fascinatingly... set up

so in dublin i met this girl, very briefly, at a hostel that danny and i were doing our laundry in (it wasn't the hostel we were staying in). she was cute, and smart, and sweet, so i thought, hey, get her information... so i did. yay.
we talked for only like 30 minutes, but it was a good conversation. she's in europe until august, so we email very short bursts, and so i really don't know much about her. but for some reason, armed with the little information i know, she fascinates me, and i can't really explain it. it doesn't happen very often, so i thought it appropriate to blog. does anyone fascinate you?

set up
in other news, the lamest/funniest thing happened today. let's start from mother's day in may...

i'm at the cemetery visiting my mom, sitting on the grass, praying and what not. some lady comes up from behind me and says, 'hi brian', in a medium-strong filipino accent. it's a distant non-relative, in-law sort of aunt, who's name slipped my mind. anyways, i'm all solemn and meditative and she begins to strike up a conversation that i'm really not in the mood for. but politely, i respond and do my best to keep my answers longer than one word.
then she asks me if i want to say hi to the 'gang', which turn out to be her 4 kids and her partner's 1 kid. well, i tell her that i appreciate it, but i'd rather be alone. she tells me that she understands, and continues the conversation, and about 5 minutes in, she calls the gang over to say hello. argh, it's uncomfortable. they had been standing at the grave of their relative and now they surrounded me, and the introductions began.
i kiss here, a handshake, a hug. i politely smiled and shyly greeted every one of the gang... and then my eyes caught the last one. the partner's kid. i forgot her name as soon as she said it, because she was that beautiful. wow. and i thought of how will ferrell met women in wedding crashers. oops. the problem was, i didn't know the aunt's name, so i probably would never see this girl again.
when i went home, i asked my dad who this aunt may have been, and if he knew of the daughter of the partner of this aunt. his guess was aunt elsa, but he couldn't be sure. he said he would find out. i laughed and told him not to sweat it, and that i just thought this girl was a cutie.
this was in early may, and i haven't thought about it since. until today.
so apparently my father calls up aunt elsa at some point and brings up god knows what, and finds out that the girl's name is ariel, she's 23, and she's single. 'what in the world did you say to aunt elsa?', i asked him. he shrugged and said, 'nothing.' so then he tells me that aunt elsa has emailed him a picture of ariel, and i'm like jesus h., what the hell is going on here?
and i'm mortified. because i don't know what my dad said. he knows too much about this girl... so much so, that i'm wondering what these people know about me. fuck, they could be reading this right now, because my dad is the type to publicize my blog.

now don't get me wrong, i don't mind being set up (mostly). but it's my father. and if you can put yourself in my shoes for one second and imagine the horror of your parents picking out dates for you... well shit. just imagine what sort of things your parents would say about you, and you get the gist.

i need to go to buddha.

btw. my father has printed the picture of this girl and left it for me to look at on the kitchen counter. hilarious.