The Rambling RedHead

17 Bad Dates... Part 2

Once again, God decided that I was taking way too many liberties with what constitutes a bad date.. Note to self: Hanging out with Kansas inspires the wrath of God.

11. This has to be the most humiliating date ever. It was a quiet night at home, I was kicked back, enjoying a frosty adult beverage and a really bad movie from the 80's.. I got a call from Dave, a person with whom I can only term our relationship as "complicated".. We've never dated, will never date and generally don't even care too much for each other but we have a strange sort of chemistry between us and occasionally hang out and get on each other's nerves.. So I get this call where he proceeds to invite me over to watch a movie.. What the heck.. it's only 10:00pm and frankly, I'm feeling a bit lonely.. Once I get to his neighborhood, I give him a call to remind me where the actual house is.. No answer.. I call again.. No answer.. And again.. No answer.. After about 10 tries I head back home.. The next morning I get a text message from him saying he was sorry but he fell asleep.. Priceless.. This, my friends, is the sludge sucking bottom of the dating pool.. When they can't even be bothered to stay awake for the date, you've hit rock bottom.

12. I'm actually counting the last one twice. He fell asleep, people. That's worse than being stood up.. The blow my ego took was harsh enough that counting it only twice is probably a total underestimation. At the very least it evens out all those platonic dates with Kansas.

13. Ted, a firefighter from Raleigh, from, once again, Yahoo. He sends me a picture of himself. Pretty cute. He says he's a young 38, divorced, one kid.. We agree to meet at RiRa's. When he walks up and says hi, I did a huge double take.. 38, my ass. The man was old enough to be my father.. He was at least mid-50'ss. That's just wrong. Did he not think I would notice he was around 15 years older than he claimed to be?? And then there was the fact that he stuck out like a sore thumb with the 30 Something crowd at RiRa's.. We get our drinks and sit down. After a mind-numbingly uncomfortable 10 minutes I get up to go get another drink and hit the ladies room. When I get back, Ted says that while I was gone, the band (The Complaints, one of my favorite bands that I help with promotions from time to time) had dedicated a song to me and wanted me to come on stage to do a shot but I was nowhere to be found. He then proceeds to ask "how many guys from the band *have* you slept with?".. Now that just pissed me off, as rudeness is one of my biggest pet peeves.. However, it did provide me with my exit strategy... I stood up, shook his hand and said: "Thanks, enjoy your drink, if you run home now I bet you can still catch the end of Matlock, Gramps..".

14. Yet another Yahoo candidate. I'm just a walking advertisement for Yahoo, huh? Except that all my experiences with Yahoo have sucked ass. At this point, I'm starting to actually enjoy the thrilling anticipation of predicting the psychosis. What will be wrong with this one??.. Let's call this one "I'm Nuts and Maybe A danger To Everyone I meet".. Initially, INMATE seemed normal, but then, don't they all.. In our initial calls I clarified that he did actually look like and was the same age as in his pictures, had a 3 year old son and was not a Jehovah's Witness and proceeded from there, affirming that my screening process has still got vast room for improvement.. We never actually met, which is why this probably shouldn't qualify as a bad date but given what transpired, I'm counting it anyways..

After chatting a bit he discloses that his former business partner was recently convicted and sentenced to 9 years in prison for violation of SPAM-ing laws but that he had left the business prior to the illegal activities.. He said he felt he had to mention it as his name was very publicly associated with the criminal charges, even though he was never involved in them.. I made a few phone calls (I've got friends in low places..) and yep, his name was all over the news and criminal records associated with this trial.. However, the info my sources tapped into seemed to support his story that he was not actually involved in the criminal trial, just that he was a former partner in the business and a victim of identity theft... Of course, the slight skepticism that remained should have been exacerbated into full fledged "abandon ship" panic by the fact that he seemed to have no discernible job and indicated his income came from "up North" and that he worked primarily in "sheltered income" and "non-traditional investment opportunities ". Most of his income was "undocumented commission".. When I ran this by Kansas, his reply was "Mafia or Amway.. Either way, you're fucked.. The guy is bad news.."

Despite the red flags, alarm bells and the sound of the siren they use for impending nuclear power plant disasters, I initially agreed to meet him for a date the following week.. However, over the weekend, sanity prevailed and I decided to back out. I'm lonely, not desperate. I called Sunday night and left a quick message saying to call me back.. About an hour later I get a call back.. From his mother.. She wanted to know if I knew her son.. "Uhhh, sort of? Why??".. Apparently he disappeared a few days before and she saw my name on his caller ID and wanted to know if I had any contact with him.. I said nope, none since last week and I had never met him in person, didn't know anything about him, knew nothing about his business activities or what he even looked like (just in case we were dealing with a federal wire-tap or potential mob hit).. I did ask if his son was missing as well.. She said oh no, she had been watching his son all weekend.. I said if I heard from him, I would be sure to ask him to call home.. After we hung up, I changed his number in my caller ID from his name to "DNA" as in Do Not Answer..

The part where he was gone for 3 days without calling to check on his kid (no parent does that) caused me to draw the conclusion that he either was fleeing an indictment or ran afoul of the mob.. Suddenly the Amway scenario was looking less and less likely.. Given I never heard from him again, I concluded he was either floating on the end of cement shoes or possibly adjusting to life as a Canadian..

I was wrong.

He is apparently alive and well and is friends with the Escort that tried to woo AJ from MySpace.. How very not surprising..

This is where it ends. After the felony guy, I decided that staying single was a valid life choice, at least for the time being. I just couldn't continue to subject myself to these dating disasters without wanting to throw myself under a bus. I pretty much quit dating, focused on my mission trip and then just spent time with my friends and my kids. Oddly enough, I sort of miss my maniacal dating spree. I learned a lot about human nature and about what fear really is. I also really learned to appreciate that God would put the right person in front of me in all due time. Since then there've been some hits and some misses, but nothing nearly as comical as the hootenanny cavalcade of online dating disasters from last summer.. I swore off online dating forever and decided that the right guy would appear when He decided I was ready..

Oddly enough, there is a funny little post script to this story. I recently started seeing someone kinda fantastic. As everyone knows, my rule is not to write about the people I am dating until it is serious or I at least have determined how they feel about being blogged. Hell, the last guy I dated prefaced every date, conversation, intimacy and phone call with "If this shows up on the blog, I will never speak to you again.."

For irony's sake, I will reveal that I met Mr. Fantastic online through My Space.







God sure has a quirky sense of humor.

posted by Monet @ 6:04 PM