Taxes and The Professor

K and I don't argue about too many things, but money is one of them. She thinks I don't give her enough. She is always complains about how broke she is and AJ is always giving her crap about it too. It seems before AJ met K, he had a lot to money in the bank and plenty of disposable income. Now he does not have that and reminds K of it from time to time. She hates that.

AJ makes more money than I do and K is working too. She is about to get a job that will pay even more. K and him have a larger and more expensive house than I do. They needed to get a house that would fit them plus our kids and is daughter. (I guess that's my fault.) She also bought a larger more expensive car. She didn't like the minivan she was driving and she had AJ buy her a much larger truck. She pretended it was so everyone could fit in it, but that is not really the truth. She just liked the new car better. It's kind of he same thing with the house. She could have bought a large house for less, but she wanted a new house so hey paid extra for that. (Which is not my fault.)

You see, K is a spender. She likes to spend money whenever she has it. She has a long list of things she wants and as soon as she has the cash she will get them. Some of the things she wants a big ticket, like cruise vacations. But while saving for that she buys stupid things like candles or soaps that smell nice. When she lived with me, the closet on our bathroom had a huge box of them. She moved that box to the new house and guess what? It's in her closet there and bigger than before.

No matter how much money she has, K will always be broke. She will just adapt her spending to match her income. That is driving AJ crazy, but he's kind of stuck.

So how is that my problem? Generally it's not, but it's time to file taxes for last year. The first year we filed separately we each claimed 2 kids. Last year she complained that she spends more money on the kids and she wanted to claim all 4. I talked her into claiming 3 and I would take one.

This year we did the fight again. Since the kids live with her full time she thinks she deserves it. But I pay a ton of money too. First I give her cash every time I get paid. It is direct deposited into her bank account. Plus I am always spending money on food, doctor visits, clothes and other stuff for the kids. I am not compalining. They are my kids and that's what I am supposed to do. I just want to be able to get some of the tax deduction I am entitled to. She does not see it that way so we had a fight about it.

What a pain in the ass.

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In other news, 107 people have looked at my Match.com profile and only 2 people have written to me. The criminal that I talked about in my last post and a music professor. I nearly missed the professor's email. It was almost 2 weeks old by the time I noticed it. He is a little older than me. His profile seemed nice, but he did not post a picture.

So I wrote to him and we exchanged a couple of emails.

Last night he called me and we spoke for about half an hour. (a stark contrast from the criminal who never wanted to talk for more then two or three minutes.) He seemed nice, on the shy side, but not overly so. After a very pleasant conversation, we decided to meet in person. I think he would have met me tonight, but I have other plans tonight. We will meet up later in the week. After we spoke, he did send me a picture. He looks good for his age. He's not a Men's Health cover model, but nether am I.

I am not getting my hopes up, but maybe I will make a new friend. I am glad he did not ask me about my last boyfriend. I didn't want to have to say that I am still in love with him.

Maybe I'll save that for the second date.

Not Of To A Good Start

So my latest foray onto gay dating is my worst yet.  I am not sure I can take many of these.

Over the course of several days JC emails and texts were showing that he was more and more interested in me.  I was actually allowing myself to put the warning signs to the side and think about the posiblities.

Did I mention the warning signs?  There were a few.

JC claimed to have a successful business he inherited from his father.  On his emails he included an auto signature with a link to his LinkedIn profile.  If you don't know, LinkedIn is like Facebook for business people.  So with the link there, I clicked on it.  I found a fairly typical profile.  It listed his current business, a past employers, and where he went to school.  Then I noticed the odd thing.  He had no connections.  Zero.  That was odd.  The whole point of LinkedIn is to make connections with other professionals.  Even if you don't make any effort at all, anyone who has been working with others for any length of time will have connections.  People will seek you out, even if you don't seek them.  (My linked in profile has over 500 connections and I rarely log in.)

Then I searched for him on Facebook.  I found him right away.  He has zero friends and his profile on Facebook was created only 3 weeks eariler.  No pictures.  No status updates.  No shared links.  No nothing.  

These to things together are pretty odd.  I mentioned it to T and he thought there could be a perfectly reasonable explanation for this and I was making too much of it.  I should just keep talking to him and getting to know him.  

OK.  So I did.  

Then I it happened.  I was expecting it all along.  It was almost a relief.

He was out of state taking care of his elderly aunt when a lucrative business deal fell in his lap.  He had been telling me about it for days.  He was very excited.  It was the biggest one he had ever had, and even better it would be closed quickly because his customer was in a bind.  The day he was going to close the deal he texted me that morning telling me he was going and as soon as the deal was done, he would be heading back so we could finally meet in person.  

That was the last I heard from for the day.  I texted him several times with no reply.  Until the next morning.  I got a text.

"I am upset and in a bind.  I really don't know what what to do."

I knew what was coming.   To make a long story short, he "overestimated" his costs on the deal and was a few thousand dollars short.  He was looking everywhere for the money.  He put up his house for money.  He used all he capital in his business.  He tapped all his lines of credit.   He even borrowed from his elderly aunt, but he was still a few thousand dollars short.  

If only there was someone else who could loan him a few dollars.  

"Well, JC," I said, "Good luck.  Let me know when you get it all worked out and can come back.  I'm very excited to meet you in person.  I have to go into work now.  Talk to you later."

Guess what?  I have not heard from him since.

I guess he thought I was some lonely old fag with some money in the bank and I would do anything for the chance at love with an attractive younger man.  Well, he was wrong about one thing.  I don't have any money in the bank.

Oh well.  Back to being ignored on Match.com and wishing that T would come to his senses.

Coffee For Two?

First I want to say thanks to everyone who has made comments on my posts lately.  While I admit I have not followed much of the advice, I appreciate it nonetheless.

This morning I woke up alone (as usual) and headed downstairs to make some coffee.  I have a small, one cup coffee maker that K got me for Christmas a couple of years ago.  I made one cup and headed back upstairs to my room.  

As I waited for the coffee to brew, I wondered what it would be like to have to make two cups each morning.  Maybe I would need a larger coffee maker.  

This is not the first time I have thought about this.  In fact, I think about it a lot.  I thought about it a lot with T and I were together.  Lately it has been less.  Since I have not been spending 2 or more days a week hanging out with T, I have been at K's house with the kids a lot more.  (Yes, I know, that's probably not healthy for me either, but spending time with the kid is good.)   I really only go to my house to sleep and shower.  I leave for work early in the morning and then head to K's house after work.  I stay there until the smaller kids go to bed.  My daughter still likes it when I tuck her in.  

This morning I found myself thinking about the possibilities with this new guy.  I still have not met him and the conflicts I had a couple days ago are still there, but this morning I was thinking.  

I am hopeful and careful at the same time.  Maybe he will be the right guy for me and I won't have to have coffee by myself anymore.  On the other hand, he might be totally crazy, which is why he is interested in a older, balding guy in the first place.  

He will be back from his traveling in the middle of next week.  Maybe I will get a chance to meet him soon.