I Hate Inappropriate Touchers

My sister in law came up with the concept of "F-Friday." She always has the best ideas. The kids think the "f" stands for "fun" or "free"; it actually stands for "F*&k It." Here's how it works: you have a bad day, which happens to be a Friday. You pick up your cell, probably while your kids are in the bathroom shaving each others eyebrows with your razor and using your expensive hair gel (by the bottle, bien sûr) to spike up their Faux Hawks, and start calling your friends, but only your fun friends. By the way, all of your friends should be fun, otherwise why are you still friends with them? They're sucking the life out of you and you're not getting any younger.

First, call the friends whose numbers you know by heart; they're usually your best friends. They'll start coming over around four, with kids, of course. Their spouses will wander in whenever they finish work or, in my husband's case, Friday afternoon tennis. You start pulling food out of the fridge. You start pouring drinks. You throw a bunch of chips, baby carrots, raisins, cocktail peanuts, radishes, whatever into an unbreakable serving dish. I love this wooden one, that my parents got as a wedding gift in the sixties and my mom thinks is tacky:


Look in the back of her cabinets. I bet your mom has one, too, unless you're one of my siblings. If you have sodas, now is the time to let the kids have them. High fructose corn syrup? Bring it! This is also a great time to use all those mismatched paper plates leftover from birthday parties.

F-Friday is B.Y.O.B., but you should also serve whatever is in your fridge (or freezer. Limoncello, anyone?) If the food runs out, get creative. Pull out that Pillsbury Crescent Roll dough and stuff it with bologna and red pepper (add a squirt of mustard for flavor). Take out the frozen waffles, top them with cheese or peanut butter, cut them up and stick toothpicks in them. Still got that weird jelly someone gave two Christmases ago? Serve it with Triscuits. If, by chance, you run out of food or alcohol, invite someone else and ask them to bring pizza and beer. If you don't know anyone else, order pizza and drink that leftover Scotch you bought for your mother in law. F-Friday is all about fun. But some people take it too far...

Which brings us to inappropriate touchers. A few years ago, we hosted an F-Friday and had a great time. It had gotten late, all remaining children were parked in front of the computer watching a movie (probably something wildly inappropriate, like Chariots of Fire, but they were too tired to care) and I was lazily cleaning up around the house.

I bent over to pick something up, perhaps a radish dipped in peanut butter, and felt a slap on my behind. I stood up, thinking it was my husband. I was irritated, because he knows that I hate, hate, hate being slapped on the behind, even on F-Friday. I should have given him more credit (I should always give him more credit, but that's a whole nother entry. Nother should be a word, which is also a whole nother entry). It was not my dear husband, but in fact someone else's husband (a husband who, incidentally, I wouldn't even have dated when I was single). When I stood up and turned around, he smiled vacantly and looked not quite at me, but in the general vicinity of my face. I'm a bit embarassed by this, but I didn't say a thing, just walked away and never spoke of it again. Well, that's not true, I told my husband and several of my girlfriends and now I'm blogging about it, but I didn't say anything to the perp.

As wise as I am, I actually wondered if I had done something to invite the slap. Were my jeans too tight? Probably, but my husband likes them that way. Was I wearing too much lipstick? Probably, but you have to allow for personal style; I even wear lipstick in an exercise class full of women. Was I too flirty? No. In fact, I barely said two words to this guy the whole night. I also felt sad for my friend. If A did something like that, I would be too embarrassed for words. I like parties and that's the kind of thing that gets you N.F.I.* for life.

Years later, I was telling the story to my friend M, who also happens to be our acupuncturist. Given my insecurity about the part I might have played, I'm not sure why I was telling him about it but, you know me, I'm not afraid to humiliate myself. He was totally shocked when I told him how I worried that it was somehow my fault. "Honestly," he said, "I'm no ass slapper, but if I was, of all of our friends, you'd be the last person I'd try it on. I would be really scared.**" And that, my friends, is the image I try to project - the kind of woman who instills fear into the meek hearts of surreptitious ass slappers. I feel better knowing that most people get it.

You know what else, it's high time we hosted another F-Friday. And guess who's N.F.I.?

*Not Effing Invited

** This was not exactly what he said. I don't remember exactly what he said, so I just made something up that sounded like what he said. It's my Blog, I can say what I want. Gosh!