Going Out

Disclaimer: Wendy, John, James, Eric, Kate, Rob, Mike, Mara, Amber, Amber's hot Gator friend who won't call me back: I love you all.

Friday night in America is typically a time for 18 to 40 year olds to go out for a night on the town, see friends, meet new ones, and soak up the social scene. We call this "going out," as in, "Hey, are you going out tonight?" "Yea man, I'm going out downtown with so and so." So it is not uncommon for me to "go out" with any number of friends I have. Sometimes, however, it seems routine and largely pointless. This evening was a perfect example.

In what started as a promising evening (see The Friend Zone - August 2005) at the delicious Musashino Sushi Dakoro restaurant quickly deteriorated into an average "couple of beers, standing around and bullshitting" evening. I was really kind of disappointed. My friend Mike's band had a set at Light, which was cool, but painfully ordinary. After an hour or so, I chugged my way over to Canvas to meet Wendy, John, James, Amber, Amber's DC friend Lauren (???), and Amber's hot Gator friend who won't call me back (more on this later). Again, very ordinary. After performing the ceremonial cross 'em with Amber ritual, it was just ordinary drinks and bullshitting. Not my cup of tea on this night.

So I thought changing scenery might do the trick. So at the behest of Wendy, I roll over to Logan's with them. The rest of the crew shows up 5 minutes later. Ok, this is where I vent a little. The ONLY reason I go to Logan's is because I have friends who go there. Seriously, I hate that fucking place. There's nothing inherently wrong with it, but there's nothing right with it either. I'm gonna have to stop going there, which is really hard because I genuinely like the people I go there with. This is a source of internal conflict for me.

Anyway, after a few minutes (1 drink, to be exact), I had to get the hell out of there. So I bailed. As with the first bar, I just kind of bullshitted. This leads me to my only somewhat relevant discussion point of this post. Yea, I've wasted your time, and, more importantly, mine. Anyway, I didn't really talk to Gator (so called because she attended the University of Florida), not because I was mean, but because when I met Gator 3 weeks ago, I hit her up to hang out and got no response, not even a negative one. So this is my question. Guys: how do you handle setting up times to hang out with chicks you've just met who you think are pretty cool? My view is this: if I meet a girl I want to hang out with beyond some initial drunken night on 6th, I call once, leave a v-mail, then either call or text. That's it. 1 call and 1 text, or 2 calls. Maybe, if she is luckly, she'll get 2 calls and 2 texts. But that's it. Gator got 1 call and 1 text. No response. I'm done. As much as it hurts (because she is fine), I gotta stick to principles. Anyway, I wanna hear your view on this.

So I say all of this to say that I want to start doing different things on the weekend. I'm up for going bowling, skating, or even a night at the movies. I just get really tired of doing the same, routine, shit each weekend. I love you guys, or as James says, "Olive Oil", it's just that sometimes, it gets kinda stupid. It's like social masturbation: you do it over and over and it never gets you anywhere. Maybe I'll start going to church to meet chicks. Who knows.

Finally, we need to plan something for Valentine's day. Having spoken to many of you, this could be a dirrrrrty night, which means I'm excited. Single folks only, of course.

Stay up y'all.