At this point in my life, I’ve been on a lot of online dates. And you know what? Generally I feel pretty good about it. Sure, none have worked out to the level I may have liked but I have had very few weird stories or horrible first dates. I consider myself very lucky in this sense. Until a few weeks ago that is. The first week of November was sort of a shit-show. First off, my apartment got broken into. Total bummer but somewhat expected after living on the first floor for a number of years. Also, we have a bad habit of forgetting to lock our windows. Oops! The good news is we have very little to steal and I’m sure the thieves were pretty pissed to find out that my wallet that they stole had nothing but an expired license, a Boloco rewards card, and a maxed out Macy’s card. GO TO TOWN YOU ASSHOLES. Secondly, my apartment also had no heat. I was sleeping with a hat on for two weeks and going to the gym to hang out in the sauna. Of course once our landlord finally got around to calling someone to look at the furnace and realized what was wrong with it, OF COURSE the parts we needed had to ship from like Zimbabwe and they took a week to get here. Anywhooooo. Last week was probably not the best week of my life. (Actually I had a really good first date but more on that later!)
The cherry on top of this week from hell sundae features none other that The Biggest Tease in the World. Let’s all remember him. First date cancelled on me because of combination office reorg and his grandma dying. Just typing that out makes me realize how ridiculous that was. First date take two was awesome and ended with me ecstatic and having a crazy dance party in my kitchen, until I never heard from him again. Oh well. Another loser to add to the pile. Or so I thought.
Saturday night I had been out with some friends downtown. I was somewhat hungover from a good first date, so cut the night short and was home around midnight. As I’m putting myself to bed I get a text message. I keep my phone sort of an arms length away from my bed, but from that distance I saw that it was a paragraph size long text. Who could that be I wondered?! Turns out it was The Booklover aka Biggest Tease in the World and now The Biggest Psycho in the World. Psycho explained to me that he had been “stuck” in California for the last month and that was somehow supposed to explain his absence. Last time I checked they did have cell phone towers in California, but hey, what do I know? He also said he flew in that night and was going to ask me to dinner that night but realized it was too late? Okay, first off. Nice gesture and all but what girl in her right mind would be like “Hey guy who never followed up on our awesome first date. You bet I’ll drop my Saturday night plans and hang out with your sorry ass!!”.
I decided to play it cool, which was probably a big mistake on my part. He asked if I wanted to hang out tomorrow (Sunday). He said something cute about getting his haircut in preparation for the date (if you remember our first date, I was the one who got a haircut and told him when he cancelled on me that he was really missing out b/c my hair looked so awesome!) and we settled on a time and a place for the second date the next night. Looking back, I think I was mostly in such a good from the great first date the night before that I probably was way too nice to this kid. I really should have set him straight then and there, but I kept remembering how much I enjoyed our initial date and thought giving him one more chance wouldn’t hurt anybody. Big mistake. HUGE.
So Sunday rolls around. I go for a run. I read a bit and do some freelance work. I hop into the shower, put on a new dress, and head down to the train station. Lucky for me I looked at my phone right before boarding the train because I realized I had a text from The Psycho. One sentence that read “I hope you didn’t leave yet! I need to cancel!”. This was at 5:10, a mere 50 minutes until the start of the date. I was floored! I answered back “Are you serious”. Then “Hello?” Once again, no follow up text. No apology. No hey sorry but my uncle died this time and I can’t go out. No, sorry I am off to a witness protection program. See you never. Nothing. Poof, like he disappeared.
Honestly I have never encountered anything like this! If I hadn’t had the one good date, I would dismiss him as a crazy person. But I know he’s not crazy! Well at least I thought he wasn’t crazy. Now I definitely do. But the point is, he wasn’t a sketchy dude. I can’t for the life of me figure out what his deal is. Maybe he gets off on planning dates and cancelling them? Maybe he has some physical ailment that pops up every now and then and he can’t be seen in public? Maybe he’s a secret spy and is constantly being called into covert ops against Russia or something! I mean I have exhausted each and every theory.
If I ever hear from him again I am going to tell him to lose my number. Screw me once, shame on you. Screw me twice, shame on me!
The Cat Lady 
Love the “Pretty Woman” quote!