DISCLAIMER: Names and identifying features have been altered or hidden to protect… ME. TO PROTECT *ME*! ME, okay?!
“It was the best first date I’ve ever been on. …Not that that’s saying much,” I shouted in my friend’s ear.
Sara turned away from the stage and grinned at me.
“Let me see his picture!”
I hesitated. “They don’t really do him justice… He’s REALLY cute. And tall! And has great teeth.”
I thought back to the previous evening. I had walked into a popular restaurant, the usual butterflies-or-is-that-just-dread filling my stomach, and a handsome guy had grinned at me expectantly.
Nope. Wrong color hair. Not him. …Shoot.
Further down, I had spotted a familiar face.
“Jules, hi!” the man had greeted.
I had been pleasantly surprised by his, well, everything.
“So you just moved here?” he had begun, and the conversation had flowed from there.
I had been in shock. A tall, attractive man, in his 30s like me, financially and hygienically sound, AND he had known how to ask questions? Well, I’ll be. A normal first date!
I had had to shake off the memory of my only other first date in my new hometown. Maybe the Oregon dating pool really would put New Jersey’s to shame! Please don’t do anything weird, please don’t do anything weird…
The date had lasted a record-breaking four hours, and ended on the promising note of future hang-outs.
“But my gut is still saying no,” I had texted to a few friends. “It was like hugging my brother goodbye.”
I had wanted to slap myself. What was wrong with me? Over the next 24 hours, I wrestled with whether or not to text him. He had left the ball in my court, and the decision to reach out felt like trying to decide between Oreos or Nutter Butters.
“Come on, show me his picture!” Sara insisted.
I reluctantly pulled out my phone and found his online dating profile, holding it out to her.
“JULES. OH MY GOD. NO. NO!” she shouted, staring at me with wide eyes.
“What. What?!” I replied, my heart stopping.
“THIS IS THE GUY I TOLD YOU ABOUT,” she said. “HE’S. CRAZY.”
Sara started recounting details – details fresh in my mind because she had indeed told me the tale several weeks earlier when we’d first met and exchanged dating war stories.
Yup. She too had been out with my tall, handsome, “normal” guy.
“He’s the rage-a-holic who told me to buy Magnum condoms and badmouthed his ex the ENTIRE TIME! MY WORSE DATE EVER! ”
I scooped my jaw off the floor. “Oh my god! I’m showing you every photo from now on! Jesus. This IS a small town.”
“I’m sorry,” she said.
“What? Are you kidding? HE HAS GUNS. You saved me!”
Her face crumpled a little more.
“I’m so sorry that was your best first date!”
I burst out laughing. “I told you it wasn’t saying much.”
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
What do you think? Should I give him another shot (pun, um, actually NOT intended, but now that it’s out there…)?
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Go Jules Go 
Oh Hell. What are the chances your best first date would be your friend’s psycho? I say run far, run fast.
Maybe you should start scoping perspective partners at the dog park. Dogs have an uncanny bullshit detector.
Right?! The only problem with that plan is that usually it ends with Uncle Jesse stealing the show.
ha! I had a crazy gun guy date as well! ))
No. Nooo! I so didn’t want this to be a ‘thing’!
You’re kidding, right? About going on a second date. I wouldn’t touch that one with a ten foot pole and neither would your intuition. Run away. Far away. Like Rivergirl said.
Now that I live in this crazy-outdoorsy town, I’ve been peer pressured into running again. Little did I know how much it might come in handy…
I love how universal it is before showing a picture to say, “This picture doesn’t do him justice. He’s much better looking in real life.” I’m going to try showing pictures after first saying, “Just to warn you, this picture is doing her a huge favor. She’s much uglier in real life.”
My first impulse is to say I’d never date anyone with a gun, but on second thought, someone with a gun can be very persuasive.
I may have done an actual spittake -TIMES TWO- at this.
What I’m trying to say is: You owe me a new laptop.
Oh. My. God. No, no, no. I think another epic chat is in order….
An epic chat with you is ALWAYS in order. In order to keep me sane.
I would also vote no. But, if you decide otherwise…please write about it!
I keep peeking back at the dating apps and I swear to chipmunks it is only -ONLY- for the blog fodder.
If your friend isn’t crazy, I say don’t do it!!!
Oh she’s nuts, but the good kind. I kid! I would trust her with my wine rack, I mean, life.
Haaaaa!
O,M.G. Oh wow….um, I say go with your gut on this one? Although if you did meet up with him again, and if he started to badmouth your friend, you could call him on his BS? (Just think how interesting that could be….) He doesn’t know where you live, right? Oh, I am so living vicariously through you right now, it’s not even funny!
I’m pretty much looking over my shoulder every time I leave the house these days. After gathering historical data, I think there’s at least a two week to two year recovery time needed after these dates. I’m hoping this time it’s the former because I’m trying to keep up the weekly blog posts 😉
The Second Amendment protects his right to own guns, but, ironically, not to amend his impression on the second date. So no.
Do any Amendments protect my right to weep while eating peanut butter out of the jar and watching New Girl as the alternative to dating?
That sounds like a cruel and unusual punishment, so probably not.
Probably not…and not cuz I am hoping you will move out here and find me irresistable…lol
I just think that friends know things and look out for each other well, especially if you are new to a city. I have been in Portland a couple of times and the people are wonderful…mostly. It’s the “mostly” you have to watch out for. Consider the advice sound and move on. Bullets can be hard to dodge twice.
Excellent advice! I’ve still had the thought of, “But he SEEMED so nice…” and had to remind myself of everything you just said!