Babs in Blogland

Those dates be calling me, man!

Things with Good Guy are going well as you may have guessed from what I don’t write here in blogland.  We have gotten quite comfortable very quickly.  We see each other several times a week.  Whether it’s eating dinner in, going to Bible study or doing “family” activities.  It’s all very nice and what I have long desired in a relationship.

As much as I am enjoying being with Good Guy and enjoying the comfort of “having a man,” part of me still misses being in the game.  I miss getting all dolled up with extra care to hair and makeup.  I miss meeting a guy at a restaurant because I haven’t disclosed my address.  I miss candlelight, wine and white tablecloth service.  I miss the friendly goodbye hug at valet as I drive off to my own home where I can kick off my shoes, crash on the couch and do whatever I want.

Don’t get me wrong, I wouldn’t trade my Good Guy for the world.  The things we do together are fulfilling a need that I have had for a very long time.  I am more fulfilled with him after just five weeks than I ever was with Texas Holdem in five months.  My craving for honesty, consistency and family are being met and that is something I am very happy to have.

Although Good Guy is great and I am enjoying getting into the comfort zone, but there is something about going out with a new guy every week that is somewhat addictive.   I think that’s part of the problem for men and women in Atlanta.  Dating can be so much fun, there isn’t much incentive to settle down and focus on just one person.  Let’s face it, before I met Good Guy I was averaging about one date a week, so to have that stop so abruptly is leaving me feeling somewhat unsatisfied.

I had no intention of discussing this with Good Guy because I didn’t want him to think I was ungrateful for our time together.  He gives me copious amounts of quality time and I appreciate that considering how busy he is.  Still, it came up in conversation and he let me know that he didn’t want me to be left feeling unfulfilled in that area.  He and I agreed to start having regular “date nights.”  I love a man that listens to my needs and takes action!

To those of you who are married or in serious relationships, do you ever find yourselves missing the single life?  Do you miss going on first dates and all that is associated with dating?  Do you take the time to schedule date nights with your mate?

Yesterday, over at Single Black Male the subject of men cooking for their women came up.  I found that post very timely because I knew Good Guy was cooking me dinner later that night.  I had no qualms about his ability to prepare a palateable meal, but I wasn’t sure if I would really love it.  Truth be told, it really didn’t matter.  I am the type of woman that prefers to cook for her man as opposed to him cooking for me (I prefer he take me out to eat), so it’s not like I expected this to become a habit.

Bon Apetit!

To my surprise, Good Guy prepared quite a tasty meal!  He made this spicy as hell delicious salmon, green beans and…wait for it…a blueberry muffin.  I can’t for the life in me figure out why he added breakfast foods to the mix, but that salmon was so spicy I was glad to have the bread of the muffin to cool my tongue.

As I sat at the table waiting for him to present the meal I had a flashback to the last time a man cooked for me.  It was probably sometime around 2005.  I was friendly with a guy I called Creepy Bald Guy.  He invited me over to dinner and I agreed.  Even though he was a tad bit on the creepy side, he was still an eligible Black man in Atlanta and I like to eat. 

Just like last night, I sat at his kitchen table waiting for him to reveal his culinary efforts.  Then without any sort of announcement, he placed a plate before me that included grilled tilapia, green bean casserole and some cantaloupe.

What’s up with men and their side dishes?

For the record, I abhor green bean casserole and it took every ounce of my good upbringing to stomach the small portion that was on my plate.  Ugh…even now the thought of creamy congealed cream of mushroom soup is enough to make me gag!

But I digress.

I think it’s great when a guy makes the effort to prepare a meal for the object of their affection.  As I can surely attest, preparing a meal takes consideration and effort and I am certainly appreciative when one does so.

As for Good Guy, his salmon might have been prepared a tad bit on the spicy side, but I’ll just take it as a symbol of the fiery passion he has for me and keep a cold glass of water at the ready.

Ladies, do you like it when a man cooks for you?  When was the last time someone did?

Fellas, do you cook for your ladies?  What’s your “go-to” meal when you are trying to impress?

Yesterday it got a little spirited around here, as I expected it would.  I know some of you have an opinion of me as being snooty or bourgie, and you aren’t far from the truth.  I am all of that, but I am also cool as hell.  Sure I prefer fine dining, but I can be just as comfortable in a hole in the wall.  I like to hang around bourgie people like me (Hey Crew!) but I can be just as comfortable with people from all walks of life as long as they are cool people.

When it comes to men, however, I prefer a certain level of man.  Not higher, not lower, but on the same level as me.  For the most part I have stuck to that rule.  The one time I seriously spent time with someone that was on what I considered to be a lower level, it ended with ice cream sandwiches being smeared all over his front door.  Aaah, sweet memories!

Anyway, Construction Guy and I were clearly on the different levels.  The man was fine and had a body that set my loins on fire.  However, he was no stranger to a court room or the inside of a jail cell and  lived in a home rented by someone else.  All he wanted to do was watch Blech Entertainment Television and have mad, dirty sex with me.  And as I was just coming out of a marriage, I was perfectly fine with that.

Eventually, he started catching feelings for yours truly and tried to take me out on a date.  We went to a pizza place on my side of town and I was truly embarrassed to be seen with him.  It was probably the second or third time we had even been seen in public together.  I’ll never forget it, he was wearing jeans and a plaid polo shirt and, like, some boat shoes, which doesn’t sound that bad but it looked very dated.  I kept looking at him and thinking “dude, why are your clothes so out of date?  You look like you just got out of prison.”  Then I remembered he had. 

Doh!

That was the splash of cold water that I needed to sever ties with him.  Like, for real, I ended it right then and there.  I told him I didn’t think it would work, had him take me home and tried to never speak to him again.  He continued to call me for the next 18 months, but that is another story for another day.

That’s my story.  I’m not saying that people can’t date down, but I knew it wasn’t for me.  There was no way I could ever take him home.  Momma Babs would have surely staged an intervention!

I have a feeling today’s subject might ruffle a few feathers but, as with most of my topics, I don’t care. I’m runnin’ this show, b!tches!

At the meet the folks event over the weekend, I met one of Good Guy’s cousins. He was a handsome man, appropriately dressed, funny and, from what I could tell in the little conversation I had with him, intelligent. Then I peeped his girlfriend and immediately thought they were an odd couple. She looked (and this is where you guys might get mad at me) like the kind of woman that lacked education, had a couple of tattoos and a couple of kids by men whom she had never married. She lacked class. She wasn’t on his level. But she was nice and friendly and that’s really all I cared about.

Later, as we were recounting the evening, I mentioned my impression of the girl to Good Guy and to my surprise he told me he couldn’t believe his cousin is with her. I was surprised that he agreed with me. He said that there are way too many beautiful women in Atlanta for his cousin to end up with someone that looked like her. I immediately came to her defense in the looks department. True, she is no beauty, but if she pulled her look together she could look exponentially better. I can’t even quite put my finger on what was wrong with her, but it was something. Perhaps it was the hair style, the excessive jewelry or the inappropriately low cut dress. Something about her just lacked refinement.

To be clear, this is not just some jump off. This is his girlfriend. He brings her around all the time and she will be accompanying him at the family reunion this weekend.

What do you think about people dating someone who is not on their level? Have you ever dated someone that was a level below you or were you the one that was dating “up”?

P.S. Before you all start calling me a snob and whatnot, I AM. And if you are just now realizing that, you haven’t been paying attention.

P.P.S. Good Guy asked his mom what she thought about me and she said I seemed intelligent and refined. So there!

I am not at all ashamed to tell you that I was Fa.cebo.ok Pimped.  In the past, I have scoffed at the idea and turned my nose up at any random that sent me a friend request.  Then I started hearing stories of people meeting their mate on the most popular of social networking sites.  First Rehab reconnected with her husband to be, and then my blog wifey met the man that would steal her heart from the precious box in which I have been keeping it. 

When Good Guy sent me a friend request, I noted that we had a mutual friend and he did look kind of familiar so I accepted the friend request.  Wait, that is a lie.  First I sent him an email asking how we know each other.  He responded with way too many details about his life and I was pretty sure we didn’t know each other, but he was cute so I accepted.

Five minutes looking at his profile and pictures and I pretty much knew we would end up dating, or at the very least going out once.  He was my type.  He was family-oriented, intelligent, handsome and God-fearing.  After a few days of “liking” each other’s updates or making the occasional comment, Good Guy asked me to lunch.

Our first lunch date lasted three hours.

I liked him immediately and he will tell you the same.  I really like how easily I could talk to him and how easily he could talk to me.  Conversations with him are effortless.  We spend many,  many hours talking and time always seems to get away from us.

When Good Guy told me he had a dog, I thought that was cool.  When he told me his dog’s name was Roxy, I was floored!  What a coincidence!

I am really and truly excited about Good Guy.  He is 100 percent honest with me at all times.  If he is meeting a woman for a business lunch he calls me and tells me.  He doesn’t ever want me to think he is doing anything shady.  After the recent bullshit I have been subjected to, this is a great relief.

Good Guy knows all about blogland, although he has told me he doesn’t want to read my site.  He wants to get to know me in person and not by what I write on a daily basis.  Still, this place is important to me and if Good Guy is going to be important to me then someday the two will meet.

If you see me walking around with a big cheesy grin on my face, it’s probably because I just hung up with my sweetie, or perhaps he just sent me a text.  I absolutely love hearing from him in the middle of the day.  He is always thinking about me and doesn’t have a problem letting me know.

That’s what Good Guys do.

Sunday night New Guy and I had our first disagreement.  The subject of the disagreement is unimportant and I honestly thought that by Monday morning it would be squashed.  I was wrong, and so I spent most of the day feeling bummed.  Here I just found this wonderful guy and suddenly there was trouble in paradise?  Babs was not pleased.

He came over Monday after work to replace my thermostat.  His commitment to that task left me optimistic about the situation.  We were both polite while we worked together to complete the task.  And by work together I mean I sat on the stairs and watched him do all the work.  Hey, I offered him a cold drink!

After he finished he replaced the batteries in my smoke detector and killed a giant bug that was keeping my guest bathroom hostage.  Then he suggested we talk.  And talk we did.

It was the best make-up talk I’ve ever had.  We both laid out our view of what went down without being interrupted by the other.  We both admitted our fault and we both apologized.  As some of you may know, I have abandonment issues, so I half expected him to chuck me the deuces and ri-i-i-i-de out.  Instead he wanted to discuss the sitation and move past it so we could get back to our happy place.

When he left I was feeling much better than I had hours earlier.  It’s nice to know that he and I can have an argument and get past it in a mature manner.

How do you and your mate handle conflict?

Do you talk things out?  Give each other space?  Duke it out?  I jest!