Cool things that have happened to me this week

ONE
I bought my new computer on May 10, and it came with a free printer of my choice (after mail-in rebate, of course). I finally got around to unpacking and setting up my new printer this weekend, and it is sweet. Not only does it print, but it scans and copies and resizes and prints photos directly from the camera and switches effortlessly between black and white and color … and it probably thaws chicken breasts and performs low-cost abortions and writes scathing retorts to whatever santorum drools out of Ann Coulter’s mouth every week, but I haven’t read that far in the manual yet.

TWO
I had some pretty expensive ($1,000+) dental work done in January, and I found out after the fact that 1) my creepy (now ex-) dentist had bullied me into getting a more expensive procedure than I really needed and 2) my dental insurance had a pretty common exclusion against that expensive, unnecessary procedure. So I ended up with about $100 in coverage. Ouch. And when I called my insurance company and my creepy (now ex-) dentist to see what could be done about it, I got the old “we’ll look into it for you” runaround from both of them. Except it wasn’t runaround! Someone actually looked into it for me—and even managed to fix the problem! Many, many months after the fact, I got a check for $360 this week from my insurance company, along with an explanatory letter that cited “new information” about my dental work. But even if that new information came from my creepy (now ex-) dentist, I’m still not going back to him. Not even if he takes an anger-management class and shaves off his booshy moostache. Because that man touched my teeth.

THREE
I had another board meeting tonight for the nonprofit organization I’m board-membering on. This time it was at a very wealthy man’s very fabulous highrise in a downtown gated community that we all decided had piped-in flower-scented air because we smelled fabulous flowers all along the sidewalk, but we never saw any flowers anywhere we walked. And when I got inside and poked around to check out our host’s fabulous digs, I found little to-deal-with piles of bills and reading materials and knickknacks lying around in practically every room. Just like in my house. Which means, of course, that I’m living a very wealthy lifestyle on a middle-class income. Except without the breathtaking view. Or the 3,000 square feet of living space, plus balconies. Or the piped-in flower-scented air along my sidewalk.

FOUR
Some of the cool kids on the board invited me to join them for half-price martinis at the Kit Kat Lounge after the meeting tonight. And I’m not exaggerating when I call them kids; they were all between 9 and 12 years younger than I am. On the plus side, we sat outside under a canopy of light-wrapped trees and enjoyed a beautiful evening together. And the kids were all fun … and extremely cute. And when I got up to leave (because some of us are almost 40 and we need our rest) and hug them goodbye, two of them totally copped a feel. Two of them. And nothing makes an older man feel sexier than a cute young guy’s wandering hands. On the minus side, though, every conversation—and I’m not exaggerating here: every conversation—we had tonight eventually landed on a kid’s story involving 1) drinking, 2) getting drunk, 3) passing out from being drunk and/or 4) puking from being drunk. And I had this weird paranoia all night that I'd developed a nose-hair problem, which is all but impossible to monitor in public without looking gravely suspicious. Good thing we were drinking in the dark. On the plus side again, though, the kids insisted on paying for my half-price, not-quite-half-finished French martini. And nothing makes a cheap older man feel sexier than cute young guys who cop a feel and pick up the tab.

FIVE
There’s one more cool thing that happened to me in the last week that totally trumps the previous four cool things. It leaves me giddy and giggling like a schoolgirl with Jell-O in her bra. It gives me a sense of calm and purpose, like a napping kitten (a purposeful napping kitten, in the interest of keeping the metaphor from sounding toooo random) but without all the butt fur. It makes me want to sing show tunes on the bus. (Wait. I always want to sing show tunes on the bus.) It makes me want to be a better man. But you’re gonna have to fill in the blanks yourselves until I feel I’m ready to cough up more details. (You're free to guess, of course—that's the whole point of teasing you with vague details—but unless you're one of the tiny handful of people I've talked to about it directly, your best guess is still going to be only about a third correct.) In the mean time, I have to go make more Jell-O. The batch in my bra is getting all melty.