Panch Drunk

Love

By Pancho Rivera

I'm in love.

Not really, but the thought pops into my head a lot. I

guess I really want to be in love, or maybe I just never differentiated between being attracted to someone and

having feelings for them. Either way, I seem to like to think about that a lot in my interactions with women. In

fact, I do it so much that I no longer trust myself to know how to tell when I actually do love someone because of

my inability to clearly differentiate attraction, affection, infatuation, loneliness, and love.

Maybe I took one

too many psychology courses and confused love with positive regard (for those non-psych people, when patients had an

unloving childhood, psychologists use "unconditional positive regard", the professional equivalent of a parent's

unconditional love, to get them to feel comfortable talking and sharing their inner thoughts and feelings). After

all, I can't get a smile from a girl I'm attracted to without turning into a bumbling idiot and losing the ability

to form a coherent sentence. When I can, it's usually because I am so focused on something else that I can never

do anything about it, anyway. Finally, when somehow things do seem to click, it is usually because it is impossible

for anything to happen. That is something I never fully understood, but it is something that is very real.



************************

Fortunately, I have grown past the point of loneliness being my only

motivation for trying to be with someone. I had an opportunity to go out with someone a while ago. Although she

was an attractive girl, I wasn't attracted to her at all. My friend kept asking me if I liked her and telling me

to ask her out. I can take a hint...no matter how dense I make myself out to be, I could see that one. It seems to

be that you can always tell when someone you don't like likes you. I won't say it is never the case the other way

around (after all, that would go against one of my other stories), but I would say that I have yet to have it happen

for someone who made me forget my own name when I saw her (I guess you have to have a name before someone can like

you, right? ).

This woman happened to live near me, so I told her that we should hang out sometime. She came

over my place, and we watched some movies after I made dinner. I made a pretty good meal, and it was a good time

all around. I popped in another movie, and I even switched the futon into the bed position so we could lie down. I

know how bad that sounds, but I have this natural inclination to lie down when I'm watching a movie at home, and I

was already slowly tilting over more and more on the futon as it was until I was curled up in a ball, trying to stop

from stretching my legs and kicking her. So, of course I was lying with her with some blankets watching a movie,

and I stepped back for a moment to assess the situation. It had been a while since I had been in this situation,

and I found it strange and funny that I had no intentions other than to watch this movie. I flashed back to my

ex-girlfriend, with whom I shared many movies and many moves on this same futon, always hoping to cuddle up and make

out at some point during or afterwards (usually afterwards on the making out - hey, I watch movies from beginning to

end).

I was close enough to feel her body close to mine, and I was tempted beyond Adam and Eve to do something

while I was there, but I didn't. I did not like her more than a friend, and although I knew I could have done

something about it, I didn't. I think I finally decided that I should learn how to be friends with women and leave

it at that. This is not because I can't, the way I thought about it in the past, but because I don't want to deal

with it. I am taking control, and I do not want anything right now.

The movie ended, and we lied there for a

while, not wanting to get up. The pressure was rising, as it was obvious that it was an easy move to make. After

all, I've done this several times before and could do it again. When I know something like I did then, I could

just do it. This time, however, it was just not right. "I wish I knew what you were thinking," she said. Be

careful what you wish for...I don't think she wanted to know the answer. I didn't even want to know the answer.

Finally, we got up, and she got ready to go home. I walked her out and asked her how she left it with this guy at

work who likes her but she didn't like him. She looked directly at me and said, "I told him that I was interested

in someone else." I tried not to physically mimic the whincing that was going on in my head. I pretended like I

thought she was insinuating that she lied to the guy and started laughing that laugh I do at random times in the

conversation that makes people wonder what is so funny. It wasn't the same after that. The next morning, we met

on the way to the bus to work without me saying much. I don't usually talk in the morning and made no effort to

pretend that I did during that trip, which basically made her uncomfortable. We tried to do something again later,

but I was busy and nothing ever really happened since.

************************
This

was not my only moment of personal growth. The friend who actually was trying to get me to go out with that girl

was actually the first step in this new development.

Shortly prior to the above incident, I meet the newest

addition to our team. We became friends quickly, as we connected with some great witty banter and interesting

conversations. What is funny is that, looking at her for the first time, I do not find her attractive. In fact, I

notice that she has almost a lisp (not quite, but the closest analogy I could make), which I could not determine

whether it what her manner of speaking English as a second language (even though she speaks it as well as I do) or

because of the structure of her teeth, which I noticed to be slightly different than what I would consider perfect,

although there is nothing inherently wrong with them.

As it turns out, she is gorgeous. Guys hit on her all of

the time, and she even has the attitude of someone who is gorgeous sometimes. I don't know how I missed that one.

Maybe it was because she stopped by my cube on her first day like I was supposed to know her, so I thought she was

someone else I knew for a short time and waited to get more information as to what she was doing at my cube before I

was comfortable making a final guess. Obviously, it was her first day.

She is the first woman of that caliber

that I have ever been friends with. I obviously have to attribute this to the fact that I didn't notice her beauty

at first and that I am not and was never attracted to her. Therefore, I did not act like it and did not go into my

goofy character that seems to emerge in the presence of the attractive. This was possibly the greatest breakthrough

in recent memory. Why? With an attractive female friend comes...well...more attractive female friends.

My life

turned on its head after that. I was introduced to several other attractive women and now have a group of

attractive female friends that I hang out with on a regular basis. Like George Costanza in the Seinfeld

episode where he uses a picture of an attractive woman to get him into the circle of attractive women, I raised

my game and probably my perceived attractiveness to a whole level.

************************


By controlling my feelings, preventing loneliness from imparing my judgment, and deciding that I am

not going out with anyone right now and will actually try to befriend women I am attracted to rather than acting

like an idiot with a crush, I finally felt alright about things. I kept myself out of trouble (i.e. keeping my mind

out of the attraction mindset) for a while, but something had to happen. There is a woman that collects trinkets

from different cities, and I sent an email about two months ago to my family as a joke that if they ever found a

cheap trinket with the city's name on it to get it and send it to me for a free drink (the offer from the woman to

anyone who finds one for her). Of course, my family steps up to the plate and asks me about this request. I told

them I was joking around (I mentioned to the woman that I had family everywhere around the US and could probably

fill her collection quickly), but of course I get one from my grandmother the next time that I see her.

How am I

going to sell this story? "Hello, I emailed my whole family so I could get a trinket to add to your collection.

Now you have to hang out with me long enough for me to seduce you." Men have said and done worse, but I of course

have no intention of that. As I said, I am not going out with anyone anytime soon, and I would like for once to

befriend women I find attractive. Unfortunately, as the difference between a straight male-straight woman

friendship and gay male-straight woman friendship, if you have a penis and you are not gay, women naturally think

you are hitting on them if you do anything...anything at all. Seriously, you could be Superman saving a woman from

falling to her death, and when you set her down, someone somewhere would walk up to you and say, "Nice...so what, do

you like her? Why didn't you ask her out?" One day, I would like to just ask someone out as a friend, have them

reject me thinking I'm asking them out for a date, and say, "What, because I have a penis, I can't be your friend?

Whatever..."

I walk down the hall to her cube ready to tell my little story. I ask her if she has a moment,

and I sit down and tell it to the best of my ability, saying that I sent an email to my geographically dispersed

family as a joke thinking that nobody sells the things she was collecting and got a call and an email from family

members asking me about this and telling me they'll buy one for me while they are in Seattle, Austria, or other

places. I tell her about my grandmother and how she gave me the trinket to give to her and how she said, "Enjoy

your free drink."

As I say this, she smiles and set her hand on my knee, which catches me by surprise. I swear,

I must be autistic because people touching me always makes me jump and then freeze until the contact is completed.

I think I handled it better than in the past, though, and despite my blushing and obvious embarrassment upon her

telling her colleague and probably being overheard by two or three more people, I get through my story. She tells

me how much she understands because she is close to her grandparents and would even like to send my grandmother a

thank-you note. I tell her I'll email her the contact information and wait for her to let me know when she was

available to take me out for that free drink (it's Q4, so people in her area probably have tight schedules, and

besides, if she's supposed to take me out, she should extend the offer, I guess). I sent the information, but I

have yet to hear back in a couple of weeks. Oh, well. I guess you can't get past your gender in these situations.

I was all excited, too, because she is gorgeous and would be a great new addition to my list of attractive

friends.
************************
I thought that would be the last little

excitement in the female arena for a while. In fact, I thought that my new philosophy was working so well that I

would be done with any romantic fantasies until I decided I was ready to actually pursue, acquire, and follow

through with something real. Apparently, I thought too soon. I had it so easy for a while that I underestimated

the power of a woman that could melt my heart at the sight of her face.

There's this girl that works in the

same department as I do, but fortunately for my sanity I do not interact with her much. As you can guess, it was

during one of these periods in which I had several interactions that I broke down, and it just got worse from

there.

I don't know what it is about this woman, but she is the kind of girl that could make me forget my own

name. After a good conversation with her, I will walk around with a pleasant feeling for hours. I am not the same

person after it, and I walk around in a daze forever until I finally come down from the high and go back to normal.

I think it has to be quite obvious, and I tell everyone how I am just completely infatuated with this woman when I

am in her vicinity.

I walk by her cube late one night to set something on a colleague's desk, and she asks me

what I am still doing here. I tell her I had to get something on someone's desk before I left, and then I ask what

she is doing here because she is usually gone much earlier than this. She tells me she is travelling to the big

meeting we have tomorrow and has to be ready for her 7 a.m. flight. I ask her if there is anything I could do to

help, and I hang around while she is getting copies of some projects ready to take with her. I ask why I don't see

her at the gym anymore, and she said she quit 'donating' to the gym a while ago. I walk her outside and ask her

if she forgot her purse. She tells me that her friend is waiting for her outside and it's in there already. I say

goodbye and go home, but the feeling lingers. It takes about an hour or so to snap out of it.

A little over a

week later, she stops by my desk and hounds us for not signing up for the 5K charity event that she is the main

contact for in our area. Of course, I made a bunch of signs last year for the event and was going to do this one

but never heard anything about it. While I had the opportunity, I figured I would go and pick a fight (the kind you

pick with people you like). I printed out my signs and went over to put one on her cube. She said that the person

organizing it for the department probably wouldn't like it, but I could hang it up inside her cube. I told her

that I wasn't going to hang it up if she didn't want it, but then she insisted so I taped it to the wall. I asked

her how to sign up, and she said just to email her. I, of course, go back to my desk and write one of my signature

emails with a serious part and a joking part, saying how I just ran a marathon so I should be able to handle a 5K

and that I don't get why everyone is so uptight about me posting fun signs for the charity walk (I took 50 Cent, P.

Diddy, etc. from their "Vote or Die" campaign and altered the pictures to say, "Walk or Die"; I also took the "Rock

the Vote" sign and changed it to "Rock the Walk"). I guess you can't mix business with pleasure or

something...which brings me to the part where she never replied, as she almost never replies via email. She must

get a million emails per day like a lot of people I work with.

Shortly after this encounter, I have a

conversation with my friend (my attractive colleague I'm not attracted to) about having a surprise party for the

woman's recent promotion. While we were on the subject, she tells me that the woman has a boyfriend.

"I know,"

I reply. "She has two pictures of him on her desk."
She asks, "How did you know it was her boyfriend?"
"It was a

picture of just the two of them and the only one in a frame. Besides, he was doing the boyfriend pose - you know,

he was turned slightly in her direction and had his arm behind her, and they were standing rather formally."
"Oh,

so you already knew she has been with this guy for four years?"
"No, actually, but I was working late one night and

noticed how everyone's lights are always left on. Her lamp was still on, so I went to turn it off and noticed the

pictures."
"But you still like her?" She asked this because she knows my policy.
"Hey, usually my mind snaps out

of it the minute I hear the word 'boyfriend', but it just never clicked for me in a way that kept me from acting

stupid around her. I told you, though, I was never planning on asking her out. Look, I know how you are when you

know someone likes someone else. You mention them a lot and ask questions." I was referring to the fact that I

knew she was insinuating I go out with the girl I mentioned earlier. "Please don't mention me to her; I don't

need her figuring out from you that I have this stupid infatuation that I am never going to act on, anyway."

Of

course, later that day, we have cake for her and my friend just has to go and mention that I was the one who bought

the cake. She thanked me, but of course I was too busy trying to put the box to the cake with the last piece back

together to give to her before she left to give a better response than, "Of course."

Once again, I figure that

this was it for a while. I seriously need to get back to the way it was recently where I somehow forgot that I was

a human with the need for some sort of deep emotional connection with someone. Instead of going to sit down, I was

on deck and stepping up to the plate shortly.

This week is over 45 hours of intense training for my job. On top

of that, I need to keep up with the preparations for the meeting we have coming up, so I need to check email and do

some extra work after hours. Even worse, the training is with over 50 people, and spending that much time every day

in the same room with engaging conversation is testing my energy level as an introvert. To add to this situation,

there are a couple of girls in this room that could draw my attention away from the speakers for half of this

program. I figure I will be okay, but time and events can have an effect on people.

The first pitch is

delivered while I am not looking. I am running to my desk to check email, and then I run back to the room. While

running down the staircase, I am of course watching the steps and not paying attention to anything else until I

hear, "Hi, Pancho. How are you doing?" As I am flying down the stairs, I look up in just enough time to see my

trinket girl passing right next to me. I, not looking and still running to get back in time, think just enough to

release a, "Hi, I'm doing well. Thanks for asking!" before I clear the stairs and bolt into the room. Of course,

I missed my opportunity to flirt and secure that coffee date in the near future or at least build rapport and ask

how she is doing, making it a called strike for a 0-1 count.

I am two days into the session, and I think the

intensity of the training, the people, and the time is getting to me. Since I am in the presence of so many pretty

faces, I take plenty of long glances to the girls that strike my fancy. I guess it keeps me awake and motivated,

since beautiful surroundings create pleasant feelings. I can feel it starting to get to me, though, in the sense

that I am starting to feel like I want to be with someone.

The second pitch comes the next day when we are at

lunch. This cute girl who I've known for a while and have talked to a couple of times sits next to me in our

group. I mention the Northwestern joke I made about her since Penn State beat them a few weeks before and I rubbed

it in her face for no reason but to get a laugh. While eating my pizza, I look down and notice that my hands are

covered in black from part of the pizza being overcooked. I am having an obsessive-compulsive fit because I can't

get it off, and she talks to me while I say, "Look at this! This black stuff is all over my hands! I can't get it

off! Ahhhh!" When I finally realize that she was talking to me, I apologize and ask her what she said. "Oh,

nevermind. It was nothing important." I haven't heard that from someone in years...in fact, I say that a lot but

am not used to hearing it. To show that I wasn't not paying attention to her because I didn't care what she was

saying, I said, "No, go ahead. It was something about my program..." I finally got her talking about it, and we

had a decent conversation. I noticed a hint of something that I couldn't quite put my finger on. I think it was

interest, but I probably couldn't recognize it because I haven't seen it in a while. That was a ball, bringing

the count to 1-1.

The next day, a similar event occurred. I arrive at the meeting last, as usual, and the first

seat I find is right next to the girl I sat with at lunch the previous day. Besides having a great seat, at the end

of the day, she had her presentation sitting on the floor next to a bottle of lotion. I take the lotion bottle and

start fake-pounding on it with my fist, pretending to squirt it all over her presentation. "Sabotage!" I whisper

to her. I am not sure she gets it at first, and I am not even thinking about the possible miscommunication that I

am doing something else. Once she sees that I am facing the nozzle at her presentation, she laughs, picks up the

bottle, and puts it out of my reach like a mother keeping a trouble-making toy away from a mischievous boy. Ball 2,

2-1. I get a replay shortly later of this when I enter the copy room and she enters behind me to copy her

presentation to give to her team. I was about to scan a large document, so I suggested that she go first. As she

was copying, I made a joke:

"It would be a shame if you had an extra copy and I stole it from you to use in our

final presentation tomorrow."
"But you already saw this presentation today."
"True, but I didn't get a chance to

copy all of your ideas down."
"You seem set on sabotaging our presentation."

I give an evil grin and wonder if

she knows I am just playing with her. She wishes me a good night, and I go to do my scanning.

It is a little

late at the office, and I pass by the woman that makes me swoon. She is still there, so I decide to stop by and

give her a hard time as an excuse to bother her. As I walk up, I notice a huge vase of roses, and I instantly know

who sent them. This serves as a reminder of that long relationship, so reality sinks in and this just becomes a

moment to talk and make a quick joke.

"Wow, those are nice. What's the occasion?"
"Anniversary."
"Ahhh.

Which one is it? How long has it been?"
"A long time..."

Whoa, does she know how she just sounded? Now, by

this time in the week, I have to admit that I am way too out of it to make a judgment call, but that sounded almost

sad. Maybe it was just wishful interpretation and she was just saying that to emphasize that it had been a while,

but, honestly, how many satisfied women do you know who answer like that? At this point, I just keep going.

"4

years?"
"How did you know?" She never told me that. Remember, I heard that from my friend when she was giving me

all of that information about her relationship status. I didn't expect her to think anything of it, so I scrambled

to make my usual wisecracks.

"Well, you said, 'A long time...' That's a long time. Actually, I found out

about it on the internet. There is a whole website devoted to your relationship with pictures and everything."

Wow, I am one step from having my foot in my mouth, but I guess that was alright.

"Anyway, I wanted to know

where my card was. You came all the way over to bug me about it, I sign up, and you don't even give me a card to

put on my cube to show I'm participating."
"We ran out. David isn't here today, and I didn't want to raid his

office to find them."
"Oh, okay."
"Here, you can have mine."
"No, I don't want to take yours, I am just giving

you a hard time about it." I am just here to talk to you because the love chemical in my brain goes crazy when I

look at you and I will bother you with any legitimate excuse I get. Don't you see that? Don't you?!?!? I hope

not, because I'd like to keep that to myself, anyway.

"No, really. Here, take mine. Everyone knows I'm

walking."

I protest while she talks, but she hands it to me and I hold it while I finish talking about it.



"You never got anyone else to sign up." Every usual comeback to that statement comes into my head and is quickly

destroyed because it would usually be self-deprecating or mean-spirited humor like, "That's because I'm a loser,"

or, "I'm not going to bother anyone with that," or whatever. My thought goes to my friend, who isn't walking as

far as I know and would be the only person I would bother asking if she was going. That is the only reason on earth

I can think of for why I said what I said next.

"I know. Maybe I should have done something like this." I

point to the vase of roses. I have been looking at them as much as I've been looking at her.

"What, given them

flowers?"
"Uhhh...yeah." What the hell was I thinking?!?!?! That doesn't make any sense at all. At this point,

I am so out of it that I don't know whether I either said or thought, "Well, one rose." I don't know what the

hell I was thinking, so I quickly change the subject.

"I really feel bad taking this sign. I am going to put it

back on your cube."

Again, she tells me to take it, and I say that I'll go put it up right away. I go to leave

and then remember the other reason I stopped by. I ask her about this project I set up, and she says that she heard

it went well. I tell her I'd give her a copy for her team when I was done in case she wants to use it for another

project. I finish talking to her and go back to my cube. A little time goes by, and I decide that now that I am

out from under her spell, I should actually say something nice about her anniversary. I was so out of it that I

didn't even wish her a happy anniversary. I decided to write something heartfelt instead.

"Subject: Beautiful

Flowers

Someone must be really lucky. Then again, maybe two people are really lucky."

Obviously, I was

ambiguous in the first one as to whether I was talking about her (for the flowers) or him (for being so lucky that

he sends flowers in appreciation). That, of course, might be enough to insinuate something, but the second sentence

left no doubt that I was just trying to pay a compliment and make her feel special with what she had. I did not get

a reply, as I knew I wouldn't, but I hope it did something to brighten her day. She is still there almost an hour

later.

"Why are you still here?"
"Why are you still here?"
"I'm not the one with a dozen roses on my

desk," insinuating that she shouldn't be here anymore because there is somewhere else she should be. I still

don't get why she is still here, but it is not my business to press. I still have this feeling that she likes me

despite some evidence that suggests otherwise. Ball 3, 3-1.

I'm ahead in the count. This should be great,

right? Thinks seem to have been in my favor recently, and maybe just the right moment will come where I'll get

something going.

Friday arrives, and the last day of training is here. I spent hours the previous night

drafting the presentation to lessen the work for our teem today. Apparently, this work was desperately needed, as

we arrived in our final team preparation meeting with a lot of work to be done. I am scrambling to get things done,

and I get slide after slide ready without moving from my seat. Lunch goes by, and I get about 5 bites of my

sandwich the whole time before final edits are made.

As I am working on the fifth or six page, one of the women

in our group comes over to show me her page. This woman is all-around beautiful, but there is something about her

that I cannot get past and even know why. She has these big, beautiful eyes, and if you know anything about

psychology, you know that big eyes are attractive. Babies have big eyes for this reason: an evolutionary way for

humans to naturally find babies to be adorable, they have several characteristics that make them great. Also, these

type of eyes are rated highly in attractiveness scales. I feel bad because I was staring at her constantly, and to

make it worse it was always directly into her eyes because they were captivating. If I could, I would stare into

them all day. Honestly, besides knowing that she has short, blond hair and that she is thin, I don't know what the

rest of her looks like in more detail than those eyes.

She goes over the page with me, and I draw it up on the

computer. She comes by later, puts her hands on my shoulder, and asks how I am doing. I am not even sure if I

answered her because I was so focused on what I was doing. A half-hour or so later (time was crunched and I could

not tell how much was going by at any moment despite my constant clock-checking), the presentation was almost done,

and we were racing the clock as our presentation was almost about to begin. She puts on her makeup and tells me

that she would buy me a drink if we weren't already having a company-sponsored happy hour after the presentation.

I look up as she says this, and she is putting on some type of shiny lipstick. I stare for a moment and look at

something other than her eyes for once. Damn............................. *Snap* I get back to work. Strike 2.

3-2.

We give the presentations, and I go back to the room we were preparing in to get my stuff. Apparently,

this was the site of the happy hour. Whoops. They moved all of our stuff in no particular order to another room.

I scramble over to look for my stuff, but the cap with attached necklace to my USB memory stick is gone. I can't

find it, and it is driving me insane because I never lose anything. My obsessive-compulsive behavior kicks in, and

I am looking frantically for it. I grab what I could find and take it back to my desk so I don't lose it, and I

get back to my cube only to find my chair is gone and someone was logged into my computer with their username

locked. I'm starting to stress out. I've been around a large group of people all week, there is a large social

event going on, someone touched and moved my possessions, and I can't find things. I am losing it. During this

little panic, I miss the bulk of the happy hour.

As I am running around, someone tells me that someone found a

USB-related item. I turn to find the most attractive girl at the meeting standing two feet in front of me looking

directly into my eyes. I did not see that one coming, and I am shocked. I could have stopped and talked to her,

but instead I thanked her and ran off to find my stuff.

Later, one of my teammates stops me to say goodbye, and

I ask her if she happened to see it or (even better because I'd have found it) take it while she was putting her

laptop away. We looked for a minute or two, but then she had to leave. As she was leaving, Big Beautiful Eyes was

getting ready to leave, too, and overheard me talking about how I never lose anything.

"You'd hate being with

me, then." What?!?!?!? Did she just say what I think she said? Once again, I hear my words coming out of someone

else's mouth that have always been used around someone I like. Of course, I was too busy scrambling to find my

lost stuff, so I kept looking around. As they left, she thanked our teammate for keeping us all together, and then

they thanked me for my job on the presentation, saying there would be no presentation without me. They leave, and I

make my final attempts to find whatever else I could find, missing what appears to me in hindsight to be huge missed

opportunities. Strike 3. I'm out...

I go back to the happy hour, have a drink, and help the organizer clean

up. I am about to leave when I decide to thank someone I never met in person for helping me out last year on a

project via a colleague and email. Because of this, I get into a conversation with him and this girl that I

actually had lunch with through the same colleague a couple of times a few months before the other event, meaning it

was almost a year and a half ago. As thanks for my assistance with cleanup, I got a free ride home courtesy of the

organizer, who I should have remembered better before being reminded.

I slowly begin to fall asleep after I get

home while thoughts and images of the week's events danced through my head. I suddenly remember that I was going

to try and ask out this one girl, one of the attractive girls in my lunch group, to a movie over the weekend but

never had a moment that day to make it to her desk. I had a dream about her the night before, and I had a feeling I

should ask her out the day before when I stopped by to give her a cookie and show her something we were talking

about the previous week. I can't put my finger on it, but something was telling me to ask her out. Unfortunately,

time was not on my side this week, and I fell asleep thinking about the romantic adventures of Pancho Rivera...



I wake up on Saturday and take a day off from life. There needs to be some downtime from all of that action. I

figured that this might finally be the end of things for a while since I won't be seeing the people I had training

with very much anymore. Of course, I check my email to see if anything happened last night that I should be aware

of, and who would have thought: the trinket girl sent me an email the night before apologizing and telling me that

we will definitely go out for a drink very soon. The catcher must have dropped the ball on the third strike and

gave me a chance advance to first. Maybe things might work out after all. Maybe this crazy week with women might

amount to something. Maybe I'll get to think for the second time in my life, "I'm in love." Maybe I'll just,

for once in my life, have a gorgeous female that I am attracted to as my friend. Either way, three out of four

ain't bad.

PR