Well, since I have a pretty normal girlfriend I don't really have a whole lot to blog about right now (well...maybe a little update)...so we're going to go with more of the random thoughts right now rather than Anchorage women...
The Blockbuster and I are doing fine - we go out pretty regularly, we really don't fight (although there was one night where we got kicked out of The Shed where she was upset over the circumstances of that particular incident), and everything is pretty standard. She's a direct type of person so I get the feeling if I were screwing up she would tell me, but she seems happy with me and I seem to be "the good boyfriend" amongst her group of friends. She's the classic "cool girlfriend" - not needy, lets me hang with my friends, knows how to have fun, and very low maintenance.
For example, we were hanging out watching a movie one night when I got a text from a friend (a female friend) asking me out to a movie. I'm not sure if she was asking me "out," but it certainly seemed that way. I, stupidly - at least I thought, showed her the text and she was really happy I was honest with her and she was with a "wanted" man. Other women I've been with would have probably burned my house down after cutting off...well, let's just say important parts of my body.
That being said, she's still not "wowing" me. I think this is a byproduct of my past experiences in Anchorage. It's not as if I liked drama - far, far, far, far (did I mention how far?) from it, but through all my experiences I've trained myself not to get excited about a new relationship anymore. I can remember when I would talk about a good night kiss for days after a first date. Everyone knows that phase - the honeymoon phase - of a relationship, and then if it sticks you settle into a more normal phase. Well, with The Blockbuster I've skipped the honeymoon phase and landed squarely in the normal phase because the normal phase was dominated by my suspicion she would inevitably turn out crazy. All told, I'm filing this under "good problems to have."
Now for the random thoughts...
As you might have picked up by earlier posts I work for the Air Force. I recently got a new job where I'm partially in charge of setting some new areas on base and I've discovered a few things...
First - I've learned new things about the universe. While I've been setting up these new spaces I've been reading A Brief History of Time by Steven Hawking. It's extremely nerdy, but very enlightening. One thing I'm getting from the book is that nothing is constant. First people thought that motion was constant, but it's really relative. Even time isn't constant according to experimentation. If you look at quantum theory it looks like nothing is really settled at all.
However, I have found the one constant in the universe - the bureaucratic mentality.
While I've been reading the aforementioned book I've also been making several, several calls to several base agencies. To get systems, for example, a form needs to be signed by a guy at Hickam AFB then go to another guy down the hall, but in a different organization, at Hickam AFB and then come back to our base so the comm person can start building our systems. Now, when asked if it would help if we called the people at Hickam the sergeant gave me a very emphatic no as it would get him in trouble for bothering the people he needed to sign the sheets he needed.
In another case one agency certified an area as good to go with official forms without talking to another agency that they needed to check with. When the second agency refused to fix the problem they should have fixed weeks earlier (hence the certification) it took four hours of e-mails from multiple people and calls to get... a fully functional area? No. A fully operational certification? No. A million dollars? No. No, what we got was a sheet of paper from that agency saying we were okay and they would respond if we needed help, but the real utility for that is getting us the second sheet of paper which is only good for getting us the third sheet of paper in the above paragraph that is sitting at Hickam AFB.
The last example was when I called a meeting because one project I'm running requires four separate groups to work together to make it happen. Another squadron had the same exact project - I don't mean similar, I mean exactly the same and they are already more than a month late than the already delayed project completion date. Every single one of these groups have already had delays in the previous project, but despite their own experiences it took me 45 minutes to explain to these people why they had to take a half hour of their time to get on the same page and avoid delays from our end. For the record, if you didn't catch that, I took more time explaining the meeting to get them to go than it would have taken them to read my e-mail and just show up.
Are you still following me?
If you still are, good, you may have a future as a civil servant. If not, you still have enough brain cells to make a contribution to society so please, please, for the good of humanity stay away from any job with government - especially the armed services.
My theory on this is called "Bosses vs Customers." Everyone in the Air Force is now a customer at some point. They are a "customer" of Finance, a "customer" of the MPF (Military Personnel Flight), a "customer" of comm. I have had the joy, however, of working in organizations in the Air Force that still had some of this organic capability with the squadrons (they were almost all centralized to save manpower and many of their duties are now "additional duties" by untrained squadron personnel). For example, in my last job we had comm folks. If anything went wrong I could go and have them fix it. They also had to report to a "boss" every morning at 9 AM about current projects. In a word, they were accountable. When you have customers you're really not accountable to them. They don't write your performance reviews, they can't punish you, and they aren't there day after day to make sure you get your job done. So when I go to all these people to get things done now I'm a customer - they don't have to answer to me or my boss - they have to answer to their boss. When you run an organization the main concerns are on the health of your particular part of the world - not on what the low ranking lieutenant needs to get oh, I don't know, a flying squadron what it needs to do real missions.
I guess the bottom line is that commanders with real missions: CE building bases, special forces operators doing their thing, SERE folks rescuing people, pilots flying, intelligence gathering and analyzing data, or AOCs running operations had people in their squadrons and organizations to make their bureaucracies work for the warfighters and the direct supporters of the warfighters. Now those folks near the "pointy end of the spear" are doing the jobs directly (additional duties) or forced to deal directly with the bureaucracies that don't have a real interest in helping you specifically. Generally they have jobs to support the rest of the force and take that seriously on a macro level, but on a person to person basis (the micro level) there really is no interest - after all they do have to get their forms signed before they can be any real help.
I guess I'm just ranting here, but I was selected to do a certain job by the Air Force - I wasn't selected for comm, not for personnel, not for security forces, and not for services. However, I'm doing all of those jobs in my new job.
Until next time, I'll be on hold with someone...
AirForceKush, aka, The Arctic Fox
The Blockbuster and I are doing fine - we go out pretty regularly, we really don't fight (although there was one night where we got kicked out of The Shed where she was upset over the circumstances of that particular incident), and everything is pretty standard. She's a direct type of person so I get the feeling if I were screwing up she would tell me, but she seems happy with me and I seem to be "the good boyfriend" amongst her group of friends. She's the classic "cool girlfriend" - not needy, lets me hang with my friends, knows how to have fun, and very low maintenance.
For example, we were hanging out watching a movie one night when I got a text from a friend (a female friend) asking me out to a movie. I'm not sure if she was asking me "out," but it certainly seemed that way. I, stupidly - at least I thought, showed her the text and she was really happy I was honest with her and she was with a "wanted" man. Other women I've been with would have probably burned my house down after cutting off...well, let's just say important parts of my body.
That being said, she's still not "wowing" me. I think this is a byproduct of my past experiences in Anchorage. It's not as if I liked drama - far, far, far, far (did I mention how far?) from it, but through all my experiences I've trained myself not to get excited about a new relationship anymore. I can remember when I would talk about a good night kiss for days after a first date. Everyone knows that phase - the honeymoon phase - of a relationship, and then if it sticks you settle into a more normal phase. Well, with The Blockbuster I've skipped the honeymoon phase and landed squarely in the normal phase because the normal phase was dominated by my suspicion she would inevitably turn out crazy. All told, I'm filing this under "good problems to have."
Now for the random thoughts...
As you might have picked up by earlier posts I work for the Air Force. I recently got a new job where I'm partially in charge of setting some new areas on base and I've discovered a few things...
First - I've learned new things about the universe. While I've been setting up these new spaces I've been reading A Brief History of Time by Steven Hawking. It's extremely nerdy, but very enlightening. One thing I'm getting from the book is that nothing is constant. First people thought that motion was constant, but it's really relative. Even time isn't constant according to experimentation. If you look at quantum theory it looks like nothing is really settled at all.
However, I have found the one constant in the universe - the bureaucratic mentality.
While I've been reading the aforementioned book I've also been making several, several calls to several base agencies. To get systems, for example, a form needs to be signed by a guy at Hickam AFB then go to another guy down the hall, but in a different organization, at Hickam AFB and then come back to our base so the comm person can start building our systems. Now, when asked if it would help if we called the people at Hickam the sergeant gave me a very emphatic no as it would get him in trouble for bothering the people he needed to sign the sheets he needed.
In another case one agency certified an area as good to go with official forms without talking to another agency that they needed to check with. When the second agency refused to fix the problem they should have fixed weeks earlier (hence the certification) it took four hours of e-mails from multiple people and calls to get... a fully functional area? No. A fully operational certification? No. A million dollars? No. No, what we got was a sheet of paper from that agency saying we were okay and they would respond if we needed help, but the real utility for that is getting us the second sheet of paper which is only good for getting us the third sheet of paper in the above paragraph that is sitting at Hickam AFB.
The last example was when I called a meeting because one project I'm running requires four separate groups to work together to make it happen. Another squadron had the same exact project - I don't mean similar, I mean exactly the same and they are already more than a month late than the already delayed project completion date. Every single one of these groups have already had delays in the previous project, but despite their own experiences it took me 45 minutes to explain to these people why they had to take a half hour of their time to get on the same page and avoid delays from our end. For the record, if you didn't catch that, I took more time explaining the meeting to get them to go than it would have taken them to read my e-mail and just show up.
Are you still following me?
If you still are, good, you may have a future as a civil servant. If not, you still have enough brain cells to make a contribution to society so please, please, for the good of humanity stay away from any job with government - especially the armed services.
My theory on this is called "Bosses vs Customers." Everyone in the Air Force is now a customer at some point. They are a "customer" of Finance, a "customer" of the MPF (Military Personnel Flight), a "customer" of comm. I have had the joy, however, of working in organizations in the Air Force that still had some of this organic capability with the squadrons (they were almost all centralized to save manpower and many of their duties are now "additional duties" by untrained squadron personnel). For example, in my last job we had comm folks. If anything went wrong I could go and have them fix it. They also had to report to a "boss" every morning at 9 AM about current projects. In a word, they were accountable. When you have customers you're really not accountable to them. They don't write your performance reviews, they can't punish you, and they aren't there day after day to make sure you get your job done. So when I go to all these people to get things done now I'm a customer - they don't have to answer to me or my boss - they have to answer to their boss. When you run an organization the main concerns are on the health of your particular part of the world - not on what the low ranking lieutenant needs to get oh, I don't know, a flying squadron what it needs to do real missions.
I guess the bottom line is that commanders with real missions: CE building bases, special forces operators doing their thing, SERE folks rescuing people, pilots flying, intelligence gathering and analyzing data, or AOCs running operations had people in their squadrons and organizations to make their bureaucracies work for the warfighters and the direct supporters of the warfighters. Now those folks near the "pointy end of the spear" are doing the jobs directly (additional duties) or forced to deal directly with the bureaucracies that don't have a real interest in helping you specifically. Generally they have jobs to support the rest of the force and take that seriously on a macro level, but on a person to person basis (the micro level) there really is no interest - after all they do have to get their forms signed before they can be any real help.
I guess I'm just ranting here, but I was selected to do a certain job by the Air Force - I wasn't selected for comm, not for personnel, not for security forces, and not for services. However, I'm doing all of those jobs in my new job.
Until next time, I'll be on hold with someone...
AirForceKush, aka, The Arctic Fox
Yes, you read the headline right...I found a nice, well maybe not "nice" in the traditional sense, but normal woman who is diluted enough to go out with me!
Let's call her "The Blockbuster." This is an online girl, but one that actually turned out. It was helped by my trip to Florida that allowed us a month to e-mail and talk back and forth about who we were. Unlike a crazy person she didn't use this as an excuse to get attached, but merely to find out about me. It was a refreshing change from the way business is usually done in Alaska.
I got back and we hit it off pretty well. Since then it's been a couple of weeks since we've be "official" and about a month since we started dating. It's been going pretty good so far and I'm hopeful we can maintain the current level of normalcy.
This has made me realize that we can define some things by the absence of certain characteristics. For example, a crazy woman can be defined by the absence of the following...
1.) More than 15 texts in a day
2.) Storming down to their car sitting in the driveway to then start a text fight
3.) Leaving unreasonable things at my place in an effort to "nest"
4.) Feeling neglected from a lack of attention due to my need to sleep at least five hours on a weeknight
- Or a need to do laundry after an entire weekend spent with one another
- Or seeing a movie you had planned to see (and was willing to see again)
- Or because you like her dog (she suspects you're in it just for a pet)
5.) A feeling of shame and panic anytime she wants to meet my friends
6.) Generally clingy actions
7.) Made up people on the internet stalking me
8.) Fights between the girlfriend and said fictional people
9.) Suspicions that every girl you come in contact with "wants you"
10.) Proposals for marriage, living together, or anything else not commensurate with a relationship that's a month old
That being said there are some oddities...
The biggest thing I hinted at - the nice thing. This girl is all about me being bad in a party kind of way - staying out, getting drunk - that kind of stuff. Nothing too bad or illegal, but I tend to be a pretty responsible guy. She thinks she can change me and I'm merely a challenge, but I'll hold tough - it's hard to teach a old dog new tricks...
In other news I have picked up a bit of a clingy friend that includes some of the things mentioned above (texts, panic, etc). We went on a bit of a lunch date and she wasn't my type, but that didn't deter her (even when I said no romantic involvement). When we went out a second time as friends (I made that painfully clear) learning that I now had a girlfriend didn't deter her - in fact she made it quite clear that I could have her if I wanted and when I politely declined she invited me over for dinner. I thought it was good when she went on a date with another dude, but I get the feeling she was just trying to make me jealous or something. This has cooled off over the last week or so, but we are having lunch tomorrow (as friends, as I painfully made clear again) and if it flares up I'm going to have to be a bastard...but this is merely a small cloud in my overall sunny day and life is good.
Also, sorry for the lack of updates, but between a new job on base, a new girlfriend, a few new hobbies, and a trip home for a wedding (my only mistake was making the girlfriend "official" before going to a wedding in which I had to turn down quite a few overtures - and by quite a few I mean two, maybe three, but that's 2 - 3 more than I usually get!) I've been pretty busy so the blog got put on the back burner, but now I'm back!
Until this one turns batshit crazy...
AirForceKush...aka...the Arctic Fox
Let's call her "The Blockbuster." This is an online girl, but one that actually turned out. It was helped by my trip to Florida that allowed us a month to e-mail and talk back and forth about who we were. Unlike a crazy person she didn't use this as an excuse to get attached, but merely to find out about me. It was a refreshing change from the way business is usually done in Alaska.
I got back and we hit it off pretty well. Since then it's been a couple of weeks since we've be "official" and about a month since we started dating. It's been going pretty good so far and I'm hopeful we can maintain the current level of normalcy.
This has made me realize that we can define some things by the absence of certain characteristics. For example, a crazy woman can be defined by the absence of the following...
1.) More than 15 texts in a day
2.) Storming down to their car sitting in the driveway to then start a text fight
3.) Leaving unreasonable things at my place in an effort to "nest"
4.) Feeling neglected from a lack of attention due to my need to sleep at least five hours on a weeknight
- Or a need to do laundry after an entire weekend spent with one another
- Or seeing a movie you had planned to see (and was willing to see again)
- Or because you like her dog (she suspects you're in it just for a pet)
5.) A feeling of shame and panic anytime she wants to meet my friends
6.) Generally clingy actions
7.) Made up people on the internet stalking me
8.) Fights between the girlfriend and said fictional people
9.) Suspicions that every girl you come in contact with "wants you"
10.) Proposals for marriage, living together, or anything else not commensurate with a relationship that's a month old
That being said there are some oddities...
The biggest thing I hinted at - the nice thing. This girl is all about me being bad in a party kind of way - staying out, getting drunk - that kind of stuff. Nothing too bad or illegal, but I tend to be a pretty responsible guy. She thinks she can change me and I'm merely a challenge, but I'll hold tough - it's hard to teach a old dog new tricks...
In other news I have picked up a bit of a clingy friend that includes some of the things mentioned above (texts, panic, etc). We went on a bit of a lunch date and she wasn't my type, but that didn't deter her (even when I said no romantic involvement). When we went out a second time as friends (I made that painfully clear) learning that I now had a girlfriend didn't deter her - in fact she made it quite clear that I could have her if I wanted and when I politely declined she invited me over for dinner. I thought it was good when she went on a date with another dude, but I get the feeling she was just trying to make me jealous or something. This has cooled off over the last week or so, but we are having lunch tomorrow (as friends, as I painfully made clear again) and if it flares up I'm going to have to be a bastard...but this is merely a small cloud in my overall sunny day and life is good.
Also, sorry for the lack of updates, but between a new job on base, a new girlfriend, a few new hobbies, and a trip home for a wedding (my only mistake was making the girlfriend "official" before going to a wedding in which I had to turn down quite a few overtures - and by quite a few I mean two, maybe three, but that's 2 - 3 more than I usually get!) I've been pretty busy so the blog got put on the back burner, but now I'm back!
Until this one turns batshit crazy...
AirForceKush...aka...the Arctic Fox
As good as my word, dear readers (all five of you), I have returned to Alaska and have some updates/thoughts...
First, as the title says - the Doctor is indeed out. I know many of you might be hoping for a great story out of this one, but it's actually rather mundane. We had been communicating back and forth since February and were all set to get together when I got back from Florida when she called and told me she was leaving Alaska. Surprisingly it really had nothing to do with me and she felt rather bad about the whole debacle. Really the choice has to do with career - a better internship for what she wants to do in medicine. We made the usual promises about keeping up with one another, but I'm really doubting that at this point - we really only hung out once and then talked a lot.
Secondly, an observation from my trip in Florida. This is something that my wishful thinking and optimism stopped me from seeing what is the truth...Alaska woman when compared to the rest of the nation in terms of general attractiveness seem to come up lacking. There, I said it! My friends have been telling me this for awhile and I always thought, "no, this is the same as anywhere else." I've even dated some very attractive women (and, admittedly, some not so attractive ones) since I've been in Alaska. I'll admit that there are some very attractive women in Alaska, but the overall quotient of hotness is less than other areas of the nation...
As you can see the rest of the nation is typically 10 points or more higher in an overall hotness quotient than Alaska and the disparity is only growing.
I really didn't notice this until my four hour layover in the Minneapolis Airport. Minneapolis is not widely regarded as a bastion of attractive ladies, but here I was feeling like a man just let out of prison! I got a cramp in my neck from how often I strained it in reaction from all the attractive women walking around. I thought there was a hot girl conference in town (I know they happen...don't tell me anything different). Then it hit me, this wasn't the mythical hot girl conference (San Diego 2009!!!), but this was the old normal from when I actually lived in the Midwest. So now the old normal is the new hot girl conference normal.
Thank you Alaska...
In any case it was like going from this...
And in the interior this...(yes, that's a woman!)
...to this in Minneapolis...
And this in Florida...(no joke, I made eye contact with this woman and my eyes melted from the hotness)
The Arctic Fox's lawyer wants to make a note here that all pictures do not represent the actual people they may or may not actually be and/or the places they are from. Any suggestion that these pictures are being used for monetary, sexual, emotional, mental, gastrointestinal, or any other type of gain is false and if you can Google the image and they contain no legal protections on said photos then anyone that wants to complain can just suck it!
That being said there is much more to dating than just looks and there are plenty of good enough looking girls for me as my appearance is closer to a male version of this...
...than anything that the female population of the larger nation or Alaska may want to date - as a great man in dating history once said, "beggars can't be choosers."
This was just something I noticed during my many travels over the last few months and there's no way I'm going to change it over the minimum two years I have left here in Alaska.
In other news and updates I have a second date with a woman I've been dating since I've been back and there's no nickname yet and the usual initial lack of craziness, but as always I'm very hopeful and I'm proud to say she has a much higher attractiveness quotient than the average Alaskan woman noted here. I just hope she doesn't notice my attractiveness quotient anytime soon!
Until next time keep being choosers (even if you are a beggar!).
AirForceKush, aka, The Arctic Fox
First, as the title says - the Doctor is indeed out. I know many of you might be hoping for a great story out of this one, but it's actually rather mundane. We had been communicating back and forth since February and were all set to get together when I got back from Florida when she called and told me she was leaving Alaska. Surprisingly it really had nothing to do with me and she felt rather bad about the whole debacle. Really the choice has to do with career - a better internship for what she wants to do in medicine. We made the usual promises about keeping up with one another, but I'm really doubting that at this point - we really only hung out once and then talked a lot.
Secondly, an observation from my trip in Florida. This is something that my wishful thinking and optimism stopped me from seeing what is the truth...Alaska woman when compared to the rest of the nation in terms of general attractiveness seem to come up lacking. There, I said it! My friends have been telling me this for awhile and I always thought, "no, this is the same as anywhere else." I've even dated some very attractive women (and, admittedly, some not so attractive ones) since I've been in Alaska. I'll admit that there are some very attractive women in Alaska, but the overall quotient of hotness is less than other areas of the nation...
As you can see the rest of the nation is typically 10 points or more higher in an overall hotness quotient than Alaska and the disparity is only growing.
I really didn't notice this until my four hour layover in the Minneapolis Airport. Minneapolis is not widely regarded as a bastion of attractive ladies, but here I was feeling like a man just let out of prison! I got a cramp in my neck from how often I strained it in reaction from all the attractive women walking around. I thought there was a hot girl conference in town (I know they happen...don't tell me anything different). Then it hit me, this wasn't the mythical hot girl conference (San Diego 2009!!!), but this was the old normal from when I actually lived in the Midwest. So now the old normal is the new hot girl conference normal.
Thank you Alaska...
In any case it was like going from this...
And in the interior this...(yes, that's a woman!)
...to this in Minneapolis...
And this in Florida...(no joke, I made eye contact with this woman and my eyes melted from the hotness)
The Arctic Fox's lawyer wants to make a note here that all pictures do not represent the actual people they may or may not actually be and/or the places they are from. Any suggestion that these pictures are being used for monetary, sexual, emotional, mental, gastrointestinal, or any other type of gain is false and if you can Google the image and they contain no legal protections on said photos then anyone that wants to complain can just suck it!
That being said there is much more to dating than just looks and there are plenty of good enough looking girls for me as my appearance is closer to a male version of this...
...than anything that the female population of the larger nation or Alaska may want to date - as a great man in dating history once said, "beggars can't be choosers."
This was just something I noticed during my many travels over the last few months and there's no way I'm going to change it over the minimum two years I have left here in Alaska.
In other news and updates I have a second date with a woman I've been dating since I've been back and there's no nickname yet and the usual initial lack of craziness, but as always I'm very hopeful and I'm proud to say she has a much higher attractiveness quotient than the average Alaskan woman noted here. I just hope she doesn't notice my attractiveness quotient anytime soon!
Until next time keep being choosers (even if you are a beggar!).
AirForceKush, aka, The Arctic Fox
Dear readers have no fear - I am still alive!
Lack of communication with "blognation" recently has to do with some trips for work and a disturbing lack of internet access from the "world's most advanced Air Force."
Rest assured stories have been happening, updates are occurring, and ideas for entries are percolating in the ol' brain. I'll be back in Alaska in a week - expect some updates then!
Thanks for the understanding!
AirForceKush - aka - The Arctic Fox
Lack of communication with "blognation" recently has to do with some trips for work and a disturbing lack of internet access from the "world's most advanced Air Force."
Rest assured stories have been happening, updates are occurring, and ideas for entries are percolating in the ol' brain. I'll be back in Alaska in a week - expect some updates then!
Thanks for the understanding!
AirForceKush - aka - The Arctic Fox
Thanks for the patience everyone! I wish I could say I was suffering somewhere horrible so it wouldn't be so bad that I hadn't posted, but I was in Hawaii for an exercise and besides the work I had some great times! This is going to be a pretty comprehensive post as there are a few stories and thoughts to share here.
First - prostitution...
Whoa! What?
Yeah, hookers are everywhere on Waikiki - not exactly family entertainment. Not interacting with hookers was one of my last bastions of midwestern innocence that was shattered midway through my trip.
About halfway through the exercise a couple of NCOs and I were going stir-crazy and just needed to get out on the town for dinner and a couple drinks. I'm proud to say that I actually got to bed by 12:30 AM (8 AM call at work), but on the way back to our car there was about a three city-block line of hookers waiting to greet us and any other tourist that had to run this gauntlet. Most were pretty polite - just a "hey" or "hello" here and there, but there was one that got aggressive...
Hooker: "Hey, where you going"
Arctic Fox: "Home"
Hooker: "Where's home?
Arctic Fox (not about to let her know what military base I was staying on): "Iowa"
Hooker: "Is that even a state?"
Arctic Fox: "It's a great state!"
Hooker: "I'll put you in a great state."
Arctic Fox: "I gotta go..."
I'm not going to lie, I wanted to give her a hug right there just for the great wordplay, but that would probably have been misinterpreted as me wanting to go to "Iowa" with her.
At first I couldn't believe I was the type of person that a hooker would approach, but a group of three guys on a weeknight walking down the obvious line of hookers and not avoiding them - I could imagine why they might have thought they could make a few bucks off of us.
Thinking about it, however, I don't think I could ever be in a position to buy (rent?) a hooker. First, I'm like a sex camel. I won't lie, I feel a bit of...stress...when going through a dry spell like any other guy, but (especially recently) in the always epic battle between my brains and my balls my brain seems to have the upper hand. It's not like that I have women throwing themselves at me left and right (except for hookers), but I've passed on a few "opportunities" because it was better in the long term to stay away from the ensuing craziness or for good, moral reasons (yes, I still consider myself a "good guy" blogging notwithstanding).
Some other tidbits from Hawaii -
I met a girl there (no nickname - just a random) who couldn't stop saying in her interactions with others (especially men) - "that's not scoring you any points with me." Finally, I couldn't take it anymore and just flatly stated, "it's not about scoring points with you, it's about me having a good time with the group." I'm all for people being confident, but in social interactions (especially dating) it shouldn't be about getting people to "score points" or subject themselves to you, but it should just be about an overall good time. Sorry, random rant, but it was on my mind.
Wear extra sunscreen - I slathered on the SPF 30 twice and now I'm peeling skin by the metric ton, I have what can only be described as a "Gorbachev Spot" where I got burned, and the skin from my nose might fall off. I've already convinced a couple of people that I had a flesh-eating virus. However, I'm actually pretty tan (for me) and it's also hilarious to watch people that just went through two snowstorms try and figure out how you got a sunburn.
In other news, I went on a date!
I've replaced the crazy "Don't Touch Me" with another, slightly less crazy woman. No name yet, but we'll figure it out. Just dinner and a movie, but some definite red flags. First, she's divorced...I've never had to deal with that baggage before. Second, her roommate is her ex-boyfriend - she wanted to come to Alaska anyway, and found a guy to date and live with...the lease evidently lasted longer than the relationship. The positives are that she can take the occasional kiss on the cheek without immediately going to confession, we seem to have a good, comfortable interaction, and she doesn't seem crazy... As always I'll keep you posted, but we're firmly planted in "Happyville" for right now.
I'll be calling the Doctor tonight and The Bag Lady before I go to Florida.
Yes! That's right! The tropical destinations seem to have no end for me :) I'm slated for a class in Panama City from about April 18th until May 20th. Almost a solid month in Panama City in vicinity of many friends. I'll be leaving just in time for my sunburn to heal. I'll caveat that with the fact that I've been gone for two weeks and I'm not sure what the status of everything is and the MPF doesn't even seem to have a training office (the 9th phone number today was the charm). All things to deal with tomorrow...but as of now everything is still looking pretty good - wish me luck!
Also, if anyone that found this blog in Hawaii is still reading this - welcome! All thoughts are welcome!
Until next time - I'll be itching and on the phone...
AirForceKush - aka - The Arctic Fox
First - prostitution...
Whoa! What?
Yeah, hookers are everywhere on Waikiki - not exactly family entertainment. Not interacting with hookers was one of my last bastions of midwestern innocence that was shattered midway through my trip.
About halfway through the exercise a couple of NCOs and I were going stir-crazy and just needed to get out on the town for dinner and a couple drinks. I'm proud to say that I actually got to bed by 12:30 AM (8 AM call at work), but on the way back to our car there was about a three city-block line of hookers waiting to greet us and any other tourist that had to run this gauntlet. Most were pretty polite - just a "hey" or "hello" here and there, but there was one that got aggressive...
Hooker: "Hey, where you going"
Arctic Fox: "Home"
Hooker: "Where's home?
Arctic Fox (not about to let her know what military base I was staying on): "Iowa"
Hooker: "Is that even a state?"
Arctic Fox: "It's a great state!"
Hooker: "I'll put you in a great state."
Arctic Fox: "I gotta go..."
I'm not going to lie, I wanted to give her a hug right there just for the great wordplay, but that would probably have been misinterpreted as me wanting to go to "Iowa" with her.
At first I couldn't believe I was the type of person that a hooker would approach, but a group of three guys on a weeknight walking down the obvious line of hookers and not avoiding them - I could imagine why they might have thought they could make a few bucks off of us.
Thinking about it, however, I don't think I could ever be in a position to buy (rent?) a hooker. First, I'm like a sex camel. I won't lie, I feel a bit of...stress...when going through a dry spell like any other guy, but (especially recently) in the always epic battle between my brains and my balls my brain seems to have the upper hand. It's not like that I have women throwing themselves at me left and right (except for hookers), but I've passed on a few "opportunities" because it was better in the long term to stay away from the ensuing craziness or for good, moral reasons (yes, I still consider myself a "good guy" blogging notwithstanding).
Some other tidbits from Hawaii -
I met a girl there (no nickname - just a random) who couldn't stop saying in her interactions with others (especially men) - "that's not scoring you any points with me." Finally, I couldn't take it anymore and just flatly stated, "it's not about scoring points with you, it's about me having a good time with the group." I'm all for people being confident, but in social interactions (especially dating) it shouldn't be about getting people to "score points" or subject themselves to you, but it should just be about an overall good time. Sorry, random rant, but it was on my mind.
Wear extra sunscreen - I slathered on the SPF 30 twice and now I'm peeling skin by the metric ton, I have what can only be described as a "Gorbachev Spot" where I got burned, and the skin from my nose might fall off. I've already convinced a couple of people that I had a flesh-eating virus. However, I'm actually pretty tan (for me) and it's also hilarious to watch people that just went through two snowstorms try and figure out how you got a sunburn.
In other news, I went on a date!
I've replaced the crazy "Don't Touch Me" with another, slightly less crazy woman. No name yet, but we'll figure it out. Just dinner and a movie, but some definite red flags. First, she's divorced...I've never had to deal with that baggage before. Second, her roommate is her ex-boyfriend - she wanted to come to Alaska anyway, and found a guy to date and live with...the lease evidently lasted longer than the relationship. The positives are that she can take the occasional kiss on the cheek without immediately going to confession, we seem to have a good, comfortable interaction, and she doesn't seem crazy... As always I'll keep you posted, but we're firmly planted in "Happyville" for right now.
I'll be calling the Doctor tonight and The Bag Lady before I go to Florida.
Yes! That's right! The tropical destinations seem to have no end for me :) I'm slated for a class in Panama City from about April 18th until May 20th. Almost a solid month in Panama City in vicinity of many friends. I'll be leaving just in time for my sunburn to heal. I'll caveat that with the fact that I've been gone for two weeks and I'm not sure what the status of everything is and the MPF doesn't even seem to have a training office (the 9th phone number today was the charm). All things to deal with tomorrow...but as of now everything is still looking pretty good - wish me luck!
Also, if anyone that found this blog in Hawaii is still reading this - welcome! All thoughts are welcome!
Until next time - I'll be itching and on the phone...
AirForceKush - aka - The Arctic Fox
I have returned!!!!
Have no fear dear readers - the recent family crisis is mostly resolved and now I'm looking forward to bigger and better things both professionally and personally. However, I have been tapped for a trip to Hawaii so while I am making a pretty good post here this will probably be the only one for the next couple of weeks - hopefully this will be enough to tide all three of you over...on to the post...
I was once described as having a "shotgun" approach to humor - if I just throw some stuff out in a scattershot sort of way, some of my jokes are bound to hit home. How does this apply to dating you ask? Well, recently I've been taking the same approach to dating. This all happened very accidentally, but the more I think about it the more I like it and the logic behind it.
To put in a simpler way - I'm playing the field...
In college and the more normal world of Iowa cornfields I was very against dating more than one woman at a time. Generally the women were quality enough to want to concentrate on and dating more than one woman at a time created scheduling difficulties and confusion. Plus, I've always been the type of guy that wants to put his full attention into one woman - see how it plays out, and then move on - it's just simpler for everyone involved.
In Anchorage, however, the "one at a time" approach becomes more problematic for a few reasons. First - I tend to be a bit more popular (at times) with the ladies of Anchorage. There might be more than one (seemingly) nice woman around and I might have trouble deciding exactly want to do. Second, the women of Anchorage are crazy like you read about (in this blog), however, sometimes this craziness doesn't become apparent right away - it might be a couple of weeks after you decide to focus on just one woman - by the time you figure out she has a shrine to you in her basement next to the voodoo dolls of past boyfriends (not a real story...yet) it might be too late to call the other woman you met around the same time. I'm sure some guys could swing it, but for me it would just end with an awkward excuse of why I waited two weeks to call - and that's if this proverbial diamond in the rough remembered who I was anyway. Lastly, even if the woman isn't crazy there's a good chance I'll screw something up with the normal lady in the early going and might need (how do I say this?) a "fallback position."
So, in the ideal situation I might start out with four eligible bachelorettes that I met around the same time. The first week I might go out with the #1 ranked prospect and find out she's going to Botswana for three months - well, she's out until she's back and checked for malaria. That same week #2 (WHO DOES NUMBER 2 WORK FOR - sorry, couldn't resist) and I might go to the Moose's Tooth. She's nice and I'm relaxed because I don't like her as much as #1 and we really hit it off. #3 and I might never go out because that happens for various reasons and I might quickly find out that #4 enjoys satanic rituals - a hobby that I don't share. So, in a about two weeks of dating, maybe less, I've weeded out a crazo, saved myself from uselessly pursuing #3, and found a probable, but possibly mythical, nice woman.
My current situation is like this - although with only three, now narrowed down to two, prospects...
#1 - The Doctor - The Doctor and I met on my birthday (happy birthday to me!) through a mutual friend. We've talked a few times on the phone and things are going okay. The pros are that she seems like a normal woman from the lower 48, has a good job, we have a mutual friend that can help my efforts, and the chances of craziness are low for a few reasons. First, there are very legitimate reasons for a medical professional to come to Alaska that has nothing to do with running away from the sane reality that is the lower 48 - loan paybacks, better advancement, etc. Second, a doctor is a profession that doesn't usually turn crazy. Lastly, she's only been in Alaska for less than a year so if you assume she came here sane then she may have not had enough time to become crazy through whatever mechanism makes single women crazy up here. The cons are mainly scheduling related - she's very busy in her residency and I'm very busy and on TDY quite a bit (but that should be slowing down starting mid-May).
#2 - The Bag Lady - See previous post. The latest update is that there is none - I think she's still at home on leave and I'll be in Hawaii until the the second week of April - we'll she how it goes after that.
#3 - Don't Touch Me! - This happened so fast I didn't even know what was going on. When I was at home I got a contact on my dating website of choice and she seemed normal in the first few e-mails. Then on the phone the first warning sign was that she was worried I wouldn't be able to "handle" her. She kept mentioning that she was a "handful." I personally didn't see anything too wrong and we talked on the phone for about two weeks. We finally had a pretty low key, hang out kind of date yesterday. I had to deal with a phenomenon called "The Obtrusive Roommate." Either your roommate or theirs don't get the hint that you might be on a date and doesn't bug out to let you watch the movie. So there was the three of us, on a date, hanging out. I playfully gave a kiss on the cheek and she was surprised and moved away. Had we been alone I would have gotten the hint, but her roomie was there so I thought that might have been the issue (even though I had already, and rather loudly, gotten the roommate approval). So, when I was leaving I gave another kiss on the cheek and joked that she didn't pull away. We laughed a bit, she told me next time to wear more comfortable clothes if we have a night in (I wore my "good" pair of my two pairs of non-Air Force shoes). I figured I was good so when I gave her a call tonight I got no answer and was a bit confused. Well, I was confused for about five minutes until I got a long text about how if a "woman pulls away the first time you try for a kiss" you should take the hint and not be too pushy the second time around and she didn't want to see me again because of the aforementioned "pushiness".
Really? A kiss on the cheek? That was that offensive? I had, indeed, found my crazy girl in the group - I certainly could not "handle" that amount of insanity. If I had held her hand she might have sicked her dog on me, but luckily I wasn't nearly that bold. However, I must apologize to my younger readers for the adult content in the last few paragraphs. The best course, as always, is abstinence - the only way to prevent craziness, the common cold, and cooties is to refuse to kiss (even on the cheek) and definitely not hold hands (that's just crazy talk).
Also, for the record this woman - Don't Touch Me - is a "Passions" consultant - she sells sex toys. Hypocritical much? Maybe she was testing me to see if I could deal with how much of a handful she was (now a new code for crazy), but I've been around the block here in Anchorage a few too many times to fall for that one again.
So, we're down to two heading into the All-Star Break in Hawaii - what awaits me on the other side? Only time will tell!
Also, all comments are very welcome and requested on the latest "Don't Touch Me" incident - have you ever run into that kind of closed off situation? What happened to you?
Until next time - please take the hint and stay out of my three foot space bubble!
AirForceKush - aka - The Arctic Fox
Have no fear dear readers - the recent family crisis is mostly resolved and now I'm looking forward to bigger and better things both professionally and personally. However, I have been tapped for a trip to Hawaii so while I am making a pretty good post here this will probably be the only one for the next couple of weeks - hopefully this will be enough to tide all three of you over...on to the post...
I was once described as having a "shotgun" approach to humor - if I just throw some stuff out in a scattershot sort of way, some of my jokes are bound to hit home. How does this apply to dating you ask? Well, recently I've been taking the same approach to dating. This all happened very accidentally, but the more I think about it the more I like it and the logic behind it.
To put in a simpler way - I'm playing the field...
In college and the more normal world of Iowa cornfields I was very against dating more than one woman at a time. Generally the women were quality enough to want to concentrate on and dating more than one woman at a time created scheduling difficulties and confusion. Plus, I've always been the type of guy that wants to put his full attention into one woman - see how it plays out, and then move on - it's just simpler for everyone involved.
In Anchorage, however, the "one at a time" approach becomes more problematic for a few reasons. First - I tend to be a bit more popular (at times) with the ladies of Anchorage. There might be more than one (seemingly) nice woman around and I might have trouble deciding exactly want to do. Second, the women of Anchorage are crazy like you read about (in this blog), however, sometimes this craziness doesn't become apparent right away - it might be a couple of weeks after you decide to focus on just one woman - by the time you figure out she has a shrine to you in her basement next to the voodoo dolls of past boyfriends (not a real story...yet) it might be too late to call the other woman you met around the same time. I'm sure some guys could swing it, but for me it would just end with an awkward excuse of why I waited two weeks to call - and that's if this proverbial diamond in the rough remembered who I was anyway. Lastly, even if the woman isn't crazy there's a good chance I'll screw something up with the normal lady in the early going and might need (how do I say this?) a "fallback position."
So, in the ideal situation I might start out with four eligible bachelorettes that I met around the same time. The first week I might go out with the #1 ranked prospect and find out she's going to Botswana for three months - well, she's out until she's back and checked for malaria. That same week #2 (WHO DOES NUMBER 2 WORK FOR - sorry, couldn't resist) and I might go to the Moose's Tooth. She's nice and I'm relaxed because I don't like her as much as #1 and we really hit it off. #3 and I might never go out because that happens for various reasons and I might quickly find out that #4 enjoys satanic rituals - a hobby that I don't share. So, in a about two weeks of dating, maybe less, I've weeded out a crazo, saved myself from uselessly pursuing #3, and found a probable, but possibly mythical, nice woman.
My current situation is like this - although with only three, now narrowed down to two, prospects...
#1 - The Doctor - The Doctor and I met on my birthday (happy birthday to me!) through a mutual friend. We've talked a few times on the phone and things are going okay. The pros are that she seems like a normal woman from the lower 48, has a good job, we have a mutual friend that can help my efforts, and the chances of craziness are low for a few reasons. First, there are very legitimate reasons for a medical professional to come to Alaska that has nothing to do with running away from the sane reality that is the lower 48 - loan paybacks, better advancement, etc. Second, a doctor is a profession that doesn't usually turn crazy. Lastly, she's only been in Alaska for less than a year so if you assume she came here sane then she may have not had enough time to become crazy through whatever mechanism makes single women crazy up here. The cons are mainly scheduling related - she's very busy in her residency and I'm very busy and on TDY quite a bit (but that should be slowing down starting mid-May).
#2 - The Bag Lady - See previous post. The latest update is that there is none - I think she's still at home on leave and I'll be in Hawaii until the the second week of April - we'll she how it goes after that.
#3 - Don't Touch Me! - This happened so fast I didn't even know what was going on. When I was at home I got a contact on my dating website of choice and she seemed normal in the first few e-mails. Then on the phone the first warning sign was that she was worried I wouldn't be able to "handle" her. She kept mentioning that she was a "handful." I personally didn't see anything too wrong and we talked on the phone for about two weeks. We finally had a pretty low key, hang out kind of date yesterday. I had to deal with a phenomenon called "The Obtrusive Roommate." Either your roommate or theirs don't get the hint that you might be on a date and doesn't bug out to let you watch the movie. So there was the three of us, on a date, hanging out. I playfully gave a kiss on the cheek and she was surprised and moved away. Had we been alone I would have gotten the hint, but her roomie was there so I thought that might have been the issue (even though I had already, and rather loudly, gotten the roommate approval). So, when I was leaving I gave another kiss on the cheek and joked that she didn't pull away. We laughed a bit, she told me next time to wear more comfortable clothes if we have a night in (I wore my "good" pair of my two pairs of non-Air Force shoes). I figured I was good so when I gave her a call tonight I got no answer and was a bit confused. Well, I was confused for about five minutes until I got a long text about how if a "woman pulls away the first time you try for a kiss" you should take the hint and not be too pushy the second time around and she didn't want to see me again because of the aforementioned "pushiness".
Really? A kiss on the cheek? That was that offensive? I had, indeed, found my crazy girl in the group - I certainly could not "handle" that amount of insanity. If I had held her hand she might have sicked her dog on me, but luckily I wasn't nearly that bold. However, I must apologize to my younger readers for the adult content in the last few paragraphs. The best course, as always, is abstinence - the only way to prevent craziness, the common cold, and cooties is to refuse to kiss (even on the cheek) and definitely not hold hands (that's just crazy talk).
Also, for the record this woman - Don't Touch Me - is a "Passions" consultant - she sells sex toys. Hypocritical much? Maybe she was testing me to see if I could deal with how much of a handful she was (now a new code for crazy), but I've been around the block here in Anchorage a few too many times to fall for that one again.
So, we're down to two heading into the All-Star Break in Hawaii - what awaits me on the other side? Only time will tell!
Also, all comments are very welcome and requested on the latest "Don't Touch Me" incident - have you ever run into that kind of closed off situation? What happened to you?
Until next time - please take the hint and stay out of my three foot space bubble!
AirForceKush - aka - The Arctic Fox
You all may be wondering why I haven't been posting...
Well, just had a death in the family - it was my grandfather. My grandfather and grandmother raised me from age 11 on. Most of the important things I know about life came directly or indirectly from lessons they taught me. Because of that upbringing I am now "the rock" as my Aunt Ruth puts it. In any case I'm on leave in Iowa (my home) until mid-March.
It's really interesting - there's my 12 year old cousin, 21 year old sister, 48 year old aunt, 70+ year old (other) aunt and uncle, 80+ year old grandmother, and a bunch of others that have been around. But I'm "the rock" - I'm in charge; the executor of the estate and the one who makes all the arrangements (sell the house, sell the car, move my grandmother to my aunt's house, etc, etc). I'm only 24 (and just turned 24).
When my dad passed away about five months ago I had my grandfather help me be "the rock" and make those arrangements - I took the lead, but I had backup in that role - we were a team. Now he's gone and I'm it - the team is broken. It's an odd feeling - much as if a torch has been passed into my still very young hands. Don't get me wrong - I still have support from friends and family - they're helping, but all of the sudden it feels very lonely being at the top of my family and no matter how much support you get - how much you can delegate and get done - you're still the one at the top - the one everybody is (and can) depend on.
On the positive side it's been very good getting back with the family - it's been more than a year since I've seen some of my extended family, and about five months since I've last been home (the aforementioned death of my dad) - so we've all been going out, sharing stories, taking care of my grandmother, going through old pictures and memories, and trying to find some good stuff to laugh about with one another. It's the worst kind of family reunion, but it's still a reunion - and there's some positives in that.
Well, I didn't intend to post this much about it, but it's helped and that's good.
Also, as a note - life has been still going on - there's some news on the dating front, a few ideas for postings bubbling up (you can't keep a blogger down) and they'll all be coming when I need a good break from the very real life I've been living lately.
Until next time - here's to family :)
AirForceKush - aka - The Arctic Fox
Well, just had a death in the family - it was my grandfather. My grandfather and grandmother raised me from age 11 on. Most of the important things I know about life came directly or indirectly from lessons they taught me. Because of that upbringing I am now "the rock" as my Aunt Ruth puts it. In any case I'm on leave in Iowa (my home) until mid-March.
It's really interesting - there's my 12 year old cousin, 21 year old sister, 48 year old aunt, 70+ year old (other) aunt and uncle, 80+ year old grandmother, and a bunch of others that have been around. But I'm "the rock" - I'm in charge; the executor of the estate and the one who makes all the arrangements (sell the house, sell the car, move my grandmother to my aunt's house, etc, etc). I'm only 24 (and just turned 24).
When my dad passed away about five months ago I had my grandfather help me be "the rock" and make those arrangements - I took the lead, but I had backup in that role - we were a team. Now he's gone and I'm it - the team is broken. It's an odd feeling - much as if a torch has been passed into my still very young hands. Don't get me wrong - I still have support from friends and family - they're helping, but all of the sudden it feels very lonely being at the top of my family and no matter how much support you get - how much you can delegate and get done - you're still the one at the top - the one everybody is (and can) depend on.
On the positive side it's been very good getting back with the family - it's been more than a year since I've seen some of my extended family, and about five months since I've last been home (the aforementioned death of my dad) - so we've all been going out, sharing stories, taking care of my grandmother, going through old pictures and memories, and trying to find some good stuff to laugh about with one another. It's the worst kind of family reunion, but it's still a reunion - and there's some positives in that.
Well, I didn't intend to post this much about it, but it's helped and that's good.
Also, as a note - life has been still going on - there's some news on the dating front, a few ideas for postings bubbling up (you can't keep a blogger down) and they'll all be coming when I need a good break from the very real life I've been living lately.
Until next time - here's to family :)
AirForceKush - aka - The Arctic Fox
Well, it's official - I've finally had a date with The Bag Lady.
To recap - an eternity ago some Canadian friends of mine (and hers) thought we would be a good match. From then on we communicated through our airmen and through our Canadians - it was all very high school and fun, but a bit tiresome. A little later we made a breakthrough and got in touch through e-mail for the first time. We finally arranged for several dates that got canceled - but there was an encouraging hour and a half conversation the night of one of canceled dates.
Then...it finally happened..."Hey," Bag Lady called, "where should I be driving, I'm ready for our date!"
OMG!!! I had to scramble. I knew we had a date scheduled, but we had other dates scheduled and I had a huge amount of security forms to fill out that night. I was just making the dinner reservations as she pulled up.
I wish I could tell you she's crazy - that she jumped me in the car (in a good or a bad way), she was 400 pounds and wanted to move in with me, she's facebook stalking me, or some other crazy thing, but I have to say other than a few little quirks I'll get into this was a nice, normal date - yay for me!
It started off extremely rocky. The Roommate was walking in just as we were walking out and, trying to be friendly, said, "You must be Jitterbeangirl!" The problem was that this was Bag Lady, not the very married Jitterbeangirl. Bag Lady responded, "um, no, I'm Bag Lady." The Roommate was unconvinced for a few seconds until I formally introduced them while casually mentioning that Jitterbeangirl was my very married friend. Did I mention how married Jitterbeangirl was? I think I mentioned it a few times to Bag Lady. The Roommate helped matters by having an extremely wide-eyed and frightened look on his face. I don't think Bag Lady read too much into it, but I guess we'll see.
After that it picked up pretty well though - we made our way to the Glacier Brewhouse and had a wonderful meal and some nice conversation. We have a surprising amount in common - we even did a not of the same nerdy things in high school even though I think I won the "nerd off." Being an honorary member of the band (not a real member mind you) was enough to put it over the top (hey, I was a letterman in football too!).
I did get a bit of a curveball when she insisted on splitting the check. I know this is a rather common thing nowadays, but I tend to be a bit more old fashioned when it comes to dating - I like to show someone a good time and treat a woman that's nice enough to go out with me. I half-jokingly said that if we split the check it wouldn't feel like a date unless I got a goodnight kiss. She agreed and noticed I was planning to get a cajun dish - she recommended something a bit tamer. It's kind of interesting - when you really look at it she ended up paying about $24 to kiss me. I would think that's pretty impressive, but the dollar isn't worth what it used to be :)
In any case she had to get back to the Valley and after the aforementioned goodnight kiss I found out I earned a second date. Unfortunately because of our leave schedules that second date will come in about 3 weeks. As always I'll keep you posted - but for right now I have some other familial issues going on so I probably won't be dating anyone else in those three weeks - expect some more random postings.
As for some other housekeeping items - the tropical push for the Arctic Fox is going to be pushed a couple weeks - my TDY was postponed until April, I'm a bit disappointed, but it's better for the career so I'll go with it. I did decide to tack on a week to my leave at home and spend it in sunny Florida with a few friends, but that won't be until mid-March.
Well, until next time keep good thoughts for The Bag Lady and me!
AirForceKush - aka - The Arctic Fox
To recap - an eternity ago some Canadian friends of mine (and hers) thought we would be a good match. From then on we communicated through our airmen and through our Canadians - it was all very high school and fun, but a bit tiresome. A little later we made a breakthrough and got in touch through e-mail for the first time. We finally arranged for several dates that got canceled - but there was an encouraging hour and a half conversation the night of one of canceled dates.
Then...it finally happened..."Hey," Bag Lady called, "where should I be driving, I'm ready for our date!"
OMG!!! I had to scramble. I knew we had a date scheduled, but we had other dates scheduled and I had a huge amount of security forms to fill out that night. I was just making the dinner reservations as she pulled up.
I wish I could tell you she's crazy - that she jumped me in the car (in a good or a bad way), she was 400 pounds and wanted to move in with me, she's facebook stalking me, or some other crazy thing, but I have to say other than a few little quirks I'll get into this was a nice, normal date - yay for me!
It started off extremely rocky. The Roommate was walking in just as we were walking out and, trying to be friendly, said, "You must be Jitterbeangirl!" The problem was that this was Bag Lady, not the very married Jitterbeangirl. Bag Lady responded, "um, no, I'm Bag Lady." The Roommate was unconvinced for a few seconds until I formally introduced them while casually mentioning that Jitterbeangirl was my very married friend. Did I mention how married Jitterbeangirl was? I think I mentioned it a few times to Bag Lady. The Roommate helped matters by having an extremely wide-eyed and frightened look on his face. I don't think Bag Lady read too much into it, but I guess we'll see.
After that it picked up pretty well though - we made our way to the Glacier Brewhouse and had a wonderful meal and some nice conversation. We have a surprising amount in common - we even did a not of the same nerdy things in high school even though I think I won the "nerd off." Being an honorary member of the band (not a real member mind you) was enough to put it over the top (hey, I was a letterman in football too!).
I did get a bit of a curveball when she insisted on splitting the check. I know this is a rather common thing nowadays, but I tend to be a bit more old fashioned when it comes to dating - I like to show someone a good time and treat a woman that's nice enough to go out with me. I half-jokingly said that if we split the check it wouldn't feel like a date unless I got a goodnight kiss. She agreed and noticed I was planning to get a cajun dish - she recommended something a bit tamer. It's kind of interesting - when you really look at it she ended up paying about $24 to kiss me. I would think that's pretty impressive, but the dollar isn't worth what it used to be :)
In any case she had to get back to the Valley and after the aforementioned goodnight kiss I found out I earned a second date. Unfortunately because of our leave schedules that second date will come in about 3 weeks. As always I'll keep you posted - but for right now I have some other familial issues going on so I probably won't be dating anyone else in those three weeks - expect some more random postings.
As for some other housekeeping items - the tropical push for the Arctic Fox is going to be pushed a couple weeks - my TDY was postponed until April, I'm a bit disappointed, but it's better for the career so I'll go with it. I did decide to tack on a week to my leave at home and spend it in sunny Florida with a few friends, but that won't be until mid-March.
Well, until next time keep good thoughts for The Bag Lady and me!
AirForceKush - aka - The Arctic Fox
Some of you are probably thinking, "The Shipwreck? This has got to be bad..."
Well, the inspiration for the title is actually a bit more benign than all that. When I was a kid my grandfather and I had to take a road trip for some awards thing I had to do and whenever it was just the two of us that had to take a trip we would always look for those local "Mom & Pop" restaurants to eat at. On this particular trip we found a place run by a Greek couple and their specialty was called a "shipwreck." They would take all sorts of breakfast things and put them in scrambled eggs - it was like eating a disorganized omelet, but it tasted wonderful. That's the spirit of this entry - there have been all sorts of little things going on, but nothing that individually would require a blog entry.
First - an update to "The Fix Is In." We've scheduled lunches, dates, and other meet and greet kind of occasions over the last two weeks and I've gotten cancellations every time. To her benefit I've canceled some of them for work-related reasons (it got pretty crazy last week), but we've maintained contact and have been e-mailing and talking to one another nearly everyday. Today we were finally supposed to have a date, but I got a weather cancellation (the roads were supposedly getting bad). I thought that excuse was pretty lame and perhaps she was flaking out on me, but then she called me and we talked on the phone for over an hour just discussing random things (it was almost like high school). We have again scheduled a date - this time on Tuesday and the nice conversation makes me think that she's sincere about wanting to meet me and see if anything is there. Word is spreading about this predicament (we've found that we have several common friends) and the pressure is on to see how this thing is going to turn out. I'm actually pretty hopeful for this one - call it cautiously optimistic right now. As always I'll keep you posted, but for some reasons my Air Force buddies will hopefully understand she's officially earned a blog name - "The Bag Lady."
Second - my birthday is coming up! We've been celebrating it on this long weekend and I've found out some things about going out in Anchorage on your birthday.
1.) I've found my inner dangerous guy - women that were obviously on dates - or in situations where their guy companions thought they were on dates - hit on me or kissed me when I was out and about this weekend. At McGinley's a very nice young lady offered to buy me a drink and started chatting me up when her guy friend literally pulled her away and let me know in no uncertain terms that she was with him. She didn't take too kindly to that, but our crew was rolling out anyway so excess drama was averted.
2.) The Cougar population in Anchorage is much more numerous than even I thought. They were everywhere - and on the hunt. Luckily I'm a pretty elusive prey...
3.) Women in Anchorage will say really weird, unsolicited shit when you're out and about. Last night there was a woman in a Gonzaga hooded sweatshirt who told me she was married, had a kid three months ago, and thought she looked great. Another woman was a stripper in Texas and has a four year old child, yet another had four kids and had a tattoo for each one, and there was one more who tried to sell me a vacuum.
4.) I'm becoming a regular at some places in town and I don't know how I feel about that. We went to The Shed earlier in the weekend - the karaoke guy and the waitress recognized me (the karaoke guy knows me as a singer, the waitress as the DD - she seemed pretty excited that I was drinking). They also know us at Humpy's, but I'm pretty sure that's unrelated to the News Anchor incident.
5.) Women let you get away with almost anything when it's your birthday - I don't know how many women I kissed this weekend, but if anyone in your crew (or you) tells a woman it's your birthday and to kiss you - they'll do it and probably throw a bit extra into the mix. The birthday thing (or possibly other special occasions) seems to be the only independent variable in this situation - relative beauty, size, age - whatever - didn't seem to come into account. Now it's possible that relative sluttiness levels could also be a variable, but I had no way to gauge that as I didn't get turned down all that often this weekend (in terms of making out like freshman at the bar - nothing more) Luckily I didn't get myself into too much trouble other than the aforementioned bruising of some fellows' egos.
Third - the Arctic Fox is going tropical pretty soon. I'm either going to Hawaii or Florida (the Air Force can't decide - my money's on Florida). Overall this is a good problem set to be working with, if I go to Florida as planned I'll be there just over a month with some time in Iowa and California. Expect some pretty good stories and blog entries from there to make all my Alaska readers jealous (I wonder if they have wireless internet on the beach?).
As for some upkeep items - some guest blogging will be coming soon - I swear! Also, I'll probably be having more entries reviewing places to go, putting out some random thoughts, and hopefully also some good commentary on the singles life. I still have some more stories up my sleeve, but since I've been very careful about Alaska dating over the last six months the reservoir of good, truly crazy stories is drying up.
Well, until next time I'll be gathering my sunblock and shorts...
AirForceKush - aka - the Arctic Fox
Well, the inspiration for the title is actually a bit more benign than all that. When I was a kid my grandfather and I had to take a road trip for some awards thing I had to do and whenever it was just the two of us that had to take a trip we would always look for those local "Mom & Pop" restaurants to eat at. On this particular trip we found a place run by a Greek couple and their specialty was called a "shipwreck." They would take all sorts of breakfast things and put them in scrambled eggs - it was like eating a disorganized omelet, but it tasted wonderful. That's the spirit of this entry - there have been all sorts of little things going on, but nothing that individually would require a blog entry.
First - an update to "The Fix Is In." We've scheduled lunches, dates, and other meet and greet kind of occasions over the last two weeks and I've gotten cancellations every time. To her benefit I've canceled some of them for work-related reasons (it got pretty crazy last week), but we've maintained contact and have been e-mailing and talking to one another nearly everyday. Today we were finally supposed to have a date, but I got a weather cancellation (the roads were supposedly getting bad). I thought that excuse was pretty lame and perhaps she was flaking out on me, but then she called me and we talked on the phone for over an hour just discussing random things (it was almost like high school). We have again scheduled a date - this time on Tuesday and the nice conversation makes me think that she's sincere about wanting to meet me and see if anything is there. Word is spreading about this predicament (we've found that we have several common friends) and the pressure is on to see how this thing is going to turn out. I'm actually pretty hopeful for this one - call it cautiously optimistic right now. As always I'll keep you posted, but for some reasons my Air Force buddies will hopefully understand she's officially earned a blog name - "The Bag Lady."
Second - my birthday is coming up! We've been celebrating it on this long weekend and I've found out some things about going out in Anchorage on your birthday.
1.) I've found my inner dangerous guy - women that were obviously on dates - or in situations where their guy companions thought they were on dates - hit on me or kissed me when I was out and about this weekend. At McGinley's a very nice young lady offered to buy me a drink and started chatting me up when her guy friend literally pulled her away and let me know in no uncertain terms that she was with him. She didn't take too kindly to that, but our crew was rolling out anyway so excess drama was averted.
2.) The Cougar population in Anchorage is much more numerous than even I thought. They were everywhere - and on the hunt. Luckily I'm a pretty elusive prey...
3.) Women in Anchorage will say really weird, unsolicited shit when you're out and about. Last night there was a woman in a Gonzaga hooded sweatshirt who told me she was married, had a kid three months ago, and thought she looked great. Another woman was a stripper in Texas and has a four year old child, yet another had four kids and had a tattoo for each one, and there was one more who tried to sell me a vacuum.
4.) I'm becoming a regular at some places in town and I don't know how I feel about that. We went to The Shed earlier in the weekend - the karaoke guy and the waitress recognized me (the karaoke guy knows me as a singer, the waitress as the DD - she seemed pretty excited that I was drinking). They also know us at Humpy's, but I'm pretty sure that's unrelated to the News Anchor incident.
5.) Women let you get away with almost anything when it's your birthday - I don't know how many women I kissed this weekend, but if anyone in your crew (or you) tells a woman it's your birthday and to kiss you - they'll do it and probably throw a bit extra into the mix. The birthday thing (or possibly other special occasions) seems to be the only independent variable in this situation - relative beauty, size, age - whatever - didn't seem to come into account. Now it's possible that relative sluttiness levels could also be a variable, but I had no way to gauge that as I didn't get turned down all that often this weekend (in terms of making out like freshman at the bar - nothing more) Luckily I didn't get myself into too much trouble other than the aforementioned bruising of some fellows' egos.
Third - the Arctic Fox is going tropical pretty soon. I'm either going to Hawaii or Florida (the Air Force can't decide - my money's on Florida). Overall this is a good problem set to be working with, if I go to Florida as planned I'll be there just over a month with some time in Iowa and California. Expect some pretty good stories and blog entries from there to make all my Alaska readers jealous (I wonder if they have wireless internet on the beach?).
As for some upkeep items - some guest blogging will be coming soon - I swear! Also, I'll probably be having more entries reviewing places to go, putting out some random thoughts, and hopefully also some good commentary on the singles life. I still have some more stories up my sleeve, but since I've been very careful about Alaska dating over the last six months the reservoir of good, truly crazy stories is drying up.
Well, until next time I'll be gathering my sunblock and shorts...
AirForceKush - aka - the Arctic Fox
I'm back! Sorry it's been a few days folks, but man cannot live on blogging alone and work was pretty busy this week.
In any case I think it's time to get back to what this blog does best - describe the crazy happenings of my dating life in Anchorage.
Today's subject is "The Condo Hunter." Condo Hunter was the first woman I met in Anchorage. Well, to be honest I met her before I got to Anchorage. In between assignments I was home for Christmas last year and I figured I would change my home of record to Anchorage on a dating site and see what was out here.
Within a day I got an e-mail from Condo Hunter saying I was cute and looked like a nice guy. She also looked nice and normal so I decided to e-mail her back. I had six weeks between my assignments (there was an Air Force class in between as well) and after about two weeks of e-mailing back and forth we talked on the phone.
Everything was pretty nice at that point - she had a good job, she was nice, and looked okay. However, there were a few warning signs. Keep in mind at this point I've never stepped foot outside the lower 48, haven't been within 1,000 miles of Alaska, and had no idea what I was in for. The first warning sign was when I made an innocent comment about online dating and I had no real idea who she was - she could be any number of things (I listed out a few as a joke), but the last thing was 400 pounds. She took a bit of offense to this and asked what I would do if she were 400 pounds. I was in a real pickle so I dodged - I said something like it doesn't matter since I had already seen her pictures and I knew she looked fine. The second warning sign was a...for lack of a better term...a love letter. It was merely a nice note saying how much she liked our conversations and how she couldn't wait for me to get up to Anchorage - all the guys in Anchorage evidently are weird as well - needless to say this was a first for me.
At the end of the day, however, I was concentrating having fun in Florida, my class, and visiting my family soon on my way up to Alaska - these warning signs were merely an afterthought to the other things going on in my life. Condo Hunter was something to look forward to - a nice welcome to this great state.
Well, time passed as did our now almost nightly conversations and I had arrived in Anchorage. I decided to surprise the Condo Hunter at work and let her know I had arrived and she looked...like...well I can't really describe it except that she looked almost nothing like her pictures and the weight concerns definitely made sense.
There are times in a man life where you face real tests of character. We all go through tough times and some of us rise to the occasion, we all have times where it might be easier to lie - some of us do, some of us don't, there are always times where it might be easier to be lazy rather than work hard to get a task done, and some of us face moments were that online hottie you've been talking to for six weeks turns out to quite possibly weigh more than you do even know they're four inches shorter than you.
So, I did the right thing - I went with it. I hadn't had a girlfriend in awhile and Condo Hunter was a legitimately nice woman. I enjoyed the connection we had during my transit to Anchorage and I would at least like to think I'm not a shallow person. Things progressed for about a week and a half - we went on a few dates, out for my birthday, and everything was good. She helped me buy furniture and I gave her advice on her next purchase (a condo - hence the name).
One night, about two weeks after I had arrived she was mentioning her difficulty finding a suitable place when she inquired about my place that was just coming together - what my lease was, how long I had on it, etc, etc. At the end of this she suggested that I help her to buy this condo since she was thinking that we would move in together once my lease was up.
WHAT!!!
It's one thing to face the moment of truth and date a women who completely misrepresented herself online, but it's a completely different thing to move in together. Especially after only two weeks of actually dating. I was in yet another pickle and had no idea what to do.
My solution was what General Patton would say is "advancing in another direction." In other words, I retreated. I didn't call quite as often, cut back on the dates, and racked my brains trying to figure a way out of this and into the priesthood or some other celibate profession where I wouldn't have to worry about these things.
Luckily Condo Hunter sensed my apprehension and the fact that I wasn't as "into this as she was." She gave me an out and I took it. I don't know if she ever got that condo or someone to live in it with her, but luckily it wasn't me.
Until next time - here's to truth in advertising!
AirForceKush - aka - The Arctic Fox
In any case I think it's time to get back to what this blog does best - describe the crazy happenings of my dating life in Anchorage.
Today's subject is "The Condo Hunter." Condo Hunter was the first woman I met in Anchorage. Well, to be honest I met her before I got to Anchorage. In between assignments I was home for Christmas last year and I figured I would change my home of record to Anchorage on a dating site and see what was out here.
Within a day I got an e-mail from Condo Hunter saying I was cute and looked like a nice guy. She also looked nice and normal so I decided to e-mail her back. I had six weeks between my assignments (there was an Air Force class in between as well) and after about two weeks of e-mailing back and forth we talked on the phone.
Everything was pretty nice at that point - she had a good job, she was nice, and looked okay. However, there were a few warning signs. Keep in mind at this point I've never stepped foot outside the lower 48, haven't been within 1,000 miles of Alaska, and had no idea what I was in for. The first warning sign was when I made an innocent comment about online dating and I had no real idea who she was - she could be any number of things (I listed out a few as a joke), but the last thing was 400 pounds. She took a bit of offense to this and asked what I would do if she were 400 pounds. I was in a real pickle so I dodged - I said something like it doesn't matter since I had already seen her pictures and I knew she looked fine. The second warning sign was a...for lack of a better term...a love letter. It was merely a nice note saying how much she liked our conversations and how she couldn't wait for me to get up to Anchorage - all the guys in Anchorage evidently are weird as well - needless to say this was a first for me.
At the end of the day, however, I was concentrating having fun in Florida, my class, and visiting my family soon on my way up to Alaska - these warning signs were merely an afterthought to the other things going on in my life. Condo Hunter was something to look forward to - a nice welcome to this great state.
Well, time passed as did our now almost nightly conversations and I had arrived in Anchorage. I decided to surprise the Condo Hunter at work and let her know I had arrived and she looked...like...well I can't really describe it except that she looked almost nothing like her pictures and the weight concerns definitely made sense.
There are times in a man life where you face real tests of character. We all go through tough times and some of us rise to the occasion, we all have times where it might be easier to lie - some of us do, some of us don't, there are always times where it might be easier to be lazy rather than work hard to get a task done, and some of us face moments were that online hottie you've been talking to for six weeks turns out to quite possibly weigh more than you do even know they're four inches shorter than you.
So, I did the right thing - I went with it. I hadn't had a girlfriend in awhile and Condo Hunter was a legitimately nice woman. I enjoyed the connection we had during my transit to Anchorage and I would at least like to think I'm not a shallow person. Things progressed for about a week and a half - we went on a few dates, out for my birthday, and everything was good. She helped me buy furniture and I gave her advice on her next purchase (a condo - hence the name).
One night, about two weeks after I had arrived she was mentioning her difficulty finding a suitable place when she inquired about my place that was just coming together - what my lease was, how long I had on it, etc, etc. At the end of this she suggested that I help her to buy this condo since she was thinking that we would move in together once my lease was up.
WHAT!!!
It's one thing to face the moment of truth and date a women who completely misrepresented herself online, but it's a completely different thing to move in together. Especially after only two weeks of actually dating. I was in yet another pickle and had no idea what to do.
My solution was what General Patton would say is "advancing in another direction." In other words, I retreated. I didn't call quite as often, cut back on the dates, and racked my brains trying to figure a way out of this and into the priesthood or some other celibate profession where I wouldn't have to worry about these things.
Luckily Condo Hunter sensed my apprehension and the fact that I wasn't as "into this as she was." She gave me an out and I took it. I don't know if she ever got that condo or someone to live in it with her, but luckily it wasn't me.
Until next time - here's to truth in advertising!
AirForceKush - aka - The Arctic Fox
