Page 96 of It's Not PMS, It's You

I was serious.

“And what’s the woman’s job?” I asked.

Boyd sat back in his chair. “That’s easy. A woman’s job is to radiate and exfoliate.”

He had either been sniffing glue or was high on the mushrooms he was foraging.

Either way, this guy was already gone. He didn’t even know it.

I would just have to wait out the time left on the clock and then hope the next date would be better.

Boyd looked around the bar. “Not a bad establishment, but it’s not the place to cogitate or delve into the annals of possibilities. Hey, did you ever notice how the words annals and anal are so much alike?”

I shook my head. “Not even a little.”

One minute left. Hang in there.

“Have you ever pondered the meaning of life and then come to the conclusion that you’re existentially insufficient without a feasible way to elucidate a concept and that you just might suffer the malaise that kept you from being one with who you are and who you are not?”

I sighed, ready to put yet another man in his place. “Look—I appreciate your ebullient and convivial attempt at communication, but it’s nothing more than sesquipedalian loquaciousness. Furthermore, your disheveled and brusque articulation and verbiage might be considered avant-garde to the neophyte, but as someone who has been compared to a lexicographer, I consider it a blatant faux pas and boondoggle that comes off as more of a cacophony of informal confab that is the complete opposite of perspicacious.”

His eyes went wide. “Holy cow. You’re much better than I am.”

“No shit, Sherlock.”

Thank God the bell rang.

Boyd stood and scratched the side of his head. “I’m guessing you’re not going to want my contact info at the end.”

“You’re a smart man, Boyd.”

He smiled. “Thanks! Maybe I’ll see you at the bar later.”

“There’s a zero percent chance of that happening.”

“Great. See you then.”

I tried to wake myself up from this nightmare. Slamming the rest of my beer, I decided to give it one more shot. One more man. There were many other men in lineup, but there was only so much idiocy one person could take.

One more.

“Mark your score cards!” the host said. “Men! You know what to do, don’t get lazy now! Same thing as before, please move to the next table on your right! Ladies, are we having fun yet?”

Only three or four ladies answered, giving me the impression that they were all suffering just as much as I was.

I turned to my right to glance at the next man coming my way and—

No way. It can’t be.

Chapter Nineteen

RUTH

Dating after forty was like trying to find the least damaged item at a thrift store that didn’t smell like someone had left it in their trunk for a year.

Why was being single so hard?

And why was Bagel Barney at the speed dating event?