Sunday, November 8, 2015

Boring With a Capital B

I had a boring date the other weekend. Now, don't feel sorry for me because I've had more than my fair share of good ones so I guess it was time for a bad one.

I wasn't getting a good vibe from this guy in the lead up to our meet 'n greet. He was a terrible texter and I don't just mean he replied with a couple of words. Sometimes he wouldn't reply until the next day

This makes it really hard to get to know someone and keep a conversation going when hours go by and they haven't replied.

After a couple of weeks we'd organised to meet up but I had to cancel when I lost my voice and could hardly talk. Now I hate being cancelled on at the best of times so a lame "I'm sick, can we reschedule?" text wouldn't have cut it for me so I gave him the courtesy of a call.

(Not to mention my lack of voice cemented I was really sick).

We chatted for about half an our (which I was surprised with due to his terrible texting ability). The conversation itself wasn't the best as I could hardly talk and every second sentence he's like "sorry, what did you say?".

Forward another week and our date night had finally arrived. I arrived early and he was late. He caught the train and jumped off at the wrong stop so I sat drinking by myself until he arrived.

Now this guy's photos were all different so I wasn't exactly sure what he would look like. Unfortunately he looked a lot older than his five years on me and I couldn't stop staring at his grandpa white Bonds single poking out the top of his shirt.

Apart from neither of us drinking beer, wine, tea or coffee, we didn't have much more in common. Our conversation was so boring we were talking about what he ate for morning tea at work (boiled eggs on rye toast for $6.50 from the cafeteria).

I'm not a big cook myself so one of the traits I look for in a guy is someone who can cook. This guy was quite proud to tell me he hadn't cooked a meal in two years.

When he didn't text back frequently I started to take it personally, but after spending three hours with the guy I realised he just can't be bothered. Can't be bothered to message back, can't be bothered to cook, just can't be bothered to make an effort.

During our date we bar hopped to four places and each time we left the last place I was planning my escape. I was even messaging a friend telling her how boring it was and I wanted to leave.

But there in lies the problem. How do you leave without hurting their feelings? If I'm honest with myself, the majority of dates I've been on, the guys has been the one to make the move to leave first, rather than me. Probably because I'm always enjoying myself and want the date to go on.

But this guy was boring with a capital B.

After too many awkward silences I decide to leave. He's mid-drink so I figure this is my time to go. I considered waiting until he'd finished, but then I didn't want that awkward-end-of-date-moment when we walk out together and stand awkwardly at the taxi rank. So I did the really mature thing of making my run for it when he's still got a drink to finish.

It's not nice, I know, but I'd stayed about an hour-and-a-half longer than I'd wanted so I said I was going to go home, gave him a hug and left.

I thought he got the hint I wasn't keen, but he sent a very generic 'how did you pull up after last night?' text the following day. I waited 24 hours to reply (he still didn't get the hint) and my message was very non-committal.

I thought our very average date spoke for itself. Apparently it didn't.