N. IM’d me last night. We’ve now dated…drumroll please…guy #8 and guy #9 in common.

Both guys apparently brought me up in conversation. That’s…interesting.

In other news, I went to a bar with friends the other night. (This is a rare occurrence, as evidenced by the fact that they were worried about me driving home after 2/3 of a watermelon martini.) Yet again, I got to have this conversation:

Me: So, where do you work?
Guy: [Tech company]
Me: Oh, really! Do you know [the guy who dumped me when his beloved ex called to retrieve her from jail]?
Guy: Yeah! Do you know him?
Me: Umm…

Last weekend, I had a premonition I was going to run into someone I knew. At a birthday party with J., I kept craning my neck all night in hopes of catching a familiar face. No luck.

Then, on the long walk home, we crossed paths with C., the ::cough:: 22-year-old I dated for a couple months. Although we went our separate ways for practical reasons (I’d be in my mid to late 30’s by the time he finished grad school), I thought we were sorta close, in that we-once-shared-a-moment sort of way.

“C.!” I shouted. “C.!”

From 3 feet away, he turned to stare at me.

At this point, I realize:

1. I’m with my boyfriend.
2. He’s with his girlfriend.
3. He has no clue who I am.
4. I feel like throwing up.

Ew. One of the fellows mentioned in this article I, uh, dated at some length.

Just got invited to a friend’s party. Lucky me, he’s co-hosting with a guy I went on an awkward date with. (One of these things is not like the other: New Balance gym shoes, backpack, dinner at an upscale restaurant.)

Anyway, things with J. are good. Just booked tickets to spend 10 days over Christmas with his very cool family.

I was watching a TED Talk yesterday when I was struck by a sense of recognition. Where had I seen this speaker before?

Oh yeah, we had lame date.

Q: How did I get on the mass mailing list of a recruiter?

A: Went on a date with him half a year ago. Eyeroll.

One of my friends who I talked into online dating is now going out with the guy with the gentle smile. They’re both great, so I’m cheering for them

In other online dating news, my sister A. finally went online, choosing a username whose sole purpose is to indicate that she’s my sister, lest any guy try to date her after having dated me. In a further effort to shame me for my history of dating too much, she has taken to sending me profiles of guys she’s potentially interested in and including the demand, “Did you sleep with this one?!”

“You say ’slept with,’” I replied calmly. “I say pre-screened.”

My friend told me a story a few months back. I wish I could remember all the glorious details, but suffice it to say that:

In college, a guy asked her out.

At the restaurant, she ordered an entree and a beverage.

He simply ordered a glass of milk. He then proceeded to retrieve a baggie of cereal and a ceramic bowl from his backpack.

I went to a bar last night with my sister, A. As we talked, I kept glancing at the guy behind her, wondering if I knew him.

“I might have gone on a date with that guy,” I mused.

“Yes, you have,” A. declared.

“Wait, how do you know?”

“Before you got here, F. and I were talking with him. He asked F. how he and I knew each other, and F. said ‘my brother dated her sister, just like you did.’”

“What? How did F. know I’d dated him?”

“Oh, he didn’t. He just assumed. But apparently he was right.”

Some updates:

J. and I went to a ::cough:: math competition a couple weeks ago. In the group of about 50 people, I managed to find an ex, a date, and a guy I recognized from a dating site. This has led poor J. to start stories like, “So, my friend Craig…actually, have you dated him?”

Oh, and we won the math competition

Two days ago, I had dinner with a female friend of mine. She’s recently begun trying her hand at online dating and apparently asked the guy she’s dating whether he knew me. No, he reported, but he recognized me from a couple dating sites. Because of this I’ve started dreaming about running into people I recognize from dating sites, but don’t actually know.

And then yesterday, I crossed paths with stomach flu guy while leaving work. I tried to contort my face so as to look like somewhat else (WTF?!?), then I fled the scene. Since I read that his company recently laid off 75% of its workforce, I’m praying he’s not interviewing for a new job in my building.

Anyway, the long-suffering J. continues to be better than I deserve. His dossier now includes the killing of 2 spiders, the gift of 2 bouquets of flowers and 6 jars of gourmet peanut butter (!), use of the word “pulchritude,” and only mostly dissolving into laughter when, as we lay in bed together, I exclaimed, “Oh, hey, guess what percentage of the South Korean GDP goes towards education!”