From Tuesday, February 18th, 11:27 AM

I'm sitting up against the back wall in Cox, having what you could call brunch, I guess, and ignoring the fact that my time might be better spent reading my chem book than writing in a journal. The atmosphere here's not conducive to studying, I'm rationalizing.

There's always some question of what to do while eating on Tuesdays and Thursdays, because as usual, I'm eating alone (read: Jake has class until 12:45ish, and my physiology class starts at 1:00). Normally this means I just have some time to sit and think and read the latest scintillating editorials in Georgia's finest student publication, although today I did receive some unwelcome advances from a guy who introduced himself as "Carlos." This consisted of the incredibly suave (read "suave" as though preceded by "rico") ploy of dropping his bottle cap at my feet, apologising profusedly, and then looking me in the eye and pronouncing, in heavily accented English "I hope you do not mind, but... you are very beautiful."

"Er... thanks," I answered, smiling uneasily while sidling around around him to get a water out of the cooler. I thought maybe we could just leave it at that, but when I turned around to get in line to pay for my food, he was still standing there, looking confused, but determined to give it another go.

"I am sorry; I did not mean to concern you," he tried again, extending a hand. "My name is Carlos. I just saw you walking across the room, and could not help but notice--"

"Uh, no, it's... fine, er, thanks," I said, cutting him off as I reached the front of the line and handed over my card. "Right. Well. Got to go now."

Run away! Run awaaaaay!

Of course, this got me thinking. Score another one for asocial tendencies, I suppose, but I feel no shame. Pulling the "I-saw-you-from-across-the-room-and-you-were-so-beautiful-I-couldn't-help-but-say-something" on me? Sorry, but I think not. Even if I give Señor Carlos some extreme benefit of the doubt and say he wasn't creepy (which he was) but rather just dripping overconfident machismo (which he was), I'm still going to be edging my way towards the nearest exit. Porque no me interesan nada guys who don't share at least some level of the self-doubt I'm used to living with. Which could potentially lead to some serious dating paradoxes at some later point, I'm thinking. Hmm. You're confident enough to ask me out? Nope, sorry. Not interested. But no matter.