The men that inspired this blog

You may be wondering what motivated me to create a "Creepshow Watch" blog. Maybe my older blog entries will give you an idea of the amount of creepers that harass women, but I think you may need my backstory to understand why I chose to blog about this topic.

The biggest creeper I have ever encountered is a student at the University of Arizona, and I had the unique misfortune of meeting him in the fall 2008 semester. Here's what went down:

I had a two hour gap between classes every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. During this time, I caught up on my class reading assignments. Because I love the sunshine, I chose to read outdoors. I particularly liked the benches next to the Modern Languages building, so I'd find an unoccupied bench and read for about an hour and a half.

On a Monday, I was sitting by Modern Languages, and some guy wearing an American flag t-shirt approached me. I'd seen him walking around campus before, but I didn't know his name or class year.

"Hey, I know you," he said, and I just went along with it.

Pretty quickly, I remembered that we had, in fact, met. The week before, I'd been walking to class and he randomly started talking to me. I had no clue who this person was, but I like talking to people, so I continued chatting with him.

After a few minutes, he asked if I wanted any Starbucks.

Not really, I thought. But, being in the hyper mood that I was in, I complied, and I told him that I would have to leave after five minutes.

The two of us strolled over to the UA Bookstores Starbucks, and this guy kept forcing conversation when I would have appreciated the quiet. It was almost like he was too anxious to just be, and I really have no patience for nervous filler dialogue. Pointing to the Starbucks pastries, he said, "Those are good, but I don't want to get fat." I felt like saying, "are you afraid of silence or something?!"

Ten minutes later, this person asked me if I wanted to hang out again. I knew right away that I'd really gotten myself into a bad situation, and I continued to fuel the fire because I was incredibly naive. I told the guy he could text me if he wanted to, and I planned on just ignoring him if he contacted me. I take responsibility for being misleading, but I felt cornered, and I'll admit to severe naivety. My small town upbringing ruined me that way, and it's taken me years to put on a harsh city front.

A minute after we parted ways, he texted my cell phone. I didn't write back. An hour later, he texted me, "HEY WHAT'S UP?!?" I didn't response. Two hours later, he wrote, "hey, how are you?" as if I'd never ignored him. He sent me five more messages that night, all of which I didn't answer. It was kind of creepy that he'd re-send the same message over and over again. He was not getting the hint.

The following morning, he sent three texts, and I didn't write back. Finally, he sent me a text that said, "Hey there cutie!"

"You don't get to call me that," I immediately wrote back, and I said I wasn't interested.

"So I did all that work for NOTHING?!?!" he texted, and I knew that I'd found a crazy one. I thanked him for the Starbucks but admitted to feeling manipulated, ambushed, and pressured into everything.

I told the guy that I liked another classmate. I'm not sure if that was a lie or the truth, but it was my only way of getting this weirdo out of my life. He was livid.

"WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME YOU HAD A BOYFRIEND?!?!" He said, and I laughed. I never said I had a boyfriend. He was misinterpreting me and manipulating my words.

When I clarified that I was single but not looking, he still persisted that we hang out. No, I said, and I had my mind made up.

He continued to write crazier messages such as, "You lied to me, you should give me a chance. You never know what we could create. Do you want to explain yourself?!?!"

By then, I just stopped responding to his texts. I wasn't going to play his pathetic game. There's only a certain amount of neediness I can tolerate, and there was no way I'd ever want to date someone so erratic, clingy, and pushy. More than that, any man who would speak to a woman like that is clearly too immature to be dating anyone.

The next day, this creepshow found me reading on my favorite bench.

"Hey Laura, I want to apologize for yesterday," he said.

"It's fine."

I found this weird because he'd been furious in his messages. This seemed like a ploy to get me to communicate with him again.

When he wouldn't leave, I told him that he was way too demanding of strangers. I hadn't even known this guy for 24 hours and he'd already gone psycho on me. I said something along the lines of, "You can't expect anything from me, it just seems so desperate to prey upon random girls." Mean, I know, but this guy had been equally disrespectful.

He stayed there, watching me read, for five minutes, until I finally left the premises and continued my reading in the UA Bookstore.

A half hour later, I got a text from him.

"LAURA, WHAT'S UP?!?"

I replied, "Due to the nature of this situation, and the fact that you've freaked me out in the day that I've known you, I think it's best we don't talk."

"I'm being nice to you," he said.

"Please respect my wishes and leave me alone," I said.

Finally, he wrote back, "What color is your fireworks?"

At first, this made no sense to me. Then I realized he was making a foul redhead joke. Think "fire crotch." Yeah. Gross. I laughed, but there was no way I'd let this jackass be verbally abusive and perverted towards me.

"If you ever talk to me again, I'll report you for sexual harassment and make sure you never get into law school," I said.

"FINE! I'M SORRY WE EVER MET!" He wrote, and I wasn't going to disagree with him on that!

You can argue that I created this awful situation. I should have ignored this guy from the beginning, but I thought I was being open-minded by socializing with strangers. I did this all the time growing up in northern California. As I keep saying, I'll always have a small town naivety to me, and this episode taught me that not everyone is worth chatting with.

Anyway, this creepshow made my semester a complete Hell. Because I'm incredibly stubborn, I refused to move from my favorite bench, even though this guy would walk past me every day and say really mean things.

He'd walk RIGHT next to me and say to his friend, "This girl was such a bitch, she went with me to Starbucks and then turned me down. It was like, YOU KNEW SIX HOURS AGO THAT YOU WEREN'T INTERESTED!"

He did this about three times a week, and I just ignored all his weird comments. I wasn't going to play his game, and I wasn't going to leave my reading spot just because he was a creep. Why would I let him win?

A few weeks later, he'd approach me and say hello, and I said nothing.

One night, I walked into the College Republicans club meeting, only to see he was a new member.

FML.

Thankfully, he left me be, and for good reason. As it turns out, he's creeped on at least three other girls in the CR's. He showed up at one girl's house and she had no clue how he got her address. He texted and called another girl to an obsessive degree. I think we all have the same story. Some of these girls threatened to kill him if he came near them again. At least I didn't do that. Seriously, though, if girls are vowing to murder you and call the police if you come within five feet of them, chances are, you're probably a creeper.

Is this guy really a creepshow? Last year, it seemed that way. Now that I've had a year to soak up this story, I just think he may be really clueless and inexperienced. He doesn't know how to approach women in a healthy, normal way, so he smothers them. At first, I thought this guy was capable of turning me into a bedroom lampshade, but he's not malicious, just very, very lost. I'm kind of sad for him that he had to be this way. He was 22 years old at the time. How in God's name do you reach 22 years of age and act like this?!

This kind of behavior lends itself to creepshows, so this poor, "misunderstood" guy will be seen as a creeper until he can calm down.

Many of my guy friends think I'm too hard on these creepers. I've been called mean for having this blog, and the men in my stories are supposedly "misunderstood." Hence, I'm trying to give the creepers a basic psycho analysis and maybe give them the benefit of the doubt. Even so, there are only so many excuses I can make for people who come off as creepy.

What about me and all the other women who have to worry about being stalked by weirdos? Why are we the bad guys for trying to address that it's unacceptable to approach women in such an uncomfortable, forward manner? I will never back down. I know I'm entitled to my feelings, and I'm here to stand strong for all the women who have to go out of their way to avoid creepers. I could have done this with the bench, but I chose not to. I refuse to let someone's harassment dictate my life.

Creeper on our doorstep

My roommate and best friend, Carolyn burst into my bedroom at 7 a.m. this morning. I'd gone to bed a mere four hours earlier, so I was extremely tired and confused.

A half hour earlier, a drunk 300 pound Samoan guy tried entering our apartment. He repeatedly inserted his key card into our door. When that didn't work, he began pounding on the window and door. Carolyn's dog, Ollie went nuts and started growling.

Carolyn opened the front door.

"Can I help you?" she asked.

"I live here," he said. "I'm in unit 'C.'"

That's impossible because I occupy room "C"!

"No you don't," Carolyn said, repulsed by the alcoholic scent all over this man's apparel. He reeked of whiskey and Jack Daniels, she guessed.

"Yes, I do," the guy went on, sticking his hand and foot in the doorway.

Carolyn has the biggest heart of any of my friends, but if you anger her, she can be your worst nightmare. Thankfully, we've never gotten into any fights, believe it or not.

Anyway, Carolyn, in her assertive tone, said to the guy, "Get the f*** off my porch. I swear to God, I'll break your hand if you step any further!"

The guy backed off and she slammed the door in his face.

It was then that she woke me up, and I went into our living room.

The Samoan guy waited by our front door for another half hour. He eventually left, and Carolyn needed to take her dog to the bathroom. After that episode, I wasn't about to send Carolyn outside by herself, so the two of us took the dog to the bathroom together. The man was gone.

So, men, if you're going to get drunk enough that you sleep walk, do all you can to avoid involving women in your confusion. They will take it the wrong way or feel threatened. Getting sh** faced is no excuse to stalk a girls only apartment for 45 minutes straight.

This story is hilarious to me, by the way. Seriously, the weirdest things happen to me!

Creeper on UA Campus

The Daily Wildcat just published this report about a creepshow on the UA campus. Are you shocked to hear that this same guy creeped on me all the time at Espresso Art Cafe last year? That's my life for you :)

Read the article here:

Campus police have issued an exclusionary order against a man who allegedly repeatedly harassed faculty and staff on campus, effectively barring him from all property owned and controlled by the UA.The man, 48-year-old Carlos David Manrique, allegedly frequented the workplaces of certain faculty members, sent them unwanted e-mails from university computers and violated pre-existing court orders, according to a University of Arizona Police Department press release. Manrique already has two court orders prohibiting harassment and a court order barring him from the campus, the report says, adding that he is known to frequent the Modern Languages and the Main Library computer commons. Exclusionary orders — which can be given only to non-UA affiliated persons like Manrique — last for either six months or one year and can be issued following complaints of harassment, disturbing the peace, misuse of university facilities or a crime, UAPD spokesman Sgt. Juan Alvarez said. UA affiliates accused of similar misdeeds can be referred to the Dean of Students Office, Alvarez said.

Exclusionary orders are rarely issued, Alvarez said. “It’s not something we do all the time,” he said.

My face is up here, not down there...

I can't say I encountered "creepers" today, but two men shamelessly admitted to staring at my behind, and that's actually pretty hilarious.

This morning, I wore my favorite pair of green Victoria's Secret Pink brand sweats. They look a little something like the sweats to the right:

My sweats are green in shade, and the word PINK is plastered on the back.

As I walked into Campus Health Services this morning, some young guy said quite defensively to me, "HEY! You can't say you're wearing pink when you're actually wearing green!"

"I guess I just did," I responded, laughing.

The best part about this story? The guy wasn't joking. He was legitimately annoyed!

As I came out of Target this morning, an older man approached me and said, "That's an interesting shade of pink you've got there."

This story is more humorous than anything, and I wouldn't consider these guys actual creepshows, but the situation as a whole was kind of funny. I'm not one to attract this kind of attention to that area of my body, so now I know what guys are really thinking when they see women in tight sweats.

A manpig story from a friend

My good friend asked me to share her creeper story on this blog. She's a teacher in Texas and she has something to say about some of the bad intentions of men:

"I have been emailing a Texas University coach back and forth to try to get his basketball players to come and read to my students. He has been putting it off, and well.... lets just say he...asked me what I would give him in exchange. SO Sad!! We are dealing with children here!!!!! does that matter to menpigs? NO."

How rude is that? She only wants to bring some celebrity figures into her classroom, and the man in charge wants to take advantage of her need. Not cool at all.

Creepers come in all forms. They don't have to physically harass a girl to be considered a total creep. They can also expect absurd sexual favors in exchange for an act of kindness. Unbelievable.

Creeper at Fry's Food & Drug

I had a run-in with a creeper at Fry's Food & Drug this afternoon. Why am I not surprised?

As I grabbed a can of Campbell's Chicken Noodle Soup, this creeper over here started breathing heavily and making disturbing noises.

I turned around and this guy was right next to me, leaning over on his shopping cart, eyeing me up and down, smiling, and saying inappropriate things. He stared at me as I walked away, and I said aloud, "what a creep!"

Meanwhile, his girlfriend (in photo) has stepped away for ONE SECOND to scope out some Top Ramen noodles.

It takes a true creepshow to "eye f*** the sh**" (Wedding Crashers quote) out of a random girl while grocery shopping with his girlfriend.

So, Mr. Creepshow: If you're going to sexually harass me while I'm just trying to buy some soup, especially while your significant other is present, I'm going to warn the world about it.

It's not like I was even asking for this kind of perverse attention. I was wearing jeans and a sweatshirt, not a bikini.

This is Fry's, not a porn movie. Don't talk dirty to me while I'm fully clothed and trying to buy groceries.

Creeper at Cactus Moon...

(Taken at Cactus Moon club a few weeks ago)

This creeper in the green shirt kept following my friends and me on the dance floor.

He went up right behind one of my friends and kept scaring the daylights out of us.

Only when he realized that we were taking pictures of his weird antics did he finally leave us alone.

Lesson of the day? Photograph creepshows when they follow you like a puppy!

Just for the record, I have no intention of exposing anyone's face. I'm glad this man's features are covered up.

The purpose of taking pictures of creepers is to show them that they are going too far and being invasive.

When you get up in their space, they should start to think, "Wow, I'm kind of a creep" and walk away.

Hey, it worked for me and my friends!