Walk of Shame.

Let's say, for the purposes of this post, you are a guy. You have just hooked up with a decent looking girl...you got some action, she got some cuddling, all parties are happy. The next morning, your friends come to your bedroom door, trying to awaken you for some new shenanigans. She wants to get changed, and they're not budging from the door. Trying to save some semblance of class, she decides to change in the shadow of your closet, far from the prying eyes of your friends.

After reading too many issues of Cosmopolitan, she thinks it'd be cute to get changed seductively, intending to kick your boxers she was wearing onto your bed after removing them. While attempting to perform this maneuver, she gets the boxers stuck around her legs, trips, and falls into your closet, wearing simply a bra and underwear. 

For the sake of my pride, let's just say this is totally a hypothetical story. However, I would really, really empathize with any girl it did happen to. Totally.

S.S. Minnow.

A wise, wise man once said the two happiest days in the life of a boat owner are the day he purchases a boat and the day he sells it. Clearly, he was referring to a sailboat. He should have expanded the saying to include the fact that the happiest day in a non-boat owners life is the day he or she declines a pleasure cruise on the aforementioned water craft.

I have an odd fascination with boats. I tease my friends about their lack of yachts upon which I can sun myself. I wear boat shoes. I own multiple belts from J. Crew, adorned with anchors. So whenever my uncle invited us to spend a day on the water on his boat, not only did I jump at the offer, but I bragged about it to my friends.

Now, I should have seen the warning signs long before the trip. Namely, the night before. Any evening when people start having beer chugging contests before they start eating dinner probably isnt going to end well. 

However, confident in my non-academic skills that I had developed in college, I quickly sprung out of bed the next morning, chugged a gatorade and was on my merry way to the dock. 

Things which I did not take into consideration: 

a. sailboats are hard work. They do not leave time for one to locate a breezy location, curl up, and pass out. 

b. I can barely walk and be a functioning human being on dry land, let alone on a boat. With ropes. Everywhere

c. It was going to be 100 degrees

d. The wind which made 100 degrees feel more like a balmy 92 degrees also made the water rough.

By these powers combined, the two or three hours we actually spent sailing were horrific. I was too prideful to let myself throw up, so instead, I would lurk away and nap for 20 minutes at a time in some forgotten about sail covers. That is, until I would be awoken by water coming over the edge (apparently this is standard procedure) or the sail's boom swooping down and almost hitting me in the head. It was the most adventurous nap I'd ever taken. Whenever I was awake, I'd consider  swimming to shore. Even drowning in the attempt would be a preferable outcome. 

We then decided to drop anchor for lunch and swimming in a shallow cove. Mind you, nature and I have a very distant relationship, in that we enjoy observing each other, from a distance. Even in the ocean, I don't like touching the bottom. Even when I can see my feet. However, the ungodly heat drove me into the water today. But I refused to touch the bottom. I spent the better part of an hour floating and awkwardly doggie paddling around everyone. 

That's when disaster struck. Sometime between lunch and frolicking around in the water, the tide went out. Leaving our boat more on the ground than in the water. So when we started the engine we went...no where. Desperate times called for desperate measures. A rope was thrown over the side and we followed suit. And proceeded to pull the boat. Off of the sandbar from hell. I touched the bottom. It was as disgusting as expected. I also managed to get stung by every jelly fish in approximately a five mile vicinity. You can't even tell though. It blends in well with my tomato colored sunburn I got. 

Needless to say, I will never buy a boat. Unless that boat is a yacht that comes with it's own staff. For now, I will limit my nautical enjoyment to my closet.

Nature vs. Nerdture

To say I work with a cast of characters would be the understatement of the year. I work at a library and needless to say, each day puts every episode of The Office to shame. Well, maybe not the UK version.

Anywho, one such coworker is the epitome of these characters: aviator glasses (not to be confused with the fratfully popular sunglass version, I think this pair changes color as he goes indoors), flood pants bordering on capris, and a debatable mullet.

In my youth (aka three years ago), several of my coworkers and I developed a borderline obsession with this man. How old was he? Do you think anyone had ever had the misfortune of kissing him? What does he do in his free time? This last question was our favorite point to ponder. We each had our own version. My tale of choice involved him going home to his mother's basement and staying up until 5 am, posting conspiracies on various forums. "The government is employing mind control through library books." "Aliens live in your belly button." Before going to sleep, he would search for vintage Pokemon cards on eBay and promptly crawl into a bed covered with pet hair of no less than 14 cats. Twelve of them would curl up with him.

Now that I am older and wiser, I can't help but realize that clearly this man has some sort of social anxiety. A combination of bad physical and emotional genes had given him the short end of the lifestyle stick. He was nice enough; creepy, but nice. I was a pretty awful person for my relentless teasing, as I was the proverbial ringleader.

Then my mind wandered to his hair: the semi mullet. Spiky on top, grazing his collar in the back. The embodiment of all that made me giggle behind his back. Were these naturally unfortunate cowlicks or did he actually pay somebody to do this to his head? Concluding that an entire head full of cowlicks is pretty much physically impossible,  I decided that to some degree, this was a choice.  

And I felt a little less bad.