The Handsome Texan

Hello! 

Welcome to Help Me I’m Chubby; the ramblings of a woman in her early thirties trying not to unravel under the pressure of finding a life partner on Hinge, whilst also trying to hold up a cool, chill-girl exterior. I’ve somehow found myself an unwilling participant in a race against time. Participants include my rapidly sagging face; pathetically propped up by Botox, my equally rapidly declining egg reserve, and finally, my breasts, which once sat up defying gravity, but have now found themselves taking two or three tumbles at the end of every bra removal. 

As the quest to find someone (anyone) whom I may have a slight connection with continues, I’m trying to squeeze every piece of joy out of life too, whilst trying to do an absolute Jay Shetty and find some purpose.

I moved to Los Angeles for the summer and completed the obligatory half marathon, which seems to be a rite of passage for every childless thirty-year-old. I quit my corporate marketing job in clinical trials and became a Nanny to an eight-month-old baby. And I applied for 300+ jobs in London, only to visit on my return to the UK, to discover that London scares me.

(Surprisingly, this photo didn’t make the Instagram grid)

Perhaps, unluckily for me, one thing I’ve consistently enjoyed has been writing this blog. I quit blogging in 2020 and always, always thought about it. I love it! Writing about myself, who knew? Self-indulgence disguised as creativity, sign me up. Anyway, in the past three months, I’ve had roughly seven people mention this godforsaken blog to me. It was less pitchfork-wielding “Bring back the blog!” demands but more “Didn’t you have a blog?” whilst awkwardly standing beside each other in a pub queue. Nonetheless, I took it as a sign.Help Me I’m Chubby is reborn.

And, look, I know we aren’t calling ourselves/each other chubby anymore, but I made the name in 2014 so, please don’t cancel me. The main worry I have is that TikTok has destroyed our attention span so much that nobody will ever read past the second paragraph. Time will tell, dear reader. Time will tell. 

Let’s begin, shall we? 

The Handsome Texan

Picture this, you’re three months into living in Venice (One thing I learnt from living in California is that if you live in Venice, you do not say you live in Los Angeles. You live in Venice and you’re proud). You’re ovulating and feeling like a social butterfly. It’s Saturday night goddamnit! You live in Venice! It’s time to get out there! You put on a little yellow summer dress, grab your Kindle, lipstick and ID, and take the three-minute walk to Venice Beach Wines (VBW) to park yourself for the night and look like the cool, mysterious gal.
(This is where I switch back to first person)

The yellow dress in question
I’m two wines in and roughly ten pages into my book when a pair of girls sit next to me and we start chatting. They happen to be sisters and we get along like a bloody house on fire. We swap numbers and they invite me to their bottomless brunch in West Hollywood with them the next day. They leave, and I have a pep in my step. One more wine, please Waiter!

Wine number three is sliding down my throat an absolute treat when I check my phone to see a message from a handsome Texan I had given my number to on Hinge a few weeks back, turns out I hadn’t responded…

“Hey Laura, I’m at Penmar with some friends. What are you up to?” (Penmar is a golf course that hosts fun outdoor live music every weekend. It’s also the golf course that a drunk Harrison Ford once crashed his aeroplane into in 2015)

“Hey, Handsome Texan! I’m just at VBW with a book and a glass of wine”

“I’ll ditch my friends and come and meet you”

Oh God. Oh God, Ooh God. I rushed to the toilets to check my teeth for remnants of the bacon-wrapped dates I ate with my wine, before realising all I’d eaten with my three glasses of wine was three bacon-wrapped dates and I was, in fact, quite pissed. No time to dwell on that now, Laura; you’ve got a handsome Texan to meet! I plonked myself back in my seat to try and regain some resemblance of sobriety and confidence, even three organic wines couldn’t produce the latter. 

Handsome Texan arrived a few minutes later and was as handsome as he was chivalrous. I never really thought I was into chivalry; I can pull my own chair out, and I’ve always had the dexterity to open my own car door. But my God, how quickly my morals went out the window when that man put his hand on the small of my back and pulled out the chair that I had previously sat on for three hours. After five minutes of chit-chat, he confidently beckoned over the waiter, asked for a plate of bacon-wrapped dates and proceeded to tell me how delicious they were. I nodded with a forced smile whilst trying to guestimate how many dates one would need to consume in 90 minutes before a toilet-related emergency ensued. 

We shared a bottle of wine and drunkenly complimented each other’s accents, outfits and faces. We laughed at how gross it is that Brits say “Where’s the toilet?” as opposed to “Where’s the bathroom?” (the only language change my time in the US which has stuck) as he got up to find said bathroom. He sneakily paid whilst he was up there and hushed my objections to Venmo (bank transfer) him the money. He suggested dessert at Jeni’s Ice Cream and we stumbled over, arm in arm. Max from Catfish was behind us in the line and we both said hi before making a joke about not catfishing each other. We ate ice cream on a bench on Venice Beach looking at the Santa Monica Pier and I was happy. Life is great. The Handsome Texan walked me home and I fell into a nice, drunken slumber. 

What happened next with The Handsome Texan? All will be revealed next week.

And that’s it! The first blog is out of the way. Felt good writing it. Hopefully, you enjoyed reading it. I’m trying to think of ways to modernise this, maybe I could do little audiobook episodes on Spotify reading out the blogs? I mean, it won’t be reading it. I’m so shrill and nasally, every stranger I meet thinks I’m saying Nora, rather than Laura. Narrator volunteers welcome! Feedback is very much welcomed in the comments.

See you next Thursday! x

1. 

   I am SO glad these blogs are back!!!! Loved loved loved reading them years ago and randomly stumbled over them…

2. 

   Loved reading it, give us more!

3. 

   Was only thinking about this blog last week, thankyou for returning! Xx

4. 

   And she’s back ladies and gentlemen!! Can’t wait for the next one – I’m already hooked! ❤️

5. 

   Finally, you’re back!! I absolutely cannot wait for the next instalment! So descriptive, I felt like I was there with…