Dont Mince Words

I’m kind of the grouchy old lady of the internet. I remember the internet when it was just tech geeks and sci fi guys who couldn’t get laid. Now, everyone is on the internet thanks to mass social networking sites like Myspace and LinkedIn.

I have friends and I have a professional network that I’ve maintained for 25+ years through paper and now by a digital address book. When someone told me that Myspace was no longer a recruiting tool for bands that couldn’t afford their own website database, I got on to, of course, put a dating profile up. What I got was spam from comedians and musicians asking me to see the shows. I set my six-friend profile to private. I joined LinkedIn years ago and didn’t maintain my profile because my old fashioned way was working.

This morning I received a LinkedIn friend request from my old boss in New York. After I accepted, I received a “You might also know” list of ten people. Check out how connected and random this is:

Ivan – a guy I dated
Lauren – a woman who runs a marketing network luncheon group I attended in 2003
Arthur – he dated a friend of mine
Cordes – she’s a worthless headhunter I tried using
Suzanne – she went to my grad school in VA
Terry – I met him at a technology event
Mark – my brother’s ex-roommate from 1994.

So, 70 percent of the people LinkedIn suggested I get in touch with I actually knew. That’s either one smart database, or I get around. My nine-colleague profile is expanding thanks to a DB email scrape!

I don’t know what traditional child-rearing is, but I’m sure when I get together with my single-mother friends, the kid is bound to learn something.

Mom and Kid arrived Friday night and requested what any land-locked resident would: sushi. We had fish alfresco where we could dine and scope out the pedestrian meat. Kid quickly learned to play the “gay, straight, married and beat down, or single” game. We got her on big wallet patrol. After a cocktail, I began my fast-track tutorial with Kid which ended with the quote of the night, “You need a strong man who knows what he wants and can make decisions, otherwise, you are just dating a pussy with a dick.”

Kid laughed and responded with, “Yeah, I guess so.”

Since Mom is a teacher, she’s very good at wrap up and summaries and made Kid repeat what she learned in the evening. “Yeah, Mom, I know. If I’m going to waste my time dating, he needs to have an education, a good job, some money, and be handy around the house.”

Our next meeting will include a visit to Home Depot where we’ll teach her the “do-it-yourselfer, contractor, or day laborer” game. The one thing I learned this visit: men look at you more if you have a hot, teen girl beside you.

You may not know this, but Los Angeles has a subway. It doesn’t go anywhere, so I’ve never been on it even though the stop is three avenues over and three streets up from my house. However, when my boss invited me to a fundraiser downtown at an Irish pub, I knew I should look into riding the subway in order to avoid parking fees. In addition, I could enjoy a couple extra Guinness.

My coworkers congratulated me on my maiden voyage and told me my Union Station transfer would be easy – nothing compared to a Times Square transfer tunnel maze. I was excited. I was doing my thing for the environment and I could get hammered in an Irish bar. Win-win.

I had my Black and Tans and my flirting and made my way back to the Pershing Square station without conflict (e.g. panhandlers, pimps). After transferring, I stood on the Union Station platform and looked at my watch. Nobody was around and it was only midnight.

In New York, this happens and you assume trains are running slow. But when no one is around, you suspect you missed a notice. One time I fell asleep in the Spring Street C station waiting for a train that had been diverted on the F tracks. In LA, I didn’t know what to expect, so I checked the schedule.

The last train north left the station at 11:52 p.m. on a Saturday night. It’s hard for me to stand by the MTA when they can’t even offer drunk service on a Saturday night. I left the platform and walked to the front of Union station where I caught a cab home for $30. My cab rides home to Brooklyn were cheaper.

And you wonder why people in LA like to drive.