<valley girl> Omiga-awd</valley girl>

Salon.com published my "date from hell" story today! (I'm the cat hair one, aka "The slob and the spit gob". I cannot stress enough how much cat hair there really was. You probably could have constructed an entire third cat from what the other two had shed.)

I don't know why they withheld my name - I don't recall asking them not to publish it. Oh well. Maybe they figured the woman could figure out it was her, if she happed across the story somehow, and sue the heck out of them and me. Or maybe she works for Salon. Hmmm.

Anyway, you have to watch the "free day pass" ad to see the story. They don't ask for personal information or anything - you just have to endure the ad (get to it via the upper-right hand of the topmost banner). They place a cookie on your machine which allows you access for a day. I would just post the story here, but I think Salon owns the story once you've submitted it to them.

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Update:
Aw hell, I guess if I can post an entire copyrighted article by someone else, I can post my own.
Here's my "date from hell" story on Salon:

I swear this was not an episode of "Seinfeld."

I met this pretty blonde at a party -- a slightly less glamorous Gwen Stefani look-alike. I asked her out, and we decided on an afternoon movie followed by dinner at her apartment that coming Saturday.

I arrived at her door and immediately noticed a thunderous, full-bodied stench that had so many components to it, the very air around me seemed to carry slight discolorations. Looking down, I saw I was standing in a grayish, viscous puddle that was hosting a fly rave. About a minute after my second knock, I was beginning to think I'd been stood up when she dashed around the far corner yelling, "Sorry! I had to put the garbage out!" Puddle mystery solved.

She was wearing a cute red top, very sporty, and flattering jeans. When she went into her apartment to grab her coat, I happily noted that she was as cute and svelte as I remembered her. Caveat: Walking to the car, I noticed she had those little dried white spit globs at both corners of her mouth, the ones we all sometimes get. I'm not a fussy guy, so I mentally shrugged it off. We're all human and sometimes flaws are cute.

At the movie, she was charming, intelligent and funny. Secretly I was thrilled at my luck as the movie started. We shared a tub of buttered popcorn and a Coke. When the movie ended, as we got ready to leave, I noticed that the spit globs were still hanging on! The grease from the butter was shining all the way around her mouth, and you'd think that the popcorn would have dragged the globs into oblivion. Still, no big deal. I would just have to think of a way to have them exorcised by the time the goodnight kiss arrived, which I suspected it would, given that the date was going well so far.

We got back to her place, she got me a beer, and told me to sit on the couch while she made dinner, turning down my offers to help. While she cooked, I took in the apartment, which was like a shoe box, taller than it was wide, and it had two lofts: On one I could see a gray futon with stained sheets. The other was piled approximately six feet high with dirty clothes, including undies. There's something a little too intimate about seeing someone's soiled underwear before you've even kissed them, so I looked away and did my best to ignore it.

She also had two enormous gray cats who stirred only to growl at each other occasionally. I'm cool with pets, and they didn't seem to be annoyed at me, so I took the place in. Beer helps with denial, so I reached for mine. My hand had an odd nimbus around it. The beer was strong, but I hadn't had that much yet, so I took a closer look. It was covered with a thick mat of gray cat hair. Glancing around I saw the whole place was coated. Even the carpet, which was probably some form of beige, had a gray cast to it.

That was when she had put the pizza in the oven, sat down next to me, and told me how good her Bisquick pizzas were. According to her friends, they were renowned, she said. One of the interesting facts I learned about Bisquick pizzas is they take only minutes to cook from scratch (or from box, at least), so we would be eating soon.

During our conversation, I licked the corners of my mouth a few times in hope she would unconsciously mimic me.

We had just opened our second beers when the pizza was done. It looked marvelous. She'd put the ingredients on rather artistically; an aesthetic culinary event appeared imminent. I took a big bite, carefully holding the cheese so my chin wouldn't get a molten cheesy hug, and the odd sensation of many tiny things dragging across my tongue and out of my mouth almost made me drop the piece. The whole edge of the bite mark was lousy with threads of baked-in cat hair. Since there was so much, I thought it had to be a fluke, so I pulled off that part of the crust, explaining that though the pizza was good (not that I could tell, my mouth had shut down from shock), I liked a little less crust. The next bite was the same. As was the third. I nearly gagged on the third bite, managed not to, but my eyes watered up quite a bit. I can only guess she mistook that for newfound affection brimming up within me.

I gave up. By now, I was thoroughly, irrevocably grossed out. Critical mass had been achieved. I did not want another date with her, no matter how cute or smart or sexy. I went to the bathroom, rolled the cat hair off my hands, washed, and then looked into the mirror to prep for a breezy, promiseless exit.

The first words out of her mouth when I emerged were, "We have to do this again! I've had a great time! Are you busy tomorrow?" The globs were still in place, and I probably imagined this, but they were bigger. I have no excuses for what happened next.

I immediately abandoned all intentions of honesty, smiled brightly and said, "Sure! I'd love to. However, tomorrow I'm meeting some buddies, uh, out of town, and I won't be back till late, but how about sometime later this week?"

"Great!" she said. And stood there waiting for a kiss. So I kissed her. The globs were gone after that.

She waved to me from her door as I got in my car. "Call me!" she hollered. "You bet!" I hollered back. She closed the door before I was stricken with a full-body shudder. And, of course, I didn't call her.

I'm such a schmuck.