The Legend of the Crazy Animal Print Chick: Part Two

Prologue

I took a girls virginity. I'm not sorry about this. She had it coming. I guess if anything, I am kind of sorry that we never actually made it to the third movie, but that would have just prolonged things. At the time, I just wanted to get it over with. Maybe I should back up and explain how this came about.

Part 2: What is a Woogie?

"You are telling me that you have never seen Star Wars?" I asked, incredulous.

"That is what I'm telling you, I have never seen that movie." She crooned in what she evidently thought was a seductive tone... It wasn't.

"You know there are six... six movies." I informed her, struggling to hide my condescension.

Six Movies

"Oh" she sounded interested but looked rather crestfallen "Maybe you could show them to me sometime."

"Maybe I will..." I said with a laugh despite my revulsion at this situation. "I just can't wrap my head around the fact that you have never seen these movies. How have you made it to your twenties without even stumbling across Star Wars by accident? I mean, the first one is on TV basically every weekend."

>>>Fast Forward>>>

Days have passed since I took Sierra to see Toy Story & Toy Story 2 in 3D. She is now my friend on Facebook, and she texts me basically every day.

Whatever happened to people not having to be in contact with each other every second of every day. In movies, people will go on a date with someone, have almost no contact with that person for about a week, and go on a date with them again the next weekend. The only time they talk is to set the date. There is no, "hey, just checkin’ to see how U R" or "hey here is everything i 8 today: [unreasonably long list of foods including low calorie cookies and diet drinks]" By the way, this is just something that needs to be said to the general population: just cause it says "diet" on the container doesn't mean you should eat twice as much of it #defeatingthepoint. But back to the constant contact thing; I never saw Meg Ryan bugging Tom Hanks incessantly in Sleepless in Seattle (or You've Got Mail... the shameless and unnecessary remake that at the time was cleverly modern, but is now hilariously dated)

...And in You've Got Mail, she could have bugged him mercilessly, flooding his inbox with unending and inane blather. But she didn't. They sent email back and forth at a rate of about 1 every couple of days. Granted, they were merely pen pals for the majority of the movie, so maybe the analogy is not perfect. The fact remains, however, that before texting and Facebook chat (and AIM I suppose), people actually had to converse. I usually like talking. If people spoke with each other more often rather than writing to one another in various ways, many arguments could be simply avoided. I get into an argument with some of my friends every time we text. One or both of us will inevitably misread or misinterpret the message. It is something I have known since the days of IM, but I still seem to ignore it, sarcasm/jokes are hard impossible to convey via text messages.

One final note about texting, can we move past the silly abbreviations? I will grant you that there are some occasions when abbreviations are acceptable and even preferable, but they are pretty rare. Once admitted into college, you should be at a point in your life when "lol" and "gr8" are no longer a part of your textcabulary. Middle and High School girls, feel free to continue using these abbreviations, no one cares what you have to say anyway. But beyond that, Stop It! I poop you not, my grandma, who is surprisingly proficient at texting, would put "lol" at the end of every text she sent for almost a year. We found out she had no idea what it meant. She thought she was saying "Lots of Love" not "Laughing Out Loud"... and this is exactly the problem. There should be a statute of limitations on these abbreviations. When you are writing collegiate research papers and making real resumes, you should not be allowed to use these anymore (except in the rare emergencies alluded to previously). I would not have so much of a problem with if they did not bleed over into non-text speaking and writing. Email, in general should not contain any of these, it is just sloppy. Speaking... whatever... say whatever you want, but if you say "lol" out loud (especially if you aren't actually laughing) don't be surprised if I never listen to another thing you ever say, sarcasm notwithstanding. Finally, and most appalling, the little dipshits who have been "failing up" through our public school system and are inexplicably admitted to my college will invariably write "UR" in place of both "your" and "you're" in final drafts of papers that I have to grade... I gave 3 F's because of this last year. But I have gone on a major digression... Back to the story!

Did I mention that she texted me... a lot? It was excessive, especially for someone who I had, in essence, just met. I am ok with daily texting from people with whom I am friends; I actually have stuff to talk about with them. Still, I did not want to jump to unfounded assumptions. The great thing about texting is you can ignore them if they become to annoying, unfortunately, if you ignore them too much, you get a bunch of "hello?", "have you been getting my messages?", and the ever dreaded "?" in your inbox. If you get the "?" you may as well give up. You chose poorly. You are in more trouble than the Nazi at the end of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. I did not ignore her very much, and was able to avoid the "?", and by Wednesday date number 2 was set. Via text. I guess this is the world we live in now and I will just have to come to terms with that.

I thought it was a bit early in the aquaintanceship (I refuse to call this a relationship) for her to be coming to my apartment, but that is what happened on Friday. I spent most of Wednesday through Friday before the date cleaning up the apartment. My roommate, Captain Asshat, was gross. Dude, if you are reading, I don't mean to be rude, but you were gross. You left dirty dishes all over the apartment, you almost never took the trash out, you left a bowl of cheese on the counter for 2 months and you grew plants on the dining room table. Also if you are reading this, do you have my black microwavable Tupperware bowl with the strainer top? If so, can I get that back. Also, congratulations on getting married.

Anyway, I spent a lot of time cleaning up to get ready for the big night. I was actually pretty excited. You see, this was not going to be just any date, this promised to be a special night for both of us. It was going to be her first time. That's right, I was taking her Star Wars virginity. At that point I had only taken two other girls Star Wars V-cards. The first time it was really awkward and we never talked again after it was over. The second time, it was a girl who I was friends with... she seemed to like it. We are still friends and talk occasionally. The best part about this time was that it was her idea! I think my alarm bells and whistles were broken, or else set to silent, because they were really letting me down with this girl. I am certainly not going to make the blanket statement that any girl who wants to see Star Wars is crazy, that would be silly and untrue, I know tons of awesome girls who both have seen and liked Star Wars. However, that in addition to everything else should have made me question the situation.

For instance, I am sure these girls are pretty cool.

She arrived at my apartment at 6:30pm. She was wrapped once again in an ill-fitting assortment of animal print clothing. The lurid blue peacock feather print top clashed spectacularly with her tiger print handbag. Again, being me, I commented.

"You sure do like your animal print" I said blithely.

"I am a Cougar! Some people can't pull off the animal print, they can't handle it. I love it, It makes me feel... dangerous."

Holy Damn Lady, you are crazy as hell... is what I should have been thinking (probably saying). Instead, I thought: I don't think she knows what being a 'cougar' means. Don't you have to be a divorcee and in your 40's and have older children? …And I don’t think I've ever seen Courtney Cox in animal print. "Oh, that is interesting" I said with a slight chuckle. And I didn't really think about it again that night.

Rather than go to dinner or order takeout or something normal like that she insisted on cooking for me... on the second date... at my apartment. The dinner was mediocre. Edible. I don't even remember what she cooked, which is bad. Ladies, if you are trying to impress a guy with your cooking, which can be highly effective, make sure that you make something memorable. Memorable, in a good way is probably best, but even memorable in a bad way can do the job. It shows that you are willing to put forward the effort. If the meal is bad, the guy might think you are cute for trying. It helps to actually be cute in this case. If you aren't cute, cook well. Sierra's cooking was totally forgettable. Not good. Not bad. Forgettable... this is the worst possible case scenario. What I remember about it was that she cooked for me as well as Captain Asshat.

That is right, the first date in our apartment and he stuck around for AND PARTICIPATED in it. At the very least he should have barricaded himself in his room for the evening. It is just courtesy, especially on the big night. Boundaries Dude! A normal person would have left for the evening, allowing me to make a fool of myself privately, where no one will be able to analyze my behavior and recount it for me… But Not Captain Asshat! He stays where he knows he is not welcome! He participates in private things! In front of your friends and girls you are trying to impress, he reminds you of all the embarrassing things you have ever done! He is... CAPTAIN ASSHAT! Queue the Captain Asshat theme... That sounds like it would be a Goldsmith score. Goldsmith is no Williams, but I do enjoy a good Goldsmith score. That reminds me, don’t you hate when they change composers in the middle of a series. John Williams did the score for the first 2 Harry Potter movies, and then they brought in some other jokers to do the music for the rest of them... which totally changed the tone of the movies. It makes them feel disjointed. Even though they use the original themes, it just isn't the same. They did the same thing on the original Superman movies. The first two were great and had great music, the others... well how many of you have actually seen Superman 4?

Anyway, I'm off topic again.

So she cooks. I remember the cooking taking a lot longer than necessary. Conversation was not as easy this time. Rather than moving seamlessly form topic to topic, the conversation was disjointed. We kept running out of things to talk about. I chalked it up to nerves. Excitement about the after dinner activity. More likely though, it was due to the fact that I had apparently tapped out her store of topics for conversation on the previous date. Every time I tried to introduce a new subject, she would invariably, and inexplicably bring things back around to Nubby. I thought we had satisfactorily put that particular gem to rest. Apparently not.

"I mean, where'd Nubby go? Where is he AT?"

Every time she said this she started to giggle. Her giggles were a singularly disturbing thing. It was not a hearty laugh, that might have been better. And it was not a chortle, which would have suited her. It was a high pitched unnatural keening. Not quite nails on a chalk board, but it was close. Every time she brought "Nubby" back up, I clammed up and stopped talking all together, effectively killing the conversation. This happened at regular intervals through the dinner portion of the night. When the food is finally ready, the three of us sat and ate. The awkward dinner conversation was mostly facilitated by Captain Asshat. This was not because I was incapable ore unwilling to shoulder that responsibility, rather that he felt that any conversation he was not dominating was a waste of time. Even he became annoyed with the "where's Nubby at" discussion by the time dinner was finished. Before it was over, both of us wanted to do this:

I am not sure whether it was this, or him finally taking the hint, but he did eventually go up to his room, not to be seen again for the rest of the night. Though, now I think on it, he left directly after dinner. He did not help with the clean up. I suppose that is all in a day’s work for... CAPTAIN ASSHAT! Queue music again.

I should probably take a moment to describe my apartment a little bit. This bit of exposition is not necessary for the story, but it does add a bit of context. I want to make it clear that I had nothing to do with the imcomprehensable setup. When you walk into the front door, on the wall immediately on your left is a projector screen. On the wall adjacent to that wall is the couch (facing the front door and front window). At the end of the couch is the stairs and the enterance to dining area... you get the idea. What I want to draw your attention to is the fact that if you are sitting on the couch there is no comfortable way for 2 people to watch anything on the projector. The only other tv's in the apartment are in the bedrooms. We were not at a point in the acquaintanceship where I was prepared to be alone with her in my room... alone. For all I know she could be a serial killer. She did after all have a peculiar preoccupation with Saw. So we improvised. We pulled the couch around so that it faced the screen. The couch was very long and spanned the width of the room, meaning we had to climb over it to sit in it or to leave the room.

The time had come. She settled herself on the couch. I was very excited. This was actually going to happen. I gingerly removed the DVD from its case and slid it smoothly into place in the player. I gently touched the "Play" button... and we were off! We found ourselves in a galaxy far, far away.

As I plopped myself down on the couch next to her I glanced over and realized that she had not been reading the opening crawl. No big deal, maybe she didn't realize that for this movie, the text at the beginning was important.

Sidebar: The opening crawl at the beginning of the Original Star Wars move (Star Wars Episode IV, A New Hope) is vital. If you don't read it, the rest of the movie is going to make no sense at all. Don't even bother watching it. Especially if that is your first Star Wars Movie. Some movies have text at the beginning that is not really important to understanding the movie, but this is not one of those movies.

"Do you want me to rewind it so you can read that?" Technically it was a question, but it was not actually a question.

"No, that's ok. It isn't really that important is it?" See above. Before she had finished talking I had already started rewinding. At this point I was starting to second guess the whole evening.

"It is kind of important, It sets up the movie." I restarted the movie. She looked ...embarrassed? I don't know for sure, It was kind of dark. It was tough to discern facial expressions. In any case she grimaced.

We got past the Opening Crawl. We sat there quietly for a few minutes, enjoying the movie, then she started up again. She started asking questions. I understand the temptation to ask certain questions during certain movies, but she asked dumb questions.

"What is that gold guys deal, he is so annoying?"

"That is C-3P0, he is a neurotic robot, sorta like Marvin from The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy."

"I don't know what that is."

Silently sighing in exasperation, "Never mind, just watch."

---

"What is that giant black robot guy?"

Am I really having to explain this? I am tempted to turn off the movie and tell her that is it time for her to be hitting the ol' dusty trail. "That is Darth Vader. He is the bad guy. That is why he just choked that rebel"

---

"Who are the 'Rebels'?

I audibly sighed, and turned to face her with what I can only imagine is a look that rivaled one of Sheldon's haughty looks of derision.

"They are the guys who are fighting against the Empire... the ones currently lying dead on the ground."

"..." She looked confused.

"The guys dressed all in white, the Stormtroopers, are the bad guys. They are Imperial soldiers, Darth Vader is their commander, they all work for the Emperor. The rebels are the good guys, Darth Vader just choked one."

"Oh" annoying giggle "I thought the guys in white were the good guys"

She totally looks like a good guy, I get the confusion!

Palmface. You have got to be kidding me. It is like you haven't even been watching the movie. Maybe if you would stop asking dumbass questions and pay attention to Lucas' Masterpiece we could have forgone this little foray into crazy land where Storm Troopers are good guys. "nope, they're the bad guys."

---

"Why doesn't that car have wheels?"

"It's a Speeder, it hovers... just watch."

---

After that, we got through maybe five more minutes of the movie before she started up again.

"Dear god, what is that thing."

I just now realize that those are the exact words that Wesley tells Prince Humperdink will echo in his prefect ears after they fight "to the pain". What a good movie. Ironically, Nubby (Cary Elwes) pops up again. It is like the number 23. It is everywhere, but you do not notice it until you look for it.

"That is Chewie, He is Han Solo's Co-Pilot." I said literally seconds after Obi-Wan said "This is Chewbacca, He is co-pilot in a ship that might suit us"

"But what is he?"

"He's a Wookiee..."

"What's a Woogie?"

"I don't know, I believe it is what you do directly after you Boogie…” at this she just stared at me blankly, so I continued, “…but Chewie is a Wookiee." And sensing a dumb follow up question, I added, "He is an alien."

Woogie:

Wookiee:

I was done. This was too much. I was ready to call it a night. She had successfully ruined Star Wars. It was like she just shat on my floor. It is kind of like when you are a kid and someone tells you Santa isn’t real. Imagine that someone took your favorite thing in the world and destroyed it with a baseball bat, Office Space style…

I had the overpowering urge to punch somebody in the face. I resisted. I could never have a relationship with this person. Ladies, when you know that you are watching a guy’s favorite movie, don't do the things she did. If you have a question, ask the guy to pause the movie, and then ask your question. Before you do that, though, ask yourself, will this question likely be answered in the course of the movie? If so, do not ask that question. If the question is not likely to be answered, ask yourself, Is this a dumb question or will the answer to my question contribute in any way to my understanding of the movie? If the answer is “no” your question is dumb. If it is a dumb question (You have been lied to all your life, there are definitely dumb questions) Do Not Ask It.

We did finish the movie, and there were myriad other dumb questions. As the movie progressed, and the questions got dumber and dumber, I think she could tell that I was getting frustrated. When the movie started, we were sitting next to each other. When it was over, we were on opposite ends of the couch. When the credits started to roll, I played the "I'm gettin' sorta tired card" to great effect. A few short minutes later, she was at the door gazing at me with big doe eyes. I am 95% sure she expected me to kiss her. I leaned in, gave her an awkward "just friends" hug, you know the one…

Best Part of the Entire Movie!

Like that one. I stood back and said, "Well, it is getting late, I will call you later this week..."

"Yeah, this was really fun!" She sounded genuine, but c'mmon, really? In what universe was this a really fun time?

"Me too" I lied.

She got in her car and drove off

The End… I wish.

Coming Soon:

Part 3: The Double Dare Date and the Mail Order Fiancé

Coming Later:

Part 4: Sierra Strikes Back with A New Hope

Part 5: Political and Grammatical Correctness

Epilogue: The Long Good Bye

The Legend of the Crazy Animal Print Chick

Prologue

Stories become tales, tales become legends and legends... well they are the stuff of dreams, legends inspire the imagination. This is not a legend, it is merely a story. I, never the less, will continue to refer to it as “legend” because I like the sound of that better, and it bespeaks a cautionary tale, like a fable. This story may or may not be true. The names may or may not have been changed to protect the not-so-innocent. It is not really even an original story, you've probably heard it before in some form or fashion, but here, in its entirety (or as close to that as I could get from memory) is the story. Sure, it's embarrassing, a little shallow, and after reading it you probably won’t sleep soundly for a few days. But for my own sake, and the sake of posterity, I had to commit this story to the most permanent and lasting medium I could think of... the internet. Once it is here, it will never go away. So here it is:

The Legend of the Animal Print Chick.

Part 1:
The Ominous Origin

I have learned a lot of things in college, like... buffalo wings cost 50 cents on Tuesdays, and no matter how big the discount, waffle house will always be cheaper than IHOP, and never, ever, eat the beef at the dining hall, you will be picking it out of your teeth for the rest of the week... flossing won’t help. Most of the lessons I've learned are about food. I think, though, the most important thing that I have learned in my 6 years in college (calm down, I am getting a masters degree) is that boredom is the worst reason to do anything.

My IPod had stopped working about 2 weeks ago. It gave me the frowny face symbol that usually means “You’re Screwed”. If you insulted your IPod’s mother, this is the face it would give you, then it would never talk (or play music) to you again. So, I stepped on to an almost full bus after my Physics lab on the way to truck after a long day of classes without the respite of my own personal sound track as a barrier to the rest of the world. Like I sometimes did when my IPod was mad at me, I struck up a conversation with the person next to me, you know, just being friendly. Today, that person was a girl with longish dark curly/scrunchy hair, she was wearing glasses, jeans and an ECU hoodie. She was extraordinarily average looking. It was almost refreshing. At the time I would have given her a solid 6 (I warned you of the shallowness) which is on the mid to low end of the "dating potential" range.

"How's it goin?" My usual, and completely original opening line. Though perhaps not clever or creative, it is remarkably succinct and depending on the response, you can tell instantly whether the person has any interest in a conversation with you.

"Alright, classes are sucking though!"A complaint, right off the bat, a bad sign. However, the fact that she responded with more than a one word... "good" or "alright" means that she is probably interested in a conversation.

"That sucks, what sort of classes are you taking?" A chance for her to redeem herself. See, she started off with a complaint, generally a bad sign. I mean, who starts complaining to complete strangers. But, my second question gave her the benefit of the doubt. Maybe she just has tough classes. If she is a Chem major or an Econ major, commenting on the difficulty of her classes is a totally justifiable general statement and not really a complaint at all.

"Blah, Blah, English, Blah Blah Blah, Psychology... what about you?" My interest began to wane. Here is a piece of insight ladies; in general, your attractiveness is directly correlated to the how much I pay attention to you when you complain/talk about stuff that doesn't interest me. This girl was a 6, not a bad score, not a great score. I paid her just enough attention to catch the important details, English and Psychology. She was a psych major. I got it. Here is a helpful chart:

Notice that even if you are a 10 (meaning you are Natalie Portman or equally attractive) I will still only listen to you talk about things I do not care about for about 20 minutes. 20 minutes is actually quite a lot. I have trouble paying attention to things I really enjoy for much longer than that. But, it is for this reason that I started playing hard core Angry Birds shortly into Black Swan. Even a lesbian scene between Mila Kunis and Natalie Portman was not enough to hold my attention. This is also why I change the channel immediately when I see any current or former female Secretary of State or AttorneyGeneral, or Rosie O’Donnell…

you get the idea.

A Digression:

No offense to you psychology majors out there, but let’s be honest, you have limited yourselves by choosing that as your field of expertise. In the field of psychology, there are very few actual jobs that you can really do. How many more self help books do we really need? Although, I suppose it may be fun to build a psychological profile of the morbidly obese diabetic in a wheel chair to whom you are serving Big Macs while you work on that pop-psych article

you're hoping will set the blogosphere abuzz. Stop lying to yourself, a job at McDonalds is not field research and no one reads your blog. A psych degree is like a degree in being annoying. We all like to use the stuff we learn in class, I get it. I talk about markets and business models and fun stuff like that when it is appropriate. But psych majors, stop psychoanalyzing your friends, after a while you won’t have them. This is really all I am trying to say. As a student you know just enough to be annoying. Not all guys who have a healthy respect for their mothers have an Oedipus complex and not all girls who dress like sluts have daddy issues. Sometimes, most times, a cigar is just a cigar.
…But I digress

"Management Classes, they aren't too bad...lots of group projects." An honest answer.

“I'm Sierra by the way… like the mountains.” At this she fell into a manic fit of giggles.

"blah blah... more small talk ...blah blah" I'd almost completely stopped paying any attention at this point, just the token head nods, and "oh, really" where appropriate.

"Well, this is my stop, I'll see you lat..."

"This is my stop too... I am parked all the way in the back ...and it's raining, just my luck."

"Man, sucks for you!" is what I should have said.

What I actually said: "I'm parked right in the front, I could give you a ride to your car if you want, it is raining pretty hard."

And that was mistake number two... mistake number one, I would learn later from my friend, Smallgood, was talking to strangers on the bus in the first place.

...So, I drive her to her car and once there I say, "well... it was nice meeting you, maybe I'll see you around." and here is where the story takes an intriguing turn. Before she gets out of the car she says, "Aren't you going to ask me for my number?" I know you all saw that coming, but at the time, I did not... what can I say, I am a bit slow on the uptake. Well, needless to say, I am shocked. I stutter. I am lost for words. I say, "That’d be great". Here is what was going through my head. ::She's a 6, that is pretty good, and I am not really busy right now, I have no other prospects. What harm is there in taking her number. She seems nice enough. Who knows, she could be really cool. Why not?:: It was the "why not" that finally clenched it for me. There is really no argument you can make for that kind of logic. Also, I think I had recently seen the movie Yes Man with Jim Carey, so, ya know, I said yes.

So over the next couple of days I couldn't stop thinking about how I really wanted to see the Toy Story 1 and 2 double feature in 3D. More importantly I thought about how I did not want to be that guy sitting by himself in a theater full of kids and their parents. Timing is everything. I found out about the movies months before, but none of my friends wanted to go with me. "I already own those movies", they would invariably say "why would I pay $12 to see them?" apparently, they did not think 3D movies were as cool as I did. Then out of nowhere, there was this girl who serendipitously gives me her number a week or two before the movie goes out of theaters.

...Timing

I didn't immediately friend Sierra on Facebook. I had had a relatively recent bad experience with a girl on Facebook. I friended her after meeting her for the first time. We went on one date. She had crazy eyes, and was a hippy. It didn't work out. Had I not friended her, I would have never had to talk to her ever again, and that would have been that. Unfortunately, I did friend her and after that date, she was constantly trying to talk to me on the (new at the time) Facebook Chat. It got to the point where I stopped signing on. I eventually had to block her. I did not want a repeat. So I put off friending her as long as possible. Unfortunately that severely hampered my ability to do research on (read: Face-Stalk) this girl, which could have helped meto avoid a few surprises, but I'll get to those later. After the requisite 3 days, I called her. We set up a nice little date for that Saturday, dinner at McAlister's and the movies, pretty standard.

I was amped about having a real date. It is a rare occurrence. It is not that I can't get dates, I just don't. So Saturday rolls around. For brevity's sake I will skip the saga of me getting ready for the date. suffice it to say, it takes an embarrassingly long time to achieve that I'm dressed up but trying to look like I'm not dressed up look. I go to pick her up. I walk up to the apartment. I knock on the door. The door opens and I learn several things in very quick succession. First I learn that she lives with her mother... in an apartment... in Greenville. Second, I learn that there is a very small child that lives with them. Third I learned that she really liked animal print. I have never had an issue with girls wearing animal print before. But this was not animal print like I'd ever seen before. She was wearing 3 separate, non matching pieces of animal print clothing, shoes, a shirt and a purse.

I gave her the benefit of the doubt, but that should have been a major red flag. At the time, I just thought she was trying a little too hard to impress on the "first date" and went a bit overboard. In any case, it was visually painful... and being me, I did comment on it, almost instantly. She was thoroughly convinced that she looked awesome in animal print. And she may have... at one time. Unfortunately, the most disquieting thing about the whole situation was that not only did she wear non matching animal print clothing, but the non matching clothing did not fit. It was just a scoach too small for her. However, this was a first date and I had other things to worry about like being immediately introduced to her mother and "nephew". And just in case I wasn'tsquirming enough already, Grandma, who lives next door is invited to this little family reunion. Perfect, just what I wanted, to be judged like a show dog by the mother and grandmother of the girl I was taking to see two Disney movies. Even if they did not have me under the microscope, that is a lot to throw at a guy within the first 5 minutes of the first date.

As we drove to McAlisters, we chatted. Conversation with her was surprisingly easy. However, that was probably due to the fact that she shared way more info than is necessary or appropriate for a first date. At least she was honest and forthcoming. Before we even left the parking lot, Sierra told me about how her estranged father who lives in another state owned the apartment complex where she and her mother and grandma lived. This situation was odd and begs many questions... none of which were asked, I did not want to go down that particular rabbit hole. The amount of weird that I had thus far encountered had very nearly reached my personal limit.

I next learned that she and her mother were taking care of her nephew. Her older but less mature sister got "knocked up" (her words). This sister was apparently very irresponsible so the kid stayed with “Grammy and Auntie Sierra”. She really loved the kid. He was her little man, and I was told that if he did not like me then she would not date me... the end. There is nothing really wrong with this on the face of it. She loves her nephew, and was flirting at the same time. Don’t get me wrong, it was weird, but I was reserving judgment at this point. Later events however would cause me to question whether this child was her nephew or, in fact, her own offspring... But I am getting ahead of the story.

Once at McAllisters we discuss movies and music and other typical first date fare. She really liked horror movies and loved the Saw series (Right then buzzers and red lights and alarms should have been going off). My experience with horror as a genre was limited, but I had at least seen the first 3 saw movies. I like them for what they are... gory slasher flicks, but they don't even crack my top 50 That reminds me, I should redo my top 50 list, Star Trek 4 and Rocky are definitely in the top 5 this time. In any case, we started talking about Cary Elwes's character in the movie. You know the guy who was the Dread Pirate Roberts in The Princess Bride… This Guy:

Anyway, *Spoiler Alert* She noted that after he cut off his foot in the first movie and crawled away, you never see what happens to him. "I mean all he has is a stump of a leg left. Where'd he go, where is nubby at?!" She said. I have no idea how it happened or why, but somehow the grammatically appalling "Where'd he go, Where's Nubby at?" phrase became a thing, a sort of inside joke between us and she would repeat it continually. I did attempt to correct the grammar once (yes ladies, I'm that guy) but for that story you'll have to wait for Part 5. Anyway, we stayed on Nubby for a while until I made the call and pronounced that particular conversation dead. Before it was all over, I wanted to do this:

We moved on to other movies and I discovered that she had never seen Star Wars... none of them. I always told myself that that would be a deal breaker... any girl I date must be a Star Wars fan, or at the very least have a healthy respect for the movies. She did say she was willing to watch them, and we pretty much planned the second date right then and there, though I didn't realize it then. Again, I was reserving judgment and relaxing my standards. Star Wars is not, in itself, the end all, be all of films. However, whether a person has or has not seen these films says a lot about that person. If you have made it to your 20’s without seeing these movies, you have the capacity to willfully ignore one of the greatest achievements in film history.

You are purposefully keeping yourself from understanding countless pop culture allusions. It basically means that you will never fully enjoy Family Guy or Robot Chicken. If you doubt the cultural significance of Star Wars you have never seen them, and that is nothing more than willful ignorance.

We headed to the theater for the long awaited Toy Story and Toy Story 2 3D double feature. I was so excited! These are 2 of my favorite movies. I remember when I saw the first one with my family in 1995. I dreamed about it for weeks before. I'm sure it drove my parents nuts how much I talked about it. And here it was again! I don't remember any of the conversation between me and Sierra the rest of that night. It didn’t matter though; we never actually made it past small talk. Once we were in the theater, popcorn and soda in hand, I considered and ultimately decided against the safety seat between us in the theater, I was on a date after all. I am relatively certain though, that there was no hand holding or arm over the shoulder maneuver as these would have distracted from the movies.

Hours Later, once the movies were finished, I dropped her off at her mom's apartment, walked her to the door, gave her a hug, and said “I had fun, we’ll have to do this again.” And we did...

Coming Soon:

Part 2: What is a Woggie?

Coming Later:

Part 3: The Double Dare Date and the Mail Order Fiancé

Part 4: Sierra Strikes Back with A New Hope

Part 5: Political and Grammatical Correctness

Epilogue: The Long Good Bye