Did I become a "Cougar"?

Saturday night, I'm over at my friend Sarah's, enjoying a bottle (or 3) of wine, eating some Austin's Pizza, and watching Bridget Jones' Diary. You know,what every single girl in their late 20's wants to do on a Saturday night.

I suppose, in our semi-drunken wine haze, Sarah and I get the bright idea around 10:15 (after our movie was over) that it's time to party downtown. In the clothes we'd both been wearing the whole day. The cab gets called, I slap on a little lipstick (hoping I'd stay "in the lines" since I was a little tipsy) and blush, brush and tease my hair, and hope that I look even halfway presentable for the bar(s) down on West 6th.

Our cab shows up 10 minutes later -- a rare occurrence since it usually takes about an hour -- and we think it's going to be a good night because Jorge our cab driver has Christmas lights twinkling all through out the interior and hip-hop blaring so loud the cab was vibrating (an extra bonus!). Sarah and I are telling each other how great we look (yeah right!) with Jorge echoing his sentiments.

We get dropped off at the first bar, which is completely dead inside. After a lame attempt to persuade the bartender to play some 80's hair bands (specifically a little GnR), we decide to move on to greener pastures.

The next bar is totally packed, and we're ready to go. We get up to the bar, and low and behold, Sarah knows one of the bartenders, Fernando. A middle school alum, who's grown up to be super-hot, he gives us the first drink on the house....Score #1 for the night, right? We've already gotten a free drink!

We decide to make our way up to the rooftop bar, but spend the next 20 minutes making fun of the people on the street, not paying any attention to the masses (and possibly cute prospects just waiting for us to unleash our fabulous personalities) of people behind us. Side note--what has happened to people in Austin? It was fake boob city out there -- and I seriously think these women were having a contest to see how short they could make the small strip of lycra/spandex/cotton they were passing off as dresses. Of course, they were accompained by "Going-out" guy -- you know who I'm talking about. He has a uniform -- button-down shirt, either striped or small pattern, sleeves rolled up juuust above the elbow, perfectly coordinated jeans, some sort of slip on loafer (or leather flip-flops, since it is summer)....hair perfectly gelled and a tan you wonder whether it's real or fake... Geezzz, this isn't Dallas for goodness sake!

But back to my story....Sarah and I bore of our roof-top hate-fest and decide to make our way back down to the ground floor. We manage to snag a small table and survey our surroundings (Sarah, as my wing-woman, is scoping out who I'm going to attempt to go talk to)....but, a mere 5 minutes later, an upstanding young gentleman stumbles over, and practically drooling on me yells to us, "Do either of you have a lighter?" I very nicely say "no"--Sarah, on the other hand, looks at him and says, "You know you can't smoke inside anymore, right?" (leave it to my good friend to point out Austin's no-smoking-in-bar ordinance...) Not the least bit fazed, our boy says, "I know, I don't even smoke." (Interesting pick-up line #1)

Realizing that's he's found his conversation opener (and excuse to linger), Jon (we found out his name) proceeds to tell us he's had 25 drinks (great, this one's a keeper!) and he's from Austin. Oh, where is he from? Sarah and I are native and like meeting a fellow Austinite, since they've become so rare. Where did you go to high school, Jon? Westwood. Oh really? When did you graduate? 2002.

Are you freaking kidding me? I graduated college 2 years before this guy graduated high school? A 23-year-old is hitting on me? I mean, I'm flattered, but when I was graduating high school he hadn't even gone through puberty yet!

Since he'd decided we were his new friends, we proceeded to mess with his head and lack of short-term memory (hopefully alchohol-induced). I told him I was an undercover cop and had my gun in my purse, and then told him I was an attorney as well...He didn't remember either of those facts 15 minutes later....

When he stumbled off to get another (or 5) beer(s), another young stud and his cronies decided it was time to move in for the kill. This guy came up and said, "Ladies, excuse me, but I have to ask you a question. I will buy you a drink if you know who my friend is--" (Wait, was this seriously a pick-up line?) I looked at him dumb-founded but Sarah cut through the bullshit and said, "Wait, so are you trying to get us to tell you your friend looks like Adam Goldberg?" (in Dazed and Confused....don't worry, you'll remember) His friends look totally confused (probably because they realized they were actually talking to girls) and young stud thinks he's been really clever. Sarah, again cutting through all the bullshit, point-blank asks him how old he is, and wait, you'll love this, he's 21. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, we managed to lure over a barely-legal. Sarah starting calling him "the child" -- I'm not sure he appreciated it. Then Footloose came on, and she commanded him to start dancing Flashdance (she'd had a few also...Footloose, Flashdance, they're the same, right?). I don't think he really appreciated that either (or didn't remember the movie(s))...

Sarah and I caught a cab about 1:30 and rode on home...I woke up early on Sunday with cotton-mouth and went grocery shopping. How very 29-year-old of me.

Oh, and if you're wondering...yes, I gave Jon my number....just call me Mrs. Robinson...


But, only on one condition. I said I would respond to him only if he could remember my name in the morning. He called half an hour later. Guess that short-term memory was really gone.