Welcome to my worst date awards! All of these happened a while ago, and my sister recently reminded me of them. Perhaps I blocked them from my memory.
Note: If you happen to be featured in one of these worst dates, never fear! I actually still genuinely love all the people these stories are about, and in a strange way, these are some of the best dates I've had because they were so interesting and funny and awkward! And a lot of the awkwardness could have been avoided if I had been smarter. Let's all celebrate our weirdness! Yay!
Cabela's
During January one year, I had a terrible fever but for some reason was too scared to cancel a date. I thought it would seem "mean" or something (classic people-pleasing behavior). So this guy I barely knew picked me up, and told me he had a surprise date planned! Then he took me to Cabela's. I now know hunting sometimes actually helps promote the health of an ecosystem, but at the time, I was an extreme environmentalist and had been an animal-lover and afraid of hunting for all my life (as a child, I thought I was the fairy from Fern Gully). Just picture a feverish 20 year old me, stumbling around Cabela's, trying not to faint, throw up, or cry while looking at stuffed deer, and then sipping tomato soup while watching my date eat a bison burger. Yek.
Charlie Brown love letter
Once I took a small seminar class in college and ended up dating a guy in that class, we'll call him Jared, for a couple months. At one point, we had to turn in a nature journal to our professor, whom I knew very well from study abroad and previous classes. After we all turned in our journals, I left class. As I walked out of the building, I heard someone shouting my name and running after me. I turned around and saw Jared running towards me. Breathless, he handed me a piece of lined paper and said, "Here! This is a letter that I wrote for you and photocopied to put in my nature journal." Then he ran away. While walking home, I read the letter and alternately laughed and scowled at lines like this, "You are like a Charlie Brown Christmas tree. Not much to look at, but when a family takes you home, they want to keep you, year after year." A week later, my professor took me aside and said, "Um, I read Jared's nature journal. He wrote a letter about you--you know about it?" I was like, "Yeah, he gave it to me last week," My professor eyed me for a second and then said, "Yeah, you can do better than that guy."
Note: Jared and I actually ended up in another class a year later, and became really good friends. He's one of the kindest people I know. Perhaps also the funniest/worst analogy-maker I know.
DTR during the symphony
One guy (I'll call him Tom) I had been on about five dates with took me to the symphony, and we sat behind my favorite professor and his entire family. I said hi to them and introduced them to Tom, and then whispered to Tom, "I went on study abroad with that professor and his family! They are the best!" Tom nodded and we chatted for a couple minutes. Then he abruptly turned to me and said, "Yeah, yeah, so really. Tell me what you think about me. Do you like me? Are we dating?" I squirmed in my red velvet chair and said, "Tom, do you think we can talk about this later? We're at the symphony! There are people everywhere!" He was like, "ok, fine." And...apparently "talking about this later" meant to him that as soon as the curtain fell for intermission, he could pounce on the topic again, "OK, so now tell me. What does it mean that we're on this date?" I'm sure my favorite professor, his wife, and his teenage kids were all biting their tongues while listening to this, and laughing their heads off after that concert. I fended off Tom's questions until the end when we walked to the car.
In retrospect, this guy sounds a little like Tom Haverford from Parks & Rec.
Lightning Frisbee Golf
On a blind date with a guy I'll call Lucas. Lucas picked me up on a windy, cloudy evening and took me to a park to play frisbee golf. This particular park is nestled at the base of a mountain, and the frisbee golf course actually sort of goes up the mountain. It's really challenging to even see the goals (or whatever they're called) through the scrub oak and tall grass. So we start trekking up a hill to get to the first spot. It's actually kind of steep, and the rocks and dirt are crumbly. Suddenly, the windy, cloudy weather picks up and I hear thunder, and look up at the mountain. Dark grey clouds start swirling around the mountain and actually, I'm not kidding, swiftly rolling down the mountain towards us. I keep scrambling up the hill, and finally get to the first spot. Then there is lightning and thunder happening almost simultaneously, and I can feel my hair starting to prickle. The rolling, slate grey mass of storminess coming off the mountain heads straight for us at basically the same speed as a train and is now 300 yards away. Now 250. This literally all happens within the 2 minutes it takes up to walk to the first spot.
For some reason, Lucas takes no notice of any of this. He starts getting his frisbees out of some duffel bag and I yell (I have to yell because the wind and thunder are so loud), "LUCAS! WE HAVE TO GET OFF THIS MOUNTAIN!" He looks over and is like, *sigh* "Ok." So I run down to a pavilion and get underneath just before it starts pouring buckets of rain. Then he and I sit on the cold aluminum table and chat for a while, it's a nice chat, and then go get smoothies at a store, which was a bad idea because we're already cold.
Making friends with strangers at the batting cage
Another blind date, pretend name Hartford, took me to BBQ. It was clear within about 5 seconds of BBQ that we were bored with each other, but he didn't even pretend to be polite. He leaned back in his chair, hands behind head, avoided eye contact, and just looked insanely bored while I tried to still ask nice questions. Finally he sort of shoved his chair back, stood up, and said, "wanna go to a batting cage?" I was surprised because he was not into me. I thought it sounded fun so I said sure. We went, and then he basically abandoned me and just started batting. It seemed he just wanted to go to a batting cage while he was in the area, and didn't care whether I was there or not. So I wandered away, made friends with some nice families, and hung out with them while their kids batted for an hour. It was fun! But worst date ever.
Note: If you happen to be featured in one of these worst dates, never fear! I actually still genuinely love all the people these stories are about, and in a strange way, these are some of the best dates I've had because they were so interesting and funny and awkward! And a lot of the awkwardness could have been avoided if I had been smarter. Let's all celebrate our weirdness! Yay!
Cabela's
During January one year, I had a terrible fever but for some reason was too scared to cancel a date. I thought it would seem "mean" or something (classic people-pleasing behavior). So this guy I barely knew picked me up, and told me he had a surprise date planned! Then he took me to Cabela's. I now know hunting sometimes actually helps promote the health of an ecosystem, but at the time, I was an extreme environmentalist and had been an animal-lover and afraid of hunting for all my life (as a child, I thought I was the fairy from Fern Gully). Just picture a feverish 20 year old me, stumbling around Cabela's, trying not to faint, throw up, or cry while looking at stuffed deer, and then sipping tomato soup while watching my date eat a bison burger. Yek.
Charlie Brown love letter
Once I took a small seminar class in college and ended up dating a guy in that class, we'll call him Jared, for a couple months. At one point, we had to turn in a nature journal to our professor, whom I knew very well from study abroad and previous classes. After we all turned in our journals, I left class. As I walked out of the building, I heard someone shouting my name and running after me. I turned around and saw Jared running towards me. Breathless, he handed me a piece of lined paper and said, "Here! This is a letter that I wrote for you and photocopied to put in my nature journal." Then he ran away. While walking home, I read the letter and alternately laughed and scowled at lines like this, "You are like a Charlie Brown Christmas tree. Not much to look at, but when a family takes you home, they want to keep you, year after year." A week later, my professor took me aside and said, "Um, I read Jared's nature journal. He wrote a letter about you--you know about it?" I was like, "Yeah, he gave it to me last week," My professor eyed me for a second and then said, "Yeah, you can do better than that guy."
Note: Jared and I actually ended up in another class a year later, and became really good friends. He's one of the kindest people I know. Perhaps also the funniest/worst analogy-maker I know.
DTR during the symphony
One guy (I'll call him Tom) I had been on about five dates with took me to the symphony, and we sat behind my favorite professor and his entire family. I said hi to them and introduced them to Tom, and then whispered to Tom, "I went on study abroad with that professor and his family! They are the best!" Tom nodded and we chatted for a couple minutes. Then he abruptly turned to me and said, "Yeah, yeah, so really. Tell me what you think about me. Do you like me? Are we dating?" I squirmed in my red velvet chair and said, "Tom, do you think we can talk about this later? We're at the symphony! There are people everywhere!" He was like, "ok, fine." And...apparently "talking about this later" meant to him that as soon as the curtain fell for intermission, he could pounce on the topic again, "OK, so now tell me. What does it mean that we're on this date?" I'm sure my favorite professor, his wife, and his teenage kids were all biting their tongues while listening to this, and laughing their heads off after that concert. I fended off Tom's questions until the end when we walked to the car.
In retrospect, this guy sounds a little like Tom Haverford from Parks & Rec.
Lightning Frisbee Golf
On a blind date with a guy I'll call Lucas. Lucas picked me up on a windy, cloudy evening and took me to a park to play frisbee golf. This particular park is nestled at the base of a mountain, and the frisbee golf course actually sort of goes up the mountain. It's really challenging to even see the goals (or whatever they're called) through the scrub oak and tall grass. So we start trekking up a hill to get to the first spot. It's actually kind of steep, and the rocks and dirt are crumbly. Suddenly, the windy, cloudy weather picks up and I hear thunder, and look up at the mountain. Dark grey clouds start swirling around the mountain and actually, I'm not kidding, swiftly rolling down the mountain towards us. I keep scrambling up the hill, and finally get to the first spot. Then there is lightning and thunder happening almost simultaneously, and I can feel my hair starting to prickle. The rolling, slate grey mass of storminess coming off the mountain heads straight for us at basically the same speed as a train and is now 300 yards away. Now 250. This literally all happens within the 2 minutes it takes up to walk to the first spot.
For some reason, Lucas takes no notice of any of this. He starts getting his frisbees out of some duffel bag and I yell (I have to yell because the wind and thunder are so loud), "LUCAS! WE HAVE TO GET OFF THIS MOUNTAIN!" He looks over and is like, *sigh* "Ok." So I run down to a pavilion and get underneath just before it starts pouring buckets of rain. Then he and I sit on the cold aluminum table and chat for a while, it's a nice chat, and then go get smoothies at a store, which was a bad idea because we're already cold.
Making friends with strangers at the batting cage
Another blind date, pretend name Hartford, took me to BBQ. It was clear within about 5 seconds of BBQ that we were bored with each other, but he didn't even pretend to be polite. He leaned back in his chair, hands behind head, avoided eye contact, and just looked insanely bored while I tried to still ask nice questions. Finally he sort of shoved his chair back, stood up, and said, "wanna go to a batting cage?" I was surprised because he was not into me. I thought it sounded fun so I said sure. We went, and then he basically abandoned me and just started batting. It seemed he just wanted to go to a batting cage while he was in the area, and didn't care whether I was there or not. So I wandered away, made friends with some nice families, and hung out with them while their kids batted for an hour. It was fun! But worst date ever.
Gather info. Write a book. Publish it at BYU Press. It's a textbook for Marriage Prep.
ReplyDeleteHaha just read this Darren! Great idea. Thesis: Get ready girls, this is real! Just embrace it. Find someone where you both love each other's craziness and you're fine getting weird love letters and risking your life on poorly planned dates with them!
DeleteThis is absolutely hilarious...
ReplyDelete