“No longer will I play the field.” —Holly Golightly

If it were 1989, I’d file my most recent date away in my Rolodex under “Worst Ever.” For now, I’m just going to blog about it. I wasn’t going to because not all bad dates deserve to be written about on the internet, but this date was so particularly bad that I had to laugh at myself after.

It all started about 3 weeks ago when my coworker asked me if it would be okay for her to give my email to an old friend of hers. She said he was nice, funny, smart, 32, and looked like Pete Sampras. She had barely said “Pete Sam-” before I said, “Yes!” I wasn’t desperate; I just always thought Pete Sampras was hot.

[It should be noted before I continue that he really is a nice guy, but we were on parallel paths from the very beginning and they never managed to cross. In other words, there was absolutely no chemistry, verging into negative numbers at certain points.]

A couple of days after my coworker and I talked, he emailed me, and he seemed like a nice guy. He had a joke right in the first sentence, so he was starting off well. The emails went back and forth for a week or two before I decided to bite the bullet (since he seemed to enjoy having a pen pal) and invite him to the post-Christmas party at the bar my coworkers go to every year. It was neutral spot, and our mutual friend would be there to break any awkwardness. He couldn’t make it, but continued to email (fairly long ones, too). At one point he sent a picture and he looked cute enough, although no Pete Sampras. Something seemed weird, though. My coworker was in the picture, and I could tell the picture was from a while ago. She couldn’t even remember when the picture was taken, but I didn’t think anything of it at the time. I sent a picture back, and again, more emailing. I had given up hope of ever meeting, but at the end of last week he finally asked me if I wanted to get together over the weekend. I was booked solid on Friday and Saturday, so I asked if Sunday was okay. I figured a Sunday lunch would be a good first meeting. He went one step further and suggested a movie followed by dinner. He’d be at my place at ten of four.

I spent Sunday recovering from a slight hangover and cleaning my apartment. At twenty of four (10 minutes early), he arrived at my door. I was not ready – my hair was dry and I was dressed, but I didn’t have a smidge of makeup on. When I opened the door, I suddenly didn’t feel so bad. Pete Sampras was not standing at my door, and neither was the guy from the picture. My hunch about the picture being old was right, and the guy looking at me was bald and had sprouted facial hair. Needless to say, the awkward go-in-for-the-hug-but-change-my-mind moment lasted an eternity. I gave him a brief tour of my apartment and tried to think of ways to get out of going to the movie. It wasn’t that he was bald – I’m not against bald people. It was that he lied to me that made me really angry.

I couldn’t think of anything, nor do I really think I could be that mean, so we got into the car and made our way to the theater. On the way there, we attempted small talk. At one point there was a pause, and he declared, “I don’t really like sports. I never really follow them. I do like boxing though.”

Boxing? Really? I was so screwed. And not in the good way.

I made some lame comment about how Ireland has a tradition of strong boxers, but had nothing else to add to the conversation. In a freak reversal of roles, it was nerd meets jock, and I was the jock.

We finally made it to our seats at the movie, and I thought the previews would never start. The conversation was painful, and since it was the 4:20 showing of Marley and Me, the theater started to fill up with old people who probably used their senior citizen discounts on the matinee tickets.

He asked me (out of the blue), “Are you a risk taker?”

I don’t consider myself a dare devil of any sort, but at the same time, I’ve made decisions that some people would consider risks. ”I don’t mull about when making decisions,” I said. “I don’t spend hours or days weighing all of the options and doing tons of research. I listen to my gut, know what I want, and go for it, so I guess in some respects that would be considered a risk-taker.”

“I like to plan,” he said.  ”I spend a lot of time thinking about the options and it takes me a while to reach a decision.”

SILENCE.

The movie was a glorious 2-hour reprieve from conversation, and I didn’t want it to end. I would have sat and watched it again if it meant not having to go to dinner, but unfortunately, the credits rolled and we had to leave.

On the way to dinner, I made every attempt to engage him in conversation, but everything I said was met with silence. Not an I’m-pissed-at-you silence or a passive aggressive silence, but just silence.

Example:
Niamh: I had two dogs when I lived in at home, and I’ve thought about getting a small one now that I have the space in my apartment. Did you ever have a dog?
Date: No.
SILENCE.

At one point I contemplated jumping out the window. We were in my hometown, I had my cell phone, and my old neighborhood was less than a mile away – I could do it.

When we got to the restaurant, I said a little prayer to St. Jude for an efficient waitress. It worked, and our waitress came over right away. I ordered the Chicken Rolletini (which was amazing), and he ordered the Penne. While we were waiting for our food, we made more attempts at bad small talk, but I was even less inclined to participate than I was on the car ride to the restaurant. Somehow I managed to find out that not only did he not like sports, but he also still lived at home. He has an in-law apartment that used to be his grandmother’s, but he “still sleeps upstairs.” Read: In this childhood bedroom. Then we started talking about college and friends, and I told him that my friends and I try to get together whenever we can, at the very least twice a year, with random smatterings of smaller gatherings throughout the year. He told me that the friends he had in college all live out of state now and he doesn’t see them any more.

SILENCE.

Then we moved onto work – an ostensibly neutral topic. I explained my job, and he told me that he and his mom work at the same company, so they carpool to work together every day.

As I watched this date go completely down the toilet and out to sea, I tried to avoid becoming engrossed in the football game that was being shown on one of the big screen TV’s. I wanted to be at home or at my sister’s apartment watching the game, not listening to the sound of my own chewing interrupted only by awkward comments. I finished my meal, and as the waitress cleared my plate, I looked over and saw that my date was eating his Penne ONE AT A TIME. This date was never going to end. At that point I gave up and watched the game. I had run out of things to talk about, and I was scared of the answers I might get to anything I said. I tried not to make it obvious, but at one point there was a bad snap, and I said out loud, “Ugh! That was terrible!” He heard me (obviously), and then I had to explain what I said and what a bad snap was.

He asked me if I had room for dessert (no, duh), so when the check came, I insisted he let me help. I knew I wasn’t going to go on another date with him, and I didn’t want to make him pay for the whole thing. It just seemed wrong. He wouldn’t let me help with the bill, but he did let me leave the tip. He paid in cash, and the change arrived quickly (great waitress), yet we continued to sit there in total silence. The football game was still going on, but there was less than a minute of play left and it was clear who was going to win. I couldn’t understand why we weren’t leaving, so I waited until he finished his soda (yes, soda), before playing dumb and saying, “Did you pay with a credit card?” When he told me he paid with cash, I suggested we get going. It was Sunday after all, and I had a ton of stuff to get ready before the morning.

The drive home was longer than I wanted it to be, and on the way there, he opened a pack of gum, took a piece for himself, and offered me a piece. I had seen this move before (and used it myself once or twice), but I had no intention of kissing him at the door, so I declined. It was all I could do not to sprint out of the car and up my steps, but I stayed long enough to thank him for a nice time and to wish him a good night.

When I got up to my apartment, I dropped my bag on my table and said out loud, “Pete Sampras my ass!”

I then called my sister and walked over to her place. She had dessert waiting for me and promptly got a pain in her side from laughing so hard at my sad tale.