"Will get you to wear heels next time to compensate" Eew, no you won't!

Four updates for your reading pleasure:

1) Monday night I had dinner with my ex, Youngster McFriendlyGiant. This was not, as Blondie wanted it to be, a date where he confessed that he was still in love with me and wanted to get back together. Thank God, because that would have been awkward. Instead, it was two old friends getting together and catching up. We had a really nice time. No vote necessary, as this guy has been and always will be a bud.

2) Last night, as you know (and I'm sure have been anticipating), I was supposed to meet Ballsy McIndian for coffee. However, as the day progressed, my anxiety about having to go and meet this guy steadily increased. I got cold feet. So after consulting with both Blondie and HeyTallGirl, I came to the conclusion that the best option, in this instance, was to cancel the date. I played around with a number of different ways to cancel, but decided that just keeping it short and sweet would be the best way to deal with this.

I know some of you are disappointed that I didn't meet Ballsy for coffee "for the sake of the blog," but I just couldn't do it. Honestly, what would be the point? It would have been a big waste of my time and I couldn't bare to do that - waste my time. I just don't have enough of it. And you will see, by reading the text below, that I actually dodged a big shiny bullet by canceling on that date.

Yep, that's THREE separate text messages you see there, including one that clearly reinforces his tall girl fetish. Oh boy. It is official, this guy is a total, major, absolute FREAK!

3) Speedy McSwede called me on Monday night while I was out with Youngster. He didn't leave a message, so I called him back on my way home. We chatted for a few minutes ("How was your day." "Terrible." Wow, Debbie Downer much, Mr. McSwede? I jokingly wanted to say, "Could anything else go wrong?"). Finally, he got to the point and asked me out on a second date. After that Ey-ore conversation we'd just had, I considered saying "No thanks" but thought I should maybe give him another chance. And since my schedule is so packed this week, our only option was Sunday. So, Sunday will be date #2 with Speedy McSwede. Should be a rip-roarin' good time!

4) Also while I was out with Youngster, I got a call from another potenty who lives in SF. His name, for lack of creative inspiration, will be LovesFood McSanFrancisco. So far, our email interactions have been about restaurants we love and the Giants winning the World Series. Not bad. I had some doubts about him after listening to his gravelly "uh"-laden voicemail message, but after playing it for Blondie and my friend, NicestFriend McChurchGirl-Granola, they both decided I was being overly critical and that he actually didn't sound "slow" ("It sounds like he is getting over a cold," NicestFriend said. Of course, because she is so nice), as I initially classified him. So, I called him back (one full day later) and we made tentative plans to go to a restaurant he recommended in San Francisco this weekend. I need to call him back on Thursday to confirm. Can someone PLEASE remind me!?

All in all, things have slowed down a bit on Match. We'll see how things play out with all of my aforementioned McDudes (including Mr. McBulgaria who hasn't called me yet this week). And if nothing pans out, I'll get to winking again...

No, he's not a Viking

OK, I had two dates this weekend. The first was on Friday night and it was with Speedy McSwedester. All in all, this was an OK date. It was neither spectacular nor terrible. As per pretty much all of my dates, Speedy was a nice guy. My free dinner count went up another notch (Thank you Mr. McGentleman), which I really appreciate, but other than the fact that he was nice to look at and his Swedish accent sometimes caused him to mis-pronounce words (which I giggled at in my head each time he said them), there wasn't much else super interesting going on with Speedy. Of course, my friends have had fun making fun of me for going out with "a Viking" as they like to refer to him. "How was your date with Sven?" (not his name), my roommate, Triathlete McHouseHusband asked me. "How's Olaf?"(also not his name), was one I got from my other roommate - Skinny McBride-to-Be's dad (who is in town visiting for a couple of weeks). So, to spare you the trouble of even asking, the answer, people, is NO - we did not go to Ikea and have Swedish meatballs for dinner. And, NO - he wasn't listening to Bjork in his car. And, NO - he's not a Norseman.

Instead of Ikea (which, btw, of course I asked him if he frequents, and he says he DOES go there sometimes for the pickled Herring. Eeew), we actually met at a wine bar in Downtown Mountain View. We each enjoyed a flight of wine and some hummus, which he paid for with a Yelp! coupon (!!!), and this - I have to say - is actually something I really liked about the guy. A frugal man is a man after my own heart. Afterwards, he asked if I wanted to get dinner. Who am I to turn down dinner? Of course I said yes! We went to a Chinese restaurant across the street, which he was super excited about because he had spent some time in China. In my opinion, he was just a little obsessed with Chinese food. He got these big bug eyes when he was looking at the menu and he was practically salivating all over the table. But, to each his own. We ordered TONS of food and I ate WAY TOO MUCH (I paid for it the next morning), but it was super delicious. And, dinner was on him. Score!

So, on our date, I learned that he just moved here from Sweden in September and this is his first time living anywhere other than Sweden. That sounds like a pretty big move, right? Well, when I asked him if it was hard for him to leave his friends and family, he said, "Would it be bad if I said, 'No.'" I laughed uncomfortably and said, "Of course not!" But that is a lie! Yes, it's bad, you cold-hearted abandoner! And that's when I knew it wouldn't work. Blondie McSmartyPants told me once that she read in one of her ever-growing collection of dating advice books that the reason a guy doesn't call you back is often not the reason you think (he's not attracted to you, he had a terrible time on the date), but it's actually more often based on something you said that didn't click or resonate with him or made him go, "Hmmmm..." In this case, with Speedy, I think it was this comment about not having a problem leaving his friends and family that made me go, "Hmmmm..." If I up and moved myself to Sweden one day, let me tell you this right now, I would be a DISASTER, crying for years probably, because I missed my friends and family so much. So, between his black heart and awkward, one-word responses to some of my questions ("Do you like red wine?" "Yes." "Are you close with your family?" "No." "Is pickled Herring tasty?" "Yes." Come on dude, throw me a bone here!), my final vote is simply going to have to be: Bud.

Now, last night's date, with VolleyBaller McBulgarian was a much more promising experience. We went to an Indian restaurant in Santa Clara that I recommended ("I know a really good Indian restaurant in Santa Clara" - say that with an Indian accent, please). He had mentioned in his profile that he loved Indian food, so in our email exchanges, we discussed our favorites in the area. He had never been to this one and - as I suspected - he was impressed. I told him that you can always tell it's a good Indian restaurant if there are actually lots of Indian people eating there. We were seriously SURROUNDED by McIndians. Except for one McAfrican who was sitting behind us. So the place was for sure legit.

One judgmental side note: so I could sort of tell from his profile pics that his hair was a little thin on top, but when I saw him in person, I noticed some serious balding action. Thankfully, bald is the new boyfriend and I don't actually care about a dude's hair (unless it is long and stringy. No Allman Brothers wannabes, thank you very much), so that didn't bother me in the slightest. Plus, he rocked it.

Overall, our date was pretty great. But when I attempted to rate my date over the phone last night with Blondie, I at first gave it a B+. I don't know why, except maybe for the fact that I am scared to rate any dates too high because then I run the risk of getting let down later on down the road. She slapped me upside the head through the phone, though, and told me the date should at least be given an A-. And she's right. Here's why: 1) He's cute. 2) He laughed at my jokes. 3) He made me laugh. 4) He's 6'5". Enough said. 5) He profiled me based on my astrological sign (WHAT? I know! That should totally be #1, right? AND, here's the best part. He was right! He was like, "You're a natural leader because you're an Aries." He's a Taurus, btw. In case you were wondering). 6) He paid for dinner (Oh, and here's a tip for you ladies - the best way to guarantee your date will pay for dinner is to get up and go to the bathroom just as or just before the bill comes. This way there is no akwardness and you don't have to take out your wallet and even pretend like you're going to pay! It's genius and works every time). 7) He asked if I wanted to go out again way before our date was even over. 8) He walked me to my car. Awwwww. I like him. We have a second date scheduled for Saturday afternoon. Right now, he's ranking pretty high on the stud-o-meter, but no votes just yet. We'll see how date #2 goes...

If at first you don't succeed...

...dust yo'self off and try AGAIN! Aaaaand that's what I'm doing.

Yeah... after the overwhelming feeling of rejection that I suffered this weekend, I decided to jump right back on to match.com with full force - new profile, new attitude. So I updated my profile and got to winking. And now I've got three dates coming up in the next week. Only one is from match.com, though.

Speedy McSwedester is a tall, athletic Swedish guy who recently moved to the Bay Area. His email subject line said, "Wanna go for a run sometime?" HA! Did you laugh out loud, too? I told him I'd go for a run with him, but it would be more like me running really slowly and him taking a walk next to me. Anyway, he seems like a pretty cool guy. He's a semi-pro cyclist, which is a little intimidating, but we'll see how things go. We have a date scheduled for Friday night.

I gave in to Ballsy McIndian (we met in the cereal aisle at Target, remember?) only because I am 99.9% certain that our date will lead to some really good blogging material. Is it bad to agree to dates "for the sake of the blog"? Because that has pretty much been my tagline lately. Either way, it appears he has moved from his tall girl fetish to a more appropriate obsession with my job as a teacher, as his "future career interest is in that direction." So, we're having coffee on Tuesday next week. Wish me luck!

And then, on a particularly odd note, I saw one of my exes at my triathlon practice last Saturday and we made plans to have dinner at this restaurant in Mountain View that I apparently told him I'd take him to while we were dating (I do not remember that at all), but I never did. Whoops. That's what you get for breaking up with me. So, Youngster McFriendlyGiant and I are going to dinner on Monday night at above-referenced restaurant. However, just for clarification, this is not a date-with-a-potential-husband situation. That ship has sailed. I never felt particularly sad about our breakup and we have remained semi-friends. So THIS is just two friends meeting for dinner. However, I will still blog about it because blogging about people when they don't know I'm doing it is so much fun!