She's "one that got away" that I remember fondly from time to time. A lovely person as well as being nonchalantly hot in such an easy, elegant way. I know she made an effort, sure, but it always seemed like the healthier kind — in that it was more for her own appreciation of herself rather than putting it out there for others' attention/validation.
Now that I think about it, there was a time years after the scene above when she came into my restaurant as a health inspector (I knew she worked as one, but it's a big, food-centric county and I'd not run into her on the clock before).
I did everything to play it cool, as if I'd not been low-key wondering for years what it'd be like to make her laugh, spend hours in her company, etc. Even tried the ol' hypothetical angle of "if I weren't at work, and you weren't actively inspecting my business here, what would you say to catching up over a drink later?" She blushed when she replied that she wasn't too sure [name] would take that very well. I went with "Fair enough, but that's why I figured it was best to not invite him.", and we laughed it off.
At the very least, I can safely say that she knew and implied that she appreciated my attention, but it was a non-starter for reasons. Ah well. C'est la guerre. 🤌🏼
NGL, the first time an old friend got dropped off for some random D&D one weekend way back when, the rest of us were waiting on the porch for his always-late ass. A red Ranger turns to roll past the house and I check out the driver, assuming it was just passing through (golden olive skin, so many freckles, long hair in a loose ponytail)... but while I watched, it pulled over across the street from us and said friend hops out to hurry on over.
I called out, clearly having all the game in the world, "Daaayum [name], I didn't know you had a sister!" and he yelled "STFU, that's my mom!" and I looked past him to the truck: she was trying to keep from laughing and I barely heard the others around me giving me shit for being such an awkward jackass. I was in love in that instant, and spent the next ten years wondering how I could take my shot.
She's still a damn knockout, but her son's now a creepy conspiracy nut/prepper/sov cit, so 🤷🏼♂️
I gave MJ the following:
"the most super-future painting in the style of Van Gogh, world record highest price at auction, ultra accurate theme, perfect style likeness, --v 5.2 --ar 16:9"
and... I don't want to choose. I mean, look at that life-goal level of No Fucks Given. 🤌🏼 Please, consider this a quadriptych of his moods.
You are correct in these hypotheses, yes, and details to a person's overall presentation are some of the first introductions one has to said stranger's tendencies, interests, and even self-worth. Of course, conjecture is not fact, and an educated guess is only as good as the education behind it.
No judgement, here. In my experience, the latter has led to the widespread use of patchouli by those who believe in salting their pits, and that's not much of a vote of confidence in its efficacy.
I wonder what that would look like if the roles were reversed: ie. the posted job description didn't match the internal listing, and only after doing some amateur sleuthing did one find that the same corp has been playing a shell game with major contracts, covering up their overseas labor, and they've got sympathetic chairs on each "oversight" org in their sector.
That'd just be another day like any other, though. 🤷🏼♂️
To be fair, I'd be more concerned with the unkempt excuse for a beard being a sign of other, less visible issues. Sure, the bun is cringe AF, but adult-level hygiene is clutch for ranking as The One. 🤗
edit: ooh, touched a nerve with some? Go wash yourselves.
If only he'd wear it during hunting season, maybe with some female elk piss on it?