Are You Good? (Max in Real Life)

Only a few days left to nominate me and my blogging buddies for the Black Weblog Awards...have you done it yet?

Last night I got the words "I am bad" tattooed on my back. I meant it in the Run DMC sense rather than the literal sense and if you don't know what that means get off my blog and never come back but still when I looked at it this morning it seemed...a little wrong. In a way I felt like having that sentence permanently etched on me was equal to publicly declaring that I'm not a good person. But am I?

Every Sunday I wake up with the intention to go to church. Sometimes I make it, moretimes I spend the church hour doing my nails writing blog posts about sex and abusing my body by stuffing it full of homefries and nicotine. So am I a good person because I believe in God enough to want to go to church? Or am I a bad person because I never rarely go?

I'm a generous person, I work hard to be considerate and invested in people's lives. But I'm also unfriendly and can be selfish...at least if you subscribe to the theory that ignoring my friends' phone calls equals selfish. I try to let the people I care about feel cared for but I also live a pretty hedonistic lifestyle and shun long-lasting connections with people. I have great sympathy for many causes but can rarely rouse myself to do anything altruistic to help them.

Am I a good person? Sometimes I can't tell.

I mean - I think I am, but who ever really believes they are a bad person? And what does being a good person even mean? I used to know a man who I described as "a really good guy with really bad behaviour" until a friend of mine said that you can't divorce one's behaviour from one's character...if you act badly you're bad. At the time it struck me as really strident but then again at the end of the day what do we really have to go on in our relationships but how the person acts toward us?

This is something that I work around in my brain endlessly, so I thought I'd share it with you guys to see if anyone else out there thinks about this. So tell me, the pitiful few of you who comment on Thursdays dear readers, what does being a good (or bad) person mean to you? Which do you consider yourself? And can we change from one to the other or are our positions on the good-bad spectrum set in stone? Are goodness and badness functions of our behaviour or what lies beneath? Speak on it in the comments.

The Great Guy and the Regular Chick

Only a few days left to nominate me and my blogging buddies for the Black Weblog Awards...have you done it yet?
 
Last night I was gossiping talking to a girlfriend about a mutual friend of ours and his new-ish boo-piece. The dude is pretty dope. Very smart, highly educated and very well-read. Cultured and well-traveled but not obnoxious about it. He reads books and plays sports. Has good taste in music and movies. Attractive and well-hung built. And he's funny. He is, for lack of a better word, a great guy.

Now booski on the other hand is just...meh. She's a pretty girl, but in an entirely unspectacular way. Okay body dressed in the most generic offerings ever put forth by the regular girl trifecta of Old Navy/The Gap/Banana Republic. She's smart enough to follow the conversation when we all hang but seemingly without the ability to contribute to it. She's not funny but she's able to understand a joke and laugh unassumingly at it. Neither particularly friendly nor particular stand-offish. The kind of girl that you don't mind having around but who you don't miss when she's absent. She's not a reader or a sports fan and her taste in television shows is more The City than Lost, more The Hills than True Blood. Musically she's strictly Top 40. In short, she's just....regular.

Before hooking up with this girl, our buddy had been single for a long time. And being the kind of friends who like to discuss things repeatedly and ad nauseam, I had heard many times his spiel about how he was looking for exactly the right woman. While this guy is not arrogant in any sense of the word, he's well aware that he's a bit of a catch and was holding out for a woman who was a match for him. So the day he announced that he was bringing "someone for us to meet" to one of our hang out sessions, imagine our surprise when he showed up with a girl who was just...regular.

This is a phenomenon I've witnessed too many times. I'm fortunate to have a lot of dynamic men in my life; some exes, some cousins, some friends. And it seems that 99% of the time that these dudes wife up, the girl is just...milquetoast. Meanwhile my most interesting, most dynamic, funniest and coolest female friends remain perpetually single with ladyflowers drying up under the hot sun of celibacy.

What is up with that?

Being the loud mouths type of people we are, as soon as the opportunity arose my girl and I began to hammer our buddy with questions about her; progressing quickly through the polite "where did you meet/how did you get together" stuff and getting straight to the point - why her? His answer basically boiled down to that she was easy. Not easy in the sense of being a mattress, but easy in the sense of being drama free. Accommodating. Undemanding.

Well colour me high-maintenance, but I would shoot myself in the head if "easy" was my boyfriend's reason for being with me.

I'm aware now that pretty girls have a bad rep for being too much work...but is this also true about interesting girls? Smart girls? Funny girls? Stylish girls? Is a woman who is accommodating and easy but lacks a discernible personality really so preferable to one who might give you an occasional headache but who can excite you with her intellect or cajole you out of a bad mood with her humour? Should we as women stop focusing on being interesting and start working on being obsequious?

My informal twitter poll last night didn't yield any conclusive answers (sidebar: do you guys love how I always say "informal twitter poll" as if it's possible to have a "formal" poll on twitter??). There was a fair amount of people who mistook my definition of "regular" to mean pretty; therefore there were a fair amount of knee-jerk responses suggesting that the man has matured enough to value compatibility over looks. But don't get it twisted - pretty girls can be regular too. Being regular isn't about looks; to me it comes down to this: if someone asked me what you're like and I can't come up with five adjectives to describe your personality, you're regular. Because you have no distinguishing characteristics.

But anyway...what do you guys think? Is this dynamic guy-regular chick phenomenon one you've noticed before? Or is this just saltiness on the part of an interesting chick who can't find someone to take her to the outdoor movies at Harbourfront one of those things that can't be understood when you're looking at a relationship from the outside? Is there an inverse of this - dynamic women wifing regular dudes? And my gentleman - have you ever wifed a regular girl? Illuminate me in the comments.

Who Told You to Have Feelings (Throwback Tuesdays)

Only a few days left to nominate me and my blogging buddies for the Black Weblog Awards...have you done it yet?

Observe this conversation between fcuk buddies:

Girl: So can I come over tonight?
Boy: Nah, sorry I'm booked.
Girl: You're booked? What does that mean?
Boy: I mean I already have plans. Sorry.
Girl: Oh with another girl? Oh so it's like that then? Okay fine. Have fun. Talk to you later.
Boy: (confused) okay, um, bye.

Two days later...

Girl: You know you really hurt my feelings the other day...
Boy: (no memory of the above conversation) I did, how?
Girl: When I said I wanted to come over and you said you were booked.
Boy: *stupefied silence*

Ladies, I'm going after you today. You're wrong in three ways on this one:

1. Use of the phrase “another girl”

This implies that you thought you thought that you were the only girl. And the very fact that you are on fcuk buddy status with this dude should tell you that that is not the case. In fact, more times than not, you are the “other” girl.

2. Being Passive Aggressive

Saying “Okay fine. Have fun then” in a pissy tone of voice is a classic girl move that does not work. When men are in situations like this, they hear words, not inflections and not the feelings behind them. So if you're saying '”have fun” he's hearing “have fun” and moving on with his life. And you know you're pissed and you don't want him to have fun so why not try saying what's on your mind? I told you before, men are not mind readers. If you're disappointed that you can't get together then say something and maybe you guys can work something out.

3. Using the “F” word

“You hurt my feelings'”? Girl, you are out of bounds here. Who told you feelings were allowed in a fuck buddy relationship? A fuck buddy relationship by definition is a casual, non-exclusive, no-strings attached type of deal. If you're getting your feelings hurt because dude has plans with another girl, you're obviously not built for this type of thing and you need to keep it moving.

In my opinion, 99% of girls in the world are not built for casual sex. Not because they catch feelings (although you're wrong for doing it) but because they seem to think that the dude should care about said feelings. Ladies, if he wanted to care about your feelings you'd be wifey, not jump-off. So please either keep them to yourself or recognize your limitations and stick to feelings-friendly zones like relationships.

That’s my rant for today, but what say you dear readers? Are feelings okay in a fcuk-buddy relationship or should they be checked at the door with inhibitions? Have you ever been the girl or boy in this scenario? Discuss.

The e-Boo

Time is running out to nominate me and my blogging buddies for the Black Weblog Awards. Take a quick five minutes to cast your vote please! 

Ah the e-boo. Part crush, part long-distance boyfriend, part ridiculous fantasy that makes you feel like you've regressed back to your teenage years. If you spend anywhere near as much time online as I do, sooner or later you will probably find yourself in some kind of e-boo relationship. This is both a blessing and a curse.

But first for my three-dimensional people who are looking at me like I'm nuts, allow me to explain what I'm talking about.  Your e-boo is someone you met online when you weren't looking for anyone. This isn't someone you met on match.com or POF, it's someone you "met" in the comments section of your favourite blog or who caught your eye on twitter. Or maybe he's a blogger whose point of view you find intriguing or a dude in a mutual friend's Facebook photo who you wanted to get to know.

Wherever you find him or her, the e-boo relationship is ideal because of its ability to seamlessly integrate into your "real" life...it's a fun little distraction that can pick you up on a bad day and entertain you when you're bored. For the most part, an e-boo is a safe bet...you're unlikely to get your feelings hurt by someone who you're not even completely sure really exists.

On the other hand, because your "relationship" exists exclusively on the internet it can be hard to gauge just how much importance you should put on it. I've seen people take their e-boo relationships way too seriously and start to get jealous and feel a way when they find out that their e-boo is actually attached in real life. Then they feel dry and rejected and the worst part about it is that they're feeling that way about someone they've probably never even met.

The best thing about an e-boo relationship is that the delayed nature of online communication allows you to put your best foot forward at all times. If you're like me, you do your best flirting online where you a) have time to think about what you want to say and b) the object of your flirting cannot see you getting all sweaty and shaky.  Your e-boo can make your spirits soar as a flurry of suggestive tweets fly back between you...until you creep his timeline and realize he's been simulatneously exchanging dirty tweets with @RealTalkSuki three other girls. Once again, you end up feeling dry.

Having an e-boo can take the sting out of being single just by the simple fact that you have something to distract you from your loneliness...until you're on twitter at midnight fighting with @RealTalkSuki a bunch of other girls about who claimed him first and you realize that while you're doing that he's off in the 3-d world getting his. Then you feel silly.

But hands down the absolute best part of the e-boo relationship is the e-sex...with the right e-lover it's epic. And you have a written record of it that you can carry around with you and read when you're bored or horny.

Yes the e-boo relationship has its ups and downs, but if you're going to undertake it, please remember to keep it light. I am never in favour of psycho-bitch behaviour, but if I find out you've gone nutso on your e-boo for any reason, I will block you from my blog!

But what about you guys? Anyone out there have an e-boo? Does s/he lift you up or take you crashing down? Share your e-love stories in the comments.

Leave My Bush Alone

Just nominate me please. You've heard the spiel enough times. 

So today I have a bone to pick with someone. Two people actually. One is whoever invented the Brazilian wax and the other is the big mouth who told men about it.  Because ever since those two events occurred I've had men all up in my garden and not in a good way.

Seems like every where I go, every man I talk to is professing his love of the bald poon. Or the landing strip - which is just stupid. What is the point of that strip? All of a sudden no one wants to see hair down there despite the fact that the good lord Himself saw fit to put it there.

Well I am here to say to you all that I am not doing it. And I'm giving you 5 reasons why.

5 Reasons I will not bald off my p*ssy:

1. That shit is expensive. 

I'm a dougla girl and you know we come with more than our fair share of hair and the shit grows extra-fast. I can't be running to the salon every week dropping $60 to remove something that has every right to be there! Why - because you saw it in a porno once and you think that's cute? Try again.

2. It hurts!

My man - when was the last time you let someone spread a burning hot substance on your joint and then rip it off you? Just take a second and imagine it....and then try to dream up one good reason why I should pay money to have it done to me.

3. It's itchy

Unless you are comfortable being with a woman who a) occasionally needs Bump-No-Way on her private parts and b) scratches that shit like a monkey at a gym, you might want to think twice before insisting on the landscaping...when the stuff starts to grow back it itches like a motherfcuker.

4.  I am not 11 years old.

And I don't want my vagina to look like I am. That's all I'm gonna say about it really.

5. Take a look at your private parts and then ask me again. 

99% of the men who love an empty forest have pure thickets going on inside their briefs. If that isn't audacity I don't know what is.

Now let me just say this - it's not that I intend to leave the area wild and untamed. I groom myself. I trim and I spruce...the appropriate things can be found with no need for compass (© Nickerz). That's really all I can do. And to the men out there who complain about getting hair stuck in their teeth let me remind you that I don't really need your mouth to be down there anyway.

Who's joining me on my crusade to bring back the bush?