12 reasons you are totally missing out by not calling me
Posted by Richard Mankhey
1. I’m a decent (that means “clothed”, right?) stable guy with a good job, balanced morals, a penchant for serendipity, a good collection of friends, and an entertaining sense of humor. I went to good schools, had loving parents, and know my way around a formal dinner setting. I’m a good speller. I’m house-broken.
2. Dogs love me, and I can seduce most cats in about 15 seconds. Children think I’m funny and crazy and generally want to talk to me.
3. I look great in a suit, though truth be told I really don’t like dressing up. But I’ll do it if I have to and probably enjoy it.
4. In the event that you do call, and we do go out a couple times, I can’t rule out an incredibly passionate affair, which is quickly displaced and required to be held across an ocean (Southern Europe, perhaps?), and then I quit my job and follow you around and we buy an old farmhouse in Vermont with great skiing nearby. We spend some holidays and winters up there when we’re not in DC or NYC or Shanghai, wherever your work takes you, having extraordinarily passionate…um…conversations on snowy evenings after a long meal and two good bottles of wine, inviting friends to stay for long weekends, drinking coffee (even though I generally dislike it), heading to Montreal occasionally to laugh at the Quebecois (it’s not French, seriously) and enjoy the rich cultural chaos of that city. Meanwhile, I’m writing an amazingly intricate (or crap, doesn’t matter) novel, and you’re making tons of money. Also, we have a couple cats and not a single dog and possibly a feral hedgehog who keeps eating the plants around the house and two lesbian neighbors that provide us fresh vegetables, local gossip, and all the inside scoop on indie bands playing in the area. (We might have children in this fantasy, but that’s negotiable.) We get into fights about who does their share of the gardening or the laundry, and then have more great um…conversation to make up. The bartender of the local gay bar wants to hate us, but can’t bring himself to do so because we’re actually decent, cool guys and a lot of fun.
5. But, really, it’s just a fantasy - I’m also totally cool with a cheap, meaningless affair if you want. No-strings multi-orgasmic, safe um…conversation for three hours twice a week. Totally down with that.
6. My French is questionable and my Spanish excellent, and I can converse convincingly in Russian. I know what to do in an airport when your bags are lost, scribbled on, torn, confiscated, searched, peed upon, and/or eyed suspiciously by pissed-off underfed airport workers.
7. I eat anything. I don’t make a big fuss about choosing a restaurant, and I can almost always find something that I like, but I will *always* ask for my dressing on the side.
8. I’m great with mothers, good with fathers and brothers and sisters, and can usually even coax conversation from the sullen 16-year-olds. I get along well with my family, have the World’s Best Mom, and know how to deal with the normal and the crazy (I have both!)
9. I require no ET-OH whatsoever to do a smashing job of virtually any song you care to throw at me during a cutthroat game of Karaoke Roulette.
10. I don’t have swine flu.
11. I am willing to lay money down on the fact that I know enough about people that I can pass all of your friends’ “Tests” without leveraging what I know about people.
12. I can still recite one of the poems we had to memorize in 6th grade: W.E. Henley’s Invictus - and while it’s quite a dark poem to give to 6th graders, I think it’s great and try to remember it when I need to be kicked in the slats and actually do something. I still (mostly) control my fate, dammit.
So, take control of yours. Call me.
Nude
Posted by Richard Mankhey
Where does the time freaking go? I feel like Einstein’s Universe is contracting around us and the laws of relativity no longer hold true. I can’t seem to be able to get anything finished anymore…I want to be in touch with all the wonderful people in my life, but it seems like the more they mean to me the worse I am at being a good person and letting them know how much I care about them or even just saying hello via Text, Twitter, Facebook, Email, etc.
I feel overwhelmed so easily these days, where as before I hardly even knew what it meant to be just ‘whelmed’ (Clueless! Love it!). But seriously…
So I won’t talk about work, but Sunday AND today my gym was closed due to a power outage and even some restaurants were shut down. They might not open until Wednesday.
At first I was *horrified* because I NEED my exercise like…a junkie…and Sunday I was a bit stressed out to not exercise and today when I got to the gym after a particularly long day at work and saw it was closed I seriously thought I would start crying.
But I got over it quickly and thought to myself, “Hey Richard…what is the universe trying to tell me? What can I do with this situation?”
I decided to go home (after stopping for some celery and iceberg lettuce and cans of baby corn…oh, and a box of Frosted Flakes and some ketchup) and put on my running shoes and risk my life on the darkening streets of sub-rural Vienna.
So I mapped out a 3 mile route on Go(d)ggle Maps, uploaded some Beyonce remixes to my baby iPod (the 80GB one is just too big to run with because when it’s in the pocket of my running shorts it bounces around much too closely to my junk for my comfort) and took off and you know what? It felt SOOO good to feel the air and see the stars coming out and have Beyonce’s “Halo (Dave Aude Remix)” accompanying me that I managed to run a steady 10 minute mile pace and went the 3 miles non-stop. I barely even had that coppery taste in the back of my throat that reminds me oddly of steel or oxidized blood that arises when one exerts oneself too much.
I still had some energy so I ran to the Vienna Metro parking garages and ran up and down the 6 flights of stairs a few times and then I ran some laps around the top of the parking garage and you know what? The view from up there is incredible! Not that Route 66 is all that romantic, but I was thinking it’s too cool to enjoy alone. 
So the power outage at my gym goaded me to remember how much I love running, and I discovered a fun place to take a date sometime and enjoy the view in semi-public-privacy. Lol.
I just love serendipity. It seems to be all around when you look for it and even when you don’t it’s there, but you don’t get to enjoy the benefits unless you keep your eyes and mind open (and Beyonce remixes don’t hurt, either).