"I Have a Boyfriend in the UK"

The swing dance renaissance of the late 90’s brought out the best of my generation and provided us with arguably the best times we were ever going to have in our lives. Men were dressing in suits and women were dressing in dresses. People cared about what they looked like, not in a slutty, going-to-the-meat market sort of way, but more in a “how close can I get to look like Cary Gran/Audrey Hepburn” sort of way. It often reminded me of a theory I had that if the architecture in a city looked better then the people would be happier as it gave them something visually pleasing to look at. And the way the masses dressed I theorized would be no different and thus if the people would dress better then the masses would be happier. But if there was one thing to look at in the entire swing dance scene and something that would certainly make the men happier as it would be visually pleasing to look at, one had to go no further than the illustrious and moxified Jennifer Fondulac.

Jennifer Fondulac was every guy’s dream come true. She was a short, petite redhead whose specialty was not just fashion, but retro fashion. She would regale the men in the swing scene with beautiful 1950’s dresses, heels that were so classy they would put most of the Fredrick’s of Hollywood line to shame, and that classic 1950’s style of hair and make up. She was a naughty June Cleaver with a masters degree and her own company. She was, in the simplest terms, heavenly.

Fortunately for me I was one of the best swing dancers which invariably meant I got to not only dance with this heavenly creature, but I got to know her as well. She invited me over to a couple parties and soon, after enough conversation, she invited me out for a ride on her little moped. Sure enough, I showed up, and there she was on her vintage Vespa, pigtails coming out of her helmet and all. She took me for a joy ride through St. Paul and I dared to think that maybe, just maybe I should ask her out.

Of course in retrospect I was well within my rights to ask her out. We had danced, we were roughly on par with one another in terms of looks. Same intelligence level and she had invited me to not just parties, but now a one on one outing where she was giving me a ride on her moped. And so with great confidence that I was soon to be courting this hot red-headed number I asked her on a date. To which she responded,

“Oh, I’m sorry, but I have a boyfriend.”

I was shocked. Never before in the past 4 months of me knowing her had I seen nor heard of a boyfriend. And given she had a passion for dancing, I figured he must have been on the swing dance scene as well. Completely confused as to his whereabouts I said,

“You have a boyfriend? Well where the hell has he been? I’ve never seen you with a guy before.”

And then the jaw-dropping moment came that would knock Jennifer from a heavenly, naughty, June Cleaver with red hair and a moped to just another childish, middle-schoolish girl,

“Well he lives in the UK.”

A face that can only be described as the Shrek-Donkey face when they see the Doluc welcome song took to my face.

Here was NOT a 13 year old child, but a 25 year old “woman” who “had a boyfriend in the UK.” I thought women left this childish crap back in middle school.

Now the reason I bring this up is that not only do I need to establish a historical record of what I had gone through during my twenties so you all know why your beloved Captain came out the way he did, and not only have I heard of this excuse being used more and more by older and older girls/women and therefore find it necessary to discuss it, but there are no doubt millions of young, middle school/high school boys where it is a ritual that they have to tolerate this vapid crap and are left even more confused than they already were (which was already an unacceptable amount of confusion anyway). Ergo let me explain;

1. That’s precisely what the “I have a boyfriend in Chile/UK/Russia” line is; vapid crap. There is no line or logic to it. If you get this excuse it’s because the girl doesn’t really want to have a boyfriend, but just likes to have the “status” of having a boyfriend.

2. I don’t know if it’s because girls are afraid of intimacy or what the specific reason is why girls resort to this, but you can see the inanity of it regardless when you ask the natural follow up question of “how often do you see him?” This is the logical question in that half, if not 90% of the point of having a boy/girlfriend is the kissings and the snugglings and (presuming you’re old enough) the sexings. The inanity is proved when they almost always say, “every 6 months he flies over for 2 weeks, but (are you ready for the eye-roller?) WE E-MAIL EVERY NIGHT," as if that has now validated this pointless relationship. I know it doesn’t make any sense, but it is key to understand you don’t have to concern yourself with making heads or tails of it. All you have to do is realize that you ARE dealing with a little girl and is probably somebody you don’t want to go out with anyway.

3. I can understand younger girls (such as middle school or even freshmen in high school) doing this in that they are LITTLE GIRLS and prone to playing with Barbie Dolls and make-believe and living in lala land. But good lord and all that is Godiva Chocolates and fat wiener dogs, women who ARE IN THEIR 20’s???????? Now as I said before, this was quite some time ago when I ran into the 25 year old, but I’m hearing this as a more common event.

Thus, for all the Cappy Cap women out there, could some of you please explain to me what the heck is going on? In the meantime could we all make it a law or something this excuse is never used upon graduating from the 8th grade?