things about men, mostly

I really really want to believe that I was NOT hearing a musak version of "Get Up, Stand Up" in Au Bon Pain just now, but I guess I shouldn't live in denial. On this same lunch break, I got asked out by a dude who was hawking his CD's on the corner. I'm always slightly disturbed by how easily and quickly the "I have a boyfriend" lie rolls out of my mouth, I don't even have to think about it. And I always resent that I have to use that excuse at all, as if that's the only reason I would turn down having dinner with this guy... but it's really just the easiest way to diffuse a situation and get the guy to let go of my hand. Whatever works, I guess.

Had a meeting this afternoon with the designers of our Annual Report, who I've worked with for a year and a half and who are great. After we'd gone over the project we were talking more generally, and one of them said (not completely out of nowhere), "I just got off the phone with my wife - she's an art director and used to work for me - and I realized that because we used to work together, I am pretty much always telling her what to do." I didn't know what to say. Congratulations? That kind of insight usually comes after lots of therapy? He's a pretty subdued guy, and was clearly awed by this revelation. The other designer is the one I do more work with, and he is Britsh and adorable and I have a huge embarassing crush on him. It's usually easy to handle because we communicate mainly via phone and email, but when we meet in person I spend the rest of the day smiling stupidly.

There are a whole lot of things I love about the Sunday Times, and one of them is the "Modern Love" column in the "Styles" section. Sometimes it's sappy, sometimes crazy, but always - ALWAYS - entertaining. Sometimes it's even beautifully written or painfully relatable, though I don't think this last thing is ever really the point. After a couple of not so great ones over the last few weeks, this past weekend's kind of blew me away. It was suspenseful and spare and raw and gorgeous. And the subject is along the lines of something I've been thinking a lot about, and scribbling down notes for some eventual essay about... the way "older men" function in relationship to "younger women," how it seems like so many women that I know have at some point formed relationships with much older men almost as a rite of passage, and how this dynamic is all over a lot of fiction I read as a kid/teenager. Abby Sher's piece - "So He Looked Like Dad. It Was Just Dinner, Right?" - is more specific about her motivations, and so worth reading.

This piece about scoring massive amounts of free shit by posing as journalist is hilarious (and horrifying), and makes me even sadder that this is The Black Table's last week in existence.