Maybe if I had brought a cooler that would have been even more awkward.
I just finished reading Brian Donovan’s book Not a Match: My True Tales of Online Dating Disasters. My oldest son starts college in the fall, so I have been feeling nostalgic about my own dating days as a Cougar.[1] What makes a bad Mormon date bad? The same thing that makes any date bad: awkwardness. This is my story.
I met Sam* in the MTC when he was cleaning the girls’ showers on our floor. I saw him in the laundry room sometimes, and we hit it off as friends. He was funny and offbeat in a brotherly sort of way. He was going to South America, and I was going to Europe. We corresponded a few times in the mission field about the weird things in our missions: mission rules, strange companions, and oddball teaching situations.
I got back to the states several months before he did and had enough time to end a relationship and start another and then sort of end that one (the breakup didn’t take, and 21 years and three kids later we’re still together!) I was a free agent for about five days when Sam** called me for a date.
He suggested going to a movie, but he was culturally out of it and didn’t really know what was playing.
“Well, everyone’s talking about Silence of the Lambs[2],” I offered helpfully. Then I (should have) added, “On second thought, maybe that’s a little intense to cut your teeth on right after a mission.”
“Sounds great!” he chirped.[3] And like the trusting co-ed who naively gets in Ted Bundy’s van, away we went. Somewhere between the woman-suit seamstress guy prancing around in front of the mirror and “it puts the lotion on its skin,” I started to think this might not have been the ideal first date movie. We were just getting started.
After the movie, perhaps to distance himself from the embarrassment, he made a suggestion. “Do you want to go to the Village Inn?” He paused. “I mean the restaurant.”[4] We had milkshakes. The wholesomeness couldn’t do much to restore a sense of normalcy at this point, but there’s only so much you can expect from a dairy beverage. He dropped me off at my place and asked if he could come in to use the bathroom. I can see you putting two and two together. Let me assure you this is not a lactose intolerance story. There but for the grace of god, as the saying goes.
This is nothing like how it went down
For those not familiar with the acoustic properties of the Crestwood apartment bathrooms, imagine those moments when a celebrity thinks they are having a private backstage moment making rude remarks, unaware that they are still miked and an entire auditorium is listening. Now substitute “bodily functions” for “remarks.”[5]
The sound of urinating reverberated through the apartment. It was endless, like Niagara, but frothier. I kept picturing beer on tap filling frosty mug after frosty mug, until the mugs were overflowing. I started counting slowly to ten, then back again. Partway through this deluge, the toilet flushed, followed by even more urination. Then silence. What sounded like confused silence. Finally, he exited the bathroom.
I didn’t really understand what I had just heard.[6] I was mortified at the smorgasbord of horrors I had heard and seen end-to-end throughout this entire date. So, I fell back on my faithful ice breaker and made out with him for 10-15 minutes and sent him on his merry way. As one does.[7]
- What’s your worst date ever? Was it at BYU or elsewhere?
- What made it so bad?
- Did you ever have an awkward date that actually worked out?
Discuss.
——————————————————————————————————————————————————
*Not his name.
**Still not his name.
[1] A BYU Cougar, that is.
[2] In case you are wondering, the lambs haven’t stopped screaming. In whatever the opposite of my defense is, I had already seen the movie once, and I still said this.
[3] He probably didn’t chirp, but I do think he had at least one Peter Brady voice cracking moment on that call. He seemed nervous.
[4] Because a girl who suggests Silence of the Lambs as a first date movie less than one week after you come home from your mission might be expecting some hokey pokey in a hotel!
[5] I had an incontinent roommate from Norway whose digestive pyrotechnics were audible at the worst possible moments, when our home teachers were visiting or when someone was making out on the couch. I can’t think of the dessert from Outback without thinking of my unlucky Norwegian roommate.
[6] I asked my current husband, my then ex-boyfriend, what I had heard. His reply: “You were on a date?” Apparently, we had diverse opinions about the status of our relationship at the time I went on this date. He said that sometimes guys flush mid-pee to cover the sound.[8] In which case, epic fail.
[7] It seemed polite.
[8] Boys are weird.
By Common Consent, a Mormon Blog 
While I already shared my worst [Mormon] dating story (https://bycommonconsent.com/2013/02/05/date-me-not-my-uterus/), and it’s bad, I admit I cringed at seeing SotL with a green returnee!
My worst non-Mormon date was with a PRCA cowboy who took me for a walk and proceeded to ask me about my dating history, and with the subtlety of a cattle-prod told me if I had ever dated anyone who wasn’t white, he wouldn’t be able to see me again. He sure made that easy.
Wait… He didn’t flush again after he was finished? Did you have one of those slow-filling toilets?
I was newly divorced and had this LDS boy on my trial. I finally agreed to go on a date with him. Two minutes into the date he let me know he had done his research and found out that the divorce wasn’t my fault and that he loved divorced women. He kept telling me how much he appreciated Latinas and explained how Latina women age so much more gracefully than white women – here he inserted how his mother would not be happy with him dating someone outside the white gene pool- but he said he didn’t care because I was pretty. He also told me I had a smashing body for having a baby. *SO AWKWARD** I didn’t know what to say to that because “thank you” didn’t sound right. It kept getting worse and worse to the point that I pulled out my politics. The only way I got rid of the guy was by telling him that I was so far left I couldn’t see the center and that I couldn’t wait for the day Hilary Clinton became president. I don’t like going “all liberal” on people but this guy was too much. He thought the Clintons were the spawn of you-know-who and he never called after that.
*trail- it’s hard to type on iphones.
Lucy – that is funny that he mentioned his mother wouldn’t approve of you for appearance reasons. I had a boy (different from the above) who told me his mother wouldn’t approve of my short hair. We were just studying together, not actually dating, which made it even worse.
Wow, this is really funny. I had no awkward dating situations. None. No, no, don’t argue. I’ve made up my mind, don’t confuse me with the facts,
Footnote [1] FTW.
This is more a story of a date that didn’t really happen. I had been flirting with a girl who worked on campus for months (USU). She invited me to go to SLC with some friends of hers for a movie. I showed up, only to learn that one of her “friends” was her boyfriend. The others in the group were all complete strangers to each other. We split up for the drive to SLC. I ended up in car with a super quiet/shy guy and a girl who had been home from her mission less than a week… for a 90 mile trip. None of us had met before. They decided to see “Legacy”. Another girl, a non-member from NYC, yelled mocking comments throughout the movie, “That’s [crap]!”, “Like I’d believe that?” etc. At dinner, one girl sampled the desserts off of the dessert tray before deciding how she would order. On the bright side, quiet guy, sister RM and I had a lively conversation on the way home.
Worst LDS dates:
It was her first date after a 20 year marriage she thought she was ready but it turned out she was way too shy. We met for dinner in SLC and she didn’t utter more than a brief sentence or two it was painfully awkward even though I repeatedly attempted to relax the situation and smooth it over with light conversation. As we left the restaurant she yelled “call me” over her shoulder as she ran to her car never to be seen or heard from again.
Her profile was upbeat and interesting and strongly implied she is a working International Flight Attendant. Her photos were very attractive and she looked fit but when she arrived she looked nothing like them having gained a lot of weight due to depression.
Worst LDS non-date:
She developed a sight unseen crush based on my photos and the sound of my voice from our first phone call and “knew we were meant to be together”. She seemed like a very nice person but obviously naive.
I no longer date LDS women and the % of awkward dates has dropped to almost zero while the % of first date hugs and good night kisses have risen dramatically. Life is good!
I’ve had a number of bad dates. One I remember–and I don’t even remember how I happened to go out with this guy, as he was far from my type–I think he was a relative of a friend or something, began okay. We went to a movie. Then on the way home he starts talking about marriage and asked me what kind of diamond I liked. This was a first date!! Anyway, I told him I didn’t particularly like diamonds. He couldn’t believe any woman in her right mind would not like diamonds. I told him I didn’t mind them if they were very, very, very large. I never went out with him again.
This post confuses me. I would think that women would find a large bladder an attractive quality in a man. E.g., he doesn’t need to stop on long road trips; he doesn’t wake you up in the middle of the night with constant trips to the bathroom; he isn’t constantly excusing himself during movies and sporting events. What’s not to like?
One of my college roommies had a weird date in downtown SLC. All night, she kept tucking her shirt in and it just did not feel right. Eventually, she decided she just had to untuck it and start all over again. She started untucking, and like the magician’s handkerchief, an extra pair of garment bottoms emerged from the back of her pants!
The date was excellent, the kiss was terrible (like what I imagine it would be like to kiss Brak- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brak_(character)).
The only conversations we had after that were about city planning. Avoiding the topic ftw.
When I was 24 a friend set me up with “a really smart, go-getter” of a guy “so mature for his age (also 24) and he has his own business!”. He called and we made plans to go to dinner and then meet mutual friends for Salsa dancing later. He showed up looking like a 17 year old, and treated me to “dinner” at Denny’s, where he ordered, I kid you not, the side salad. JUST the side salad. An older me would have ordered whatever I wanted and then paid for it myself, but 24 year old me didn’t think of that so I also got the side salad. And together we munched droopy iceberg lettuce while he regaled me with tales of the most important relationship of his life, which had only just ended. Imagine, they were together for almost two whole weeks! And she just, called it off! Dude was devastated. I, as you can imagine, was enthralled.
It got worse. Somehow the Salsa dancing with friends turned into just the two of us, at an institute dance, surrounded by 18 year-olds doing the Mormon-sway, with a backdrop of balloons spelling out “YeeHaw!” and a table of punch and cookies (which he devoured with impressive speed and single-mindedness). Then, icing on the cake, a friend of his recognized him and came over to chat. This friend nodded to me politely, and Side Salad said “Oh, this is…um…remind me of your name?” Jenn. My name is Jenn. You are awesome at dating.
Wait! Not finished yet! His very expensive car ran out of gas on the way home. He walked to a gas station but refused to pony up the $5 for a little plastic gas-can, so we pushed his car up the hill several blocks so he could fill up at the tank. When he got me home I felt so bad for the guy I almost said “Well that was fun.” But lying would not have helped him at all, so I changed it at the last second to “Well, that was…interesting.” And the awkwardness rose off the pavement like mist and choked us both.
We did not get a second date. Darn.
This thread is very good, and has the potential to be great. Will be monitoring closely, though unfortunately I don’t have quality content to contribute…
I’m so grateful someone arranged my marriage.
I remember being the cause of several bad dates – does that count?
Hi! Long time lurker, first time responder-
Let me preface this by saying that in college I was very shy and way too nice. I agreed to go out on a date with a very forward foreign exchange student from China who I met briefly at an Institute dance. He took me to see “As Good As It Gets”, and during the movie would try reach over and wrest my hand into his. Each time I would wrench it back, and by the end of the movie I was sitting at the far edge of my seat with both my arms and legs crossed tightly. Afterwards he offered to take me out for ice cream, which I politely but firmly declined. As he walked me to the door of my dorm, I turned to give him the obligatory “That was nice. Goodbye (forever),” when he grabbed me in a bear hug, pinning my arms to my sides, and planted a big juicy one on my mouth.
I RAN inside.
I’m not sure if it was my idea, or my date’s, but the worst date I had was in high school, going to see My Life (Michael Keaton cancer flick), a week after I found out my own dad had cancer. After the credits start, my date gets up and heads down the aisle, and then realizes I’m still in my seat sobbing hysterically–like the hyperventilating shaking kind. For about half an hour. The kid had absolutely no idea what to do or say, so he just kind of sat there awkwardly patting my arm occasionally.
Speaking of extremely poor movie choices, although this wasn’t a date; in college one summer my roommate’s brother committed suicide, while attending the same college as us. She had gone over to stay with her family after they flew in, while I was in the apartment fielding phone calls from their concerned family and friends. Several days later, my FHE brother said I should come over and watch movies to get out of the house and take my mind off things for a little while. His choice? Harold and Maude. I’d never seen it, but he said it was hilarious. After the second suicide attempt in the film in just the first 15 minutes, I left, completely sick to my stomach.
When I was living in LA, I met a Mormon woman and totally misread her: I thought she was edgy and had been part of the lefty-cool scene at BYU. We drove over to Echo Park and stood up eating chili dogs at Tommy’s, and then went to a small experimental theatre doing a play about murderous Texan bisexuals which included three simulated sex scenes, full frontal nudity and an electric chair execution. And apparently I swore a lot.
So I read her totally wrong.She was horrified beyond belief, and would have walked out but was too afraid of the sketchy neighborhood. She called the bishop to report me, and told everyone what a nasty fellow I was. We were in the same ward for another three months and she would not make eye contact with me. Fair enough.
I got a call from a woman a few weeks later who had heard the story and wondered if I’d be interested in meeting up somewhere. We dated for about a year.
Worst date ever was at BYU-Idaho with a fellow whose face occasionally shows up on the website. He and his roommate took me and my roommate to Gringo’s, then swimming at Rigby Lake, followed by movies at the guys’ apartment. My date and I mostly snarked at each other, and I assumed my main function was wingperson as all the flirting was going on between our respective roommates. First movie ended and I was all dated out. I hopped up and said “Welp, that was fun, guess we better be going…” to which everyone (including my traitorous roommate) responded “Whoa, curfew isn’t for 2 hours! We’re watching another movie.” Determined to be through with this interminable experience, I leaned over on the couch armrest and went to sleep. I woke up 30 minutes later and, surprise surprise, my date had squirmed up next to me, draped my arm over him, and was doing his best to “snuggle.” I came to just as he was going in for a big smooch. I intervened by putting my hand over his face and uttering a groggy “no.” So then it really was over. Silent ride home, handshake goodnight, and he still asked me out again. Worst part: more than once I’ve told this story to a girl my age, who responded “Wait, what’s his name?” Followed by a wide eyed “No way. I had the same date. With the SAME GUY!” Anyway, I hear he’s still single. It’s a jungle out there.
Well, I met this girl named Jodi Arias….
Lucky in AZ FTW!!
de Pizan, your story sounds familiar. I hate to pry, but was the situation with your roommate and her brother at BYU in the summer of 1999? If so, I also know the people involved. Either way, my apologies and condolences.
When I was at BYU a very shy guy in my ward asked me out. After that unmemorable first date he called one Sunday evening to ask if I wanted to go for a drive. I did not, but hadn’t yet learned to say no. So I agreed and he picked me up and drove us, in near silence, up to an empty parking area near the “Y.” I wasn’t sure if he wanted to make out, talk, or kill me. He didn’t try any of the above. In the awkwardness I kept checking to make certain the door was unlocked in case I needed to bolt. After a while I said I needed to go home. So he drove me home, without talking much.
I felt bad for not making a better effort at conversation, but was too freaked out. It still makes me cringe to think of it.
Jack was new to the social scene at USU and he wanted to go to this local off-campus ward dance. I knew the ward and it was not known for its hot young women, rather mostly retired big band era folks my parent’s age. We paid the $3 to get in and as I predicted the pickings were mighty lean. Jack was from down south and he had some odd ideas. He suggested a contest as a way for one of us to recoup our money while the other might experience extreme amusement. Whichever one of us danced with the ugliest girl paid the other $5.
Jack immediately asked Sherry who was probably physically the least attractive girl there. Stringy red hair, too tall, big feet, mayonnaise complexion with severe ache, overweight , tacky & too tight cloths. But I knew Sherry from high school and she is actually a very nice person. Not so fast I told Jack. Because beauty is only skin deep but ugly goes all the way to the bone. In walked Teresa, a plain appearing girl with a generous figure, not that bad looking really but she had an exceptionally obnoxious personality. I danced with her and demanded Jack pay me $5 explaining anyone who knew both girls would definitely agree with me.
Since the voting was a tie Jack suggested we needed another round to convince ourselves who had won. So we danced with them again and again and eventually took them for a walk in the moon-light. I had to admit to some immature amusement watching Jack flirt with Sherry. But it was so not worth it. Teresa was being loud and rude while Sherry was somewhat perplexed but responded appropriately. Jack, still not convinced, invited us all over to his apartment for a video party (a tie breaker) and the girls agreed. They still didn’t know about any bets.
Sherry was acting a little bit uncertain but completely normal and nice as we sat on Jack’s old sofa with several tears in the fabric. Teresa was swearing, telling dirty jokes that nobody else laughed at, helping herself to Jack’s refrigerator and guzzling juice straight from the jug and preaching to us about Jack’s poor house-keeping methods. Jack could no longer deny that he was losing the contest. In a last ditch effort to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat, he leaned over and kissed Sherry on the mouth. Did he think this was so gross as to outweigh everything else? I would have never agreed to taking it this far.
Teresa saved my wallet. Seeing Sherry getting kissed, she jumped onto my lap spread eagle, grabbed me by both ears and started forcefully kissing me against my will. I instantly shoved her off hard, accidently pushing against her breasts. She had been munching peanut butter and crackers and the shock of it caused her squeal and to york chewed crackers and peanut butter right in my face before she landed on her rump on the floor. Somehow the fall disturbed her lower gastrointestinal tract to the point that she “let one rip.” And once she started she couldn’t stop laughing which caused a further critical build-up of gas in her lower gastrointestinal tract and more explosive loud odorous noises. Without further argument Jack handed me $5 and ordered me to take my date home. I reminded Jack that he drove and I didn’t have a car. I left him with both girls and walked the 2 miles home.
Jack decided he liked Sherry and dated her for a while. The next week at church Jack claimed I owed him $20. He explained that my date had ripped holes in his old sofa and that was about what it was worth.
I grew up in DeKalb, IL. Five miles away was Sycamore. The DeKalb Ward building actually was located in Sycamore. At church we had kids from DeKalb, Sycamore and the smaller rural towns in the region.
So at some church event, one of my Sycamore friends had brought a non-LDS friend from Sycamore, and this girl let it be known that she would like to go out with me. (Why any girl would desire such a thing was completely beyond my ken at that time.) I said sure, so we arranged to go out on a certain night.
I was planning on taking her to a dance at our church, but she obviously had other ideas. I showed up wearing a tie and a nice shirt and pants; she was wearing jeans, cuffed at the bottom, long dangly earrings. A cute outfit, but we were sort of mismatched, so I quickly lost the tie to even things out. I thought the dance would be a place where I could play my strong suit, because I was a terrific dancer back then, and we went for a while but she just wasn’t interested. Instead, she suggested we go to the DeKalb v. Sycamore basketball game in Sycamore that was just about to start. Great.
So we go there, and ran into the problem that she was from Sycamore and I was from DeKalb. I agreed to sit on the Sycamore side of the gym, but I’m pretty sure I heard scathing insults like “traiter” comeing from some of my classmates on the DeKalb side.
Later in the evening she excused herself to go to the bathroom and was taking a long time. Eventually some of her friends found me and told me she was sick. So a group of us took her to the hospital, where she was admitted with food poisoining. (We hadn’t eaten anything, so I wasn’t sick. The last I saw her she was laying in her hospital bed dressed in a gown, and she gave me this pitiable look that sort of said “I’m sorry.” Her friends joked that there went my goodnight kiss.
I called her after a couple of days to see iif she was ok and also to see whether she wanted to give it another shot. She had some excuse that let me know that wasn’t going to happen. Either she just didn’t like me much after all, or she was mortified by ending our date at the hospital, or maybe a little bit of both. I never saw her again after that.
Playing softball with my girlfriend’s extended (and extended and extended) family at a reunion and splitting my pants fielding a ground ball – then taking off those pants in the park’s public restroom, handing them to my future mother-in-law around the corner of the doorway – then waiting in my underwear while great-aunt somebody sewed them up enough to cover my backside properly – then receiving said pants back from my future mother-in-law (again, blindly around the doorway corner) – emerging from the restroom in time to have to rejoin the hundreds of relatives at the lunch table as they waited to say the blessing on the food. Yeah, that’s one I won’t forget.
Driving to your Bishop’s house on a date to show your girlfriend how beautiful it was and getting stuck on the snow-covered, gravel road in the middle of the orchard surrounding the house – walking to the Bishop’s house to call your father to have the car towed back to the paved road – having your uncle (mother’s brother) show up with your dad – all in a town where you are related to 25% of the people, who, naturally, all knew about it very quickly.
I married my high school sweetheart (the only girl I dated after she turned 16), so I don’t have a lot of awkward date stories involving someone else – but my second date was one I remember well. A girl one grade above me asked me to go to a movie and school dance, but she forgot to mention that we would be going to the movie with . . . my aunt and uncle who lived near her. I liked her but had no romantic interest – which, given our company at the movie, was a good thing.
Oh, and you would think a reasonably intelligent Mormon boy who was one of the oldest in his grade, born and raised in Utah, would understand that he shouldn’t ask (multiple) girls in his own grade on a date right after he turns 16. Yeah, that was an embarrassing few calls that didn’t turn into a date. I ended up going out with another girl in the grade above me.
Long ago, when I lived in west Texas, I went out several times with a woman in my ward. After several dates, she moved for a few weeks to Abilene, and then to Dallas. I wasn’t sure if it was really worth it to try to keep things going long distance, but I figured the best option was to see if she wanted to keep dating. She said she did, so we eventually arranged a date shortly after she was to move to Dallas. I was going to drive there Saturday morning and we were going to take in a temple session and a Rangers game. I was going to stay in a motel for the night and then head home. I figured if things went well Saturday, I might go to church with her before driving home the next day. The motel room, Rangers tickets, and gas probably came in at >$100.
Saturday, I got up at 3 am and drove six hours to Dallas. She stood me up.
I’m starting to get very worried that a story about me is going to show up in this thread.
it’s a series of tubes, wow, that’s right. Thank you, it was a very traumatic year (especially as earlier that same summer a friend of ours had been killed in a car accident when we were coming home from a volleyball game).
Ray’s comment reminded me of a guy who asked me out in high school. He was cute, I’m pretty sure the date was okay (no particular memories) but he called my sister the next day and asked her out for the following Friday night. Yeah, neither of us thought much of him after that.
This guy Steve Taysom once invited me to the Church History Library. He didn’t even buy me dinner first.
As I recall, you were more than willing even without the dinner
I took a really cute girl from class to a haunted house in Provo. She seemed excited to go and kind of flirty, so when she started hanging on my arm acting all terrified, I figured she was playing the game the way the other girls seemed to be. It was fine with me. I joked along. Until she started overdoing it a little, and I thought she was getting a little silly. Then the guy with the chainsaw jumped out and she literally collapsed on the ground with her hands over her head. I laughed (though I’d become impatient) and tried to get her to come, when it suddenly dawned on me that she wasn’t acting. I ended up having to pick her up and carry her out. She was undoubtedly humiliated, and I felt terrible she thought i was laughing at her. I never saw her again — she must have dropped that class.
True, Steve. I now remember we went to the museum, not the library (I’m not that kind of guy).
Taysom, you have to watch out– Bonjo has been known to wield uncovered shoulders and bare kneecaps. You could hardly be held responsible it the face of such temptation.
My date had, unbeknownst to me, been the first choice of another member of our group. She told the other guy that she had too much homework but said yes to me, not knowing the other guy would be part of my group. It was an awkward evening.
This isn’t my date but how I ruined someone else’s. I guess.
My roommate had asked out a young woman who was a friend of mine and on whom I had a minor crush. Somehow their date wound up including sitting around a table at Bob’s Big Boy with several of the rest of us. At some point, my roommate made a comment about my friend / crush’s hair. (She had just done something with it and it was a little out of control.) It seemed like a surprisingly insensitive and obtuse thing to say. So, I threw my water in his face and called him a jack-off. He left and then a few seconds later she left. I wasn’t proud but neither was I embarrassed … I sometimes wonder about myself.
This particular roommate could be tough to live with.
He worked a graveyard shift at a grocery store about 15 miles away. Late one night another roommate and I drove to the store where he was working and re-wired his horn to his brake lights. Then we went home and listened. Sure enough, in the early dawn you could here him get closer and closer to home: hooooonk, honk, HONK, HONK!!. He wasn’t happy. It might be funnier if you knew that parties involved.
Many other stories, but no others involving dating so I guess I’ll bow out.
I clearly have a part of me that isn’t very nice. Fortunately Father BCC is here to accept confessions.
I’m surprised at how many of these dates have a creepiness factor (forcible cuddling with a sleeping girl? Hello, Mormon version of Steubenville!)
Along those lines, one of my mission friends was on a double date with his roommate. The four of them were trying to decide what movie to see. I think maybe the roommate was trying to demonstrate his worthiness by pointing out that he didn’t want to see anything with sex and nudity in it. Then he very enthusiastically (yet creepily) said: “I mean I like sex. I like nudity. I like them A LOT. But these things can lead to other things, and then the next thing you know, you’ve got guys like Jeffrey Dahmer and Ted Bundy happening.”
“Creepy” is what girls call attention from beta males. Same acts feom an alpha, not “creepy.”
Once, when I was in grad school, a fellow co-ed I worked with at an internship asked me out. We went out to eat, got dinner, and went for a nice drive. He then told me he wanted to take me to his home to meet his dog. OK, I said, I like dogs well enough. Oh no, that’s not it, he said. Rather, he explained, he always brought dates by to meet his dog to see what his dog thought of the girl. If his dog barked at the date then he knew she was “crazy” and if the dog didn’t bark, she was a “keeper.”
I went out a few times with a really great guy. A little too perfect, though, and one time a date included going to his apartment and him making carrot juice (with a little celery) with his new juicer. He gave me a great big glass of it. I really liked him so I tried desperately to drink it. I really gave it my all (like I said, I really liked the guy) but I was only able to choke down maybe 10 or 15 percent of it though. I am not sure I’ve ever tried so hard and failed so miserably at something.
He is also the guy I practiced tennis by myself for a tennis date with him. Of course all I could do was practice my serve but I practiced. I guess he wasn’t a match made in heaven for me but he really was perfect. He had deliberately sought me out in class because I was smart and wanted to study with me (because he was smart too) and proceeded to apparently like me how could I resist? He was good looking, smart and very talented.
If only I could have downed that carrot juice I could have been married to someone perfect and drunk healthy carrot juice for the rest of my life.
Orthopod: I disagree that creepiness has anything to do with alpha or beta types of men. I think it’s a byproduct of reciprocal feeling. HIMYM put it best with the Dobler / Dahmer effect: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-V5xjfSB53E
If you like the person, romantic gestures seem like Lloyd Dobler from Say Anything. If not, it’s creepy (like Jeffrey Dahmer).
This is the problem with “pick up lines.” If the girl (or boy) is attracted or interested in you it really doesn’t matter what you say (within reason). But if she doesn’t like you there is absolutely nothing you can say in one sentence that is gonna change that. Severe intoxication can contradict this but doesn’t apply to most of the BCC crowd.
I remember my brother met this girl at her apartment swimming pool and after flirting for awhile she left. He later went up to knock on her door. When she opened it and asked him what he wanted, he noticed a jackalope head hanging above the fireplace. His answer: I want to pet your furry rabbit. I thought that was an extremely creepy thing to say. Because she liked him she invited him in although she was alone and didn’t know him. (Risky obviously). They were smooching a few minutes later and that led to them dating for a while.
What is creepy? Part of the dating process is that you exchange signals, verbal but mostly otherwise that indicate various levels of romantic interest or disinterest. Neither person wants to be rejected and neither wants to blow a good chance. But we can’t read each others’ minds and our impressions can change quickly. Creepy is when a person is not reading the signals, usually of disinterest and continues to escalate their signals of interest which would be entirely appropriate if interest was being returned. Some people are skillful at this while others are not. Practice increases these skills and one of the reasons that dating many people over several years results in a higher probability of attracting a compatible partner.
I’d share my stories, but I signed Steve Taysom’s non-disclosure agreement. I can’t say anything more without a lawyer present.
I was asked out several times by a future Jeffrey Dahmer. The first clue of his psychotic nature was when he left a cute picture of a dog with a handwritten note below it on my doorstep saying, “Go out with me! Or else I’ll shoot this puppy!!” and then signed his name. He sure knew how to sweep a girl off her feet. I thought of many responses, like asking him to not waste the bullet on a dog when he could use it on himself, but I decided the best response was no response.
“Shoot the puppy” as my roomies and I referred to him, called me a few days later and said he was lying in the street after being hit by a car and I was the first person that came to his mind to help him when he regained his consciousness. I told him that he didn’t sound like he was outside and then he proceeded to make completely non-realistic car noises like Vrooom! Vroom! to simulate cars zooming by him. He then told me if I didn’t come and pick him up, he was going to be hit again and possibly die. I told him that was a risk I was willing to take. Truthfully, if I had owned a car at the time, I would have done the job myself.
It’s never the nice guys that are persistent. I’m sorry I don’t have actual date stories to share, but I’m thinking if I had ever had said yes to S.T.P., I wouldn’t have been able share the story with anyone because my corpse would have been on the 10:00 news. I miss the Y….
As it relates to Orthopod’s point, I learned a lot from this video.
http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?v=gBVuAGFcGKY&desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DgBVuAGFcGKY
Lots of nice guys are persistent. Of course, they also tend to be the ones that are persistent on a girl most definitely not in their league.
One year in college my roommates and I met a nice group of girls. One of my roommates, a good friend of mine, asked one of the girls out on a date (she was the type that got at least one date a week). After he asked her out a second time, she told him that she was not interested in him “right now.” Unfortunately he interpreted “not right now” as “possibly some time in the future.” It took quite a bit of work from myself and another one of the roommates to convince him to look elsewhere for dating opportunities.
Nice guy? Yes. Creepy? No. I’m fairly certain she never saw him as being at all creepy. Clueless? Eh, probably.
The problem from the start is that you dated a man brought up in a sexually repressed, confining , misogynistic religion that force feeds conformity with unparalleled success; especially in the arena of applying enormous pressures. Talk about being unprepared for the “real world”, the mormon religion out tasks any other in its ability to keep its devotees naive and ignorant of the world at large, which surrounds their cozy, uncomfortable, cultural enclave. Their bubble, so to speak. And if youre mormon….you have my sincerest condolences for having been brought up in that awful culture.
Divorced and in my 40’s, I met up with a man from an LDS singles dating site (mistake #1) for lunch. Within the first five minutes of conversation — about his divorce — which he brought up, because I have no interest in becoming privy to the details of your prior marriage(s) or relationships on a first date — he said, “And, by the way, I know how to sexually satisfy a woman.” I raised my eyebrows, and muttered through iceberg lettuce and ranch dressing something like, “Well, how ’bout that.” I honestly don’t remember anything else about the date, but in hindsight, I wish I’d had the courage to say, “Really? Can you be more specific?” Maybe his skills would have impressed me enough to consider a second date. I’ll never know.
depizan, your roommates brother moved into my apartment when I left… small world. I still often think of a conversation he and I had one Saturday morning while playing roller hockey. I suspect we may have been part of the same FHE group that spring semester. It was a hard day when Tim called and told me what had happened.
I suspect I know the story earlier in the summer as well. He was the EQP in my ward the semester before. Not my favorite summer of all time.
dennis, you have my condolences for feeling the need to comment in a forum like this.
Let it go, dude.
One of my first post-divorce dates include a man who tried to convince me that it didn’t matter than he was 24 years older than I because God had promised him long life, he would become a General Authority, a high school teacher once tried to seduce him by taking off all her clothes in her classroom after school, and he was one of the Three Nephites. Oh, and that if I wanted to marry him I had to get used to having big babies because his were all at least 10 pounds. I…don’t even know where to start.
I really want to hear some more bad date stories. I am rofl right now. Keep em comin.
A couple of fun ones:
My roomie was invited by a guy to hike ‘Y’ mountain early in the morning and then they could watch the sunrise together. She said it was cold and miserable and they could barely see where they were going with their flashlights but he kept promising her that the spectacular sunrise would make it all worthwhile. Imagine their surprise when the sun came up….behind the mountain instead.
A guy went to my dad and told him that he prayed and the Lord told him to marry my older sister. He had never asked her out and was completely reptilian. My dad told him that as soon as my sister had that same inspiration, they would be in contact with him. He was angry and tried to rebuke my dad by the priesthood but since he wasn’t extremely active it sounded more like something from Cinderella’s fairy godmother. I was proud of my dad for not laughing… until he left.
My most awkward date was a blind date the semester before I left on my mission. On Friday night I was hanging out with my roommates in our apartment when a friend (we will call her Jen) from upstairs came in and begged one of us to go on a blind double date with her. Since I had no plans, my roommates volunteered me for the adventure. Jen’s older sister had set her up with a guy from work and when this guy called her to arrange the date, he told Jen that he and a couple of other guys would be picking her up. Jen let him know that she had no intention of riding in a car with three men she didn’t know from Provo to Salt Lake, so she would be bringing a friend along. Jen’s date said that would be fine, since one of his friends would be meeting his girlfriend in Salt Lake and his other buddy didn’t have a date yet.
The boys picked us up and we proceeded to drive from Provo to SLC, with Jen in the passenger seat and her date driving. I was sandwiched in the back between the guy with the absent girlfriend and my “date”. He asked me how old I was and when I told him that I was 20 and a junior at BYU, he said “Wow, you’re pretty old to still be single at BYU.” Before I could come up with an appropriate response to his comment, he informed me that he was also a junior. In high school. After finding out that I had submitted my mission papers and was waiting for my call, he proceeded to tell me at great length about his lack of belief in the gospel and how he didn’t think that he would serve a mission, unless it was to keep his parents “off his back”. He kept swearing and (I think) trying to either impress or shock me with how cool and tough he was. Poor kid had no idea that I had grown up in Boston, where the “tough” kids I knew would have eaten him for lunch. I tried to keep a straight face when Jen would throw me agonized glances from the front seat.
When we arrived in SLC, we met the rest of the group at a theater for a hypnotist show. As we filed into the auditorium seats, my friend Jen ended up with only one empty seat next to her before the aisle. She took pity on me and grabbed me by the arm and loudly announced that I needed to sit by her, thereby saving me from ending up sitting by myself in the next row next to my underage date. The show was funny and I felt a little (a very little!) bit bad for ditching the guy I was supposed to be with, but when Jen’s date offered to drive us back to Provo (plus random guy & his girlfriend who were making out on the sidewalk), we said “No, thanks” and left with Jen’s sister and her boyfriend to go get some pie and laugh over the awful awkwardness of the evening. Where did we go for pie? The Village Inn, of course.
Ooo, I have a few terrible date stories, but here’s one of my “favorites”:
I was at BYU-Idaho and this guy had been my FHE brother a few semesters back. I ran into him on campus and he begged me to go on this big group date with him and all of his roommates, insisting that he was the only one who hadn’t found a date yet and would I pretty please go with him please?
I was too nice and agreed to go, and he said he’d pick me up at whatever time while blabbering about how glad he was that he ran into me because he had wanted to ask me out for a while and yadda yadda and I went to class, dreading the upcoming date.
He comes to pick me up and again thanks me profusely, then apologizes that all 5 of his roommates and their dates backed out, so it’s just the two of us, isn’t that great! He wanted to make it up to me by taking me to his “favorite mexican restaurant in town.” A few minutes later, we pulled into Taco Bell.
After Taco Bell, he wanted to “teach [me] how to play poker” so he dragged me to Wal-Mart to buy starburst for use as poker chips, then to his apartment to play. No one else was home, it was dirty, and his roommates’ fake frat flag hung with pride over the TV: “I Phelta Thi”
After I wiped the floor with him in poker (I won basically the entire bag–teach me poker you wish), my date disappeared to the bathroom for a solid 15 minutes (whether he was crying cuz I kicked his butt at poker or having Taco Bell-related digestive issues, I’ll never know), during which time my friends started texting me about a dollar movie showing that they wanted me to go see with them. My date eventually emerged and started blabbering about the double-feature at the drive-in, and how we could load the bed of his pick up truck with pillows and blankets.
I suddenly “felt very sick to my stomach” so he rushed me home (with far too much persuasion on my part, if a girl wants to go home just take her home, geez), and once he was out of sight I ran–on foot–to the theater, arriving only 5 minutes after the movie started. I laughed with friends and roommates about the terrible date for a week.
hawkgrrrl, I was also thinking of the Dobler/Dahmer theory too. Thanks for the link.
I was invited to go to a haunted house with a brother of a good friend of mine. I should have stopped there. But he was also a redhead. I have nothing against redheads, I birthed one, but I NEVER had luck with redheads (read Sophomore Prom). I felt bad because he was a few weeks away from leaving on a mission. Might as well give the guy a break.
He picked me up and informed me we were going to a haunted house. I have a crazy fear of them and he knew this. Young me was too naïve to turn on my heels and go right back into the house. We got into the van with his friends, who by-the-way, were NOT planning on us coming so we had to sit on the floor. On the way the van started puttering and the driver pulled in to fill up with gas. All of the boys went into the 7-11 while the girls waited. My date came back into the car sporting those sunglasses with the springs attached and fake eyes at the end, you know the ones. He kept them on for the duration of our ride to TGIFridays where he snatched my menu from me and told our waitress that we would have two waters and a small cheese pizza…to share. Um. The pizza was brought out with the middle frozen and he proceeded to eat 2/3rds of the pizza. By now EVERYONE was feeling incredibly sorry for me. He left a $.25 tip.
We left the restaurant and resumed our place on the van floor and proceeded to the haunted house. The boys all got out and started walking to the entrance. He grabbed my arm and told me “So, we can’t go in. I spent our entrance money on those glasses. We can just wait by the exit.” Like hell I was going to spend the next two hours alone with this guy in the frigid October weather outside a haunted house. The driver of the van was standing near us and I saw his eyes grow incredibly round. I turned to him and told him that I left something in the car and could I have his keys please. I think he knew what I was going to do because he winked at me. I told my date I’d be right back. I ran to the van and locked myself in and left my date to shiver in the cold. The rest of his night was equally frigid.
I was set up on a blind date with a 35 year-old Mormon doctor who wore a Tigger letterman’s jacket on our date (and pointed it out to me, lest I think it was a real letter jacket), then took me to a cartoon movie because he wouldn’t agree to see anything that had higher than a PG rating.
it’s a series of tubes, we definitely would have been in the same FHE group then if Tim had been your roommate just prior to that.
Crazy – small world! Long way round to cross paths on a blog. Given that you post here using a moniker, like I do, I won’t venture to speculate which of G’s roommates you are, but at least within the confines of our apartment, your house was considered to be about the coolest group of people we had ever come across. Hope life has treated you well since then, especially after that summer.
My first date–ever–was awful. I was 18 (late bloomer, I guess) in a town with only one guy my age. We had sort of pretended to be bf/gf when we were 16, but he lived in a different town and I was embarrassed to be seen dating him at church, so I broke it off. We never actually went on a date. So when my friend’s brother got off his mission and showed up Saturday morn while my family and a few others were cleaning the church building, I was intrigued. He wasn’t that attractive, but he was interested in me, and that’s really all I was looking for at the time. He asked me out to an Institute activity the next week. I said yes.
Saturday rolled around, and dude showed up 3 hours before the activity was to start (our stake is spread out, so he said he wanted to get there on time. It only takes about 45 minutes to get there.) I was in the kitchen half dressed drinking some chocolate milk when my mom let him in. I went to put some clothes on and we took off.
On the way there I thought I was going to die. He was driving like a maniac, swerving all over the road in a brand new car he bought (how? Just off the mission? His family didn’t come from money…) which was already a turn-off, and insisted on trying to hold my hand while simultaneously trying to use the stick shift. His hand was sweaty and greasy.
We got to the church we were supposed to meet people at, and no one was there, obviously, so we sat in the car for a while as he put his arm awkwardly around me , attempted to massage my shoulders and kissed me several times on the cheek. It was creepy and weird. A few minutes later he said he needed to buy new pens. We drove to a convenience store where he spent 20 minutes choosing pens and asking my opinion on them. It was weird. Then, holding my hand the whole he pulled me to the car, opened the door and tried to kiss me on the mouth. I pulled back and said no, and he was a little angry.
We went back to the church where I went inside to “use the bathroom” and stook shaking wondering what to do. I was so close to borrowing a cell phone to have someone pick me up.
I went back out after a few minutes and there were finally other people. The activity was a road-rally, so others joined us in our car and I volunteered to sit in the back because “so-and-so was better at navigating.” I succesfully avoided him all the way through the activity until he took me home.
I declined any dating opportunites from him after that.
Another date involved meeting a self-loathing BYU student online, going to an expensive pizza place while he complains about how pricy it is, him driving me to “his favorite spot in Provo,” up the mountain a ways. Luckily he just wanted to talk, but it got all lovey very fast. Then he said we’d hang out til midnight because he wanted to go to game-stop to pick up his new Gameboy 3d. It was weird.
A guy asked me out to dinner. I go out to his car and discover 3 other guys with their respective dates. I ask where we are going to dinner and the guys all laugh uncomfortably and say it’s a surprise. (Danger, Will Robinson!) We pull up outside some grocery store and each of our dates hand us $5 apiece. Then they proceed to tell us they will be back in 20 minutes with a movie and we are to shop for dinner and to surprise them. However, they hoped we would at least include a main dish, salad, bread and dessert. I said our surprise should be to take the money and run but the other girls seemed very excited about it.
We bought some crap and went back to their apt and us womenfolk went into the kitchen while the menfolk started watching sports and playing foosball. Totally not acceptable to me. I pretty much dragged my date back into the kitchen and told him I was under the impression that this was a date and we would do this together. He looked embarrassed, the other girls couldn’t believe it and none of them followed suit, and the other guys called him a hen-pecked husband. The rest of the date went downhill from there.
When I was attending USU, I asked a girl I knew if she’d like to spend a Saturday afternoon hiking the Crimson Trail up Logan Canyon. My grandfather very kindly drove us to the start of the trail after I dropped off my car at the end. It had been years since I’d been on that trail and somehow (don’t ask me how) I got off the trail and I ended up hiking halfway up the mountain with the poor girl in tow. Finally, two hunters ran into us and told us that we were a long way from the Crimson Trail and to go back the way we came. So we hiked back to the starting point but…whoops…my car wasn’t there. ( And this was the age before cell phones). We had to walk along the highway to where my car was parked (a couple of miles I think) and by the time we got there it was pitch black and I couldn’t find my car. (It was parked in a large wooded area) We wondered around for about 45 minutes and finally ran into it just by chance. By this time it was nearly nine p.m. We’d been walking for probably seven to eight hours and were both exhausted and starving.
She married me anyway…
Aw, egee. That’s awesome!
No, egee, that proves, PROVES, the above explored Dobler-Dahmer theory.
Very small world. My apartment loved yours as well. Life’s been pretty good. How about for you?
Better than I ever would have expected at that time, though very different… our chance meeting here led me to dig out my college journal and do a little googling. I see they established a memorial scholarship in J.H.’s memory a few years back. I found Tim living in Nevada and gave him a call today as well. Though those Chancellor apartments were the crummiest place I ever lived in Provo, the people I knew in that ward were among the finest.
I prefer to stay somewhat incognito on BCC, though a few other posters besides you know who I am. Shoot me an email at fromBYUtoBCC@gmail.com and let’s catch up. Looking forward to chatting with you.
My apologies to all for the threadjack – will take the conversation offline. Now back to your regularly scheduled dating horror stories programming.
This thread is making me nervous as I start thinking about entering the dating scene again. Before she died, my wife told me she thought I should find someone else as soon as I can. I’m not sure I want to start……
Two of my most awkward dates really only got awkward for me at the end. At the end of the first one, which I thought had gone really well, with a girl I had had at least a minor crush on for a while, she told me that I was her last date for at least a year and a half, since she was leaving for her mission next week. The other date was similar. I didn’t know her well, but she was cute, and we had a really great time. As the date was ending, she told me that, in between the time I’d asked her out and the time of the date, she had gotten engaged. When I asked her why she went out with me even though she was engaged, she told me that she had promised to go out with me, and she wanted to keep her promise.
I met an attractive girl at a church singles dance in California after having danced with her a few times, I asked her out. We had a low key evening of movie and dinner and I enjoyed her company. She decided to tell me some vivid stories about her including one that involved having and argument with her family and driving into the hills and sleeping out of her car. She could hear wolves howling from the inside. There was also an amusing funny story of how she once ended up chasing her brother with a knife.
Continuing…I hit the send button too soon. So she succeeded in scaring me enough that didn’t ask her for the second date. My co-worker, Jewish, female confidante heard the story and would occasionally bring up the fact that I dated a girl who lived in her car and guffaw about it.
My father would tell his daughters, usually within earshot of the arriving date, to keep their pants up and their shirts down. One sister scheduled a date while he was away, no doubt to avoid said reminder. A younger brother, full of fraternal concern, took the responsibility on himself and, as she walked down the sidewalk, yelled out, “Keep your shirt up and your pants down!” By all accounts, my generation *should* have been the last of that gene pool, but no.
CS Eric–Your date endings are classic. Karl G. Maeser and his chalk would be so proud.
Re: Apparently, we had diverse opinions about the status of our relationship at the time I went on this date
“We were on a BREAK”. Ross Geller
It’s funny, I once went on an unofficial FHE with a group of LDS singles to see The silence of the lambs at the dollar theater. Didn’t come out of that FHE feeling inspired.
My cousin went into the marines to avoid a mission. They were confined to the base for the first several weeks of basic training. The first time they were allowed to leave the base was a Friday night and my cousin and another Mormon friend decided to go to a bar in uniform to try their first beer and pick up a cute girl. They both choked on the beer. Sitting in the corner of the bar alone was a tall gorgeous blond with pale skin looking bored.The two rowdy Mormon boys sat beside her and chatted. She seemed nice and told them her name was “Amy.” They both asked her to dance a couple of times. Other than her hands being cold and clammy she seemed interested in them.
When they thought she was not looking they flipped a nickel to see which one would “make a move“ on her. She suddenly was standing there, caught the coin and quietly whispered that she was woman enough to handle two boys. They went out to her car, an ice blue vintage corvette and she drove them up into the foothills on a dark narrow road as the fog came rolling in thick and wet. They stopped at a cemetery and she got out without a word and disappeared into the fog.
After a few minutes they decided to go looking for her. They hunted all over and couldn’t find her. They went back to the last place they had seen her and there was a nickel on a head stone with the name of Amy inscribed upon it. The other dates on the headstone indicated this Amy had been 19 years old when she died and that day was the 15th anniversary of her death. They went back to the car and it was gone. Yeh, very funny, “Amy,” they shouted, “and that was probably not even your real name.”
The two Mormon boys walked disappointed down the road quite a ways and felt impressed to stop at a certain large well-furnished house to call a cab. An older couple seemed very understanding and took them into their front room. On the wall was the picture of a beautiful young girl that looked exactly like “Amy.” The boys laughed and told the older couple that their daughter must have been the one who ditched them. The older man apologized and said it is not the first time they had experienced this with her. She has a thing for marines. But you must know that our dear sweet 19 year old daughter Amy was killed in a terrible crash in her blue corvette exactly 15 years ago this evening. Thanks boys, for seeing her safely home.
Meldrum the Less, are you sure you didn’t mean to include your comment in the Mormons and Exorcism post?
Oops, I guess it was called Missionaries and Exorcism….or in your story, Marines and Exorcism.
Apparently, Meldrum or his family members have been participants in every tall tale or urban legend known to man #rollseyes
Obviously the deleted story is a Mormonized version of a common American folk tale that I thought most people would recognize and it would bring a laugh or two. I have told variations of it around campfires for years and I thought it fit better as a date story. It really isn’t an excorcism and I just don’t have that many awkward dating stories and I was feeling left out and wanted to contribute. Girls either loved me or went running the opposite direction.
Notice my deleted masterpiece had all the classic characteristics of a folk tale. Distant source not easily verified. Parallel structures from coincidents. A subtle moral lesson or expresses a stressful topic. My old buddy Bert Wilson would have loved it. Appears to me that some people here really are entrenched solidly in Fowlers Stage 3 of very literal thinking. It is like you are sworn in on the witness stand in a court of law your entire life. I was just wondering if anger on one thread spills over onto another, is that why it was deleted? Guilt by association?
I do have a large family, my father had over 100 cousins most of whom lived in small towns where this sort of thing is common and along with my father and some uncles I have habitually collected legends and folk tales for over a half a century. These things tend to recur so roll your eyes all you want.
One of my favorite things to do is sit around a campfire with my scouts in a non-LDS troop and tell stories deep into the night. Attendance at our camping trips doubles when I go and these stores are a highlight. The 11 year old scouts tend to take things literally while the older scouts are generally able to enjoy the tale for what it is. I supposed this audience was a bit more rarified than a bunch of southern boy scouts. Silly me.
Whoops, now I see that the story is not deleted. Was it temporarily deleted? Or have so many of my contributions been deleted that I can’t keep track of them?
Getting old and forgetful is not for sissies.
Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. These are not the droids you are looking for.
I’m coming late to this date, but I thought I’d share anyway.
When I was 19-ish (I think), I met a guy at a regional YSA dance. He was friendly and seemed interested in me. He asked (vaguely) if I’d be interested in ever going out. I didn’t get asked out much, so I didn’t hesitate to say, “sure,” though I wasn’t convinced said date would actually happen. Apparently he lived outside our region — almost three hours away, actually — and only came into the city occasionally for work. I gave him my number, and them went to tell a couple of girlfriends about it. I quickly deflated. They told me he’d said the same things to them, and one of them (who knew him a little better) described him as a player. I was disappointed, but since I’d had little hopes to begin with, I got over it quickly.
He called a couple of days later. I blew him off with an excuse about work or something. He continued to call. Now that I knew his number, I just didn’t answer the phone. I was living at home, pre-cell phones, so I asked my parents not to answer it either. After a few weeks or a month, he stopped calling. Three or more months went by. One day the phone rang. Not recognizing the number, I answered. He was delighted to hear my voice. He’d gotten a cell phone. My heart sank. He was in town, and wondered if I wanted to go out the next night. Being 19 and stupid, I said yes, hoping it would finally get him off my back.
He picked me up at 6:00, so I assumed we’d be eating dinner. Nope. We drove straight to the cannery. Yep. I spent the date with a really attractive hair net on, while my stomach grumbled loudly. The old ladies thought it was so sweet that we went on a date to the cannery. I was grateful he had a different assignment that I did, in another room altogether.
After the cannery, we went to a local park, where we played relay races. No, there were no other people. Just us. By the time we got halfway through the three-legged race (us against the world?) I faked an ankle injury in a desperate attempt to end the misery.
He drove me home and never called again.
But wait, there’s more. I have another.
Years later, when I was much more mature at 23 years old, I met a guy at a regional YSA conference. He seemed cool, and he was Latino, which was interesting and attractive to me. He lived about an hour and a half away from me, but I lived in New England at the time, so that really wasn’t all that far. I spent the weekend flirting with him (instead of flirting with my future husband who was trying to flirt with me), and we exchanged numbers by the end of it. Sometime in the next week, he called me. We made arrangements to go out. Because of the driving distance, we planned a daytime date at a local aquarium. It offered conversational opportunities as well as promising to not stick us in uncomfortably close quarters, as a movie theater might.
He picked me up in a powder blue super-compact girly car, so that was a little weird. We drove to the aquarium, and the conversation was much more awkward, now that the pressure was on. By the time we arrived at our destination, I was thoroughly UN-attracted to him anymore. He, on the other hand, seemed oblivious. There was a local a capella group singing in the lobby, so we stopped and listened for awhile. He put his arm around my waist. Through the exhibits, he kept trying to hold my hand. Whenever we talked, he maintained a disconcerting level of eye contact. After the aquarium, we went out for an early dinner, and then he still wanted to do something else. I begged off, suggesting that it was a long drive for him, and he’d want to hit the road. He dropped me off around 6:45 or 7:00pm (we’d left around 3:30, I think). I thanked him for the date and when he said, “We should do this again some time,” I froze, and eeked out an awkward, “yeah, sure.” Then he left.
I was so bored that I wanted to turn around and go out!
He called on his way home. We chatted for a few minutes, then I let him know I was busy. We talked a few times a week for the next two weeks or so, while I repeatedly fought off requests for more dates. After awhile, I stopped being polite and just let his calls go to voicemail.
He stopped calling, finally. Meanwhile, I had a male friend that I really liked, but who lived across the country, who I would talk to at least once a week. Because he didn’t have a long-distance plan, he used a calling card, and his number always showed up “blocked” on my cell phone. Whenever I saw that, I did a little happy dance before answering.
One day my phone rang, and it showed “blocked.” I was a little giddy when I answered. It was Boring Guy. Lead balloon. He had deliberately blocked his number so that I couldn’t avoid it. We had a very serious Define The Relationship conversation, in which I told him that I didn’t think we should go out again. He wanted to know why, and I used the excused that I didn’t want a long-distance relationship (still young and stupid) (two months later I started dating my husband who lived 3.5 hours away). He agreed that that could be difficult, but that we could still go out as “just friends,” since that was all I wanted to be. After an agonizing few minutes of being mean enough to get my point across to him, he asked if I wanted him to stop calling. Seriously? YES!! Right at that moment, my phone dropped the call. I lived in a town full of rocks and trees, and my phone constantly dropped calls. I decided to let Cingular do the talking for me. But wait, there’s more. THE IDIOT CALLED BACK!! He left me a voicemail repeating the question: “do you want me to stop calling?” He also repeated the brilliant idea that we still go out as “just friends.”
After I didn’t call him back, he never called again. But he forever became known in stories and my dating annals as Do You Want Me To Stop Calling Guy.