I’m starting to realize that my posts have been really depressing lately, and that some people may actually be coming upon them accidentally when googling my name in search of the other two people I know of in the world with the same name. I’m going to write some positive things about myself.

First, the cute girl at the gym no longer shows up. This would seem like a bad thing. However, this is great. The gym is the point in the day when I’m at my absolute worst. I wear old clothes. I’m sweaty, tired, hungry, and angry. I often scream while lifting weights, walking around, or even drinking water. I just hate being there. I pretty much scream the entire time I’m there. I don’t want people to see me at all, and if they do, I damn sure don’t want them to be attractive women. I want them to be old, hairy men. I’m so comfortable around old, hairy men. Partly because I know it’s what I will one day become, and partly because they don’t make me self-conscious and constantly make me smell my armpits, trying to convince myself that I washed my gym clothes the night before, when I know the last time they were washed was in 2011 when I had a washing machine and not a 70-gallon litter box.

Second, I figured out a way to groom my head-hair so that it’s not so obvious that it’s going away. For a while, I had to shave the area on my forehead where my hair was receding, in order to make the line straight. However, in doing so, the area that I shaved off was always shinier than the rest of my forehead. I have decided that if I let my hair grow a little bit longer, it can cover some of my shiny head. This may not seem like a a big thing but 1) It’s good for my self-confidence and 2) I couldn’t think of anything else going for me, and I was only on my second thing. My hair is at such a good length right now. If I hadn’t retired from dating a few weeks ago, I would have gotten married like three times by now.

Third, I’ve started wearing a nice shirt and tie every few days. This also does wonders for my self-esteem. Sitting at work in a Polo shirt is okay, but when I’m in a tie, everything is so much better. Anytime I start to feel sad or unsure about anything, I look down at my tie and realize how great I really am. When on the phone with a customer, it’s always like they know I’m in a tie. They say things like, “You sound really smart. Are you wearing a tie?” I answer, “Yes, I am. Now you understand how smart I am.” You see, smart people wear ties. Mark Twain regularly wore a bowtie. Albert Einstein wore a tie. Aristotle may have worn a tie when he wasn’t butt ass naked in a robe. I think self-confidence has a lot to do with intelligence. How many epiphanies have you had in a tank top and sandals?

Hopefully by next week, I’ll actually have something tangibly good going on in my life. Until then, I’ll have to keep looking for the little things. Marry me?

The first thing a woman will notice about you, before you say a word, is your looks. It doesn’t matter how non-shallow she may be. She is going to look at you, and she is going to form a judgment in her mind. It’s just human instinct. Forming judgments about other people may be the one trait that all people have in common. This cannot be true at all.

The fact that a woman will immediately judge you is even more true in most social environments, where it is often too loud for her to hear you initially if you do try to talk to her. Here, drunkery and sight are essentially the only two human senses. You’re really going to have to do something about your body, man.

So you go to the gym. While at the gym, you feel overwhelmingly good about yourself even though you’re doing absolutely nothing there. You have your earphones on, so you’ve got that going. This feeling is really misleading. You think you’re doing something, but really you’re not doing anything at all. On top of that, you look like a creep because if you’re not actually exercising at the gym, then you’re just looking around, and if you’re just looking around at the gym, all you have to look at are women exercising and old men trying not to die. So then, you get on a machine, but you use it on such a low setting that it’s not worth it at all. Leave the gym, this was a bad idea.

Go buy some spray paint and just spray some abs onto your stomach. Actually, just huff the paint and stay home.

You know New Year’s resolutions are officially in pre-bikini season full swing when you can’t find a parking space easily at your gym. Now, let’s be clear that there are two kinds of gyms: there’s the gym you frequent to get into shape, and there’s the gym you attend when you’re ready to parade around town with the body you’ve sweated countless hours to achieve. The latter isn’t filled with elliptical seeking sweeties, but rather beachy-keen bimbettes that wouldn’t need plane-supplied flotation devices in the event of a mid-Atlantic crash. These cardio-kittens aren’t there to workout, that’s what their other gym is for! Rather they (like the men) are there to show off what their mama’s gave them in all-American Apparel that leaves nothing to the imagination. Welcome to Los Scandalous two months before swimsuit season. A land where protein shakes serve as sweet treats and calorie counting is a league of its own. When visiting this wild exhibit in the urban jungle, remember to keep your hands and feet on your own elliptical at all times, unless specifically invited by a trained aerobic handler. And please, don’t feed the models.

In an effort to ditch the guys I know I shouldn’t want, but tend to get anyways, I started looking for potential dates in places other than the usual Hollyweird hotspots. What I failed to notice, since apparently it’s been five years since I’ve had a crush and not a crash, was that most of the great guys are always right in front of you. Now, I’m totally against the available “meat” (& greet) market available at the gym. I’m more of a get in, get out, go home kind of girl (insert obvious that’s what he said joke), so I failed to notice that the cardio wasn’t the only thing making my heart race. Instead of the obvious five second once-over that you get along with any cocktail and club cover, the flirty faux friendships formed at any fitness joint are cause for something that has an expiration date beyond that of a one night fling thing. So, take the cardio from the elliptical to a post-work-out wind-down that serves as motivation to stay in sleek shape.

Watching a friend go through a bad break up is like a train wreck – it’s terrible but you can’t seem to look away. So what do you do when your crush turns into a crash? Good question. The simple solution is to pimp the victim out in the hopes that a distraction will help them move on quickly from the scene of the accident. Of course, residual effects will inevitably surface and suddenly they are screaming in pain from a delayed reaction to the pain of the accident. So perhaps the hit-it-and-quit-it method is not the best way to go. There’s of course the eat-yourself-to-sanity method, but given the uncertainty of the timeline you may jeopardize your chances of any future flame by packing on the pounds. My favorite method is the “work furiously at the gym” scenario; however the elliptical can have you feeling like a hamster on a wheel in no time. So have a drink and dive right back into the deep end, there’s no time like the present. Most importantly, breathe and be there for your friends and help them through the post-traumatic-stress ordeal. You could be the next one to crash and burn.

“Serendipity” is one of my favorite words. I just love how it sounds. After college, I truly believed I would serendipitously meet my better half at the gym, gas station, grocery store, work, or better yet, he would just knock on my door. Obviously, not the case as of yet.

Although a hopeless romantic, (with a collection of entertaining “How I met Mr. Serendipity” stories) as a busy professional, I have put that “meet cute” belief aside as I have surrendered to the notion that the story may not be that spectacular or even organic (i.e 100hookup). More importantly, I have come to terms that it’s not how or where you meet – but what you do with the relationship after the connection. With a more open-minded attitude, I’m looking forward to the spring, doing new activities on my own and with new friends. Who knows, it may even lend itself to that evasive serendipitous encounter.