January 10, 2006 - 5:17 PM

New Year, Same Suckage

How can you tell when a girl likes you? Have I asked this question before? I think I have. But, how can you tell? Or, how can you tell if a girl is just being a friendly person towards you? Or, worse, how can you tell if a girl is still holding a torch for someone else, and you're basically a placeholder?

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Favorite album of 2005? A fight between Inara George's All Rise and Imogen Heap's Speak for Yourself. It hasn't been resolved yet. All Rise started strong and held the top spot from January on, fending off contenders left and right, but the long anticipated new effort from Imogen fulfilled expectations and refused to relinquish it's grip on my CD player from November through the end of the year. A great judge of what I think an album or an artist is worth is how often it is represented in the mixes I make for friends. Inara wins out in this category, bu only because I didn't have enough time to make mixes with Imogen's songs.

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After much consultation with Soph and Gee and Phil and Jen and Nick and Tony and Margaret and Matt and Sharon and Carol, it has been revealed that I still suck and can not pull the trigger. The thing I talked the most about on my trip back east for Christmas and New Year's, and in the weeks since, is what the deal is with the girl J. Everyone commented on the fact that I have been overthinking this waaaay too much, which is a major source of my paralysis when wanting to talk about it with her. But I can't NOT think on it. I'm psyching myself out, and in trying to figure it out, I'm mindfutzing myself even more.

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Number one movie of 2005...Wallace and Gromit. Really. Two years in a row, a "family film" takes the top spot (last year was The Incredibles). Stupid awards, not recognizing that these films deserve to be considered as Best Picture nominees, if not winners.

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J and I went out for dinner a few days before I left for the holidays. Sushi at her favorite place in Brentwood. We exchanged gifts- I gave her a Chococat tote bag similar to this one and a Hello Kitty keychain fob; she gave me a sheep finger puppet. The entire night, I tried to figure out how to say to her "I like you...wanna try dating me, see how it fits?", only in a tactful and romantic way (a way which i think doesn't exist for me)

After dinner wrapped up around 9, I puttered about what to do next. After all, it was a Wednesday night, and we both had to work the next day, so options for prolonging the evening without heading past bedtime were few. She swooped in with the save by suggesting we visit a used book store about 5 minutes away. We milled around there for half an hour (she bought some Christmas presents for friends and a book on L.A. restaurants for me), then walked down the street a few blocks to see if Giant Robot was open. It was not. By the time we walked back to our cars, it was past 10, so we hugged, wished each other happy holidays, and went our separate ways. And I kicked myself over and over for not telling her how I felt.

Matt talked me out of calling her up when I got home, convincing me as I drove back to the Valley that it would be better to tell her in person. Thanks for your sage counsel, Matt.

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A few weeks ago, I heard a song from an album that's a collaboration between Calexico and Iron and Wine on KCRW. The song, called A History of Lovers (click here. and then select "launch streaming audio player" to hear it), immediately brought to mind an animated short from Pinwheel. The theme song has stuck with me through the decades, from the time when I was a pre-schooler, eating toast and sitting in front of the TV while watching Nickelodeon and Sesame Street, to now, and it would every-so-often jingle about in my head for a few hours.
The lyrics are nonsense, and my memory couldn't recall them exactly, so it took a morning of Googling to land upon the name of the song and show: Chapo Chapi. This fanpage has some clips and songs from the show. Ahhh, youthful memories and nuggets of nostalgia.

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Phil and Jen hatched a plan to help me with J. I was to call her at midnight on December 31st, East Coast time, to wish her a Happy New Year, and to suggest that we get together for drinks to celebrate when I got back to L.A. Brilliant idea, except for the one variable that could muck it up: me and my ability to not talk well with girls. I did call her around 12:30, and she was just on her way to see a movie, so we chatted briefly and I managed to pop out the suggestion which she agreed to before I told her to go go go see her movie.

A few miscommunications later, we went out for dinner and a movie on Saturday. We had drinks before the movie, and I still couldn't muster up the words. The timing was never right, and the phrases never formulated. Suck suck suck. I keep getting more encouragement and advice from everyone, but it never seems to stick in my little brain. How to solve this problem?

Now Listening To : The Smiths- Girlfriend in a Coma
Random Thought : heavy sighs of quiet resignation

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