Single In Sarasota by Loren Mayo

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I’m absolutely aware that I’m behind on my tales of the city. Don’t think I haven’t heard that Single in Sarasota has been MIA with her stories of totally wrong Mr. Rights, dirty pickup lines and girls’ nights out. And by the way, in case you still haven’t heard, the snoring Italian and Toto are history. If you would like to apply, please fill out the boyfriend application and snail mail it to The Sarasota Observer office.

Well, where to begin? It would make sense to start with the dreamy, blue-eyed grocery-store pickup, but I sort of half-promised him I’d keep it on the “DL.” So, I’m left to start with my random Pastry Art coffee date with the cellist, who once played so beautifully in my condo that he shut me up for a good 10 minutes. But my silence around this guy is probably better than me speaking anyway — I turn into a bubbling idiot. I mix up Lake Ontario with Lake Michigan. I tell stories about my friend Lance climbing mountains in Los Angeles. Oh, and when talking about the article I recently wrote about the six Sarasota buildings listed on the U.S. Register of Historic Places, I could only recall two. Good thing he’s gone for the next six weeks to South America.

After coffee ended, it was onto my next destination: dinner with Amelia. I wanted Gecko’s; she wanted Applebee’s. Well, she won. What I won was one hour eating some wannabe spicy penne pasta next to a homeless man named Jeff who claimed Obama is an alien.

Years ago, Jeff got run over by a semi truck and lost his leg. He was in the middle of explaining the details as I sipped a too-sweet Bahama Mama when he suddenly yanked his Armed Forces ID card from his pocket and showed it off. He had just started updating us on current events when Amelia asked him if he believed in aliens. If anyone has read “Children of the Matrix: How an Interdimensional Race has Controlled the World for Thousands of Years and Still Does,” let me know how it is.

Jeff arrived just before one of Sarasota’s newest Amish residents showed up in his muscle T-shirt. He’s so Amish that … he landed a spot on L.A.’s “Amish in the City.” He gets points for being able to pass his driver’s license test and make the transition from his buggy to a car. But I’m deducting five points because he believes Canada is the same size as Texas.

Somehow Amish Guy talked us into late-night karaoke at Captain Curt’s, where I was approached by a New Jersey native of equal height to myself who refused to let me be content sitting in my chair holding my Stella Artois. He pulled me onto the dance floor where he proceeded to whip me around in front of the stage like a paper doll. It only got worse from there — he signed us up to sing a duet. There I stood on stage, still wearing work attire, fist pumping my wrists and chanting, “Sweeeeet Caroliiiine — BUM, BUM, BUM! Good times never seem so good — SO GOOD, SO GOOD, SO GOOD!”