Dating older men

A friend of mine wrote a blog about dating older men. She and I used to work together in Atlanta. She should be about 25 right now...or something like that. Much younger than me. She has way more gumption than I had at that age. Anywho, her blog discussed the reasons for possibly looking for an older man - more stability, the person is more grounded and has already "sown his royal oats," and other things similar.

I have to disagree...or maybe I'm just meeting the stupid older men. Take this guy I met in Atlanta in my bowling league...we'll call him Ashy Larry. AL worked for UPS...and brown clearly could do nothing for me. He got the nickname AL from myself and my teammates, because his knees were CONSTANTLY ashy and he always had those dayum brown shorts on. Lotion, fool! Olive oil! Crisco! Somethin'.

So Ashy Larry takes a liking to me. He's not completely unfortunate. I could always keep a vat of Curel in the car. AL invites me to go to dinner with him after church one Sunday. We plan a time, and I figure what the heck. I had just gotten out of a stupid relationship, and needed to learn how to "date" again. That Sunday arrives, and Ashy Larry calls...he's going to be late because they have a meeting after church with the deacon board...blah blah blah. OK, fine. I can't really knock him for being involved with the church, right?

So 5:00 p.m. rolls around...then 6:00 p.m., then 7:00 p.m. By 8:00 pm. I'm halfway between worrying that something happened to him, and cussing his azz out for wasting my dayum time! I had no other plans that day, but still.

He doesn't call over the next couple of days. I see him at the league that Tuesday and I am most certainly giving him the side-eye. I have a hard time keeping my feelings off of my face, although some of my friends are worse than me. Now AL's parents are older and they have some health problems...he tells me they had to take his dad to the hospital. I'm thinking, "ok - that is forgiveable." But oooooooooh no. That is not the reason AL stood me up. This FOOL said, "well the meeting ran late, so after we got out I went to dinner with the deacon board."

Um. You and I had dinner plans. You went to dinner with the deacon board?????????? JESUS TAKE THE WHEEL. I just sighed and walked away.

Now, my birthday rolls around (in January). AL gets wind of this. He approaches me and says, "I want to get you something for your birthday." I tell him it's not necessary...mostly because I can just imagine what sort of foolywang mess he is going to show up wtih. My birthday was on a Saturday. So the following Tuesday at league, my team is bowling the "vacant" team, and we finish earlier than everyone else. I'm about to leave and AL comes running up to me and says, "I have your present in the car." Sigh. OK, fine. We walk out to the parking lot.

I put my bowling bag in the car and turn around. He comes up to me with this black duffel bag. Now, AL bowls on several teams in different leagues. They all have the same name. I'm not going to give it here, LOL. But him and several members of his team have personalized license tags with the initials of the team name. I would imagine they have all sorts of goodies with the team initials on it. You will see why this is important in the next paragraph.

I look at the bag and notice the following:

1. At the top of the bag, his freakin' team initials are embroidered. Fool, I am not on your team. Why do I want a bag with your team name on it? Which leads me to believe that you had this bag chillin' in your closet and came up with the DUMB AZZ idea that it would be a good present for ME. Negative.

2. This fool has had my entire GOVERMENT name embroidered onto the bag. My first name on the left side of the bag, and my last name on the right side. My first name is in white thread, and my last name is in red. WTH? He's telling me that I can take the bag to use when I'm traveling. Do you think I want to be walking through the airport with a duffel bag with my ENTIRE GOVERMENT NAME WITH NON-MATCHING EMBROIDERY????

3. This fool has spelled my last name wrong. Anybody who knows me in real life, knows that gets on my nerves. But what really irritates me about that is, this dude is the LEAGUE TREASURER. You see my name EVERY WEEK when you collect the dues. Seriously???

4. It's a freakin' DUFFEL BAG. You coulda got me some flowers. A card and some candy. Just a card, frankly. What woman do you know who puts "duffel bag" on her birthday wish list???

Thankfully it was dark outside, because at this point it's about 9:30 or so. I don't think he saw my face, otherwise his feelings would have been hurt, and he was sitting there all jipper-looking. I can't even remember if I said thanks. He just kind of gave it to me and then was like well, "I have to get back inside" and walked away. I remember throwing the bag in my trunk and being thoroughly done and outdone. My teammates had already left the parking lot, so on my way out, I proceeded to call them and tell them about the whack azz present I had received. They were crying laughing at me. That was not that funny, y'all!

I am just verklempt at recalling this mess, and I can't write any more. But, I have more stories about older men. I'll have to share them later.