DISFUNCTION JUNCTION

A few years ago I met this guy. For the sake of this post (and hilarity), we'll call him "Hands."

Hands and I had one of those friendships where everyone assumed that we were dating. We always showed up at parties together, and he gave me rides home. We followed each other around. There was obvious flirting, verbally and physically. If we were at a table together I would practically sit in his lap. We were both definitely in the stage of serious like.

Of course, this is me, so nothing ever happened. No clothes ever came off, except coats. The only deep penetration I ever experienced with this guy was purely mental. For reasons I won't get into here, because the list is both long and irrelevant to the story, we decided not to be together.

He did kiss me once, when I told him that I might be moving to LA for work (we all know how that turned out). It was only a kiss, and it never led to anything else, but it was really good. Like, really good. I didn't fall over or anything, but my theory that we would have amazing chemistry was pretty much confirmed. That made it even worse when I found that I did have to leave, and we had to say goodbye to each other permanently, adding "living 3000 miles across the country" to our reasons of why a relationship would never work. It sucked hard.

Anyway, a few weeks after I left for LA, I was sitting in my apartment alone, thinking about how my job was horseshit, all my friends were back East and how I had wasted my opportunity with Hands. We hadn't communicated since (an unspoken decision on both of our parts), and I had spent a lot of time thinking about him, due to the fact that my employers gave me no work and I sat around doing nothing all day. I signed onto Facebook to see how life was continuing without me and noticed that he was awake (before noon? On a Tuesday? That was bizarre) and had posted a Facebook status.

I forget what it said, but the first thing I realized was that in lieu of "there," he had put "their." I was mesmerized, yet horrified. Dude. You are TWENTY-NINE. Employed (kind of). Educated. What the fuck is this?

I immediately called Hurricane, a really close friend who also knew Hands and had spent the past few weeks letting me ramble about what an idiot I was for not at least trying anything out.

"Hey. How you holding up?"
"Have you been on Facebook today?"
"Not yet. What's up?"
"He used the wrong 'there.'"
"Oh. Shit."
"Yup."
"So. I guess you're cured."
"Oh yeah."
"Going out tonight?"
"Yup."

I know this makes me weird, but terrible grammar both baffles and horrifies me. A guy could be Ryan Gosling's twin and if he misappropriates the English language I will just walk away.

OK, maybe not.

A while ago I met a guy who was so dumb that I slept with him just to get him to shut the fuck up; now I would have probably just excused myself from the conversation. In my defense though, he was a work of art.

There was also, in case we all forgot, my saga with Brainy Smurf, which almost forced me to take a torch to humanity in general.

Correct usage of commas gets me hot. If a guy mistreats his run-ons, what's he going to do to his clauses? Apostrophes are big with me, too. Days of the week do not need them at the end! They are for possession, people!

On a related note, I recently met someone who kicked my ass across the room at Words With Friends, and because of this, I now want to roofie him so hard that he wakes up in a different state with his pants around his neck. (PS, Nip Clique- he actually made a roofie joke. Start our genetic mash-up ASAP.) Proper handling of semi-colons guarantees at least one future alimony check, so it'll be interesting to see where this goes, if I ever see him again.

Probably not, since now he knows I'm certifiably insane.