A certain friend of mine stepped over the mark last night. She was incredibly drunk, which I suppose mitigates stuff slightly, but basically she got off with another guy behind her boyfriend's back.

Today, she contacted me on MSN, apologising for being so uncontrollably drunk. I told her it was fine, nothing to worry about.

She told me that she doesn't feel guilty, and that: "we both enjoyed ourselves and will probably be doing it again".

I raised the boyfriend issue. She dismissed it: Quote - "yeah well, he needn't know... it's a friendship thing for God's sake".

Surely, I say, the point is what her boyfriend thinks about it, not what they think about it? What would the boyfriend do if he found out?

She says he'd probably dump her.

I suggest this might mean he would be slightly upset about the situation. Maybe she's doing something wrong?

Her: "get off your self-righteous horse and live a little!"

I say, "Get yourself a conscience." (Okay, I snapped at her, but I was annoyed that she'd called me self-righteous.)

Her: "I have one. I'm just sick of listening to it."

Me: "I'm not being self-righteous. I'm reminding you that you have a choice between risking hurting someone ~a lot~, and treating him nicely. It's the difference between you being a decent person and you being someone that future boyfriends will have trouble trusting..." (Okay, maybe a bit preachy.)

Her: "your views of being a 'decent person' are s antiquate. Anyways, you can't preach u know nothing about what [boyfriend] and me agreed on."

I reply with: "I think you'll find that most people, when cheated on, tend to get upset. If that's antiquated, then that's me. If [boyfriend] wouldn't mind, that's fine.Like you said though, he'd probably dump you, so presumably he minds."

Her: "god damn it Rich, stop telling me what I know! u bore me"


Right. She's a tad defensive, and I'm more than a little irritated. I take a few minutes out of the conversation, so we can both calm down.

I ask her, wording it carefully, how her and her boyfriend are at the moment. She says "fine". I say, "you sure?"

Me: "God damn boy, leave me alone. get a life"

Now I'm incredibly pissed off at her.

Me: "No need for that! [angry face, very rarely used by me even in the most hostile MSN conversations] I was asking out of concern!"

Her: "well it doesn't fell that way. It feels like you're nag nag nagging away at me, trying to make me feel bad about what I do when I really don't"

Me: "I was wondering if the reason you weren't so bothered about [boyfriend] dumping you is that maybe things were coming to an end anyway."

Her: "no, they're not. We're great together, I have no intention whatsoever of breaking up with him any time soon. OK? Satisfied?"

Me: "Calm down. It's just the way you seem to have stopped caring about his feelings that's getting to me. It's as if you're trying to rationalise what you did last night. You stumbled, that's all - it's nothing to worry about in the long term."

Her: "but I haven't!!! For God's sake man, drop it and mind your own buisiness"

I apologise: "That's how it's coming across. Sorry." (Okay, a qualifed apology, with explanation as to what I'm talking about.)

Her response? One of my closest friends, one of the people who I care most about in the world? Her response was:

"well you can fuck off, I don't care what u think"

So I do. I don't reply, Isave the conversation as a text file and shut down MSN Messenger.

A few minutes after, I start getting upset.

Not entirely because of the whole close-friend-telling-you-to-fuck-off-when-you're-concerned-about-them thing. Not quite as altruistic as that. This close friend is an ex-girlfriend as well. If she can rationalise cheating on her boyfriend so easily, what is there to say she didn't do the same to me a year ago?

Also, if the boyfriend does find out, and he dumps her, she'll be gutted, he'll be gutted, and how the hell do you express sympathy for some selfish idiot who brought it on herself?

Am I out of line with the things I said to her? Is there something wrong in assuming that the rules for cheating that apply in a relationship are the rules belonging to the victim, not the cheater? Does anyone else think she's just being incredibly defensive, because she's feeling guilty? Have I just killed one of the most important friendships I have?

Sorry I've not posted for a while, been a tad busy. (Yet I've still found the time to comment on other people's websites.)

I've added another link to the page - Laura, one of the LURPERS, plus an absentee (shame!) member of the Writers Guild. She writes some odd things on there though. After seeing her twice this week, I've worked out that a response to the statement "I could do with losing a bit of weight", that she made in a self-analytical questionnaire she put up:

"Yer wha'?!"

But it's true that she does have shiny fingernails.


Anyway, this week's been a bit eventful.

Wednesday 9am, I sleep in and miss my Ling 206 lecture. It's missable.

Thursday 11am, I sleep in(!) and miss my Ling 206 seminar. It's not missable. I am probably in big trouble because of this. In fact, I walked past the head of department on the corridor, didn't recognise her until she was gone, but I'm convinced I picked up an inkling of a dirty look. Paranoid? Maybe. But she may have been expecting an apology or something. I was on my way to apologise to my tutor as it was.


Tuesday night, the first playtest of Imperium. For a report on how that went, take a look at Laura's blog - in the comments section of 'Long N Boring With A Bit Of RP'. Overall, not bad, although it became clear that combat was too slow and too complicated.