sushi with asian dentist

i meet up for date #2 with asian dentist at a sushi place. i know, i know... stereotypes abound. but it's not like that, i swear! as with the first date, the conversation is ok but i cannot recall him making me laugh at all. (are we picking up on this internets, that this is important?) he's just...a nice guy. i cannot think of much more to say than that. i feel guilty for much of the date for stifling yawns. what do i say? 'i'm sorry, you're just nice and a little boring. plus i was up all night last night with another date, so i could use a little sleep.' no, i'm not THAT mean.

we do talk about the awkward situation (AWKWARD TURTLE for those of you that get the inside joke) of me running into him at the other bar with his 50+ year old date, ha. he tells me about her situation rather matter-of-factly, without really giving credit to how hilarious the situation was. again...sense of humor lacking.

he pays for the sushi and then ends up paying for the drinks at the bar afterwards. i protest, but he says next time i can pay and that this is how he'll get me to go out with him again. maybe i protest because i don't want to go out with him again. he's a nice guy - sporty, smart, responsible. but there's not really any sort of chemistry. i don't plan on asking him out again, and i wonder if just going radio silent will send the message.

more freeloading

freeloader is a self-proclaimed 'fantastic chef' and offers to cook for me sometime. when he initially proposes this on date 1, he says he'll make crab cakes. by the time the dinner date actually rolls around, i get a text from him asking if i like pasta. at least he brings the groceries, even if it's a downgrade from crab cakes. my friends and i had a joke/bet going that he would try to get me to pick up the groceries as well. to prove his freeloading status, though, he does ask if i have anything to drink at my house and proceeds to drink all of my beer.

he asks if he can come over at 5 because he's 'really hungry'. my bet is that this is the first time he's eaten all day, so that's why he wants to come over so early. around 4:30 i run to the neighborhood grocery store to pick up a few things, and i run into him at the bar next to the store. 'fancy meeting you here' he says. as i try to stifle the stalker feelings that are creeping up in my mind, i chat with him for a few mins. he says he's had a bad day and that he actually just got fired from his job. i feel bad for him, but it's definitely hard not to see how his status just became even more freeloader-like.

freeloader sidles over to my place from the bar a little while later. he makes the meal, which is good (though nothing special really). he then proceeds to talk about it for the next hour. 'i should have put the tomatoes in a little later.' 'but the pasta turned out delicious, right?' 'these ingredients really make for a nice sauce, even if i wish i'd cooked it slightly differently.' i finally have to ask him to stop talking about the pasta - he's incredibly insecure and i can't handle him dissecting his meal any longer. we watch a movie about the amish and their year of non-amish-ness and have some...ahem...fun for the evening. he's good for the fun part, but i can hardly even stand his personality. so now i debate if i keep him around for a booty call. maybe until something more interesting comes along.

why am i doing this?

he asked me what i wanted to be when i grow up. i replied, "content."

new ager

after the shock of running into asian dentist/small fry at the other bar, i'm a little shaken. i walk the couple of blocks to meet date #6 of the dating blitz, and i see him sitting outside. i have a brief moment where i think 'what if we sit outside and then the 50 yr old drunk lady comes by with my date from last night...more awkwardness.' but thankfully this does not happen.

this guy is from my same home state, so there's at least some common ground to get the conversation kicked off. i must say, including these old town names in conversation (morton, bloomington, champaign, etc.) gives me the shivers, but i get over it. this date has a bit of a tick...maybe nerves or just the way he is. he cannot look at me while he talks. it's a little annoying and makes me feel like he's not interested. i also find that i look at him less when i talk, picking up on it. anyway, nice enough guy, good job, seems to have his head on straight, enjoys going out for drinks, etc. he's 95% vegetarian...oh the portland veggie scene. he's not offended that i'm an omnivore, so that's good. we order some wine. when the waiter later asks if we want to order any food, he pipes up and says 'oh this is on me, so order whatever you want.' kind of a funny way to put it out there, but ok then. :) we order some cheeses - fancy schmancy date.

we talk about our conservative midwestern upbringings, and he tells me about where his head is now. firmly agnostic, and also a follower of some new-agey sounding guy who talks about positive thinking and whose seminars might involve a bit of brain washing. ummm, ok. i don't press for more info, and he doesn't really give any. he seems to only be into electronic music - yuck. but i won't hold something like that against him... yet. he is a draftsman for new homes, and i do like a man who can work with his hands at least a bit. conversation flows as the sun sets, and at the end of the evening he asks if he can call me again. i say 'sure' - why not, right?

do NOT shit where you eat

i may have just had one of the weirdest mass online dating experiences up to this moment.

i decide to have tonight's date at a bar that was close to my house because i had been wanting to check this bar out. i meet up with my friend beforehand to catch up for a bit, but we meet close to the other bar so that i didn't have far to walk afterwards. when entering the first bar...i see someone who looks just like the asian dentist and some older woman. i am guilty, folks, of not being sure it was him because of that non-group homogeneous thingy... (where are my smart friends when i need them?), and yes, it was the asian thing. oh, and he had a hat on. thinking that it may have been him, i made my friend take a table in the next room so that we could have a proper catch-up.

part way through our drinks, asian dentist and his older woman come over to our table and sit down. asian dentist just says "so, where's my drink." one has to give him credit for having the balls to come over! since my friend just looks completely taken aback, i introduce them to each other (yes, it's obvious at this point that it is indeed asian dentist). AWKWARD. could it have been more obvious that we moved tables to the other room to avoid him? i think not. turns out his older woman date is actually a former colleague, someone he had to lay off from the practice for one reason or another. asian dentist seems like a nice guy, going for a drink with a crazy former employee who is down on her luck. turns out she is totally shit-canned, and proceeds to tell us all about her recent divorce, job loss, and other life problems. it's a major case of TMI, and my friend and i wonder how many drinks down she is at this point of the evening.

i then somehow have to ask for the check without making it look like we were just ditching them and their awkward situation. GAH. we get out alive, and then i have to go on to another date. portland is already a small enough town... what am i doing having drinks with these dates close to my house? i guess i need to start dating in NE or something...

asian dentist

date five of the week has me getting a little more tired. i pick a local bar so that i don't have to go far before rushing back home to a work conference call with india later in the evening. i'm not extremely excited about this date in the lead-up, which i suppose is why i have booked a conference call on the same night for an early escape if necessary. the reason i'm not too interested is mostly in his communication - kind of weird text messages and slightly awkward phone calls make me think...hmmmm. and internets, i'm ashamed to admit it, but the hint of his accent is not a turn on.

so we meet, have some tasty beers and a little snack at a place up the street. asian dentist is extremely nice...but just that, nice. we have some music and movie interests in common, and the nearly two hours pass relatively quickly. again though... not enough sarcasm! maybe i can chalk this up to nerves (and in that case do i chalk the others up to nerves as well?) or i'm sure my humor is just SO intimidating, they are afraid to spar with me. ok, that's not it. maybe... they just aren't funny. ugh - i hope this isn't it, so i will probably give the guy another chance if he calls. and here comes my moral crisis - he pays (really just on that first date do i request it), he has a good job, he may even own a home here, but am i attracted to him? no bells were rung. as cathy would say, ack! what's a girl to do? evidently, i just want too much. what gets cut from the short list?

my friend wants me to nickname him small fry, but i don't know enough about him to er...saddle him with that name.

freeloader

sunday's date starts at his place of work, just after he gets off his shift. he's a chef at a restaurant, and so the first couple of rounds are on him (well, on his work account). i definitely get the impression, though, that if the barman had not just put my drinks on the restaurant tab, this guy would have let me pay for my own while he drank for free. somewhat annoyingly he feels the need to make some comment to each colleague that bustles by. is he showing off for me or for them? maybe he's just friendly, though that doesn't quite seem to be it.

we move on from the first bar to a sour beer festival at another bar. he's a self-proclaimed beer geek, so he decides to take me on a tour around the beers in the shop/bar. i can't decide if it's off-putting or endearing. he shows me several beers that look great, so i guess i'm happy for the tips. again i've ended up in a place where my date is a regular - he seems to know almost everyone here. the sour beers are delicious, and we decide that we want to see the late showing of 'drag me to hell' (even though i keep thinking...uhhh, i have to work tomorrow. ugh). when this dude comes over to my house to hang out, i think he's probably thinking he has hit pay dirt - this girl has her own house and all sorts of stuff!

after some of the dates this weekend, i'm thinking i'm the one who needs a nickname - meal ticket. are there any guys in portland in their 30s who actually kind of have their shit together? i'm starting to wonder. i guess i still have a couple of days this week to keep trying to find that unicorn of portland - a guy who is not taken, gay, a douchebag or dirt poor.

the trekkie

saturday's date is brunch, and i do love brunch. we go to a place where apparently he knows everyone working. since i immediately know that this isn't going to work out, this makes things slightly uncomfortable. as the different waiters come over to say hi, he is handing them brochures for his 'star trek in the park' play that he's acting in later this weekend. he then goes on to describe in great detail the episode that the play represents. now, i have a lot of friends who are into star trek, but i most certainly am not. and unfortunately, this dude fits the not-positive stereotype of a trekkie. ugh.

the date goes on to him talking 85% of the time - he tells me in way too much detail his struggles with weight and dia-bee-dis over the past several years, his job, his other company, his animals, the countries he has lived in, his family, etc. he actually does have some interesting stories, but i can't get past the fact that i don't find him attractive in the least. i won't go into exactly why i don't find him attractive as i'm afraid it will be too cruel (and i fear the revenge of karma that i've experienced in some past dates). just let your imagination take a guess. i just keep thinking, at what point can i just run out of here? please, please let the bill come soon. the conversation seems to last FOREVER (and not in a good way), even though only a little over an hour passes. every once and awhile he does ask me a question, but he usually interrupts about halfway through to give another of his own stories. i can't tell if this is ego, nervousness or just his personality. i'm thinking it's a little of all three.

i don't think i can ever go to that place for brunch again. 1 - he is obviously a regular, and i don't want to run into him again. 2 - i can't help but wonder if the cute waiter noticed i was checking him out more than my own date. and 3 - the food was too greasy. i guess #3 would really be enough of a reason, so we'll go with that.

over/under

so i have a bit of a dating blitz this week, starting with gramps last wednesay, onto a date friday, saturday brunch, sunday evening, tuesday and wednesday. i can't quite decide if i want material to write about, as that usually comes out of the bad dates. :) with this many dates, though, it's almost a guarantee.

so over/under earns his nickname well before we actually meet up. he is the over/under communicator - in the weeks before we agree on a day to meet up, he sends tons of emails, various 'winks' and some series of strange text messages that seem all out of order and confused. when we talk on the phone, though, he seems perfectly normal. in the week leading to the date, he says he wants to meet friday or saturday. now normally, i do NOT give my weekend nights to these dudes - those nights are saved for friends until i've at least established the dude is worthy. this guy looks pretty cute in his pics, though, so i decide i'll give him a weekend. when i try to confirm a day, time and place, though, he suddenly becomes uncommunicative. i finally get ahold of him over text, and it's like pulling teeth to get a time out of him. strange texts. oh well, we confirm for friday.

we meet up at dots for a late night date, which means i get to walk to the bar. since i've been drinking since 5:30, walking is a good thing. ordering drinks at dots takes me back in time to huey lewis - it's obvious that over/under isn't much of a drinker, as he orders frou-frou drinks, uncertainly each time. this isn't a big deal, though - just because i'm a lush, doesn't mean he has to be one. conversation flows well enough, though his humor is just not on par with mine. gah! is sarcasm really so much to ask for?? he loads on the compliments though, which of course every girl is going to like. i find it hard to accept compliments sometimes, but that doesn't mean i don't want them.

i get the impression that he's slightly anti-social - doesn't seem to have a ton of friends or a crazy social life. i can't tell if i just attract these guys, or if many of the guys out there online dating are like this. it's not always a bad thing, but i'd like to meet someone as social as i am, or at least close. another funny thing about over/under - his high school celebrity crushes were natalie merchant and janeane garofalo. janeane garofalo?! interesting.

despite the lack of sarcasm, the evening moves to a different kind of over/under. ;) may see this guy again...when i get an opening in my schedule.

gramps

second date of the series, and it's nothing to be too excited about again. i meet up with date two at a bar of my choice (lately they keep making me pick the places, so i guess it's good that i know my way around portland better now). there are two things from the leading-up-to-date conversations that my friend says should make me not even consider him. #1 he corrected me in an email (first off - don't correct me, but even worse is that he corrected me where he was actually wrong). #2 when i told him on the phone that i wasn't really a cyclist and asked if it was a deal breaker, he said "uh no, but if you don't give blow jobs that's a deal breaker. uh, ha ha." what i was most annoyed about with that was that i couldn't come up with a smart ass response quickly enough, but also that maybe you shouldn't say something like that before you've even met in person. bah, internet dating - making us all question what is appropriate or not so. i'm trying to give more people a chance, so i meet him anyway.

i know going into the date that he's about 7 years older than i am, but i won't hold this against him. i think the only disappointment was that in real life, he looks about 15 years older than i am - so he earns the nickname gramps. i thought "dad", but that's creepy, and then i thought "uncle" but that nickname just doesn't flow. gramps it is. he doesn't feel the need to shave for the date, despite the fact that his whiskers are gray. and maybe that's where the gramps feeling is coming from - ding ding!

gramps has worked several years in software and web stuff, so we at least can talk shop on a somewhat equal level (though he's definitely more technical than i). as he talks shop, though, i find that i keep listening to the conversation at the table behind me. the flamboyant man venting about michael jackson is 10x more interesting than my date. trying hard to focus on my own table's conversation, it flows relatively well. there's most definitely no spark, but at least a chat is possible.

i cut the date short so that i can go to my friend's bicycle race. i feel a little guilty ditching the dude at 6pm, but i know i'll have more laughs with my friends. even if conversation flowed, i don't think he made me laugh even once. deal breaker for me.

and i was thinking older guy... might be willing to pay? such is not the case, oh well.