Slightly Evil Things I Have Done

I'm going to try to keep this blog from becoming "true confessions," but a conversation I had today at lunch with an extremely handsome man caused me to mention several of the huge lies I have perpetrated on unsuspecting people. (Listen, who doesn't babble nonsensically in front of a good looking guy?)

• On a flight from Milwaukee to New York I told a very stereotypical Wisconsin woman (clearly going on vacation) that I was Anderson Cooper's husband. Not boyfriend, but husband. She bought it, but in order to keep her in the dark I had to sneak my way around baggage claim.
• In Palm Springs, a good looking guy (from Minnesota no less, and heretofore referred to as "R") & I started flirting at a bar. We then went off to one bar where I played eye candy to impress his friends. (I did this knowingly and got a perverse thrill out of it. I believe I was a geisha in a prior life.) We then went to a leather/cruise bar (not my thing, but I was on vacation and am always seeking out opportunities to try something new) where some other man remarked how good R & I looked together. I grabbed R's arm and mentioned that we were newlyweds. The guy bought it, which was quite remarkable considering that I added on the fact that we had been together for 10 years, which means that R started dating me when I was 15 and he was in his late thirties.
• I told a slightly off man in a bookstore in Milwaukee that I was part Tahitian and part Russian and distantly related to Marlon Brando.
• I seriously considered going into prostitution while in college. A straight male friend of mine was going to service female clients and I would take the males. (It was going to be a cartel like operation.) The charge: 50 pounds, roughly $100.
• While in college in Boston I routinely gave incorrect directions to tourists, frequently sending them into the sleazier parts of Chinatown or Dorchester.
• To this day when tourists irk me, I send them to Staten Island or Morrisiana in The Bronx. (Not a slight, it's just that those aren't tourist locales.) You'd be surprised how some people actually believe me when I tell them that the Empire State Building is in Grant City.
• "Oh yes, I just enjoyed bottoming for you." (Usually followed by a quick escape out of their apartment.)
• At some internships, I have acted like a dumb spoiled slut so that everybody pities me and I don't have to do any work.

That's all the disclosure for today. Now you naughty Europeans can continue your search for naked Helena Paparizou pictures and praying at the altar of Cameron Cartio.

RIP Saul Bellow and best wishes for Peter Jennings as he fights against lung cancer. (His statement about his condition at the end of tonight's World News Tonight was moving in a very subtle but profound way.)