal dose was little more than insurance, she was so gone. But I held her, and then released her once her paw pads turned cold. So fast. It happened so fast.

As I walked home, I forced my mind to dwell on the first law of thermodynamics, the law of conservation of matter: "Matter is neither created nor destroyed, it is transformed."

And so the energy that gave life to Aida left her body, and is now transformed into something, somewhere in this city of all cities. I wish it would find me, haunt me, knock things over in the middle of the night, make Jake and me jump out of our sleep confused. I miss her so much, I had no idea this thing would be this big.

I grieve, and in time, it will be easier. Acceptance will come. But not yet.

About nine years ago, GV Wonder discovered an activity that Aida would perform, over and over.

"Watch this," he said.

He held his palm down, flat, parallel with the floor about a foot over Aida's head. She jumped up, keeping her back feet on the floor, grazed the top of her head on his palm, then dropped to the floor into a barrel roll. Then she got up and did again. And again.

"She's like a porpoise. She jumps like a porpoise. And then she drops and rolls."

"It's a trick," I said. I was fascinated. "She's a one-trick cat."

A one-of-a-kind. Irreplaceable. Like my love.