Life update. This post is the anti-Twitter

Wow. So I had some vacation days from work that expire at year's end, so I took off two Mondays for some long weekends. Last Monday, I went out to the Opera with a beautiful 18 year old boy at FIT. I thought it was kind of a date, and I think we both had a good time. After the show, we parted and each began heading home in our separate directions. Somehow, about 15 minutes later we bumped into each other in Times Square. I don't know what it means. IT WAS SO RANDOM! But we hung out for a little bit in Times Square, and then went home. I was happy for the extra time with him. But this weekend he was pretty spotty with answering my calls or texts.

Friday night, a 20 year old from Parsons came over. I've known him for some time, but I'm not really that into him. We fooled around a little, but I didn't want to kiss or have sex with him. He kept asking why not, and trying to go in for a kiss. Like really kept trying again and again. Too much.

Hey, why do people ask the stupid questions whose answers they don't want to know? Like, "So how many boys have you brought back here?" I don't get it. You want me to say you're my one and only? You may one day be. But you can't erase my past, so what do you want? I should tell you all about how you're one of a long illustrious line of hot boys? Or lie and say you're the first? I mean, when you ask a question like that, what do you want to hear?

Now that awful Gaga song is stuck in my head. I'm almost afraid to tell you which one because you probably haven't heard it and if you go find it, the song's awfulness may become lodged in your head as well. It's called Monster, and the refrain "He ate my heart, he a-a-ate my heart" is pretty much the whole song.

I got a few cool items. A memory foam mattress topper which I'm lying on right now for the first time. Well, second. I lied it out on the floor when it came, but this is the first time I set it up on my bed.

Today in the city I got a few reed diffusers from Sabon (check them out - great stuff!) and put them around my room. I am now taking repeated deep breaths because with every breath I want to inhale deeply the fragrance.

I stayed at a cool hotel (the Benjamin) as part of my "staycation". But no one would join me, so I enjoyed it alone. But it sucked to be alone. I kept reaching out to people to come visit, but half the time they were busy or away or couldn't make it, and half the time they said they would come and then "their phone died" and I didn't hear back until the next day.

The hotel's fitness room was fairly small, but I had it all to myself. Felt like my own private gym. And they had a great steam room. The room was well appointed, and of a pretty fair size for the city. I had enough booze with me for a football team, but I didn't drink. I was feeling too good to drink by myself, but it still hurt that I was so alone. (Another giant breath of Sabon Bordeaux.)

I have a massive pile of unwashed laundry at the foot of my bed. By tomorrow morning it's going to be my freshest-smelling load of dirty laundry ever.

When I asked about the wifi, the guy at the hotel desk told me it was $12.99 for 24 hours. Well, what he didn't say is that the hotel's wifi is also available through Boingo, which charges just $10 a month. Think maybe that's something he could have mentioned?

At 3:00AM I called the desk and ordered a pillow. Whatever.

I got a haircut. But you might not even notice. I told him to leave it long. Partly because I want it long, partly because I didn't trust him. I think it was a good choice. New Yorkers who love their barber or stylist - please comment and tell me who you use.

The super sexy 18 year old bi boy who goes to school upstate is home for the holidays. I was looking forward to seeing him. He almost came over, but his "phone died" and we couldn't coordinate. I'm tempted to believe it's true. But it's been happening so often with different people...

The TV in the hotel was beyond useless. Nice big screen, 25 or so different channels. Nothing on. Ever. I think they do it on purpose to try to sell you VoD movies. But I decided to just stream stuff on my laptop, tiny screen and all. At least I get to choose what to watch. In the end I didn't spend much time watching anyway.

Next stops. Sephora, Bloomingdales, H&M. At Sephora, I was overwhelmed by the vast numbers of tiny bottles and jars with exhorbitant price tags that, as far as I could tell, all do the same thing. Or nothing at all. Who knows, right? I went over to the men's fragrances and sprayed them all on those little tester paper strips (which Sephora actually named "Scenta") and smelled them. I wasn't a fan of 212Men, but I liked 212SexyMen (it's different, dark, not your everyday scent) and Gucci Pour Homme (more classical). Givenchy Play Intense was interesting. Not bad, but probably not for me. Some of them just reeked bad. Malodorous. Interesting that I liked the sexy men but not the plain men...

I also saw the brand of toiletries they had at the hotel. That was cool. A lot of hotels have hotel-branded "specially made" stuff that you can never find in a store (probably because in the store it's sold under the Procter & Gamble label...)

H&M was a hot mess. I would so go there to shop for boys, but it seems the boys aren't for sale. But I digress. So there was a shirt I wanted. I own one, and I wear it all the time, and I want to get a few more just like it. Maybe in a few different colors. Why is this so difficult? So the shirt is $40. But they have another line of shirts for $20. The difference? The $20 line is cut wrong, made from cheap materials and generally just a pile of trash. So why do they adulterate their clothing with inferior stuff like that? Maybe it's a good thing. I don't know. It has happened before. Two vests. Same style and color and everything. One is 100% cotton, the other ersatz polyester. But what really threw me is that when I found the shirt I wanted, it was covered with dust. Looked like it was still there untouched from that last time when I bought the shirt that started this journey. Wow. Dusty clothing on store racks. Big no-no. I didn't buy it.

At Bloomingdales, the dressing rooms were so big and spacious I thought it might be a good place to hook up. Cheaper than a hotel. That idea was dampened when after a few minutes inside an attendant called out, "Eveything fit okay?" But I still think it could work. Hey, it beats the johns in the college library...

I feel like every one of my friends wrote a tweet or a status raving about how awesome the movie Avatar is. I'd never even heard of it until this deluge of viral.

Well you're all caught up now. [Actually, you're not caught up because it took me weeks to actually post this. Sorry, I'll try to get the next piece up son. Stay tuned.]

Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate. How comforting a thought as we head toward the bleak, dispiriting, obduracy of winter. (see below for sonnet + explanation)

My absence wasn't intentional; I've been away from blogger-enabled computers for some time. Still am, for the most part. So you know you're not missing out, its just been more of the usual - suicidal ideations, start-of-semester class choosing, the job hunt, the opera. Opera was kind of cool, I live in New York so some of my out of town friends encouraged me to take advantage of the Met. Too bad my potential date never answered his phone.

The job hunt was most depressing. I sent out tons of resumes and got no calls for interviews. I know, it's my fault. I went about the task all wrong. I didn't clearly think it through and decide what kind of job I wanted. In the end I found a cool spot in a university research lab. Probably unpaid, boring lab work, but that's life. It's only short term.

I hit a crisis after graduating. College is too good to give up for something as ethereal as a diploma. So I'm taking a few more classes this semester while I decide where to go next.

P.S. For all those of you who found this page searching for an explanation to Shakepeare's 18th Sonnet, here goes:

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest:
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.
-- William Shakespeare

It was common in Shakespeare's time to compare one's lover to a beautiful and pleasant summer day in praise of their delightful qualities. Shakespeare wants to improve on this cliche. He opens, "shall I compare thee" and answers: No, that comparison would not suffice to do justice to your loveliness, my sweet. Why not? Because "rough winds do shake the buds of May" (early summer is still cold, harsh weather may yet intrude) but you my love are always charming. Later in the season, it becomes too hot, sometimes cloudy or rainy, and then the season fades quickly back into winter.

But thy eternal summer shall never fade. Unlike the shifting seasons, once pleasant, next moment harsh, you, my beautiful muse, writes Shakespeare, shall remain forever untouched and perfect, your grace captured in my poem. This poem has endured hundreds of years and recreates in the reader's mind the beauty of the subject as it did the day it was written. Though the subject has grown old and is by now long dead, "so long lives this (poem) and this gives life to thee (keeps you alive in the minds of men)." This is one of several Shakespearean sonnets composed along the theme of poetry as a means to immortality.