(Alternate title: Look! I have the words “dominatrix” and “Old Boring Guy” in the same post!)

Yip. That about covers it...

While I fully recognize your vicarious affinity for the soap opera that is my current life, we’re going to interrupt “Days of my (Bat-Shit Crazy) Life” with a jaunt down another path — how I got back on (read: full-on mounted) the proverbial dating horse.

And it was ugly. Like train-wreck carnage ugly. Which means you just can’t help but watch, but you feel really satisfied disgusting after — so please stand by with some Pepto pills. You might need ’em.

So the end of my marriage happened in a span of about 5 months. Literally. In July I discovered that my ex and his ex-ex (a.k.a. Marilyn) had been reconnecting at my children’s school, which also just so happened to be the school her kids attended.

Classy. And quite the kwinky-dink, dontcha think?

And where exactly on campus would they rendezvous? At the flagpole, of all places…tell me that’s not some beautiful imagery! That firm, long, erect, flagpole.

Anyhow, I confronted him about their secret sexy scholastic spot — because I just happened to arrive one day at the aforementioned flagpole, looked to my right, and startled as I recognized Marilyn’s mug. But he denied any wrongdoing, and I believed him — because, after all, he was my husband.

Then came a text on Christmas (from Marilyn, which I intercepted). Then more justifications. Then the brick. Then the end.

It literally felt that quick.

So in between feeling punch drunk, and drunk on devastation, and sometimes plain ol’ super-duper drunky-drunk, I found myself not fully able to process through anything that had happened. You can imagine how ready I was for my first “relationship,” post-ex (read: not really ready at all).

Cue entrance of Old Boring Guy, stage left (or whichever the “boring” side happens to be…)

Yip, I met Old Boring Guy on my first post-breakup big night on the town. My former college roommate convinced me that we should establish a lofty yet meaningful goal for the evening: find 14 men (random number, I know, but it seemed a good idea at the time) willing to give me their phone numbers. Since I was not yet officially divorced (by technicality only — it was in process, just not signed off entirely), that’s as far as I was willing to go.

And 14 I got, though by the end, I’d had about the same number of “Pepe’s Flame of Love” martinis, thus preventing any real connections that night.

Except for Old Boring Guy. He was #12, I believe. But he was insistent upon getting my number, which in the fog induced by 12 martinis, I was more than willing to share.

So he called. And called. And called again. And I ignored. And ignored. And ignored some more. Until the night that my ex stopped by my house and casually mentioned that I would end up owing him child support.

Wait a minute. He left me for his ex-ex. But I owed him child support?!?!

He left. I picked up the phone. Game on.

Sure, there were hotter men that night, whose numbers I also got. But Old Boring Guy was different. After all, he was Old (probably just 45, if I recall, but since I was 35 at the time, the decade between us definitely earned him the dubious distinction in my martini-soaked mind). He was also Boring (though I didn’t realize that at the time, since again, after 12 of Pepe and his Flame of Love, all guys seem fun! And hilarious! And sexy! And anything else that ends in an exclamation point because that’s how I talk while intoxicated!).

But the best part: He didn’t live in Reno. He lived two glorious hours away.

“PERFECT!” I thought. (This time not a drunk exclamation point, but a legitimate one.) Hence, I go a little stir crazy, I take a quick trip over the hill, I go on a good, old-fashioned date.

Little did I know these “dates” would entail Scrabble. Then requests for sex. Or requests for sex. Then Scrabble. (Clearly I was a little off in the “old-fashioned” part of that description.)

Thus began a seedy series of what I later realized were not exactly booty calls — they were Scrabble Calls.

I actually began to get into it. The illicit midnight Scrabble cravings started giving me a buzz — or as I called it at the time, a Hasbro Hard-On.

I even imagined myself a bit of a dominatrix when it came to these encounters. And you know what I learned? I’m damn good at it.

I can do it over and over, all night long. I can do it going up, down, even upside down (I’m particularly adept at that position — which isn’t as uncomfortable as I once imagined). But I particularly love the thrill of the climax … that unparalleled moment of tease, surprise and release when you sneak up on your partner, reach from behind (the bar holding the tiles, that is), firmly take those hard pieces in hand, then with a quick but repetitive motion, explode with joy when you lay down …

7 titillating letters on a Triple-Word Score.

Nice rack. If only I can find an open "L"...

Hmmm … that was good for me. Was it for you? 😉

Yip. Scrabble Calls with Old Boring Guy. That’s how I knew I was back on the horse, ugly though it was.

Now go pop some Pepto. And the next time you’re playing Scrabble, picture me, leather clad, tapping the board with my riding crop and demanding, “Lay down those letters! Work that board! Harder, baby! Faster, baby! Yes!”

Cuz that’s how I roll…

How about you? Any post-break-up seedy stories you’re willing to share? Surely I’m not the only one with a shady Scrabble past?