Date #14

"So tell me about the new date," asked Schmoozer.

I was seated in a booth at a bar on Saturday afternoon. I had just finished with my first kickball game of the season with the new team I had joined. Schmoozer and Swayze had met me for post-game beers.

"I'm hopeful. He's in his early thirties, dark hair, 5'11"," I gave a fist pump over the height. "Strikes me as an Apple geek, which is hot."

"What does he do?"

"He's an engineer."

"Eww," said Schmoozer.

"What?"

"You know what that means?"

"Socially awkward," we both said at the same time.

"We'll see. The only thing that bugs me is that he misspelled 'restaurant' in his e-mail to me."

"Omigod, Sarah," he sighed.

"No! What bugs me is that it wasn't even a typo like 'restuarant.' He spelled it 'rest-er-aunt.'"

Swayze finally spoke up. "I may not be a great speller," he said, "But I'm smart enough to use a browser that has spell check on it."

I pointed at him, "Exactly! That's my point. I mean, what if this guy uses Internet Explorer?"

Schmoozer shuddered and leaned back from the table. "Yeah, that'd be a solid reason to not date him right there," he agreed, laughing.

I never did find out what browser Date #14 used. We met at the resteraunt of his choosing, which happened to not even be open that day. I said it was okay. It's the South and it's the Bible Belt and you never can tell what is or isn't open on Sundays. I followed him a few blocks to another tapas resteraunt.

And it just wasn't a match. Nothing good or bad happened. I wasn't particularly attracted to him, which I felt horrible about since I initiated the match. He had one of those really awkward smiles which I found off putting. Initiate hate mail here, but the bottom line is the smile wouldn't have mattered if I had liked him; instead I'd be writing about how endearing it was. But he did not reveal any significant medical problems such as spontaneous lung collapse from drugs or rashes from direct sunlight.

He did, however, frequently mention an ex-girlfriend. After a couple of name droppings, I finally asked about her.

"We were together for six months and she dumped me six weeks ago, saying that if deeper feelings were to develop, it would have happened by now. We still talk... but... no, I don't think I'll get back together with her."

"Wait. You were with her until six weeks ago?" I asked.

"Yeah."

"We were matched by eHarmony in November. You had an active profile during your relationship?"

"Yeah, I got into a relationship with her one month into my year-long membership." He paused, "I didn't check it."

Sure. I buy that.

But it was a nice enough time. I can sit and talk with anybody about anything, which is what I ended up doing. It just wasn't for me.