Bad (So Bad They're Funny) Dates

This is our first attempt at a co-authored post on our blog. For reference, anything written by Diana is in blue, and Emily has written in purple. Stories are just left in black.

Today at work I (Diana) logged on to Twitter and saw a conversation happening between Emily and a mutual friend from college. They were sharing "war stories" about some of the dates that they've been on, and I found myself laughing out loud at some of the ridiculousness of people out there in the dating game.

So Emily and I have decided to poll some of the people we know for some of their best/worst bad date stories.

All names have been changed to protect the "victims" and "perpetrators" of these dating disasters!

"Ok, so I was out on a date with this guy (maybe a second date?), and I thought it was going well. I made a joke. He looks at me completely seriously, and says 'Do you think you're funny? Because you're not...' I waited for him to laugh, like he was making a joke. He didn't laugh. He was COMPLETELY serious. I mean, what do you say to that? I said 'F--k you, I AM funny' and then after a few awkward moments, the date continued. I should have walked out! How can you be so rude?"

"I had known this guy, T, for a few years. We had an off and on again thing, nothing serious - just fun times together. We went to college in different states, and would hang out when we were both in the same town. Well, we're chatting online one night, being flirty back and forth, and out of nowhere he tells me that I'm just like candy corn: Me: What does that mean? T: Well, you know how candy corn is only around for part of the year around Halloween? Me: Yeah.... T: Well, when it's not around you have really great memories of how good it is. You almost start to crave it. Me: Ok... (at this point I think I'm flattered) T: But then when you have it, it's really good at first, and then the more you have of it, the less awesome it becomes. In fact, you have so much of it, it starts to make you sick and you don't want to have it again. Until you get some distance, and then you start to want it again? Me: ....

That was pretty much the end of that situation"

Much like dear Diana, I have been on my fair share of bad dates.(much like EVERYONE!) Hell, I once went on a bad romantic getaway (a story for another time). I've been dating since I was about 12, and I am extremely talented at dating the wrong guy. This conversation between Diana and I started when I tweeted about a recent date I had with a fella I refer to as "The Russian" (this is because he is from Russia).

The Russian was cute, and we had talked on the phone prior to the date and save hardly being able to get a word in (he was very talkative) I thought we had good potential for an excellent first date. Well, apparently we didn't. He didn't seem terribly talkative when he arrived. After we sat down, he reminded me that he was a new vegetarian and I could instantly tell that he wouldn't appreciate me eating meat. Right. There was seriously only about 4 non-meat meals on this menu. (I went with grilled cheese). He finally got talking, but the subjects were terribly serious and weighty for a first date. When I asked why he gave up meat, he launched in a diatribe about how wrong it is to kill animals. Ok, I can totally dig that. But then he started bombarding me with questions about why I are meat? Why? Because I find it delicious. Do I feel guilty about killing cows? No, that's why we raise them (sorry to any vegetarians out there). I am normally ok with defending my meat lovin' ways, but he was persistent, and tried very hard to make me hate meat. Then we started talking about religion (he's an atheist raised Jewish). Yeah, THAT was fun. Then he started a discussion about why I wasn't special. You read that right - I was not special. Me. In particular. I actually thought he was joking. He kept saying "It's not like your Einstein..." At the end of the meal he revealed that he left his credit card in his car, and though he did go get it (and I sat there thinking I was being stiffed with the bill), I new that that was a little suspicious. When we left the restaurant, he actually argued with me about how I should get home (seriously dude, I know where I live). So... needless to say, there was not a second date.

Some responses to my facebook post about looking for bad date stories:

"Jesse had been asking me out for several weeks now and finally I said yes. I got a babysitter for my daughter who was about 3 at the time. Jesse went all out for the first date. He was on my doorstep at exactly 7pm. When I opened the door he had flowers for me and a toy for my daughter. Kinda weird but was a nice thought. He brought me to the Melting Pot. After dinner we were heading back to the car. Jesse ended up puking all over the hood of the car. It was gross. He apologized and then got into the car where he puked again. I ended up getting splashed with vomit cause it bounced off the dashboard. I asked if he was ok and he said yes and he apologized again. I said it was no biggie and then told him I would prefer to take a cab home. Jesse gave me some cash for the cab ride and we parted ways."

AND

"At a friend's wedding one of her new husband's friends, Mike, wanted my number so he gave it to him. Mike called and we spoke several time. He seemed nice so I agreed to go out for drinks. Mike picked me up. After I got into the car, Mike leaned over and said 'This is the date rape car since the passenger side door handle is broken and you cant get out'. Holy crap! Who had my friend and her husband set me up with?! The date went down hill from there. Nothing happened, apparently Mike was nervous and he is known to say some stupid things but seriously! Calling you car a "date rape car" is not a good idea!"

A winning clip from another experience of mine:

First date with Chris (senior year of college): He showed up at my apartment 30 mins late. I asked if I should eat something before we go to the movie, or if we were getting dinner. He said "Oh, we'll get dinner first." So I didn't eat. When we get close to the movie theater, we're low on time, so he asks if Taco Bell is ok. I said sure, even though I was hoping for a nice meal. He said, "well it's up to you, you're the only one eating." Excuse me? I thought I didn't eat cause you wanted to. So I grab some Taco Bell (omg at least it was good) and we head to the theater. At least he paid for my movie. After the movie he comes over to my apartment, and I decided that even though the night was eh, I'd invite him up. So we were kissing on my couch when he went for more. I said "no, not tonight," and he screams "MY SISTER WAS RAPED IN HIGH SCHOOL!" Then stomps off to the bathroom. When he came out he yelled some more about knowing that no means no and then left still screaming about rape. Two months later he was my barista at Starbucks. I IMed him later about why he didn't say hi. His response "What? Emily, you were just a bar in the music of my life." Craz-Zy.
OH! Guess who had ANOTHER bad date last night? This girl!!

He picked me up from work (nice!) and we ended up going to play Candle Pin bowling, since I had never been. We played three games, and I almost won twice. While sitting there chatting afterward, his phone rang twice. He picked up both times without an "excuse me" and had full and lengthy conversations. (And when the person on the other end obviously asked what he was doing he said "Nothing, just finished bowling" - NOTHING??) I figured that would be the end of the evening, because he was all talking, but then we got in the car and just started driving. He asked what I wanted to do, and since it was almost 8 and I hadn't eaten since noon, I said food. He wasn't that hungry, so he suggested just a snack... um ok? We ended up at this random Irish pub in Brighton/Lower Allston that we drove by and he thought he would check out for his ski club meetings. We ended up there for a few hours, I had three drinks, but he never suggested food. A good hour of the time he spent talking to the owner, but when we did talk we actually had a nice time. Then he drove me home. And I never had dinner.

One last story for the books:

"I had gone out with this guy a couple of times, and he was nice enough. We got along fairly well, and always had fun when we went out. At that point I was living about 20 minutes from him (he was still in school), and one weekend night he sends me a text message that he wants to hang out with me. It's late. He'd been at a Frat party. I could put together the puzzle pieces. Well, he tells me that he's going to come over, and I say "sure" - no big deal. He texts me that he's leaving his house, and he'll be there in about 20 minutes. The time passes, and it's now been about an hour. He's not at my place, and I assume that he decided not to come, so I get ready for bed. At about 1:30 AM I get a phone call from him. He's at the police station. Turns out he was a little intoxicated when he headed over to me, headed off the road, got stuck in a ditch, and when he tried to get out a cop came by to help him. The cop smelled alcohol on his breath so gave him a breathalyzer. He was right around the limit, so they towed his car to an impound lot and took him to the police station. He was calling to ask if I could come and pick him up. I do. He's stone sober at this point, but he still asks to come over. I find out in the morning that the reason he wanted to come to my place instead of taking him home was so that I could take him back to the impound lot in the morning to pick up his car. That was pretty much the last time I saw him, as the next time I spoke to him he blamed me for making him come over."

Update: This just in from a male reader:

"I don’t tend to talk about bad dates unless someone else brings up their bad date stories, but recently that happened. My most recent bad date (and by recent I mean 6 months ago) was with a girl I thought seemed pretty cool. We had somethings in common, yada, yada and then we were chatting and she said “so when are you going to ask me out?” ... I didn’t think much of it because maybe I was taking a long time to ask her out, but I didn’t think a week was THAT long. Anyways, we went out for sushi and while we were waiting for our food and such I noticed she started picking her nose. I didn’t say anything because maybe she had an itch. But after she kept doing it and doing it I was like this is 1. disgusting 2. such a turn off! It was one pick after another pick onto the next pick! I’m like (to myself) “Is there anything else up there to pick?”. I don’t really remember if it was an actually good date because this is all that I remembered, this girl picking her nose for an hour!

My next story was years ago when I first joined JDate... I’ve learned a LOT since then. We met up at a bar in Brighton to get drinks. Had drinks, had a conversation but all I could pay attention to was her ugly mole on her face. I know you’re suppose to pay attention to the girls eyes but I couldn't. My eyes kept wondering to this mole on her face. It was horrible. Disgusting. You mean the bad word, that was it! So after having a horrible time that lasted 60 minutes, she asked the waitress for a hot coffee... who gets a coffee when you just had an alcoholic drink? So she got coffee which meant I was going to star at this awful mole for another 15 minutes!!! I was in pure hell.

Some online dating advice. Don’t go out with everyone you speak with. If you connect right away online, there is usually a chance it might be a good and/or decent first date... of course no guarantee... sorry! I don’t know what non-Jewish dating is like, but the Jewish community is actually pretty small. If you’re JDate, the chances you see JDaters around town are VERY HIGH."