Sunday, August 13, 2006
Another testament to my eternal bad luck, with a little background information first. Enjoy my misery!
When I was around the age of seven, my parents gently nudged me into piano lessons, and by gently nudged, I mean that one day I came home from school and was told to get ready for my first piano lesson at Mrs. Gygi's house (yes that's her real name). No problem. My dad is a talented pianist, and since every boy wants to be like his father at that age, I was willing to give it a try.
Fast forward about eighteen years to last Friday night, when I was alone with two women and had the strange feeling that suffering through nearly ten years of piano lessons was finally going to pay off for me. I got invited over to the unnamed women's apartment at 9:30 and was a little curious to see what was going to happen. I didn't like the odds (two against one in their favor), but I realized that if I played things perfectly, I might be allowed to participate in the kind of prurient activities that are suitable only for late-night cable TV.
I arrived to find my two hostesses finishing off a bottle of tequila and playing some kind of weird drinking game using face cards and a toy car. Part of me hesitated. I don't drink and I get a little nervous around alcohol. Since it never pays to offend people, I decided to stay for a while and then make up some pathetic excuse so I could leave, retaining my moral fiber and also their friendship at the same time. Forget the late-night cable stuff. I just wanted to survive now.
After the obligatory and uncomfortable small talk that always ensues with friends you only see once in a while, we made our way out to their balcony, overlooking western Weber county. It was a beautiful view, and my initial nervousness was fading, since I'd given up on scoring for the night and didn't have to worry about being rejected. Then we got talking, and that's where a chain of verbal banter began that has baffled me for the last week. It started, strangely enough, when I used a word that has always seemed pretty ordinary to me.
One of the girls asked if I was still nervous, since I'd been visibly thrown off after they answered the door half drunk. "No," I replied, "I'm feeling quite serene."
"Serene, I love that word," one of the girls yelled. "Say another cool word, I think it's hot!."
"Hmmm, how about solipsistic."
That one earned me more drunk laughter than I was entitled to.
"That's hot, so hot! What other cool things can you do?"
I hesitated, not knowing what to say. Then my totured childhood came to mind. "Well, I play a few musical instruments."
"Oh man, that's hot! That's so hot! What do you play?"
"I've played the piano for most of my life, and I took violin lessons as a kid and guitar lessons for a few years."
"Wow, that's so hot. Musicians are hot. Mmmm, so hot."
Now, since I haven't spent much time around drunken individuals, I don't know if saying "hot" that much is a symptom of the alcohol, or if these girls were just retarded and couldn't think of anything synonymous. They continued telling me how hot musicians are until one of the girls got a phone call and went back inside. Now, I have to admit that I was feeling pretty confident at this point, a rarity in my loser life. They were going on about how hot musicians are, and if my logic is correct here, since I'm an accomplished musician, I'm also hot, at least in their opinion. Makes sense, right? I decided to put my logical conclusion to the test while I was one-on-one with the girl whom I considered to be the more attractive of the two. There had been some casual flirting with her earlier in the evening and I thought my chance of succes was a lock. If her friend came back out and happened to catch us making out, then, well...let the games begin!
So, while my target was rambling on about the hotness of musicians, I summoned every last ounce of courage from the inner depths of my soul and made my move. I'm not going to say what kind of move I made, since I don't think it's relevant and it makes me look like a dork, but instead of a contented mew of pleasure, I got the look. No, not the lusty, "let's get it on" look that's a reward in and of itself, but the confused look women flash you that seems to ask, "What are you doing?" I froze, realizing that I'd made a serious error in judgement. After a quick apology, I decided to make my retreat. If humans had tails, mine would have been tucked between my legs as I made my way to their front door. I was defeated.
A week has passed since that unfortunate incident and I'm still licking my wounds. It's not the first time I've been shot down, and I know it won't be the last, but ouch...where did I go wrong? I've analyzed the events of that evening hundreds of times, with my linear mind working like this:
Drunk girls are easy. Musicians are hot. I'm a musician. Thus, I'm hot. I'm a hot musician, yet I got rejected. Conclusion: I'm a musician, but I'm not hot.
Ten years of piano lessons down the drain.
When I was around the age of seven, my parents gently nudged me into piano lessons, and by gently nudged, I mean that one day I came home from school and was told to get ready for my first piano lesson at Mrs. Gygi's house (yes that's her real name). No problem. My dad is a talented pianist, and since every boy wants to be like his father at that age, I was willing to give it a try.
Fast forward about eighteen years to last Friday night, when I was alone with two women and had the strange feeling that suffering through nearly ten years of piano lessons was finally going to pay off for me. I got invited over to the unnamed women's apartment at 9:30 and was a little curious to see what was going to happen. I didn't like the odds (two against one in their favor), but I realized that if I played things perfectly, I might be allowed to participate in the kind of prurient activities that are suitable only for late-night cable TV.
I arrived to find my two hostesses finishing off a bottle of tequila and playing some kind of weird drinking game using face cards and a toy car. Part of me hesitated. I don't drink and I get a little nervous around alcohol. Since it never pays to offend people, I decided to stay for a while and then make up some pathetic excuse so I could leave, retaining my moral fiber and also their friendship at the same time. Forget the late-night cable stuff. I just wanted to survive now.
After the obligatory and uncomfortable small talk that always ensues with friends you only see once in a while, we made our way out to their balcony, overlooking western Weber county. It was a beautiful view, and my initial nervousness was fading, since I'd given up on scoring for the night and didn't have to worry about being rejected. Then we got talking, and that's where a chain of verbal banter began that has baffled me for the last week. It started, strangely enough, when I used a word that has always seemed pretty ordinary to me.
One of the girls asked if I was still nervous, since I'd been visibly thrown off after they answered the door half drunk. "No," I replied, "I'm feeling quite serene."
"Serene, I love that word," one of the girls yelled. "Say another cool word, I think it's hot!."
"Hmmm, how about solipsistic."
That one earned me more drunk laughter than I was entitled to.
"That's hot, so hot! What other cool things can you do?"
I hesitated, not knowing what to say. Then my totured childhood came to mind. "Well, I play a few musical instruments."
"Oh man, that's hot! That's so hot! What do you play?"
"I've played the piano for most of my life, and I took violin lessons as a kid and guitar lessons for a few years."
"Wow, that's so hot. Musicians are hot. Mmmm, so hot."
Now, since I haven't spent much time around drunken individuals, I don't know if saying "hot" that much is a symptom of the alcohol, or if these girls were just retarded and couldn't think of anything synonymous. They continued telling me how hot musicians are until one of the girls got a phone call and went back inside. Now, I have to admit that I was feeling pretty confident at this point, a rarity in my loser life. They were going on about how hot musicians are, and if my logic is correct here, since I'm an accomplished musician, I'm also hot, at least in their opinion. Makes sense, right? I decided to put my logical conclusion to the test while I was one-on-one with the girl whom I considered to be the more attractive of the two. There had been some casual flirting with her earlier in the evening and I thought my chance of succes was a lock. If her friend came back out and happened to catch us making out, then, well...let the games begin!
So, while my target was rambling on about the hotness of musicians, I summoned every last ounce of courage from the inner depths of my soul and made my move. I'm not going to say what kind of move I made, since I don't think it's relevant and it makes me look like a dork, but instead of a contented mew of pleasure, I got the look. No, not the lusty, "let's get it on" look that's a reward in and of itself, but the confused look women flash you that seems to ask, "What are you doing?" I froze, realizing that I'd made a serious error in judgement. After a quick apology, I decided to make my retreat. If humans had tails, mine would have been tucked between my legs as I made my way to their front door. I was defeated.
A week has passed since that unfortunate incident and I'm still licking my wounds. It's not the first time I've been shot down, and I know it won't be the last, but ouch...where did I go wrong? I've analyzed the events of that evening hundreds of times, with my linear mind working like this:
Drunk girls are easy. Musicians are hot. I'm a musician. Thus, I'm hot. I'm a hot musician, yet I got rejected. Conclusion: I'm a musician, but I'm not hot.
Ten years of piano lessons down the drain.
# posted by RBW @ 2:45 AM 
