Kiss and tell.

Today, Facebook reminds me that it's ten years since E3 approached me at a reunion of sorts with G, M, BR etc. amongst others. And I turned her down. I don't know how long she'd had the crush prior to approaching me, but I'd always suggested to her that if she wanted to grab a drink, to fire me a message.

I'd always suggested this as a friend - we were reasonably close at school, so this invitation was always platonic. She never took me up on the invitation.

I can't say that I regret the decision, and under different circumstances, things might well have been different. E3 is pretty and there is/was an element of attraction there. But kissing me in front of my friends, completely unexpectedly, is not how I work. It would have needed an element of privacy - at the very least do it away from everyone else or take me up on the invitation to grab a drink when no one else is about. 

Throwback.

For the past week or so, I've been waking with FA2 on my mind. It's the same thing, I think, that happened in December. It's not about sex or a lack thereof, but about companionship and waking up to a warm body beside me. I'd argue that I miss hugs and cuddles as much as I miss sex.

Curiouser and curiouser.

There were a series of posts made by R2 on Facebook over the weekend. It seems that she's moved, and gone from city living to a more rural lifestyle. Her old business has closed and she's started a new business, albeit in the same industry.

It's all rather cloak and dagger. People who have commented on these posts are wishing her luck, but also wondering why the sudden change. R2 has not posted any replies. Have there been changes in her life? Has she separated from her husband? Who knows? But moving 200 miles away, shutting down your own (apparently successful) business in the city, only to start up again under a new name in a small rural town without any kind of clues seems weird. Would she come home if she actually separated from her husband? Who knows?

I'll be watching this with interest.

Blasts from the past.

Another thing that sprung to mind from being out on Saturday were two admissions from GM. Well, not admissions per se, but topics that were semi-interesting.

The first was a semi-acknowledgement of this post. In it, I pondered whether or not I remembered GM admitting to sleeping with a friend of S's, who he'd had a massive crush on. The subject raised its head again when a friend of S's asked him if he was ever going to sleep with the friend in question, which then led to GM's admission. Now, I'm still not sure if GM and S's friend had sex, but something definitely happened.

The other point of interest was GM's comment that Sports Girl had a boob size reduction. This actually isn't news to me - she admitted it to me years ago when we were still talking to each other. I was dubious at the time, mainly because her story was all over the place. I'd seen pics of SG in her early twenties and she didn't seem to be overly big in the chest area. But, years later, GM has confirmed that she was telling the truth.

I win!

I get to be smug because the HR girl hasn't been in touch at all today, despite her promises and protestations from Saturday night. Technically speaking, I don't think she's at work today, so her ability to contact me is pretty much non-existent, but still... I still "win". 

Talk the talk.

Following on from my last post, the chat with the HR girl was amusing. GM is well-known in the company for dating a couple of HR girls, even though he left around ten years ago for other opportunities. My own profile is less prominent, though I've been at the company long enough, and have been involved in enough company-wide initiatives that the company hierarchy know my face, if not my name.

That was the case on Saturday night - the HR girl recognised my face and was stopping to chat when GM followed me through the door.

We (the HR girl and I) then had this back and forth where she was adamant that she knew me, but she didn't even know my name. We laughed about it and when we were parting ways, she promised that she would IM me on Monday morning.

Maybe I'm being literal, but she has 4 minutes before I'm proven right.

Good times.

The good thing about S's late arrival last night was that I got to spend some time alone with GM. We were able to chat about stuff that you simply can't talk about when S is about. S seems to have an aversion to talking about serious topics.

So we covered our dating lives (mine's non-existent, he's dealing with psychos), our professional lives (we're both underpaid, he's reasonably happy and I'm at a crossroads) and mental health (his, unknown, mine, poor) and KfW2. GM (like FP) has a massive soft spot for KfW2.

When we met up with S, all that fell by the wayside and we had a great time. We ended up in a bar, that I'd never been to before, and it was great. It was my first proper night out in a long time. 

GM was distracted by some girls who were sitting beside us in the first bar we hit. There was a lot of skin on show, but a quick glance showed that they were very young. In the final bar, I watched this couple play games with each other for hours - lean in for a kiss, then back off. It didn't seem playful, it seemed like more of a mind game. 

And then I saw something else - an attractive tall woman. I think I've posted here before that I like taller women. And this one was tall. Taller than me, in fact, and I'm six feet tall. And the way she was moving around the dance floor reminded me of seeing KfW2 on the dancefloor way back in the day. S also spotted her and came over.

"Look Ruuude, there's one for you!"

She seemed to be with someone, which was a shame, but she was arguably too young for me anyway.

And then, to top it all off, GM and I bumped into one of the HR girls from work. GM used to date her closest friend.

All-in-all, a great night out.

Health by Stealth.

Kinda related to the post I made yesterday about FP and his friends, I came across the following blog post on Reddit about talking to men about their mental health (see below).

It always reminds me about those posts you see on Facebook about talking to people etc. which are, in my own opinion, fucking useless. It's a social media thing. You have to be seen to be posting this stuff. But it's rare that the people posting actually follow up on their own (i.e. copied) advice.

Without patting myself on the back too much, I've done my bit. Over the past few years especially, I've reached out to lots of people (at least a dozen alone who have been mentioned on this very blog), to chat, to see how they're coping with lockdown, isolation etc.

But I've also posted at least a few times, about my own experiences when I have summoned the courage to open up to people. I can remember feeling a little deflated after having chats with GM and KfW2. It hasn't really helped either when I think that KfW2 and I have drifted further apart over the past few years, and the isolating/lockdown has only accelerated that.

But... if you're passing by and have read this, then go read this blog post. And have a chat with someone. I guarantee that it will help.

How to Talk With a Man About His Mental Health | Psychology Today

Will he, won't he?

Going back to the "TBC" from the last post, a few days ago I suggested meeting for a few drinks and to catch up. Both S and GM were positive about it, so I pencilled it in. After all, it's been ages since I went out to socialise and the weather's great.

But it's all gone quiet. I sent a message at lunchtime, trying  I knew that GM wouldn't likely reply until after 6 PM, but S has done his usual thing of reading the messages but not replying. Is he coming out? Crying off? Who knows?

[18:25] Edit: GM has just messaged and it looks like he's still in the mood to meet. Nothing from S.

[19:51]Edit 2: S has just messaged. He's been out on the lash with one of his dickhead mates and one of his nicer mates. He may meet with us later.

Buzz. Kill.

With the weather being nice, and potentially with S popping over later before heading out for a few beers with him and GM (TBC, of course) I thought I'd open some windows and get some fresh air in as well as do some cleaning.

The cleaning was done quickly. What took much longer was trying to get the wasps out of the house. The first few good days of the year and all of a sudden, I'm inundated with them. Stripey bastards.

Fun stuff.

It's been a tough time for FP over the past while. In less than 15 months, he's lost two close friends to varying types of cancer. While I've not had a chance to speak to him about it recently, I think it's hit him quite hard. His two friends were close in age to us, so have died fairly young. I may have posted about one friend a few times. S met him in the pub one night and thought he was great, and still talks about that night out, even now though it must be well over five years ago. KfW2 met him and was seemingly oblivious to the fact he was chatting her up for almost an hour.

He did hint a few nights about taking time to smell the roses. Well, he didn't use that exact phrase, he did kinda suggest that he might think about doing fun stuff more often. We were discussing going to a Champions League match at the time, so stuff like that rather than going out for ice cream. Maybe not bucket list items, but certainly something "special".

Additionally, with the news breaking last night that Taylor Hawkins, drummer with the Foo Fighters (one of our favourite bands) dying, I think he might lean into this more. Next time I see him, I'll follow up with him on all counts, to see how he is and to see if he wants to follow up on doing more fun stuff.

Just stuff

I've taken a couple of days off work. I need a bit of a recharge, and it felt like a good time to do so. I also took a fancy to some fish tacos tonight, but with my cupboards currently being bare, I took a trip to my local shopping centre.

I popped into a few shops, then had one last stop in Sainsbury's for some sour cream. I was in a world of my own, my earphones in and a Spotify playlist on the go. But, who's that? That masked girl looks familiar... Quiet Girl!

I remember a similar meeting a few months ago. I should catch up with her and see if she wants to grab a coffee, I thought to myself. I seemed to recall that, last time, we parted ways with a promise that if we were to repeat it, she would buy the coffees.

Just grab the sour cream, head to the aisle where I saw Quiet Girl and have a chat.

As I turned into the aisle, Quiet Girl was exiting at the other end. When I followed her, she was gone. Disappeared into thin air. I spent a few minutes seeing if I could find her, but she had actually disappeared. Ah well.

I paid for my sour cream and left.

I had picked up some stuff in Marks and Spencer, specifically lovely little smoked salmon parcels with cream cheese. I picked them up out of nostalgia. FA2 used to buy them and I remembered them being delicious. They were yummy. And I spent a few minutes reminiscing about the good times with FA2.

Two Year Anniversary

Pretty much about two years ago, to the minute, I was chatting to KfW2 in my house when the expected news came in: the office was closing and we were going to be working from home until further notice. It was unusual in that I was ahead of the curve in getting the news before KfW2.

But here we are, two years later, and still no sign that our company is returning to the office. I never thought it would be two years. A year at most, I thought.

They're being ultra-cautious and I can understand that, but part of me is itching to get back, at least for a day or two per week. I want to meet my new team-mates, form relationships and take bigger steps forward than I think is possible with working from home. There's also the mental health issue to consider. 

Fingers crossed it's sooner rather than later.

Picture this.

I was going through some old emails, specifically an email conversation I had with USHW a few years ago where I had admitted to finding some old photos and scanning them onto my PC. Specifically pictures of a party I attended where I'd kissed QC1 the first/only time, where I last remember spending time with my school crush and, not pictured, the night FP and I turned up much later than we'd planned due to getting side-tracked at a pub and playing pool and losing track of time.

And another picture of QC1, a few years later. I'd hesitate to call her "beautiful", but I'd say "insanely pretty". Is there a difference? In my head, yes, though I'd find it difficult to explain why. And why did I get deja vu saying that?

Memories

Today, Facebook reminded me that it's 5 years since that last time I can remember having a night out with KfW2, just  the two of us.

My memory is shocking these day, so it's possible that we've done something since, but I genuinely can't remember. Bearing in mind, this was a birthday celebration, I have to dredge my memory to think of the last time we went out purely to socialise rather than celebrate and I can't remember that.

We are playing phone tennis at the moment around arranging another night out, though this is another birthday celebration rather than socialising for socialising sake.

And I am really looking forward to it.

Weekend woes.

I had tentatively arranged to take KfW2 to dinner on Saturday, except it all got a bit disorganised and by the time I got around to confirming KfW2's availability, there were no free slots in her restaurant of choice.

It was slightly frustrating. I knew that, despite having the entire city's restaurants to choose from if she elected to sleep in my spare room, she would choose the (admittedly decent) restaurant that was 15 minutes' walk from her house.

I think I've spoken before about how, these days, she's reluctant to move far from her house for socialising. When we do talk about socialising, I have to go to her neighbourhood rather than vice versa. She will, though, pop in with her kids.

Afterwards,  she messaged... "It doesn't have to be the local place..." but I think she's kidding herself, it's really is her much stronger preference.

It actually turned out that she was feeling under the weather at the weekend, so it was likely that she would have cancelled or that she would have been so under the weather that the night wouldn't have been enjoyable for either of us.

Celeb stuff.

I've spoken about how I think Anna Kendrick kinda, sorta, looks like CAB. A tiny, slim version of CAB from many, many years ago.

So, I went down an Anna K rabbit hole on Reddit, which brought me to this YouTube video, which I think is someone else's podcast, but she's a really good interview and I enjoyed the whole thing - all 100 minutes of it.

I also found this photo:

Anna Kendrick, blog favourite Alison Brie and two quite attractive ladies whose identities are unknown to me. I'd love to be at that table on the left. I think it'd be hugely interesting and really good fun.

That's cheered me up.

Walking, and talking.

"Who's the chick?", asked GM. "She was really nice."

I'd bumped into him when I was out on a walk with Nerdy Girl. I explained who she was and why we were off the beaten track.

When I finally got back to the house after leaving Nerdy Girl, GM was texting, asking questions. It was a last-minute thing. She only texted on Monday, we scrambled quickly and made arrangements for last night.

Still, the exercise was good, I feel it a little today even though it was just a moderately paced walk, plus catching up with her and GM was great.