It\u2019s one of those thing I struggle with every time. Getting the first date situation, well . . . situated.<\/p>\n
You chat along with someone, maybe transition to phone (or not) and then (yay!) decide to meet.<\/p>\n
And then comes the choices: when, where, what to wear, etc.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m an equal opportunity dater \u2013 and I also hope that I\u2019m an equal opportunity date planner. When I ask someone on a date, I usually have an activity pre-planned (get your minds out of the gutter ). So for me, I might call up and say \u2013 \u201cHey, I\u2019ve got 2 tickets to this show on Friday \u2013 would you like to go with me?\u201d <\/em>or \u201cI was thinking of going to this festival on Friday \u2013 would you like to meet there for coffee?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n But a lot of times with online dating, this doesn\u2019t always happen. <\/p>\n More often it will be something like [this is not an actual, word for word conversation]:<\/p>\n HE: I think you are cool enough to actually meet in person. What do you think?<\/strong><\/p>\n Me: That sounds great.<\/p>\n HE: Okay, so umm, uh, we should do that.<\/strong><\/p>\n Me: We should.<\/p>\n HE: So what do you want to do?<\/strong><\/p>\n Me: I\u2019m flexible, what did you have in mind?<\/p>\n HE: I don\u2019t know \u2013 what do you think?<\/strong><\/p>\n Now, I appreciate that dating is just as nerve-wracking for guys as girls. And even in our age of equal opportunity dating, whenever you are the one doing the asking, it\u2019s a little scary. But I just wish that we didn\u2019t always have to dance to this song.<\/p>\n Because now I have to do some mind-reading tricks, and I let my membership to the psychic network expire. If I pick a place close to me, am I being selfish? If I pick a place close to you, am I starting a pattern of making things too easy? If I pick a place out of your price range, will you think me a gold digger? If I pick a place with a dollar menu, will you always think of me as your cheap date option? If I take too much control of where we go and what we do, am I emasculating you? If I offer to pay, am I emasculating you? If I don\u2019t offer to pay and you are forced to admit you can\u2019t afford this place, am I emasculating you? If you let me pay, are we starting a sugar momma thing? Because I am sugar-free for being the dough-re-mi donator, my friend.<\/p>\n If I don\u2019t pick a place and just say, \u201cwhatever you want\u201d am I going to send you in the same swirl of internal monologue? Am I going to frustrate you by being indecisive? <\/em><\/p>\n When I\u2019m actually with someone I know well, I\u2019ll respond back to the \u201cwhere do you want to eat?<\/em>\u201d question by asking for 2-3 options. This lets them pick places they like that are in their price range and travel distance (those ankle bracelets have radiuses, y\u2019know). But when it\u2019s a first date, this can feel like a psychological test. <\/p>\n For example: We could meet at Starbucks, Golden Corral, or Texas Roadhouse.<\/em><\/p>\n If I pick Starbucks, that will be the cheapest option if he\u2019s paying. But it could also signal that I don\u2019t want to have to commit to too much time.<\/p>\n If I pick Golden Corral, it\u2019s a meal. On the other hand, I\u2019m not a big fan of mega-buffets because of my food allergies \u2013 when I try to explain that, it could make me sound like someone who is high-maintenance, potentially hypochondriac, and maybe snobby of Middle America\u2019s ability to keep the spoon for the cornbread stuffing out of the mashed potatoes. <\/p>\n If I pick Texas Roadhouse, I would be very happy (love Texas Roadhouse) but then I might be at the top of his budget \u2013 because I\u2019m a girl who likes a ribeye with mushrooms and onions and if I\u2019m at a steakhouse, I want steak. Good steak. And I\u2019m happy to pay for my own. But if I offer to pay, maybe I\u2019m implying something, emasculating my date, or y\u2019know, setting precedents. But I really like steak.<\/p>\n So, we do the dance, we hem and haw, and eventually we stumble to a solution that I hope passes the muster without providing a Rorshach.<\/p>\n Of course, I can make it work whatever happens. And reality is that this is really a first-world problem. But I have a date tonight and this is one of those things I think about as we plan the when, what, and the where.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It\u2019s one of those thing I struggle with every time. Getting the first date situation, well . . . situated. You chat along with someone, maybe transition to phone (or not) and then (yay!) decide to meet. And then comes the choices: when, where, what to wear, etc. I\u2019m an equal opportunity dater \u2013 and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3],"tags":[130,129,11,12],"class_list":["post-397","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dating","tag-choosing-restaurants","tag-first-date","tag-okcupid","tag-plentyoffish"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2UnPK-6p","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/joeywrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/397","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/joeywrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/joeywrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joeywrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joeywrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=397"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/joeywrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/397\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/joeywrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=397"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joeywrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=397"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/joeywrites.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=397"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}