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Tuesday, Nov 10, 2009
A photo of Oliver North, wildly untamed pubic hair, a guy who kept pronouncing "phallic" as "fay-lic" ... and other discoveries that ended the date.
Oct 15, 2003 | I met a woman through a personals ad in a local free newspaper. Our first date was an amazing time for both of us -- we spent over 28 hours together, napped in each other's beds (and no, we didn't have sex), went to a party at a friend's place, where she got to meet some of the cool, smart people I count as associates. A classic great time.
I should have known that this couldn't be sustained.
The second date was weird from the moment it started -- and the ending was the killer. I was in her living room while she was in her kitchen, making tea. I noticed a picture of her with a guy who looked oddly familiar. He had his arm around her waist, and they looked quite cozily friendly. Squinting and leaning in for a closer look, all of a sudden I realized the identity of the guy. Calling out to her, I asked, "Hey, is this guy..."
Before I could get the name out of my mouth, she leaned out of the kitchen, saw what I was looking at, and snapped, "That's Ollie [as in Oliver North], and I don't want to talk about it."
At that point, I asked her if she had any strong political tendencies I should know about (the topic of politics never came up on the first date).
She planted her hands on her hips, assumed a defensive body position, and said, "I am a conservative Republican."
To which I responded, "And I'm outta here."
I remember the stunned look on her face as I raced out the door.
I left and never looked back. I'm not an angel, but I'll be damned if I'm going to get involved with someone who slept with a demon.
-- David
My AA sponsor Tom, of all people, persuaded me to accept his invitation to dinner. He was 40, single, fit and somewhat attractive. I'm a vegetarian, and Tom appeared to be a gentleman, so he suggested that I choose the place.
We met at one of my favorite restaurants, a funky vegetarian place with cheerful modern art on the walls. During the appetizers, Tom let me know that he hoped to convert me to his brand of fundamentalist Christianity -- I'm Buddhist. When we started the main course, he tried to persuade me to eat meat and told me a long story about working in a turkey slaughterhouse where they played classical music to calm the birds, and said their deaths were quick and painless. When I finally managed to change this odd dinner conversation, he told me proudly that he lived in the basement of a rented townhouse, with 17 -- count 'em, 17! -- computers and four different networks.
After the one-hour-and-15-minute dinner, which was one hour and 14 minutes too long, he tried to persuade me to go out with him again -- but I declined and got away as quickly as possible. Sometimes a date is nothing but a series of deal breakers.
-- Anonymous
Marc was tall and blond with great physical presence. Losing his hair but in just the right way. Electric blue eyes. But there was something he did that was odd. Every other word he said was "phallic." Phallic this, phallic that, phallic phallic phallic. But the really grating thing about it was that he mispronounced the word. He pronounced it, "FAY-lik." Now I'm not judging the guy for being consumed with phallicism. We all have our quirks. But if you're obsessed with something, you should at least be able to pronounce it.
-- Kim
I'm a fairly funky girl -- writer, designer, vegetarian, political liberal, etc. So I'm on the turnpike one day when I run out of gas. The state trooper who finally showed up was adorable, and we seemed to really hit it off. I know what everyone always says about law enforcement, but I just couldn't resist. He told great stories, and he called me three times the first chance he got!
Well, we start going out, and although I gave him my deal-breaker test early on (does he like animals? will he give oral sex?), he wound up not only breaking the deal by lying about his answers to the above questions, but adding insult to injury by saying that my house smelled because of my dogs (it doesn't; I'm a clean freak, and they're poodles, for God's sake), and that I was selfish because I wouldn't give him oral sex (only because he wouldn't reciprocate!). And then, if that weren't enough, one day he said the fateful words that meant we couldn't even be friends: "Did you happen to listen to Rush today?"
-- Jennifer
The eight deal breakers that did us in:
1. She had a Mel Gibson poster.
2. She was a Christian, which was fine, but she was reading one of those Revelation novels.
3. Her son was arrested for sexual abuse.
4. Wouldn't trim pubic hair, at all.
5. Didn't brush teeth at night.
6. Wanted to see a Brad Pitt movie.
7. Made quilts all the time.
8. Wanted a luxury car.
-- Anonymous
I was at a date's house and she asked me to get some ice from her freezer. Things between us were heating up that night, and altogether it had been a nice evening. While getting the ice, though, I found her dead ferret frozen right next to the ice cube trays. She tried to explain ("I'm from Wisconsin and I want to take it home to bury it") but all I could think of was seeing that little shriveled paw sticking out of the aluminum foil.
-- James
