milquetoast

Well I had been working on a crush that I neglected to mention here. He is a co-worker of mine who sits in the cube right next to mine, we'll call him The Cruncher. I use the term "cube" loosely because I really only have one full wall; one side is only half a wall and the other two sides are completely open. The crush on The Cruncher started a couple of months ago, probably because he and I spend so many hours talking to each other. Our job consists of waiting for the phone to ring, in the meantime there is not much else to do but chit-chat. The Cruncher and I have a lot in common: we're both native Austinites, extremely liberal, ready to start families, have good relationships with our parents and siblings and have the same taste in movies. On paper he's a good catch: he owns his own home, drives a nice new car, has a master's degree and earns a decent living. Plus he is kind, sensitive, caring and not bad looking. Of course I am not one bit sexually attracted to him, but I figured that could change and grow. There is one other weird element: he is forty and has a 23-year-old "girlfriend" who lives in California, they have been "together" for over two years. We have gone out to lunch a couple of times and then last week I invited him over to watch a movie at my house. We decided to follow my regular movie night m.o. and order a pizza. When he got there I started making salads and asked him to order the pizza. He got very nervous and said he needed a pen so he could rehearse the phone call. Dude, just order the damn pizza! I asked him if he wanted me to order it and he conceded. Then he started asking me if his car was ok parked by my curb or if he should move it into my driveway. I live in a mini-cul-de-sac so no traffic goes by my house. I told him I thought it would be fine but he opted to move his car anyway. I felt insulted that he seemed afraid of my neighborhood. I have lived there for ten years and no one has ever touched my car or the cars of my guests. There were a few other things that happened during the course of the evening that really got on my nerves and showed me that girlfriend or no girlfriend, The Cruncher is not the man for me. It was actually a breakthrough because I realized that I do have enough self-esteem to wait for the Right Guy rather than settle for the Convenient Guy. And that includes a guy I'm sexually attracted to!