This interview was a pretty great one.
(I did not, alas, go on a date with either of these lovely women.)
I went on a fantastic date the other night. Let me set the scene: The restaurant was spectacular, overlooking the ocean and the setting sun. The guy was age-appropriate, cute, smart and interesting. He wasn’t in the entertainment industry (!), and was well versed in politics and journalism. We even knew people in common! Good ones!
I wore my new OTK cowboy boots because I am of the firm opinion that you need to let a little bit of your freak flag fly as early on in a relationship as possible, just to weed out the boring ones (see: my second date with Kendrick), and I truly felt adorable. I even had my hair blown out earlier that day, because that’s how long it had been since I’d had a first date I was actually looking forward to. I went to the DryBar in Westlake, for God’s sake.
Here’s the embedded video, if that’s easier for ya. We talk about breaking the internet, pathological oversharing, and the perils of semi-public life (and more!)
Fifteen minutes into said date, I went to the bathroom, dancing a little at how well it was going. And when I returned? My date let me know that he had to take a friend to the airport at eight.
As in…eight…am? As in, “Hey, fantastic date, just a head’s up that even though this is all very fantastic, we can’t stay out too late because I have this incredibly important appointment that will require me to be extremely rested, lest the LAX personnel judge my dishevelment”?
Oh, no no. Eight pm. As in…now. (Was the “friend” my date needed to bring to the airport a “she”? She was.)
Let’s be clear, y’all. This man was not bringing anyone to the airport. Because if he had been, when he suggested that we meet up that night for a date, he…well, he wouldn’t have done that. Because he would have had plans. But if he had done so anyway, the dinner invitation would have come with the caveat “But I will have to leave forty-five minutes in, after having consumed two drinks and one plate of sweet potato fries – which I shall eat all by myself, nary offering you a ONE.”
So while I was on what appeared, at the outset, to be a fantastic date, he was apparently on a very bad one.
I’m still going to call this date “fantastic,” though. Because once I realized that this man literally could not get away from me fast enough (yes, I checked my teeth and armpits, and no, nothing seemed especially amiss), I started cracking up. When we got to the parking area he sort of side-hugged me and nudged me in the general direction of “anywhere he wasn’t” (“Oh, is that your car allllll the way down that very dark street? BYE!”), at which point I ABSOLUTELY FUCKING DIED LAUGHING.
Here’s the thing: I know how to turn it on for a date. I’ve been knocking around this circus for a looooong time and I know how to be cute and blinky and whatever – I call it “sending in my representative” (I’m preeeetty sure I got that expression from Chris Rock). And while I have sent in my representative many, many, many times in my life – maybe even *all* the times…I did not do that for this man. I just…showed up. As myself. Not because of him, but because I have no more time, patience, or energy to expend on a performance.
I also don’t see the point.
So I got in my car, called a variety of friends whom I knew would very much appreciate the story, and cackled. It was a truly hilarious drive home, because for reals: WTF else are you supposed to do when you find yourself rejected at a level that doesn’t even earn you a sad, soggy sweet potato fry?
I choose cackles.
