Well whaddya know: Nick didn't show. Now, it could be that wires got crossed. When I made plans with Nick, I was thinking that the concert we were going to see at Carnegie Hall started at 7pm (?), so we'd be out around 9pm, and Past President (my Shaman of Live Music) and I could grab a bite to eat afterwards, and be at the Lure at 10pm to meet Nick without a hair of my moustache out of place from the mad dash from the restaurant. Then, I realized that universally, showtime is 8pm. So we'd be getting out around 10pm. So on Friday morning, I emailed Nick (far be it from him to give me a phone number) and said, 10am is unlikely, I'll see you at eleven. So all day long, I kept LeatherTribe open on my PC at work (pretty distracting), and checked email every twenty minutes, awaiting his response.

Well, suffice it to say that although I was there at the Lure at 10pm, Nick was a no show. I don't think it was the case that he just didn't get a chance to check his email. (Who among us goes for twelve hours without checking email?) (And FYI: I still don't have an answer, so he still hasn't checked his email.) I think he's a flake. He presented himself as a bondage Top. No, wait. An 'expert' bondage Top. I sort of quizzed him as thoroughly as I could on this, given my own ineptitude. I also discussed with him an area that I do know something about, single tails, talking about the scene and why I like it so much. I think I gave him reason to believe that he was in over his head. That wasn't my intention. I thought I would make it hot for him. Y'know, me, a Top, giving it up for another Top.

Maybe I shoulda seen it coming. No picture. Vague profile. On his aleged website, he had a picture, not of him, that indicated that it was apparently from somebody else.

But, remember, I knew this guy. Not well. Between 1990 and 1992, I hade the prfound displeasure of working for the General Counsel's Office of Ernst & Young. It was better than starving, but just barely. There was a a group that was called, The Night Shift. They came in at 6pm and set themselves up at desks occupied by secretaries during the day to do word processing from dictation tapes. There they'd sit, listening through head sets and tapping away. For no good reason, they were all daoncers. I was often working late, so I knew several of them. There they'd all be, delivering the finished product, heads erect, backs straight, walking toe-heel, toe-heel, toe heel. And into their ranks came Nick. I think I nearly walked into a wall when I came around the corner and saw him tapping away at 70 words per minute. Or maybe I did walk into a wall. Hair the color of brass, cropped close, strong chin, piercing eyes, nice body from what I could see beneath his oxford shirt and chinos. Weeks later (I started working late a lot), I think he fiinally said hello in response to my (studied) 'hi.' Eventually, I think after I stalked him into the coffee room, I concluded that he was pretty stuck on himself, and didn't have a lot of time for the likes of me. He was A-list, or thought he was. I, clearly, wasn't.

Or not. he was supporting himself doing typing. Now maybe he was an actor or a marketing executive or producer or designer or whatever, he was working as a typist. Now, I had an administrative job, too. But I didn't have much in the way of pretensions.

So back then, there was a difference between who Nick was and who he thought he was. And, it seems, hasn't changed much.

So I headed out of the Lure around midnight and went down to Christopher Street to pick up a sandwich. And I ran into another regular at the Factory. A guy I've had a "Hey-catch-ya-later" relationship with for about a year. Well, last night was later. So all's well ends well.