Filed under: birds and bees | Tags: alcohol, alexis, anastasia, dating, lesbian, wine, women
There’s this thing my lady friend calls the “big lesbian cesspool.”
Let’s look at some facts. In the last three elections, the Voter News Service exit poll registered the gay vote between four and five percent. Apparently the Census 2000 under-counted (awesome! go equality!) the total number of gay or lesbian households and thus the total gay and lesbian population can be estimated at five percent of the total U.S. population over 18 years of age.
Now, let’s do some (very bad) math. I live in New York City. It’s estimated that there are 8.3 million other people living around me. Multiply that by five percent and you have 415,000 other folks that either are in a strictly homosexual relationship or would like to be. Now, the tricky part: what percentage of that number are women identifying as lesbians or bisexuals? Wouldn’t it be nice if you could just halve the number since the population is generally 50 percent male and 50 percent female? But I don’t think that’s scientifically correct.
When Kinsey did his famous sexy time studies, he found that somewhere between one and two percent of women were exclusively homosexual. We’ll take that with a grain of salt since it’s a bit outdated. Ultimately the number of LGB people in the U.S. (then and now) really is quite subjective and fluid. I’m not sure a number will ever be pinned down.
So for everyone who skipped my bad math and quick googling skills: in the grand scheme of things, there aren’t a ton of gay people around. Thus, it’s safe to assume there is some inter-dating between exes and friends. And that. Shit. Gets. Complicated. Have you ever seen the L word? Let’s do a quick rundown: Bette and Tina dated. Bette dated Alice. Alice dated Dana. Dana sort of hooked up with Jenny once. Jenny dated Shane. Shane made out with Helena. Helena dated Tina. It’s a big, lesbian cesspool of dating your best friend’s ex or your ex’s best friend.
Truthfully, I didn’t believe this when my lady friend told me about the cesspool she was minorly connected to in Brooklyn. Call me naive but originally I chalked this theory to being nothing more than that: a theory, a myth, like unicorns and the iPhone. But then Alexis rolled into town for my birthday and drowned me in that cesspool with one drunken text.
We were at a lovely dinner party. Alexis made guacamole that, despite it’s poopie color due to my inability to pick out ripe avocados, was absolutely delicious. My Italian side reared its head with some bruschetta and red wine. We had too much gin, too much wine, too much pulled chicken and a super heated game of catchprase. My friend invited coworkers and my lady friend’s ex girlfriend was in town for the weekend as well, so she joined the fun. Generally, my rule of thumb is to hate any ex of anyone I’m sleeping with. But this girl is downright awesome. She acts just like a boy with me, is generous with cigarettes and introduced me to the most drunkenly violent game of rock, paper, scissors ever.
The night was winding down. Lady friend and I were lying on the floor of her bedroom trying to digest our respective food babies and my phone starts to vibrate. I was a little shocked to see a text from Alexis waiting for me. She was maybe ten feet away from me in the other room. What did she want? Why couldn’t she come into the room and tell me herself?
Alexis: Uh oh. I have something to tell you.
Me: Okay?
Alexis: It’s bad.
Me: Um, okay. Tell me.
Alexis: No, I’ll tell you when we get home.
Now at this point, Alexis rolls into the room with another friend. I’m a little perplexed as to a) why she didn’t tell me in person; b) what’s so important and c) how she manages to text me while we’re in the same room without anyone noticing.
Me: Tell me now.
Alexis: I think one of your friends is really cool.
Let’s translate: “I think one of your friends is really cool” in Alexis speak means “I want to bone one of your friends.” But something was a little fishy. When Alexis is bombed, she makes no effort to hide who she wants to bone. She’d probably tattoo it right across her forehead if she could and I don’t blame her since she usually gets what she wants. Her secretive texts immediately made me think she had the hots for my lady friend or the ex.
Me: Oh. Christ. Lady friend or ex?
Alexis: What? Dude? Come on. I think the ex is really awesome.
BAM. I just outed Alexis. Alexis had the hots for a girl. Maybe it was the wine? Maybe it was seeing me all up on another girl? The world may never know.
I must give credit where’s its due. Alexis managed to single-handedly introduce me to the big lesbian cesspool with her mini crush on my girl’s ex girl all while keeping her pants on. And it’s a shame, because the ex totally would have hit that if Alexis had made the first move.
-Anastasia Beam
Filed under: alcohol | Tags: alcohol, alexis, anastasia, beer, brooklyn, dress, friendship, martini, new york city, tequila, wine, women
Oh how people change. I moved away from Anastasia for a year and she did a 180 on me. Not that it is a bad thing; it’s just entertaining to reminisce about the old days.
I remember the day that she told me that gin martinis were vile and she had no idea how I could drink two of them. Text from last weekend: “I had two martinis and I could drive a car NASCAR style right now.” My, how people change. And only in a year.
I met this girl (Anastasia) who believed that beer was life’s nectar and a pair of clean jeans was acceptable for all occasions, Brooklyn was Timbuktu and going to Manhattan on a Sunday was like giving birth. Soooo painful. Video games were the only acceptable Saturday activity, exploring the wonderfulness of NYC on a weekend was out of the question.
Asking Anastasia to come into the city on a weekend was like asking for her first born. And trust me, she won’t even let me be in her wedding party, so I guarantee she won’t let me meet her first born. Even worse than asking her to come into Manhattan on a weekend was asking her to come visit me in Brooklyn. Queens to Brooklyn was like Germany to Bangladesh. Who would travel that far to visit someplace that wasn’t as cool as Germany and why? Brooklyn to Anastasia was like another world. Brooklyn didn’t exist. Queens was better than Brooklyn, hands down.
One time I went “all the way” from Brooklyn, middle of nowhere to Anastasia, to the Upper East Side-five minutes from her apartment. I asked her to meet me for happy hour. Her response? “Yeah there is no way in hell you are getting me to go to Manhattan on a Saturday.” Wow.
When we did go out, Friday’s only, Anastasia’s drink of choice? Beer. Beer. Beer. Try suggesting a tequila shot and you might get punched. I, of course, was going through my “dark” period, where tequila and gin martinis were necessary for survival, so we had a hard time seeing eye to eye on drinks.
I am not complaining, I loved down to earth Anastasia: the girl who didn’t know what a dress was (even in the brutal heat of a New York summer), thought that a skirt was the Universe’s punishment for women, museums were a waste of a Saturday and drinking wine and hard liquor was for pansies who couldn’t handle beer. I sure do enjoy drinking beer, sitting on the couch in jeans and a hoodie, but I also enjoy a fancy night out sipping wine. So imagine my surprise when I recently started hearing stories about gin martinis, tequila, dresses and Brooklyn. WHAT? Who is this woman?
Anastasia now: wine and gin has replaced beer, an occasional tequila shot isn’t out of the question and Brooklyn not only exists but is even inhabitable occasionally!
A status update about a month ago mentioned Anastasia buying a dress and I almost fell out of my chair. A dress?! One of those things that show legs and boobs? Anastasia? She has legs? Just plain crazy. Anastasia has sported five dresses this year, I’m in shock. Wonderment, if you will. I cannot wait to go sip martinis at a fancy bar with my “new” friend!
Anastasia has ventured to Brooklyn a few times, goes to museums, hangs out in the city no matter what day it is, doesn’t say: “Alexis, you know what day it is,” when I call her on a Saturday. To be blunt: she’s a martini whore now. Love it! I’m sure I have done just as much changing as Anastasia, seeing how we met each other during “dark” phases in our lives, but now that the sky has cleared, we are getting to know new sides of one another. She met me when I was face down in tequila 24/7 and I met her when Brooklyn, to her, was an abomination.
Times, they be a-changin’.
-Alexis Patron
I wonder some times why certain people are in their chosen profession. Especially people who work in customer service and loathe everyone. If you hate dealing with people, maybe you should look into deep sea fishing or being an astronaut, thus not having to deal with many people.
I was contemplating this when I met a very jolly fellow working in a wine bar. He was a peach.
My parents and I were having a very lovely evening out doing some wine tasting. The local wine bars where my parents live have live music on Fridays in the summer so we were doing a tour of the wine bars. It was a lot of fun until we were introduced to people-hater Larry at wine bar #3.
There was only one other table of people in the cozy bar. So the eccentric band looking like the cast of Beverly Hillbillies and the chubby, balding wine steward were the only other people in the joint. We sat in the comfy sofa seating and waited for Larry to come to us. Seeming to be rollin’ on E, barely-harry Larry took a squat at our table, very close to my mom and began excitedly shouting out what we should try. Being wine connoisseurs, my parents didn’t need this overzealous man in their face telling them what to order.
We each ordered a sample and Larry huffed his way back to the bar to get our order started. We seemed to have angered him at some point because when he returned he wasn’t very pleased to serve us. I enjoyed the syrah that he poured for me, so I ordered a glass. My parents decided to change their mind.
Watch the fuck out. Larry was gonna rage.
My mother was wearing a very nice white outfit as it was summer and seasonally appropriate. So when Larry decided to toss her glass of wine on the floor right next to her in a fit of fury, it could have been catastrophic. Luckily no wine got on the white clothing.
good god, larry, no.
With a disgusted air, Larry had taken my mother’s glass of wine after she said she wasn’t fond of it and threw it out on the floor. I was so stunned that I couldn’t say anything. I’m glad I liked the syrah, but I just don’t find it ever appropriate to do that in customer service. We were wine tasting, it wasn’t like my mom told him that the wine tasted like old hairy ass and that she would personally pluck the last remaining hairs from his head if he didn’t get her another glass of wine. It was a polite: “I don’t really care for this wine, may I order the syrah?”
Needless to say we left after that.
Larry needs a new line of work.
-Alexis Patron
