Dropping the Hammer

In the interest of pursuing a worthwhile, good kind of relationship with another human being, I had accessed date three and previous two dates scientifically and have taken the advisement of at least four other female dating science researchers. There have been some unsettling factors in these three dates which have come up again and again.

Factor one --physical disinterest. No touching or attempted touching. Even more unsettling, no verbal queue which would denote physical interest, such as compliments or direct use of name during lengthy and non-lengthy conversations. Now, no matter how interested in putting my hands down his trousers I am, I do tend to take the demur route, however, I always make sure to say name at end of date.

Factor two --lack of conversation regarding actual things about self. When people ask me about my date I say very general things. I don't even know his full name and this is date 3+. This lack of insight into his character makes it hard to make excuses for the lack of physical or verbal interest as noted above. Don't get me wrong, we talk about all kinds of good things and have some quirky commonalities --we both drive Hondas, we both used to work at the same place for a while, we both like sci fi stuff and books.

These two factors have made it difficult to actually access if he 'likes' me, the way I 'like' him. And, really, my bantering back and forth between dating articles offering exactly the opposite advice on the same issues is probably not helping. So, we list the things we are sure about.

1). I like him. He is good looking, smart, funny, sweet --all the things we have not run into in other previous dates. I enjoy thinking that this could go somewhere, which is a fairly new thing. He said in the fall he likes to go for walks outside and I thought to myself, 'Hey, I could go on walks with you in the fall'. I also really like to hear him talk about his computer stuff, which he gets super excited about, it is nice to hear him be passionate about something (Now, whether this means I will have to draw a picture of a computer on a cardboard box and crawl inside of it naked to get him to touch me or not has not been established quite yet.)

2). Something worth doing is worth doing it right. I suppose going slow does have it's advantages, and perhaps me not having employment currently is off-putting (no one likes to have to consider that their date may need them for support immediately, we are looking for equals to support each other i.e. remember that awful date I had with the dude who said he was going to go blind within the next five years, and I bolted because I would have to drive him everywhere and I got scared, yeah this could be like that.) So, we go slow and get to know each other, fine, but God damn it start telling me I look pretty or I will find someone who will. Shit, not that hard. Put a hand on my fabulous ass on the way out of the restaurant so all the other jaguars in there stop drooling over me--I look that way for you, guy, and it takes WORK.

So, and I am really putting myself out there on this one. I have decided to invite him back to my house for date four. I am going to make a fabulous dinner, and we are going to play some pool and smoke and just relax together for a while. We haven't really had a nice 'jeans and a t-shirt' style date, so maybe the tactical/venue change will help with some deeper, more honest conversation. Plus, it is an opportunity to really showcase some of the things I like and am interested in. Roommates have been nice enough to say they would vacate for the evening and I think it will be a lot of fun. --Not, I repeat, NOT luring him over to molest him. Slow, remember, slow. We will still have to be done around 10-ish so roommates can sleep for work next day, but then again, that could be a positive thing.

And if it goes well I have a really great reward --no, it's not that --I got tickets to the symphony that weekend and may invite him to go, if we are in fact 'dating'. However, he will be paying for dinner as I already paid for the tickets. Anyway, assessment is still positive, but must put an end to these heinous mixed signals.