Your writing is not as clear as it might be. You say, “… I yelled at him to fuck off. Apparently that makes me a bitch.” Rereading this piece, I recognize that he got surely and called you a bitch. Well, that’s unpleasant. Yes. But I suspect that sometimes his behavior is rewarded.

Interesting to observe that you say, “They wanted to go get a drink somewhere” rather than ‘he wanted’. Could this also have been a woman that accosted you? What’s wrong with gender?

You then say, “… I was at dork-Xmas party at a bar. There are many dorks.” Is that how you felt before you went to it? So why did you go? You start off this part of your thought already negative.

While I appreciate what you’re saying: I don’t go to bars because I don’t want to be confronted by an obnoxious drunk, and I’m quite capable of taking care of myself.

Only a few years ago, I read an article by a woman who said that women are afraid. That came home to me when I met a new neighbor who had an apartment on the third floor of a three-story building. I never said much to her. We’d pass while walking our dogs, and when we came and went from our apartments. One day she walked her dog with me, and we talked a bit. Some days later, she invited me up for a smoke and some wine. She was nice enough but she expressed a lot of suspicion about men. She’d never been raped or abused by anyone, yet she was so relieved at having an apartment that wasn’t on the ground floor — among other things. And there was a man or two that she was wary of. I began to reflect on the impression women have left on me over the years, and I think it’s true that women are afraid or anxious.

You would have some choices, among others: learn self-defense; avoid the kind of bars you’re going to; travel in pairs or groups (which is what most women do). If you insist on being ‘free to do whatever you want to do, wherever, whenever’, then you’ll have to accept that you’ll be confronted by people you don’t like. And perhaps you could invent a better response because your anger isn’t succeeding if even your imagination is freaking-you-out.

I occasionally visit your site because we corresponded some years ago about your plugin. I saw a video of yours and read your blog, and thought you were creative. I have acquaintances in Europe that I sometimes talk with using Skye. I suggested to you, and you disappeared. No more Christina. What did you think would happen? That I’d slither through the Internet right to New Zealand to accost you? If I was a woman would you have talked?

I have a good opinion of you. Sometimes you express creativity. You “Latest Music” list is stuff I enjoy, too. And most of your posts are well-written. But this one? Hmmm.