RYAN'S DATE #2
Key Takeaways: Sometimes you don't see it coming.
Vitals:
Name: Kevin: he loves the film Parasite, so I named him after the lead.
Length of date: Two Hours
How the date was obtained: He asked! Outta nowhere.
Where: Ralph's in Sherman Oaks/My Apartment
There we were on opposite ends of my roommate's couch watching Youtube videos. I was telling Kevin about last week's date (it turns out Owen was married and didn't tell me!) Kevin stopped me.
Kevin: "So, could I maybe take you on a date this week?"
Ryan: "Huh. Yeah. I'm down."
Kevin: "Could I do it now?"
It was 11pm, so our options were limited. After perusing Google, we settled on a trip to the grocery store. I told Kevin to leave for thirty seconds, knock on the door, and he could pick me up for the date. So he left.
Kevin had moved to Los Angeles from Ohio right when the pandemic hit. We became friends the first night I rejoined Tinder and, eventually, started hanging out as buds. He became a part of my quarantine bubble (we'd even been camping). I honestly discounted the attraction we'd first mentioned online because I enjoyed his friendship so much. To say I was surprised would be an understatement.
Kevin knocked. I answered. We pretended we were meeting for the first time. We started with basic first-date trivia, pretending to be shocked by each other's answers. Kevin's a sweet, lanky goofball with a cute smile and a huge heart. He's creative, he's talented, and he's honest. It'd be hard not to love talking to him. Pretty soon we were having a grand old time in the nighttime lights.
I gave him my jacket because he was cold and Kevin held the door to Ralph's like a gentleman. We took our time in every aisle, making the most of our time. He called it "inefficient," I called it "fun." I bought him ice cream and a little stuffed animal from the clearance section as a memento.
On the way back to my apartment, we shared a quick kiss in the alley. The kiss felt right so we did it again.
Somehow the date was perfect for who we are to each other: low-key, fun, comfortable, and sweet. It turns out I'm a sucker for grocery store romance.
Overall Experience:
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
The future for us… To be honest, I'm in a complicated place emotionally. That being said, Kevin's the kind of person I'd want to date when I'm ready. And we haven't stopped hanging out. Who knows?
Next Week: There's a wide world of possibilities and I legitimately don't know yet.
SKYLAR'S DATE #2
Key Takeaways: Face time dates are great first dates
Vitals:
Name: Patrick because of the results of the BuzzFeed quiz we took together
Length of date: 2.5 hours or so
How the date was obtained: Hinge
Where: My bed. Get your heads out of the gutter, it was a video date. And I have a very uncomfortable desk chair.
I was supposed to go on my video date with Patrick this past weekend but, unfortunately, some unforeseen work issues required me to be in zoom meetings late into the evening and I had to postpone the day of our original plan. I was worried that he was going to feel like I was trying to avoid the date, but he ended up being relaxed and understanding. He just said no worries and let me know he’d love to hear from me when things settled down. Awesome. No pressure. Eventually, I reached out to him to reschedule and we planned a video date for that night.
I didn’t expect to feel this way but . . . FaceTime dates are kind of fantastic. You don’t have to drive anywhere, only one half of you has to be presentable, and you have complete control of your environment, which definitely helped me relax. You don’t even have to wear pants! I mean you probably should, but you will not be written up for indecent exposure if you don’t. It’s a very low maintenance, convenient way of going on a date, especially if you haven’t quite decided how much time and effort you want to invest in getting to know the other person. Moving forward, I think doing a virtual date as a kind of screener might be my go-to move.
I would pay a decent amount of money to be able to read Patrick's blog post about this date. I think he'd say, "She was super fun to talk to, but I was a little worried when I saw the crazy cat lady glint in her eye as she began listing off different cheese related names for her non-orange kitten." And you know what, that would be an accurate description. I may have gone a little far when I told him I'd reserved @detective_cheddar on Instagram in case that's the name I end up choosing. But also, any one of my friends will tell you that if given the chance, I will talk about my pets or even just pets that I’ve met for hours at a time. That's part of the deal regardless of what kind of relationship I have with you, and Patrick needed to know that.
Don't worry, I am socially aware and didn't allow myself to reach my full animal talk potential. Because I can truly go on for hours. Patrick and I moved onto the topic of favorite quarantine show binges and found a shared love of Schitt's Creek. Conveniently, we had both finished the show last month. I shared one of my favorite hobbies, taking meaningless BuzzFeed quizzes, with him and we worked through one telling us which Schitt’s Creek character we were. Honestly, it was kind of a great activity and allowed us to describe ourselves in a low-pressure way. His result was Patrick, by far the most grounded person on the show. Encouraging. Oh, and I got Moira. This silliness led into an interesting conversation about wealth in America and ideals. Patrick shared some of his political leanings with me while caveating that there are still lots of things he has yet to learn and that the election this past year really encouraged him to research, ask his own questions, and try to grow. I felt like he was open-minded and loved that he was taking an active role in his personal growth.
Overall Experience:
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
The future for us… It was super fun getting to know Patrick! We kept it pretty light-hearted so I'd definitely be interested in getting to Patrick on a deeper level. We talked about doing a similar video date or doing some kind of social-distanced date moving forward, so we'll see.
Next Week: I don't have a date lined up yet and have really been slacking in terms of responding to people. I am in the process of moving, so perhaps someone can be convinced to assemble furniture and organize all of my knick knacks with me.