On Saturday I went out with this model guy I had met while filming Sex and the City 2. I'll call him Jeff, because that's his name.

Jeff is hot. Or at least I used to think so. I thought he was Italian because of his dark good looks and his accent. But it turns out he was born and raised in Pennsylvania and just doesn't enunciate very well. I guess when you're hot you can mumble all you want and people will nod and pretend you're interesting anyway.

We met for dinner in the East Village and right after we ordered he whipped out his phone and wanted to show me a picture. Nano-second predictions of what this picture could be ran through my head: Him kissing his teacup puppy? Him with Kim Kardashian? Or a shot of his ex-girlfriend who "looks just like me?"

Nope. This was better. "I used to do body building." He informed me and held up his Blackberry for me to see. There in the dimly lit restaurant glowed a picture of him in a bright blue Speedo, all greased up with neon orange skin. "Gross." Was my honest reaction.
"Oh wow." Was what I said.
"Here's me with the trophy." He continued. "I won. I always win. Because I always get what I want." He looked at me and added a cheesy wink. He was too entrhalled by his own image to notice me cringe.
"Please stop." I thought. "I don't know what you want from me but I can guarantee you're not going to get it."
But he didn't stop. He scrolled through photo after orange-skinned photo, "Here's me with a slutty trophy presenter."
"Oh wow. You have the same tan." I replied, which he took as a compliment.
"Here's a close-up of my ass." He laughed.
This was torture. He scrolled past some Myspace quality self portraits until he stopped again and got really excited as if he had forgotten these pictures existed, as if he didn't show them off whenever possible.
"Oh! This is me as a stripper! I got this cop uniform and..." The pictures progressed as one would imagine, from fully clothed officer to shirtless officer to guy wearing a G-string and an officer hat.

Why was I doing this to myself? I knew I wouldn't like Jeff when I first met him. He was dense, self-absorbed and boring. But I made myself say yes when he asked. It must have been the combination of the free food, his good looks and my need for some male attention that made me do it.
So what if all he talked about were vapid things - a majority of those things were about how beautiful I was, and that's something one doesn't usually get sick of hearing. But when he complemented me it didn't mean anything. I didn't care what he thought about me. I didn't want him to like me. At this point, I just wanted him to leave me alone. He seemed sincere, but at the same time I couldn't help feeling like he was just buttering me up, getting me nice and slippery so my pants would slide right off.

The more he spoke the less attractive he became. I can't stand being inefficient and I felt like this entire evening was a complete waste of time. I would have rather stayed home working and made myself a box of Mac n' Cheese with no milk or butter than be eating steak and asparagus looking at half-naked pictures of a guy I never wanted to go out with in the first place.

But if I had said no, and I had ended up eating noodles with cheese powder alone and working on a Saturday night I'm sure I would have been just as miserable.

I live in a ghetto building in Harlem near 125th street. If you are unfamiliar with what makes an apartment ghetto, please allow me to explain:

• The front door is always left open which allows strangers, homeless people, rapists and urinators to come and go as they please.
  
• My roommate and I are the only white people, and the only nonsmokers. The smoke seeps through our walls and our place reeks of smoke!
  
• People throw their trash into the hallway so they don't stink up their own apartment.
  
• It was built before elevators where invented and we live on the 5th floor.
  
• The apartment next to my bedroom blares the same music all afternoon every day, and it's horrible mexican/polka music.
  
• The apartment below my bedroom is a recording studio from 11pm-5am. The music is so loud my bed vibrates, which may sound fun, but really isn't.
• We each have one outlet in our bedroom and none in the bathroom.
• The wiring is so old we aren't allowed to have an AC.
  
• There's a dance club down the street that blares music every Saturday night from 4-4:30am.

Okay, I'm starting to get depressed so that's enough for now. The point is, none of this ever bothered me much. I liked my cheap rent and I liked living on the edge, "Will I be murdered on my way home tonight!?" It's so exciting, you never know! Until last Tuesday night at 1am. My bed was vibrating as usual. I was so tired and frustrated I stomped on the floor to let the person below know he was being an A-hole, so turn down the music! A few minutes later I was brushing my teeth when someone pounded forcefully on the door. I'm no genius but I know not to open my door in Harlem to an angry man banging at 1am. So I woke up Nora and she was brave enough to open the door (she had talked to the neighbor before and he seemed normal).

He proceeded to flip out on us. Yelling at me for stomping on his ceiling. We asked if he could keep it down after midnight. He told us we were "lil beeyotches" and "oh no, we di'int" tell him what to do. So naturally, I got pissed. He was the one being unreasonable and I was not going to lose this argument. But then he said, "You best shut chur mouth or I'm gonna send some'n after you an cut yer face!" He started to come inside our apartment and I forcefully kicked the door shut in his face. He left and turned the music up twice as loud until 3am.

So now I'm thinking of moving (mostly because my dad really wants me out of this neighborhood) and the signs to get out just keep slapping me in the face, such as this morning when I woke up to a faint rustling sound. MOUSE! Was my first thought, but after careful listening I followed the noise to a bag of granola on my dresser. I hadn't ziplocked the bag well enough and a giant cockroach had crawled inside, but couldn't get out.

Ewww. Not having the time or guts to deal with it I folded the top of the bag and put bobby pins to keep it shut. When I got back the roach was dead. Whoever said roaches could survive the apocalypse was mistaken. This guy couldn't even survive a bag of all natural fruit and nut granola for 1 day.

Check out all that wasted granola! I did get it for free from the Sex & the City 2 set, but heartbreaking non the less.