Quirkyalone noun/adj. A person who enjoys being single (but is not opposed to being in a relationship) and generally prefers to be alone rather than dating for the sake of being in a couple. Also, a book, a movement, and an international holiday that happens to fall on February 14. Read the full definition...
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Quirkyalone Movie Night at the Kabuki: A Private Screening of Sex and the City
Check out the lovely slideshow above from the Quirkyalone event last night: a private screening of Sex and the City, complete with pink carpet, a Sex and the City trivia game, and popcorn and cosmos served IN the theater! Special thanks to Julie Blaustein for taking the photos and to Wendy Merill, author of Falling into Manholes, and Jerusha Stewart, author of the Single Girl’s Manifesta, for doing a kick-ass job as the primary organizers of the event. My other co-hosts were Rachel Sarah, author of Single Mom Seeking, and Jane Ganahl, author of Naked on the Page.
My own personal take on Sex in the City: not totally into it, I’m afraid. Carrie’s big denouement: “I let the wedding get bigger than Big. ” The primary storyline–a woman who becomes more concerned with her wedding than her marriage–just didn’t strike me as all that interesting. Haven’t we heard that story before? The central Carrie witticism, which opened the film, annoyed me: “Girls come to New York looking for the two Ls—labels and love.” I’m like hmmm, when I moved to New York, I don’t remember coming for the designers. Maybe the movie was just too long, and too obsessed with shopping.
There were wise and unusual scenes for a mainstream movie: for example, when Miranda questions the wisdom of Carrie giving up her apartment and moving in with Big without the legal protection of marriage. Samantha is my favorite in the film. Her storyline is the most radical and unexpected. She would rather buy herself a diamond ring than have her lover buy it for her. When she breaks up with her young, hunky boyfriend of five years, she tells him something we don’t often hear on the big screen: ““I’ve been in a relationship with myself for 49 years and that’s the one I want to work on.”
Our June 9 Sex and the City party is all sold out–and has been for a week!–but you can still buy tickets for the 8 pm show at the San Francisco Sundance Kabuki and join us for the after-party at the Bistro Bar at the Kabuki afterward. Come dressed in your finest Monday night ensemble. We’ll be snapping photos on the pink carpet before the movie starts.
Quirkyalones Unite to Watch the Sex and the City Movie!
What could be better than getting pleasantly tipsy on a Cosmopolitan while gathered in a theater with hundreds of quirkyalones to watch the much-anticipated movie version of Sex and the City movie? The sex, the fashion, and the wittiest banter around from your fellow quirkyalones.
Please join us at the beautifully remodeled Sundance Kabuki Cinema in San Francisco on Monday, June 9, for an EXCLUSIVE showing of the new Sex and the City movie for quirkyalones (and all those in support of quirkyalones!). We’ll be opening the theater at 7pm for cocktails and mingling. Settle into your seat by 7:25 for the movie. After the movie we’ll continue to discuss and banter at the Bistro Bar in the Kabuki.
What: A party inside the Kabuki theater to watch Sex and the City
“Can’t meet men. Maybe it’s your outfit . . . ” So begins a story in Women’s Wear Daily about a new t-shirt conversation that aims to spark conversation between single men and women with slogans like “Boy Scouting” and “Just Ask Me.” Would you wear one of these Single Tease t-shirts? Why or why not? Which of the slogans would you be most or least likely to wear?
The idea behind these shirts intrigues me. I hate the way that we’re all so encased in our own private bubbles when we see an attractive stranger in line at a cafe or on the bus. On the other hand I would be mortified to wear most of them. I’d feel too available, too open to anyone. “Hello” is OK–it’s a bit more neutral and friendly and not too demeaning to the shirt-wearer.
Are You Too Busy to Fall in Love? And other dispatches from recent panels
On the 4/3 Commonwealth Club panel: Rachel Sarah, Jane Ganahl, Wendy Merrill, Jerusha Stewart, Sasha Cagen
What do you get when you bring together five single women writers and ask them to talk about the single state of the union? And what do you get when you bring together a single woman writer, a married Italian playwright, a U.S. Historian, and a Persian cleric and ask them to discuss “Too Busy to Fall in Love”? I found out over the last two weeks when I served on two panels–one at the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco and the other at the Conference on World Affairs in Boulder Colorado.
In San Francisco, at the Commonwealth Club, the “Single Women Tell All” panel we single women had power in numbers and the mood was upbeat. My favorite questions from the audience were:
What technological and social innovations do you foresee when single people cross over to majority status?
Are feminists OK with men being chivalrous and opening doors for them? Continue reading →
Fascinating story on single mothers in China in the New York Times . . Quirkyalone quote here: “I don’t want to lower myself to staying with another person just for the sake of being together,” Ms. Xie said. “If that means I have to sacrifice a lot, so be it.” Read the full story here.
I’m excited to announce that I’m working on a new project: Quirkytogether.com, a place where quirkyalones (and quirky people of all kinds) can meet. My business partner and I are still developing core concepts and features for the site. As we brainstorm, some questions for you:
What’s your dream vision of quirkytogether? I always like to start out a project by talking to lots of people, so would love to hear what you would like to see in a QT site, and the ways in which you think existing sites that facilitate meeting people fall short. So here are some questions. What would you want to do on a site where quirkyalones meet? Would it be for meeting friends, potential mates, travel partners, activity partners, or . . .? Tell us in the comments.
We’d also love to have you on board as one of our first members. There are no age restrictions, so anyone and everyone should sign up for the super-exclusive, invite-only beta. You’ll be one of the first to help establish the quirkytogether vibe.
Quirkyalone in Boulder at the Conference of World Affairs, aka, the Conference of Everything Conceivable
Next week (April 7 - 11) I’ll be stretching my brain and speaking on a number of fascinating topics such as:
Publishing a Book: Tales from the Trenches
Too Busy To Fall In Love
Why Young Voters Care Again
Feminism: The New F Word
Why We Write
The Power of Facebook
Things We Wish We’d Learned in College: A List Slam
It’s all part of the 60th-annual Conference of World Affairs at Colorado University in Boulder. This will be the second year that I participate. It’s an amazing community-intellectual event–super-stimulating and fun. All the events are free so if you happen to live nearby, or want to take an intellectual vacation, come join us.
Here’s how the CWA describes itself:
“The Conference on World Affairs was founded in 1948, originally as a forum on international affairs. CWA expanded rapidly to encompass the arts, media, science, diplomacy, technology, environment, spirituality, politics, business, medicine, human rights, and so on. Roger Ebert, who holds a record of thirty-seven consecutive years of participation in the CWA, refers to the event as “the Conference on Everything Conceivable.”
Romantic comedies can be sustaining for quirkyalones. When you’re single for a long time, fueling your singlehood with the belief that the one (or of course, one of the ones) might be out there, you need religion to continue to bolster your belief. That belief needs to be fortified, of course, by romantic comedies. All the better if the character who finally finds love is a long-single, cynical, self-sufficient woman who doesn’t believe it’s ever going to happen to her. I root for those characters so much more!
Last night I stumbled on such a movie. The Jane Austen Book Club. I love Jane Austen–especially Pride and Prejudice–I thought it would just be a soothing weekday rental. The synopsis: Six Californians meet in a monthly book group to discuss Austen’s novels, and find their own lives reflected in their plots. Maria Bello plays Jocelyn in the lead role, a long-single dog breeder who has a history of putting her best friend above her own romantic needs and meeting her emotional needs with her dog. The movie opens with an elaborate dog funeral! She has a line in the beginning of the movie that I just loved, “I’ve never been in love. I’ve had sexual partners.” I won’t spoil the ending for you, but of course, good things do come to those who wait (and lost faith).
Two years ago, the then 39-year-old actress Maria Bello, a single mother of a five-year old, told the New York Times in a profile, “George Clooney says he’s a bachelor for life and everyone thinks it’s cool,” she said. “But if a woman doesn’t want to get married, there’s something wrong with her.” That quote stuck with me too. I knew she was a quirkyalone then. . . She is totally radiant as a quirkyalone in the movie. Rent it, it’s my feel-good tip of the week.
