The Art of Avoiding the “Club Rub”

You’re moving, you’re shaking, you’re female and probably wearing something tight. The DJ is making everyone groove and you’re three drinks in.

Caught up in the moment, you grind the air and shake your bits, and suddenly, a stranger is spooning you so closely you can feel the print on his boxers, which of course, are sticking out the top of his pants.

His hands haven’t groped you yet, but give it a minute.

This is known as the anonymous “club rub," where a seemingly tantalizing woman is accosted from behind by a man with whom she has yet to make eye contact. Some people like it, some invite it, but most women agree there should be some minor protocol when it comes to dance floor grinding. The sad truth is, there isn’t likely going to be any such sensitization any time soon. So, here are a few tips for the ladies to side-step their bums being boggled by a stranger’s magic pack.

1 – Dance with friends: Usually, you are anyway. They come in handy, as you can swap spooning each other if Mr. Rubber comes for a quick bounce.

2 – Dance with your arms moving wildly. He won’t want to get a bloody nose, and you may just start a dance craze.

3 – At the first sign of your tush being crowded, turn around, stop dancing, point to your head and say “I have head lice,” then shake your head. Sure it’s a little humiliating, but guaranteed he’ll give you a wide berth.

4 – If accosted, quickly become a very bad dancer. Stepping on feet and falling over are perfectly reasonable actions, as is spilling your drink on Mr. Fire-crotch.

5 – Be frank. Turn around, and ask the gentleman to kindly desist from his actions, as by being a Rubber, he has now forgone any chance of getting your number, or making out with you by the lavatory. You never know, it may just work.

If all of these fail, consider changing dance clubs, or bring the hoop-skirt back into vogue.

Good luck!

Battling the odds & beating up fate: the dubious art of composing a dating profile.

At this point, online dating feels like playing roulette. My odds of playing and landing right are crap. Worse yet, all the profiles I read are meshing into one. This congealed Perfect Match uses proper grammar, cooks, works out, wants children, plays an instrument, likes the country and cats. And he is a fantastic lover.
He is, as I am, as fictional as ever. I don't even have the time these days to consider penning in a potentially go-nowhere date. This is the attitude I'm working with. So with that in mind, I changed my sweet simple profile into something probably pointlessly verbose, to necessarily weed out the illiterate and the un-poetic. I have to entertain myself somehow.
Here it is, was, is for now:

"How hard it is, for even the most astute writers to here delineate their sellable selves. I cannot. I could list attributes the way I do in my resume, my bankable relationship skills, or post the picture that emblematizes my coyness. I could be stern and honest, thus seem confident, a solid pick. No matter the way I choose to display the ‘me’ such sites prompt us to show, I am still just another woman on a shelf, measuring compatibility against time expenditure, being as concise with my shopping as I scroll through faces.
It sickens me, this process. And yet it has become so common and such a logical way to better our chances that you’ll scarcely find anyone who will scoff at meeting a mate online. We all know someone that has been successful, fruitful, reaped his/her bounty. I can be a part of it, acknowledge its value, or sulk and wait for things to come to me. The self-loving word ‘pro-active’ comes to mind, and like many of us of the generation of the glorified individual, there’s no harm in making Me feel better, get stronger, swell happier. So I’m quietly a part of it, although I do not believe it is the preferred way to coalesce, only, the seemingly most effective way with the best odds at the moment.
Now off, left-brain, and onward right. Both valid, both important.

What can I do then, if I insist on waiting for magic? I can tell you what makes what I take to be my soul, stand at attention. Maybe these pieces will be lucky, will let me encounter a kindred spirit.
These moments like tendrils, moments like waves, or thickening heat penetrating skin—

The vastness of the night sky and the paradox of our singular potency versus the whole of it.
Certain melodic lines tracking over synapses just so, making that song glorious, to us. Finding someone who has also been swayed into awe by that same song.
Lovely coincidences, and the choice to view them as a small piece of divine handling of my life.
The incredibly rich taste of beans and rice after three hours of canoeing, and setting up a tent, building a fire and bundling down before sunset.
The way a cat nestles and purrs against bare skin.
The smell of the nape of the neck of a man who has made love to me, and spent the night, and wants to do so for time to come.
The irretrievable glint in the eyes of a child when in a moment of discovery.
A well-done task, done.
An honest workshop.
A mended friendship.
The pure oomph of a new idea.
Putting that new idea to work.
Swimming.
Singing, singing while making people laugh.
The lull and solace of pre-dawn.
New art supplies.

The standard list of who is me and what I do, I suppose, should follow. I: am finishing a writing degree, teaching swimming, working admin for the swim program, trying to get some time in between those things to develop some plays, a script, another opera, more art pieces, more fiction, cook decent meals, sleep standard hours and see people so that I do not develop cerebral cabin fever.

Good luck to you."

Eye

Suddenly over the biology test
of conception he remembers
tinkling walls and sparks
and the moment before the prick entered
and the mask-wearing man
held his breath to push.
the sphere yielded choice-less
the gametes arched their coils
and helplessly accommodated

he knows adequate temperature, balanced viscosity
but no pink glow
only one massive eye verifying his multiplication of cells

miles away mommy reads cosmo
while daddy shakes hands

(she had her tummy tucked a little later
comforting, the masked man smiled,
pop had hair plugs inserted
the masked man smiled, comforting)

he draws the eye absently on the edge of the paper
comforting iris
masked maker
Deoxyribonucleic Acid manipulator.

virulently kept

maraschino me
jar of red
swollen distended
chemically prostrated
awaiting a finger
to plunge and pull
squirt through teeth
for years, full
alter dna, grow
glucose babies galore
I am never gone
preserved whole

Keep your text off my underwear

I recently needed to up my underwear count, and looked for 5 for 20 deals in a few standard 'fifteen to something's type stores. Pick up a funky yellow and pink pair, turn it over, and some clever designer has added, in glitter letters "Parteh grrrl".
Another, " I"m in the band"
Another, "Glamour girl"

Who wears these?

Do they get worn while said sixteen to twenty year old dances in the mirror wondering at her taut body, her panties reminding her of what "Hot stuff" lies waiting, a tush full of push and glee?

As if boys, sorry, men stop, look, read and grin and nod knowingly when they see those... as though they need a reminder that she is indeed a party girl once the pants are off.

I did find some text-less panties in the pile. One covered in hearts and candies. One with guitars and sparkly music notes. I thought- These panties reflect me, I should definitely buy them, to remind myself of what a creative sweetheart I am.

Now I think I should print my own, with such text as "Love button beneath, some activation required", and "Just take these off already".

Then again, I doubt that even men in my age bubble even read underwear, once we're down to them...