Hogarth vs Orwell (An epic one CTRL+C & CTRL+V'd from my memoirs)
Pulling up a couple of chairs, I strategically placed myself next to a pretty girl who hadn't yet been introduced to me. "My name's *Theremin*." "Hi, I'm Senia." She had a slight American accent.

"Hmmm, OK. So you get this all the time, but, that's an unusual name." "Yeah, I was brought up in Russia until I was eight, and then my parents moved to America." "Oh right, Glasnost, Perestroika, all that." "That's right."

And so we chatted, ignoring my friends nudging each other and smirking "Oh look, *Theremin's* at it again..." I didn't care, talking with this girl was easy, it just flowed. She liked poetry, I could quote some, she wrote poems, I told her about a poetry night I knew about (and frequented for the purpose of looking a bit deep and hoping to cop off with a deeply troubled egomaniac fret-fanny - it never happened).

We talked about art and literature, and all the time I didn't even have to try, unlike the usual situation of sitting there staring at my drink thinking "MUST. SAY. WORDS. BE. FUNNY. CHARMING... Hey, where'd she go?" The promoter of the event got onto the little stage and instigated an open mic session, leaving a semi-acoustic guitar next to a chair. Of course, someone immediately got up and played some songs, and whilst this was going on, everyone at our table was egging me on to have a go. Initially I refused because I didn't want to look like a fool in front of this girl, and I wasn't really in the mood.

However, my companions were insistent, and all it took was Senia saying "Oh, I'd really like to hear you" to get me to assent. Eventually I agreed to do something on the condition that one of my other friends would as well, and he said "Fine". A short while later, my name was called out, and I went over to the guitar. I sat down and quickly assessed it, string tension, action, tuning, that sort of thing. I introduced myself and the song I was about to play (one of mine - "N* S***** H*******") to the pub, and began to strum the opening chords, and then into the verse. I promptly forget the words. I launched into the song again, and remembered the lot, garnering a respectable smattering of applause (most fervently from my table).

Following the mild success of the first song, I embarked on something more adventurous, a Motown cover, hoping that my voice would hold and not do a Le Bon at Live Aid. I was lucky, and people were even doing the backing singer bits. Quitting whilst I was ahead, I mumbled "thanks" into the microphone and returned to my table.

Senia praised my performance, and then, gathering her belongings, bid us all goodnight. "See you around" she said. Around? Around? Where's around? What's going on? What do I have to do? If there are such things as past lives (which for the record, there AREN'T), I like to think I would have been a luckless suitor, killed in a pointless duel, throwing my life away for a woman who didn't really care either way. "Ummm. OK. Bye" I said to her retreating form, hoping she'd be at one of the indie clubs I frequented.

Later on that night at *venue x*, a band went on stage playing a godawful racket, eerily similar to the band "BluesHammer" from that scene in 'Ghost World'. My mate and I had been at the pub all afternoon and into the evening, and hadn't had any tea, so we stopped off a kebab shop. I ordered a large doner, because frankly, it didn't seem to matter anymore.

The following week, Senia turned up at *an indie club in London*. Eagerly (but hopefully not looking too eager) I sat down next to her and struck up a conversation. Her mobile buzzed, and she read the text message. "Excuse me" she said, before going up the stairs. She returned with, surprise, surprise, a fella. Normally I could handle this. I'd just accept my place in the pecking order and slink off to the bar to drown my sorrows. But this time it was different, I knew the bloke she'd brought down. He was occasionally at the poetry night I went to.

He was a ripped jumper wearing snaggle toothed hippy freak dipshit, whose brand of garbled yet obvious poetry never failed to raise a mental sneer from me. Immediately I knew that this girl was after the fake Boho chic thing, believing his vacuous nonsense, and speciously thinking that "Gee, he looks poor, that means he must be really deep!" He was Hogarth's 'Gin Lane', I was Orwell's 'Keep The Aspidistra Flying' and doomed to lose this fight.

The bar was calling me, ready to sooth my troubles, when another girl sat down with us, another American, and a friend of Senia's. She introduced herself as Jamie, and I promptly offered to buy her a drink. A few drinks later, and we were dancing, all thoughts of Senia stricken from my mind. Jamie was better looking anyway. There was nothing doing though, she left at about 1am, and I wandered off to find my mate so I could moan about women and how they've done me wrong (part 156 of a series of drunken lectures).

Later on that night, outside the club at 3am, a strange man pestered me for five minutes for Jamie's number, because he knew she'd given it to me (when she hadn't). I had to get out my mobile and cycle through the names to prove that no-one called Jamie was in my phone.

I may have bought a dodgy Oxford Street hot-dog that night.
(theremin put the lotion in the basket on, Fri 19 Feb 2010, 6:12, 6 replies)

I clicked
Just because you reminded me a little of the young Che, looking deep, reading Sartre in French, just waiting for the right girl to realise what a deep, sensitive person he was.

And failing.
(Che Grimsdale Best before:, Fri 19 Feb 2010, 8:52, closed)

I've read my fill of existentialist literature, but that was a few years before going to poetry night
I remember one night, sitting there, reading 'The Meaning Of It All' by Richard Feynman.

My reading was interrupted by a drunk punk, who demanded to know what I was reading. I showed him the book.

"Sha meenen ov e'al? wassat all abaa?"
My answer never got past "Well..."
"I tells ya wha ya nee ta ree. Zem crass lyrics. thas all ya nee ta ree."
(theremin put the lotion in the basket on, Fri 19 Feb 2010, 14:26, closed)

I don't get it.
(lib319, Fri 19 Feb 2010, 12:47, closed)

What
Don't you get?
(theremin put the lotion in the basket on, Fri 19 Feb 2010, 14:19, closed)

This bit

"Later on that night, outside the club at 3am, a strange man pestered me for five minutes for Jamie's number, because he knew she'd given it to me (when she hadn't). I had to get out my mobile and cycle through the names to prove that no-one called Jamie was in my phone."

Is this the upshot of the story???
(lib319, Sat 20 Feb 2010, 0:25, closed)

Not really.
It was just the end to an odd night.

The upshot is once again finding solace in 'miscellaneous meat' products.
(theremin put the lotion in the basket on, Sat 20 Feb 2010, 12:02, closed)