Carlton - Psych?

The title of this one is very clever for reasons that will be evident later on in the post. It has a double meaning. You see, when you're a woman who keeps a blog of the horrible dates you go on, you have to wonder whether the person sending you on the date honestly thinks it's a good idea or just wants to see what kind of story you'll write about it. That must be why they call it being "set up..."

Of course in this instance I told my friend that it went well just in case she had been serious. Over a year later, I feel it's safe to discuss how things really went:

After receiving my number and playing a few rounds of phone tag, he decided I should call him in the morning on my way to work... since apparently that was the only time we were both available. Reluctantly at 6:30am the next day I called him. After a riveting, groggy conversation about our goals and ambitions in life, he asked if he could take me out the following evening.

The next night, I worked a little later than planned. When I texted to inform him I was running slightly behind, he responded with, "That's fine. I'll be there in twenty minutes. Dress nice."

Uhh... What?! Remember how I said I was running late? And what does "dress nice" even mean? Are we going to a cocktail party? Is he worried I'm planning to come as a scrub?

After a quick and painful deliberation (of course my roommates weren't even home for moral support) I settled on wearing some heels with my jeans and blouse. This turned out to be a good call as he showed up in jeans and a black shirt.

We went to dinner at a jazz bistro (on disco night!!) where we were the only customers there who weren't a part of some sort of crazy quinceanera. Over the loud music I managed to learn that he is a liberal, why he hates all of my favorite sports associations, that he works as a waiter (because he has always wanted to...not because he has to) and that he is a psychology major. He did promise he wasn't analyzing me.

Since dinner took up a good amount of time, I was fairly certain I would be off the hook after that. It was, after all, past 10pm on a weeknight and the restaurant was reasonably near my house. Not so. He had hoped we could head to a coffee shop for more conversation and a game he had brought. Not just any coffee shop. His favorite coffee shop. In the next city over.

On the 20 minute drive to the coffee shop, he asked me about movies. I learned that he will never take a date to see a movie. Even if it's someone he's already dating or knows very well. Why? Because he prefers to have all cinematic experiences on his own so that the movie can emotionally and spiritually move him.

"Of course I would love to find a girl that shares my taste in movies... but there will always be those movies that are...just for me."

Naturally I'm thinking he must just enjoy deep, allegorical blockbusters... so imagine my shock when I learned what the most meaningful movie to him was.

Gone in 60 Seconds.

Wait... the one where Angelina Jolie has nasty blond dreadlocks and she and Nicholas Cage steal cars? Okay. That's normal. Enjoy that one in your "alone time." Wouldn't want to interfere with your "cinematic experience."

At the coffee shop (which inconveniently did not have a public restroom) he pulled out a mind/strategy game. Is this a test? If it was, I guess I passed since he said I was better than most girls he had played. (Barf.)

Finally as they were closing around 11pm, we headed home. The ride home, just as I had feared, was a complete analysis of my personality as he perceived it. It didn't bother me too much since my main focus at this point was not wetting myself. It was so refreshing to walk in the door after what turned out to be an extremely exhausting night full of ideas that could not have been further from my own.

A day or two later he asked if I would be interested in going out again. I politely turned the offer down, to which I received this response:

"I'll tell you what. Let's go out one more time. If it's not magical, I'll leave you alone."

I wasn't feeling the magic.

Alejandro- Orientation confusion?

Alejandro was a guy that I'd hung out with a few times. Sometimes in groups (of mostly guys) and a few times just the two of us (usually having dinners I paid for.) One night he called and asked if he could pick me up in 15 minutes for a date. After getting over the slight offense at his assumption that I would be available I agreed.

Knowing these were my favorite things, he decided we would go bowling, grab drinks at Sonic and maybe play some basketball and chat. We only bowled one game (which I won.) Then picked up some drinks and headed to the basketball court. In the car, the following conversation took place:

Him: So I was at a reception earlier and ran into one of my old church leaders. He asked if I was dating anyone yet and I told him I was mostly still just hanging out with the guys. He made some joke about how I might get "confused" if I hang out with the guys too much.
Me: So to prove to him that you're heterosexual, you called me?
Him: Yeah. Which is funny because you're practically a guy. I mean, you have a guy personality and stuff.
Me: Huh. *long pause* So that doesn't really prove your point, does it?
Him: No... I guess not.

After another long pause we played two quick games of one-on-one (which I won) before heading home. You may guess that we didn't spend much time together after that, and a few months later he was suddenly engaged to an entity we could only assume was a woman, although none of us ever met her.
Maybe he should have chosen different activities...

Sam (Prom+Trauma=Prauma)

This was one of the single most traumatizing evenings of my life. It all began as I was sitting next to a friend of mine at a church meeting. Someone I had never before met was sitting on the other side of him. About halfway through the meeting I was passed a note which read, "I know you don't really know me, but my prom is next week and I have a limo and everything, but no date. Would you go with me?"

Unsure how to respond to the note seeing as how I knew only his name at this point, I told him I'd have to ask. Before I knew it I was getting emails from mutual friends telling me how brave it was that I was going with him and what a nice thing to do. Wait... what's wrong with this guy?? Of course, I didn't feel I could back out now that everyone thought I had agreed to go. How bad could it be?

I found a phenomenal dress and got a friend to do my hair, but as it came closer to the time for him to pick me up, I felt more and more uncomfortable. The second the doorbell rang, I lost it. I went into complete hysterics and stayed near the toilet trying not to throw up as I touched up my now-smeared make-up. After gathering myself, I went out to find him having a friendly chat with my dad in the front room. I let them snap one quick picture before we headed out to the four-door sedan in the driveway driven by his brother and brother's wife. Apparently he'd been grounded and had his driving privileges revoked, and limo plans and clearly fallen through. He spent the entirety of the 40 minute drive staring at my dress.

The first stop was to meet up with another couple (thank goodness) before going to some lady's house to take at least an hour's worth of really uncomfortable engagementesque photos. (Remember how I had never officially met this guy?) Apparently this broke the ice for him well enough that he did not stop touching me for the rest of the evening. Always physical contact of some kind.

Dinner was at an obscure French restaurant with entrees which were impossible for any 16 year old to pronounce, and I still felt queasy enough that I could do little more than pick at the rolls and nervously sip my water. On the way to the dance (finally) we got lost. This wouldn't have been a big deal except that I had done nothing but sip water for the last hour and a half. By the time we made it to the dance, I had to use the restroom so badly they had to drop us off at the door before parking. It was nearly disastrous. I will say this was the one piece of time that I was being neither stared at nor groped in the entire evening.

The high school he went to can only be described as an inner city magnet school. The kind of place that students like him were chartered in specifically to raise the graduation rate. I could count on two hands the number of Caucasian females in the room with me. I stood out. I was paraded around by the waist to meet every teacher and half of the student body.

As for the dancing... Let's just say that was also not what I was accustomed to. The couple we came with decided it wasn't a place they wanted to be and asked if we were ready to leave. My date decided we would stay. When they had gone he pointed to one of the grinding couples and asked, "Would you like to dance more like that?" Uh...no. I managed to last about another 30 minutes before I let him know I was ready to go.

We waited for another 30 minutes for his dad to come pick us up. It was a long ride home. I allowed him to walk me to the door, dodged a kiss, and rushed inside where I closed the door and promptly began to cry.

I told my mom about the non-ideal night I had had. She laughed and said, "Well... Your father thinks he's pretty sharp."

Aaron - The Absent

Aaron was the roommate of a friend of my roommate's. He and his apartment had dinner with us one night. For the next two weeks I passed him on my way to class almost daily. Finally he stopped me to ask if I would be his date for an apartment activity that weekend. He got my number and said he would call as soon as he got home and talked with his roommates. He didn't.

Two days later he finally called to tell me the plans and apologize for taking so long to call me. The date was the following evening. He came to pick me up and on our way back to his apartment to meet up with the others he told me why he had hesitated to call. Apparently all of his roommates had asked girls from a particular apartment on the date... except for him. So not only was I the only "outsider" on the date, but somewhere there was a girl sitting at home alone because of me. On top of that... I would be spending the evening with 5 angry girls.

Awesome.

We made foil dinners at the guys' apartment before heading to the wilderness for a bonfire. This kind of thing would be right up my alley... except for the part where my date wanted to be where all the girls were, and none of the girls wanted to be where I was. I spent most of the evening sitting by the fire alone or throwing a football with the one guy there that wasn't oblivious.

The ride home consisted of him giving ME a guilt trip for making the night so awkward for him, and apart from an occasional text message, he never spoke to me again.

Awesome.

Blaine - The Expert

This particular story I would like to begin by saying that these are not bad guys. They are merely boys with good intentions (for the most part) that make common (and some extremely uncommon) dating mistakes which I would like to point out in an attempt to assist all who are stuck in this tragically delicious stage of dating.

That being said, Blaine was a nice, slightly shy guy in my student ward at BYU-Idaho. One Saturday afternoon he mentioned to me that he was taking a bowling class and wanted to know if I would go bowling with him for practice.

Side note: I love to bowl. It's one of the "Triple B" favorite pass times of mine (Basketball, billiards, and bowling.) I'm not completely horrible at it.

I did, however, have friends in town from Utah. With his permission, they each brought dates along.

We bowled one game. I beat him by at least 30. My friends weren't interested in another game, and after ignoring a few pleading glances from me, they left us to ourselves. No sooner had they left when he turned to me and said, "So I noticed a few flaws in your technique."

Ugh.

The ensuing game was painfully long and full of me trying to act pleasant while taking the "constructive criticism" of my game. No other conversation existed. Could not have been done fast enough.

Might I add... I didn't even break 100 that game. Not sure that advice was sound.

Craig - The Final Chapter

I promised there would be more from this guy. (See January 2010.)

Craig and I had established that we would be nothing more than friends. Most of our interaction was on the basketball court Saturday mornings. In his defense regarding my upcoming criticism, we were almost always on the same team and played pretty well together.

One Sunday evening he asked if we could go for a drive. (Do friends do that?) He asked me to sit in the middle next to him. (Okay... I know friends don't do that.) We drove out to the middle of nowhere. (Crap.)

After a long, awkward-yet-unremarkable conversation he took a deep breath, put the car in gear, and drove back. We pulled into the parking lot of his complex and after a moment of silence he blurted, "I really don't think I can just be friends with you. Do you think we could try a relationship?" When I told him I didn't think so, he added, "How can you say that? We have so much chemistry in basketball!"

I have a very serious appreciation for sports... and maybe I just don't understand what the foundation of a healthy relationship is, but I felt at the time that this was not a valid argument in behalf of ours.

I don't think we played much after that, and he never brought us up again... Until he called me a year later the week before he got married... just to make sure.