Everyone needs a little adventure in their life.

M, The Jew, and I had planned a trip to Chicago back in May (I think).  When I say planned, I mean M and the Jew were drunk and bought tickets using M’s leftover Southwest credits.  The real plan was to stay at M’s Parents place for a week and eat, drink, and sleep to our heart’s content.

As the date for the trip drew near we were no more prepared than we were in May.  Seriously, things have been a bit of a train wreck lately (more on that some other time).  We recklessly packed our things (including some dirty laundry) and managed to get to the plane on time (we also managed to squeeze in shots of bourbon before hopping in the cab).

The flight was horrible. Turbulence and poorly behaved children.  We hoped that it wasn’t foreshadowing of things to come.  I had planned to sleep through the entire flight (It’s been a rough week).  No such luck.  After 20 minutes I woke up.  I put in earplugs but they weren’t enough to drown out the voices of the kids behind me.

When we landed in Chicago it was pouring.  The luggage coming in at baggage claim was soaked.  Then yet another delay,  the ramp was closed due to lightening.  They were holding our luggage hostage.  Then M’s dad was stuck in traffic and wouldn’t be able to pick us up.  Three sad faces.  We were tired and needed a snack.

Things eventually came together.  Our luggage and our ride showed up.  We arrived at M’s parents place safely.  We were fed and put to bed.

Day 1:
We woke up rather early. There are routines at the Parents’ house that interfere with sleeping in.  The “plan” for today was to go to the Korea street festival and go out for indian food on Devon Ave. Done and done.  Bonus: a cool picture of M with a 40 of Sake and a straw hat.

We roamed around the mall after our food crawl.  The Jew needed sunglasses.  No sunglasses, but people watching and heckling was in full effect.  When we got home I went swimming in the sweet “R” shaped pool.  Then it was a quick LAN party to upload pictures from our adventure on to the FB.

After dinner we wanted to go out and see some Chicago nightlife. It was fairly uneventful.  Apparently Chicago’s version of Hipstertown had been overrun by yuppies.  We plan on going back to the last bar of the evening.[get name from M]. Since M was driving, the Jew and I were drinking.  I came home drunk.  The Jew was somewhere in between drunk and tipsy.  Needless to say we needed food.  The Jew wanted White Castle for some strange reason.  Thanks to the iPhone we made that dream come true.  I had indian leftovers at the house (Excuse me, why can’t more places serve veggie hashbrowns?).

Day 2:
Up at 11am.  Yes, we got to sleep in.  I don’t know what time we came home and passed out. The menu for today was Chinese and Thai.  M and the Jew actually went running this morning.  I do not run <strike> (I will probably swim later)</strike>.  We got a late start leaving the house. Today’s menu was Chinatown.  We went to lunch at Joy Yee’s (4pm is now lunch time).  Then we roamed around.  Sunday night is “family” dinner at M’s parents so we ended up making a small feast in their kitchen (I love the accessibility and granite counter tops).  We stayed in the rest of the night eating and drinking.  Needless to say, we slept well once again.

Day 3:
Today I was up at 8:30 for some strange reason.  We made it out of the house by 11.  We hit the field museum.  DINOSAURS! Then it was off to fancy dinner at Custom House.  The food was ok.  It was well thought out but poorly executed. The textures were off.   We ended the night dancing at Fizz.

Day 4:

Today was a full day.  After our usual breakfast of leftovers we headed to the Art institute.   We split up to cover more ground and I ended up seeing the whole thing (I could spend days in there). We made plans to go out to for tapas at Emilio’s with M’s family.  Yet another feast.  I was tired.  I passed out after dinner.  M and the Jew went out for drinks.  I didn’t even hear them come home.

Day 5:
The Jew’s last day in down.   Not so much food grazing today.  We had a low key day.  Chicago Safari.  Frank lloyd wright houses, Oz park, and   Licoln park.  M and I have dinner with an old friend.  Surprisingly decent indian food for the suburbs.

Day 6:
Lazy day.  M and I slept in.  I had to scan some paperwork to refinance my house.  we hit the Costco and the H&M. Then it was Green Zebra for dinner.  My favorite fancy dinner so far (there will be pictures).  We drank A LOT at dinner. Then we met some friends for drinks later.  Chilling out before driving home was a must

Day 7:
We went back to Uru Swathi for brunch.  We got to go orders of samosas and aloo gobi before leaving Devon ave.  We had planned to lounge by the pool before leaving but it was looking pretty dreary.  We ended up packing and chilling out.

Overall it was a great vacation.  I spent more money than I intended but at the end of the day, you can’t take it with you when you go.

For now I will give you the wrap up for 2009.  I may have some words on the last decade later.

This year in live music: Broken Social Scene, Lymbyc Systym, The Submarines,  SXSW (Flosstradamus, Asobi Seksu, Titus Andronicus, Chairlift, the DJs from the Hood Internet, Kanye West, Big Sean, GLC Consequence, Really Do, Tony Williams, Mr. Hudson, Kid Cudi, Common, Erykah Badu, Buck65, B.Dolan, Sleep, Sage Francis, the Obits, Handsome Furs, American Analog Set, the Rosebuds, Bishop Allen, Au Revoir Simone, These Arms are Snakes, Cursive,  Passion Pit,  the Soft Pack, The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, Matt and Kim, Amplive, Franki Chan and Curt from Flosstradamus, and Echo and the Bunnymen),  Crystal Castles, Loxsly, the Dears, Great Northern, Passion Pit, Harlem Shakes, Clues, Explosions in the Sky , De La Soul, El Ten Eleven , Free Press Summerfest (Broken Social Scene, Explosions in the Sky, Prince Paul, Voxtrot), Los Campesinos!, Broken Social Scene,   FFF Fest (Royal Bangs, Crystal Antlers, Foot Patrol, Sugar and Gold, Vega, MC Chris, Neon Indian, Yeasayer, Les Savy Fav, Pharcyde, Atlas Sound, Why?, Broadcast, Dj Numark,  Lucero, MIssion of Burma, Buraka Som Sistema, GZA, Kid Sister ) Regina Spektor, Hockey, and Pheonix.

This year in non-live music: I am still having Last.fm iPod scrobbling issues.  Here’s to this year’s new albums that kept me awake at my desk. NASA, Mos Def, Amanda Blank, Del tha Funky Homosapien, Discovery, Walkmen, Headlights, Passion Pit, Yo La Tengo, Heartless Bastards, Animal Collective,…

This year in Sewing: I entered the Little Black Dress Contest and helped a friend who is writing a book on green clothing design.

This year on the interwebs: I am still bad about updating Twitter.  I have fallen in love with hulu and the hood internet.

This year in Movies: (theater) SXSW (RIP: A Remix Manifesto,  500 days of Summer,  Died Young, Stayed Pretty, The Time of Their Lives, Yes Men Fix the World,  Alexander the Last, and  I Love You, Man), Inglorious Basterds, Up in the Air, (dvd)Persepolis,  Thank You for Smoking, Fast Food Nation, The Yes Men.

This year in Books: Goodreads This is what I read: Story of the Eye-Georges, Bataille, Candy Girl: A Year in the Life of an Unlikely Stripper- Diablo Cody, He’s Just not that into You- Greg Behrendt, Fast Food Nation- Eric Schlosser, The Other Side of Thirty- M.A. Thakor, The Manual- Steve Santagati, Another Roadside Attraction- Tom Robbins, Love is a Mix Tape- Rob Sheffield, Even Cowgirls get the Blues- Tom Robbins, Choke- Chuck Palahniuk, High Fidelity- Nick Hornby,

Here is the list of things I neglected to do in 2009 along with excuses for not doing them:

1. More bike rides (and maybe a bike with gears). No new bikes.  I did go on a few long rides though. I would bike more if I weren’t allergic to outside.
   
2. A jumble of personal goals: tolerance, being a better person, being more trusting, baggage reduction, etc… I haven’t made things worse (At least I don’t think I did).
3. Design for another fashion show.  Hopefully Stitch, when it returns. Stitch did not return this year.
4. Demolish the back porch and fix the fence. Those are still there.  The plan is to ditch the whole house.
5. Road trip. Didn’t happen.  I flew to Seattle instead.

2010 will be my 33rd year.   My Yenta says it should be one of the best.

The topic of baggage has been brought up on several occasions.  I am working on the train case and M is working on the backpack. Neither of us what the 23 piece luggage set from Darjeeling Limited.

I recently saw Up in the Air with my Yenta (yes, I have a Yenta now).  I will save you from the details since I don’t want to clog this post up with spoiler alert warnings.  I will say that the film was brilliant.  But what else would you expect from the man that gave us Juno and Thank You for Smoking.

Back to the backpack…

George Clooney’s character (the lovable asshole), is a motivational speaker.  His pitch is about a backpack (I am still trying to figure out if the backpack speech has anything to do with the book by John Bytheway.)

How much does your life weigh? Imagine for a second that you’re carrying a backpack. I want you to pack it with all the stuff that you have in your life… (more…)

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It’s list making time again. In no particular order, here are my plans for 2009…

1. More live music (I already have tix to Broken Social Scene)
2. SXSW - interactive, film and music.
3. More bike rides (and maybe a bike with gears)
4. A jumble of personal goals: tolerance, being a better person, being more trusting, baggage reduction, etc…
5. Design for another fashion show.  Hopefully Stitch, when it returns.
6. Demolish the back porch and fix the fence.
7. Road trip.  Maybe all the way to Seattle to visit Kitten.
8. Hang out with more real people and let them see the real me.
9. Stop freaking out about money so much.  You can’t take it with you when you die.
10. Invite people over to the house.  What’s the point of living somewhere so big?

It’s over.  I managed to get to 17 with a little time to spare. For those of you who haven’t been keeping up,  here are the dates in chronological order.  I don’t have write ups on all of the dates.  Just the first dates.  There’s usually some sort of follow up if I went out with someone more than once.  No whining!  Be happy that one of the writers around here finished the exercise.

The dates:

1. Nature Boy ~
2. Mystery Date
3. Film Boy ~
4. The Grad Student ~
5. Speed Racer ~
6. The Artist
7. The Artist
8. Guy on Bike *
9. Napoleon Dynomite *
10. The Redhead(*)
11. The Redhead *
12. The Redhead (*)
13. Harry Potter (aka Obama guy) *
14. Speed Dating
15. The Cyclist ~
16. Eeyore ~
17. The Cyclist (*)

~denotes a coffee or beer date

*denotes a dinner date

( ) denotes a date where I didn’t pay

So what exactly did I learn?

1. Meeting people organically is difficult.  The internet has it’s downfalls (shopping for men like sweaters in catalog), but in the end it was convenient.  There was one organic date (The Grad Student).
2. My target demographic is riddled with smokers.  Why do people smoke when they are out drinking and listening to music? Not sure how to remedy this.  Wellbutrin in the water maybe?
3. It is ok to let people pay for things.  This is a hard concept for me.  I don’t like owing people.  Some friends have said that my company should be enough to merit a free meal every now and then. If you were paying attention, I got two free dinners (Redhead & Cyclist).
4. I should be dating someone a lot like M (but a boy, minus the crazy, and much taller).  A bit like Peter Pan, but with goals and responsibility. A combination of dorky and artsty.  I would like to find someone who compliments me not completes me.
5. I have much to learn about the world of dating.  Thanks to all of my peeps for the wealth of knowledge they shared on this quest.  Thanks to the RJ, M, Meg (+husband), and Keely for the email counseling.
6. It’s ok to let people in.  There are some people out there that will stomp on your heart but there are plenty more who will be there to help pick up the pieces (a life lived in fear is a life half lived).
7. Out of 17 dates, there were 3 guys that stood out.  Guys that I really wanted to spend more time with.  Guys that my friends might actually get along with.  I went out with 2 of them more than once.
8. I would like to try and date someone for more than just a few dates. Maybe someone who gets the title of boyfriend.  I haven’t had one of those in about 4 years. It’s time I learned how to share.
9. There is no formula for dodging an awkward first date.  It just happens.  I can say that 2 of the first dates were not awkward at all.  Some were definitely more awkward for the guy (am I that scary?)  Awkward first date endings are equally hard to avoid.
10. I made first contact with most of these guys. They asked me out as a result.  Not sure what to think of this.
11. I am still carrying some emotional baggage.  I don’t think that this exercise made it worse.  I still have the train case.  I found some stuff hidden in the pockets though.
12. I was a good idea to blog my way though this.  It has forced me to pay attention and I spent a lot of time reflecting on things while I transferred the contents of my journal to the internet.

Now here is the part where you come in readers.  Feel free to ask questions. Maybe I will post a recap interview in the near future.

I’ve written about baggage in the past.  This song says it all.

I listen to it every time I fear that I am about to end up with the 23 peice luggage set from Darjeeling Limited.  Or like the Trash Lady in Labyrinth.

Pack light, pack smart little ones.

This post is kind of all over the place, it’s more a stream of conscious writing exercise for me than anything else.  Sometime you just have to get stuff out of your head.  So sorry if it’s a little wonky.

I’ll start with Jazz music:

You know how in dancing there’s some people who just understand the musicality of it all and how things are supposed to fit together?  Well I’m beginning to feel like that about life in general.

There’s some people who get the nuances, and the little breaks.  Then there’s just some who don’t.  This is about the time of year when reflection hits me right on the head.  These were a few past bad years for me.  I wouldn’t say that I struggled a ton, but emotionally, I think I went through some stuff that’s helped me grow a lot.

It’s kind of like a jazz song (A-B-A-B-C-B-A). Stuff’s going ok, it gets bad, then it goes good again then it gets bad, then something out of left field happends, and then it gets bad, then it’s all good again.    I feel like my life the past two years has followed that structure. Well at least loosely.

Now I move on to baggage and stuff:

I guess what I’m saying is that my interpersonal relationships have followed this pattern.  Maybe here is the place that I look back on thoes bad and good time and say thanks.  I’m not sure if any of my ex’s still read this, but that’s ok.  Writing this is more for me than them.

So, yeah, thanks to you dudes who’ve dated me in the past few years.  Through thoes relationships, I’ve learned a lot about myself and they type of people I choose to be around, clearly you were not good enough for me.  And also, I’m finally thinking that I’m getting to a point where I’m learning to let go of some of the anger and bad feelings that I’m harboring.  Don’t get me wrong, I still feel wronged by thoes dudes, but it’s just not an important part of my life anymore.  I’m downsizing, I’m not carrying my usual 3 rolling suitcases full of baggage, now I have just a small backpack.  I’m working on getting it into an even smaller train case, but that will take time.  Where I’m at I feel pretty good about.

I bet that some of this is because of the recent events in my life, but isn’t that always how it goes?   The ebb and flow of the daily stuff makes the grander stuff more bearable.  Like I always say, it’s an adventure, and I’m always good for an adventure.  In fact, I’m the girl you want on an adventure with you.  I don’t carry a ton of stuff in my bag, but I’m usually more prepaired than most people, and I’m super good under pressure and in extreme situations.

OK, enough ramblings from me, I just needed to get that out. Sorry if it’s messy or vague, but I understand it, and if you know me well enough you’d understand it too.

So there were more emails and a few more dates.

We saw Wall-e on the 4th of July and watched the fireworks from his window. We discovered that our musical tastes were compatible. I was the first person to see his new apartment. He gave me a copy of the book that he wrote. He drove across town to have dinner at my place. He even brought me flowers.

and now it’s time for the BUT.

Two days after I cook him dinner I get the “I’m not ready for a relationship” email. Apparently he just got out of something a few weeks before I went out with him. He said that I deserve to be with someone who can give themselves to me unencumbered by emotional bulshit.

I feel a little used. The fact that this didn’t come up at all in the 3 weeks that we have shared a wealth of personal information is a little weird. It seems like “I just got out of a relationship” would have popped up before a lot of the things he shared. Especially if it was something that was creating that much disruption in his life. I had finished his book and it was pretty apparent that he had gone though some messy stuff. Maybe not everything in the book was true but something in his life had to inspire his writing.

As much as we hate to admit it we all come with personal baggage and emotional bullshit. Some people have paired it down to a backpack others are toting around a 5 piece matching set.

This is why I started this 17 dates challenge. I wanted to work out some personal issues. I had built this giant wall around myself and I knew that in order to grow as a person I needed to let people into my life. I had to learn how to share and trust in order to lighten my emotional load. I think I have got it down to one of those little train cases.

It’s funny that this happened now. I was trying to figure out how to proceed with the 17 dates. The 4 dates I had gone on with the redhead were good. I decided to take things one day at time. Then there is the fact that sex complicates things so I figured it was best to hang out on the plateau called date #9. The goal of this challenge is not to go on 17 dates in a year, it was for me to grow as a person. Passing up opportunities out of fear was not acceptable.