The Three Date Weekend

Boy am I tired.

Just kidding. It wasn’t that eventful. But it was busy:

Friday night: date #3 with Frizzhead. Meh. No chemistry. It felt like I was having a chat with the stranger seated next to me on the plane. So move on to…

Saturday afternoon: date with 14-email guy. Turns out he’s a grumpy grad student with a chip on his shoulder about his department and talked about himself the whole time. (“I was forced to learn Flash but I refuse to apply it. Static cartography is far superior, but I seem to be the only person left who realizes this.”) So move on to…

Saturday evening: date with the DJ Chemist. Yes, for those of you keeping score at home, that adds up to three dates in 24 hours. And no, you haven’t heard about the DJ Chemist yet.

This guy had future professor written all over him. He’s already got the persona down: The slow, deliberate talking, the premeditated jokes that are more aimed at personal gratification than an outside audience, and the rather annoying property of not directly answering your question because there is a tangential question that he thinks is more important for you to comprehend.

For example, I asked him when he started DJing. After pausing, he responded, “That depends (pause) when you consider (pause) the beginning to have begun.”

Wha…SERIOUSLY? I didn’t realize I was on a date with Bill Clinton. Somebody get me a cigar.

Fifteen minutes into the date I had already written him off and began wondering what would constitute a reasonable amount of time before I could leave without bruising his ego. I try to follow the campsite rule for dating: Try to leave your date’s sense of self-worth in at least as good of shape as you found it in.

And then, the unexpected: he began to grow on me. Maybe it was the breadth of topics that we covered, maybe it was the smoothness with which he introduced zombies into the conversation, or perhaps it was how he lightheartedly enjoyed me making fun of him when he, say, went to ridiculous grammatical lengths to prevent splitting his infinitive. If you’re going to do that, it’s best to not fear being laughed at. (If you got that joke, I’ve got a guy for you to meet.)

We ended up walking to a park and watching the sunset over the lake while covering topics such as energy storage methods for biennials, microwave frequencies, and Greek/French fusion pastries. We also had a contest to see who could be more smug. I won.

So three hours later I found myself enjoying the company of the man I had written off 15 minutes in. Which goes to show….something, I’m sure.

Or maybe it’s just third time’s the charm.