When you were 18, she said, a good date involved making out, maybe someone getting their hand in someone's pants, then going home and smoking a cigarette.
"Now there are all these dating sites, like Tinder and Grindr and Hinge and Zoosk and Netflix. So I signed up for a dating website. My friends were all like, get out of here! Then the first message that I got from a dating website—I got a message—was from Hypergy80. So I opened it and all it said is, 'I want to put my mouth on your butt.' No hi, hello, how are you, let's go out for coffee. Just, 'I want to put my mouth on your butt.' Needless to say, we've been going out for a year."
She then shared her thoughts on children. "Kids are really great," she said. "If there are any couples who are on the fence about destroying your life and losing your freedom, you should definitely go for it. Even though your marriage is in a shambles, definitely have a baby."
So, to sum up, comedy night at Outdated did exactly what comedy is supposed to do—say everything you cannot say anywhere else; say the things people think, but that they're afraid to speak out loud; blow off some steam; and break the surface tension that makes it nearly impossible to go just a little deeper.
I left feeling like something real had happened, like I had witnessed an actual moment of change. Venditti said she planned to have this be a monthly event, and I plan to go back next time.
Mercury Retrograde in Libra
By the way, Mercury is retrograde in Libra. It will be through October 9 and then the retrograde will be working out for the rest of the month.
Libra is perhaps the most relational sign of the lot. Ruled by Venus, it's all about relationships, and also aesthetics, and justice in the most personal sense of the concept.
Mercury retrograde in Libra is a glowing, glaring reminder to consider all that you're not saying in your relationships. If you haven't noticed, people face social execution for not adhering to the doctrine of monogamy.
If you question it openly you might not get a date for 10 years.
Yet it would seem that the monogamous-industrial complex is largely supported by this thing that psychologists call withholds. Withholds are the things you don't say to your intimate partner; they are a form of unspoken lies. That's the problem. Because they're not active lies, one can claim not to have actually deceived anyone. Yet withholds are things not said that one does not feel good about. They are the things not said that might threaten the relationship structure, or that you think might make the person leave you.
And, heck, that might be true—in which case one might have to be on his or her own or find a more appropriate partner. Mercury retrograde in Libra is suggesting that we need to get beyond the equation, "If I'm really real, nobody will love me."
I propose we shake things up by being real and see what happens. Everyone's skin is so obviously crawling from all the varnish and gloss; it will feel fantastic to wash those toxins down the drain.