Part 2

“Excuse me?”

I have reached utter confusion.

He casually repeats himself, “I live there.... at the rehab.”

“I heard what you said, but what do you mean exactly.”

He shoves some more of MY fries in his mouth and starts to explain. “Well I got in a little trouble a while back and went to prison for about a year.” (Clearly this was the time we weren’t talking) “After I got released from prison I came here to a drug rehab, it’s court ordered. I do the maintenance for them as one of my jobs.”

UHHHHHHH……………………………………………………………………………

OF COURSE!!!

“So when you said you couldn’t come to my town because of work it was actually because you what…can’t leave this city?”

He says, “Yeah basically. I can’t go within so many miles from the facility or my monitor will go off. I have a curfew. I have to be back by 10:30 or I go back to prison.”

Then, because you know… it couldn’t end there… he looks down and pulls his leg out from underneath the table and lifts his pant leg up revealing….you guessed it… an ankle monitor.

Now at this point… I am replaying all of our conversations in my head. HOW in the hell did I miss this? I remember specifically asking him if he had ever been arrested. Confused, as you could imagine,  I ask him “Why did you tell me you had never been arrested if you are fresh out of prison. Clearly you have been!”

He looks up from his food, with the most serious face this man has made up to this point and says “Well technically I haven’t! I turned myself in when I found out my guy I was selling for turned me in. So TECHNICALLY I haven’t been arrested.”

Typical convict… always has a con of an answer!

I am drained.. drained physically and mentally from this date. I am ready to leave and be on my way so as I see him finishing up with my plate I ask him if he is ready to go. He says he needs to go to the bathroom again and then he will be. Please keep in mind… this is his 4th bathroom trip since we had arrived at the restaurant.

He leaves and a few minutes later I notice him heading back to the table. Thankfully he stops and pays for dinner….Hell that is better than some at this point. I took this as my cue though and got up and headed for the door.

We get to our vehicles and as he is looking at the time on his phone he says, “Well the movie starts in about an hour, what do you want to do till then?”

WHAT?

SHIT.

I asked confused since no plans were ever discussed, “What movie?” He replies with a causal “Well I got us tickets to see Meg for after dinner. Come on we can go get some ice cream at Braum’s, I’m starving still!”

So many things are running though my head! One... How in the WORLD is this man still hungry after eating a huge meal of his own and finishing off almost 2/3 of mine, with out asking mind you? Second.. I NEED TO LEAVE. I knew there was NO point in trying to continue this date because clearly it was our one and only. Third… I was a coward! NO other explaination other than a simple…You. Are. A. Coward.

So with that being said.. I let the date continue.

Without another word to me I notice him climbing up into his truck. He leans over to the passenger side rolls his window down and says “Follow me” and before I can even get to my driver door he is already backing out.

Shamefully, I follow him to Braum’s and we get out and head in. We order and sit down. I was pretty quiet at this point. I didn’t have much to say, I didn’t see the point and to be honest even if I did, I wouldn’t have been able to get a word in with him. I was starting to realize, this man NEVER SHUTS UP.

I finish about half of my ice cream and push it away. He, not to my surprise, did not miss a beat and grabbed it to finish it off. 

Luckily Braum’s was right across the street from where we originally started off and the movie theater.

At this point all I wanted to do was get the movie started for 2 reason. One because the sooner the movie started the sooner I could leave and two because the sooner the movie started the sooner he would shut up. If I am being honest… I am not sure he ever stopped talking.

We retrieve our tickets and start heading to the theater. He grabs my arm to slow me down and ask “Do you want something to eat or drink? I am going to get some popcorn.”

HOW in the hell is he still eating?

I replied with a simple “Nope.”

He orders not only his large popcorn but two candy bars and a large drink.

We finally get settled in to our seats in the back row (his choice) and I start watching the previews as he starts munching down his popcorn.

He talks the entire time we are waiting on the movie to start. About what…. I can’t even tell you. I was ignoring everything he was saying and refused to look at him due to the fact he kept spitting out his popcorn while he was speaking.

It was all over him.

Guess that is what happens when you are trying to eat and refuse to shut up for any period of time.

I remember thinking to myself… FINALLY, when the movie started. Finally, he would stop talking and watch the movie!

NOPE. I was wrong.

This convict literally talked the ENTIRE movie.

And to top it off. He decided to use this opportunity to act like we were in junior high and attempted to feel me up…not once.. not twice… but MULTIPLE times.

The movie finally comes to an end, and those of you who have seen Meg know what I mean when I say what’s next. As the dog swims across the screen in the final seconds of the movie, my little convict decides to stand up to stretch and yells “OOOH man it’s the *BEEP*ing DOG! They should have let that little mother*Beep*ing dog die!”

Everyone… and I mean EVERYONE turns to look at him. With their eyes falling on me right after.

I WAS MORTIFIED at this point.

I jump up and bolt for the door. My legs moved as fast as they could without breaking out into a full run. Before I know it… convict has caught up with me.

Damn my short legs!

I get to my car and as I open my door I am bear hugged from behind and lifted off my feet.

He laughs and sets me down. As I am turning to look at him he is stretching his arms out for a hug good bye. I panic. I dip down and open my car door and slide in really fast.

I drop the window down but only about half way.

He looks confused but oblivious as he asks, “Did you have a good time? I had a great time.. you were exactly what I was hoping for… my sexy redheaded *BEEP*!”

WHAT?

I turn and look at my steering wheel and for about 30 seconds I try and come up with a response to what he just said. I am speechless though. And not in a good way.

I decide to do the only thing left to do at this point and I reach down and put the car in drive and I just drive off.

I never turned to look at him as he pulls his arms back up from my car that he was leaning on and I never turn to look in my rear view mirror to see his reaction.

                                                       Total Time Lapse: Too Damn LONG

Part 1

Once upon a time......

Just kidding, my stories should start out more like…

On a dark stormy night, far out in the middle of nowhere, where no one could hear my cries…..

Because lets be real.. these recaps of my dating life are more like nightmares and this one is no exception.

This guy is a little different from the others. I actually made the mistake of him not once……  but twice!

Now I started talking to this guy originally through an app called Bumble where the women have to make the first move. We talked for a couple of weeks, but I found him to always be SO moody. I could say the littlest thing and he would flip out and throw a huge fit. I could never understand his outburst and after a short time it started getting annoying to say the least.

After a few weeks of talking and me blowing him off a few times on dates (because I was clearly annoyed with his behavior) he sent me a snap late one night.

“Who in the world is hitting me up this late at night? Its almost 3AM!”

Upon opening my phone I see I have a snap from the man himself. I open it and to my surprise I am staring at a selfie of him and a woman! They have their arms draped around each other and are smiling. They appear to be sitting in the back seat of a car and each of them have a beer in their hands. At the bottom of the picture it reads, “I found me a good woman now…..Jealous? HAHAHA”

ME? At this point I had compared his behavior to my 13 year old daughter during the week of her period. So jealousy was the farthest thing from my mind! I was almost relieved that he finally would just be gone!

I sent him back a smiley face and go back to sleep, not missing a beat. 

 Now, months go by, I am talking… close to a year. I never heard back from him after that night and he hadn’t crossed my mind…not once.

But then…. All of a sudden he was popping back up in my life again.

He found my profile on POF (should have known) and decided he was brave enough to message me!

His message was simple. “Do you remember me?”

Dumbass….

I didn’t feel the need to respond. I wasn’t interested in his childish games and was completely content not speaking to him. Over the next couple of days he continued messaging me though. He was insisting how sorry he was for his behavior and pleading for me to talk to him.

I finally gave in. If anything.. maybe he would get his apology out of the way and just be gone.

After a few days of him apologizing and saying he was just in a bad place at the time I started to feel bad for him. He appeared to be genuinely sorry so against my better judgement, I decided to just forget the past.

A fresh start between us… I mean if all else failed.. I could go back to ignoring him again!

Right?

A few weeks pass, and his behavior had been tip top. No outburst, kept up conversation and no couple selfies.

We were getting somewhere.

Now after talking and catching up he informed me he had moved and taken a new job. He now lived about 45 minutes away. Not necessarily a problem for me. I have dated long distance before. He was working as a maintenance supervisor for a company in the town he currently lived in. Or at least that what I was told. He didn’t give a lot of details.

Something I now know I need to ask for!

One night as we were talking he asked me to go to dinner with him. At first I declined considering all the past issues and the fact we hadn’t been talking long again but he was persistent.  After finally agreeing, he apologized and asked if I was willing to come to his town for the date, as he was on call with work 24/7 and was unable to leave the area.

I understood his “situation” and agreed.

HUGE MISTAKE!

The weekend comes and after getting ready I start to head towards his town. At this point we had not discussed any plans on what we were doing. I didn’t find it odd necessarily because that was just the type of person he seemed to be.

Spontaneous.

I called him as soon as I arrived in town and he tells me to meet him in a parking lot not far from the highway. As I pull up and look around I see it is basically a shopping mall with a bunch of stores, a movie theater and a few places to eat. People were everywhere, and it was still day light, so I felt comfortable.

As I sit there waiting for him, I noticed this old blue Chevy truck hauling ass through the FULL parking lot. The truck is bouncing around in the bed as it is hitting bumps and swerving in and out of vehicles. 

“This guy is an idiot driving like that.”

Then I notice the guy behind the wheel starts honking. I start looking around confused because I notice this truck is heading straight towards me. I knew this because I was parked in the back of the parking lot and there were several spaces between me and the other cars. This truck was FOR SURE heading straight towards me.

For a second, I get concerned that maybe this guy is telling me to get out of the way… maybe his breaks aren’t working.

But then, like something straight out of Fast and Furious, this guy slides into the spot beside me all while honking with one hand and waving at me with the other. I’m not even sure what hand he was driving with now that I am thinking back!

Holy shit….. this was my idiot! 

So here I am again, questioning all my life choices and wondering how in the world I get in these positions every damn time!

Well... lets gets this over with...

We both exit our cars and next thing I know this 6 foot 3 inch man comes barreling at me like a bear that just found his dinner. He wraps his arms around me and picks me up in the air and spins me around.

Now you can imagine how awkward of a moment this was, he was much taller than me, his energy level was that of my 13 year old daughter who has ADHD who hadn’t taken her meds in a week and the all too obvious fact, I hardly knew him. It all happened so fast that I hadn’t even been able to move my arms, so they were hanging by my waist during this ordeal, so I looked like a limp seal.

After our weird bear and seal moment and some even more awkward introductions, he decides we are going to a little café not far from where we were to grab a bite to eat.

(Might I add, he debated the all to popular question of where to eat all on his own. And by that I mean… he had an entire conversation with himself on what sounded good, what did not sound good, places he liked and places he did not like. I never even got to provide my own input.) 

Given his possibility of multiple personalities at this point and the overall concern of his hyper-ness, I insisted we take separate cars and I followed him to the restaurant.

As we sit down at a table I find myself just watching him. I could not get over the energy this man had. Not only did he talk 90 to nothing where I could hardly get a word in, but he would not stop moving. Everything was expressed with his hands and he touched EVERYTHING! And as I looked around the café I realized I was not the only one noticing his behavior because at this point… everyone was watching him.

We order our food and I start asking some questions trying to learn more.

This is when things started going from bad to worse.

I decided to ask about his job. He hadn’t told me much and I wanted to know more. I started off asking what kind of company he did maintenance for. “Well its kind of confusing but it’s basically a rehab facility.” Now that could mean drug rehab, nursing home, PT rehab, I mean there are a few possibilities, so I continued with my questions since there was still a lot of unknown answers.

Not really confusing but okay?

“Are you on call all the time, do you ever get like weekends off that you aren’t on call.” He replies, “Well not exactly.”

Okay maybe it is confusing?

About this time the food arrives. I am still unsure as to exactly what he does for work, but I am momentarily distracted by the huge plate of fries the waitress sits in from of me. It was like a small mountain and on top of that mountain was a burger that looked delicious!

I could not wait to taste it! I was starving.

I still had lots of questions regarding his employer, but I decided to put that conversation on pause and enjoy my food.

I was about half way done with my burger when I sat it down to pick up some fries.

The next thing I know……

This man slides his hand across the table and grabs the side of my plate. I am watching him thinking to myself, what in the world is he doing? Then he slides MY PLATE over to him as I was mid bite of my fry and sits it on top of his empty plate. Confused, I am still watching him like, what just happened? The next thing I know, he picks up MY burger and begins eating it. I sit there in shock thinking to myself, “WTF I wasn’t even done with that.”

In utter and complete confusion, I say “Um what are you doing, I am not done.”

He responded with something but for the life of me I don’t know what! I could not understand him with the muffled sounds coming from his mouth as he shoved the rest of my burger down his throat.

“Well I guess I AM done then!”

I sit and watch as he finishes up my dinner. I mean what else was I supposed to do at that point?

(I know what you are probably thinking… “Why not just leave?” Well that wouldn’t really make for a good story for you guys now would it? And like we have already determined from previous stories…. I am challenged when it comes to dating.)

Despite the lingering food issues, I decide to continue my conversation about his job.

Anything at this point to take my mind off what just happened.

“Do you live close to work?” 

“Well…. Technically I live there at the rehab.”

And just when I think this shit show couldn’t go any further south….

Part 4

Now where were we, oh that’s right.. we were drinking a beer at 10:30 AM!

Now a few things were going through my head at this point. First being “Um, its 10:30 in the morning, is he really about to start drinking that?” Which is answered immediately as he pops the cap and nearly finishes the entire thing in one swift swig. But then I think “Well clearly he is not that broke since he was able to purchase beer on his way up here.”

He looks at me after finishing the beer and says, “You want to get up and get ready and we will head into town before the movie? You can show me around the area.”

Again, I’m confused, but that tends to be a reoccurring thing at this point. As he is opening his second beer (at 10:35am) I say “Sure.” I am still trying to give him the benefit of the doubt. He hasn’t been up to this area so showing him around seemed like a good idea. So, I got up and started getting ready.

After four beers in for him and me showered and ready to be seen in public I ask, “Do you want to eat lunch here before we leave, the movie isn’t for a few hours and we aren’t eating till after?” He says “Nah” and assures me he isn’t hungry and will be good till after the movie.

He finishes his fifth beer for the morning and we head out.

We vape our way into town like normal and I start showing him around. Not even 20 mins into town and he says, “Babe lets go eat somewhere, I’m starving. What’s good around here?” I think to myself “SURELY, if this man is bringing up lunch after I already offered to eat at home he is going to pay…Right!? He can’t possibly stick me with another tab.”

I ramble off a few places and he chooses a Mexican restaurant we are close to.

We get in and seated and start to place our orders. Low and behold, he orders a beer. At this point…I just can’t.  NO MORE BEER COUNTING!

We finish our lunch, he downs another beer and 2 mimosas, and it comes. The check. The waiter sits it at the edge of the table. At this point I know I am not reaching for it. I figure two can play this game!

Something I need to point out- I am usually a very open and verbal person. I don’t mind speaking my mind. I don’t mind making an ass out of myself when needed. I don’t mind standing up for myself and I sure as hell don’t mind telling someone when they are wrong. HOWEVER, something I have come to realize in my dating experiences the last 3 years, I am the complete opposite with men and relationships per say. I am submissive and tend to follow in line with the very old fashion roles. I find myself unable to speak in moments like this. EVERYTHING runs through my mind but to actually say it out loud does not come easy for me. I can’t stand the thought of being rude or disrespectful to that person. I can’t stand the feeling of taking that man’s balls, so to say.  I basically become a mute in these moments. (I’m working on it ladies, no judgments! Remember!)

So, with all that being said, 20 minutes pass and I can’t take it any longer. I grab the damn check, hoping he will say, “No I got this” but knowing better at this point. He says nothing. I pay for the damn food and start heading for my car not even looking to see if he is behind me.

I was furious with him. I was furious with myself. How could I have let him put me in this position and not even speak for myself? I wanted this weekend to be over with!

I drive to Walgreen's to pick up a bottle of water for the movie that was starting soon. I browse the candy aisle for a few minutes and head to the register, basically ignoring I have company with me. I set my stuff down to pay and, well you guessed it.... My little scrub (because he has officially eared that title by this point) puts his stuff down as well and starts looking around, completely obvious he is avoiding the important part of what comes next…PAYMENT! Once again… I pay.

At this point I want to throat punch myself and shove his Douche Flute down his.

As we sit down in the movie and I am fuming from all of this, he begins to tell me how excited he is to see the movie. I let out a little laugh at this point (what else can I do).

Now I won’t give any spoilers but for those of you who have seen Avengers End Game… will understand the irony of this movie and his love for Iron Man.

It was like my little small piece of karma in that moment. (Petty, I know but I was taking whatever I could get at that point.)

Three hours pass and the movie ends. I am refreshed and calmed down. We start to walk outside, and I am in no shape or form hungry. I ask him if he was still wanting to go to dinner since we had such a big lunch, and OF COURSE he says yes. I think to myself, “I AM NOT PAYING. No way shape or form am I going to allow this to happen again!”  So, with a smile on my face I agree.

Now this burger place we go to is a little different. You order as you walk in, they hand you cups, you pay and then you go get your drink and sit down. We order, the lady behind the desk hands us our cups and tells us the total. Next thing I know, this man is GONE! GONE! He had done took his cup and headed straight for the coke machine leaving me standing there with a line of people behind me. I am shocked. As I hand my card to the lady at the register I say, “I picked a real winner, didn’t I. Dumb fuck.” (Excuse the language.) She gives me a look of pity and hands me my card back.

I catch up to my scrub and we sit down. Now at this point, I am not even talking anymore. He is admiring all the beers they have available and I stare at the wall like he isn’t even in the room.

Our food arrives, and I start picking at mine. I wasn’t hardly hungry, so I didn’t get much and at this point I had lost all my appetite. He begins eating and after finishing only half of his burger, that’s right HALF, he proceeds to tell me he is full.

…………….

Do I even need to point out what is wrong with this picture? No? I didn’t think so… but I will.

This scrub insists on going out to eat again, bails on paying again, and then has the audacity to only eat HALF of the damn food?

Women have KILLED men for less than this shit! Seriously, look it up!

At this point, I just get up and start walking out. I figured maybe if I was lucky I could make it to my car before he does, and I could leave him there. But as I am getting in, my little scrub is making himself comfortable in the passenger seat.

I drive. I just drive as fast as I can home. The sooner I can separate myself from this man the better.

The entire way to my house he talks about the floods that were currently happening between his house and mine. He expresses his concern about not making it back home the next day. Even makes the comment, “I guess I can stay up here till they go down the end of next week.”

“OH HELL NAH”

A light goes off in my head. THIS IS IT. This is my chance to get rid of him TONIGHT!

Absolutely NO WAY is this man staying another night.

I eagerly say, “You should leave tonight. Yeah as soon as we get back you should leave.”

He of course has no clue why I want him to leave, he assumes I am worried about his well being. Hell NO! I am worried about him being stuck at my house! About having to support this scrub for a second longer.

As soon as we arrive to my house I am pushing him out the door. He debates and goes back and forth about leaving. I ignored everything he was saying. Can’t even honestly tell you what all he rambled off. All I was concerned about was making sure he had all of his stuff (I could not risk him leaving anything behind and him having to come back for it). I encouraged him to get on the road as fast as he could and started taking his bag to the car. Next thing I knew, I had loaded up all his belongings in his car… even his beer cooler!  I am not even sure he set down at my house between the time we arrived, and the time I had him packed!

He gets in his car.

And just like that, I watched him pull away. He was gone! And then I danced. Yep, I did a happy dance right there in my door way!

Now I know what you are thinking, “That’s it? She didn’t yell at him? She didn’t shove his douche flute down his throat?”

No, to all!

At this point I was done. I had no intentions of seeing him again however, I would like to finally share some GREAT news with everyone!

WE ARE ENGAGED!!!

………

HAHAHAHAHAHA Kidding, come on now! 

He left, and I have not seen him since.

Later that evening, he messaged me saying how much he missed me. My response was, “We need to talk about what happened this weekend, I am very upset about having to pay for everything.”

He responds with “Let’s talk about it later after I get home and settled.”

Now at this point I think speaking about it on the phone is better than in text, so I agree.

I don’t hear from him the rest of the night.

Next day comes and he hardly says two words to me.

At this point I am putting no effort in. I have fully checked out and could care less if I hear from him again.

A few days pass and he messages me randomly. He starts the conversation with asking me why I got so mad at him over something so petty. I take this opportunity to finally vent all those frustrations I have had built up. I lay everything out on the line and tell him exactly how incredibly messed up everything he did was.

His response…. That I was the most “conceited” person he had ever met.

I can’t even make this shit up! 

Now in this moment I felt that confusion again.

I say “Um…. I am not sure you understand what that word actually means but regardless I am not going argue with you. I am done. Best of luck.”

“Bye” he replies.

I felt relieved, I was finally done with this entire nightmare.

But then…..30 minutes later.

I receive another message from him. “I don’t care anyways. I have a date tonight.”

IF you could of only have seen the eye role at this point. My teenage daughter would have been like “Dayyyyyyuuummmm momma still got it!”

I respond (against my better judgement) “Clearly you still do because you are still messaging me but either way…Best of luck on that date tonight! Hope it goes great for you two.”

He then replies with “OHH it will. She lives here so I won’t have to make a 200-mile round trip to just be criticized the entire time.”

Then he sends...

And that was it ladies and gents. A 27-day streak ended with a thumbs up!

Notes to self:

1-If he pulls out a douche flute….RUN

2-If he cracks open a beer at 10:30AM…..RUN

3-If he is OKAY with letting you cover him financially…….RRRRRUUUUUUNNNN

You deserve better than a scrub….and so do I!

Part 3                   

By this point in our “relationship” we were about 17 days in! I know… kind of a big deal, right? He had left the day before and I was back at work. I had received my “Good morning beautiful” text and was feeling pretty darn good about our possibilities. I mean nothing could stop us now!

 HA HA HA

He reminded me in the beginning of the week that we were both off the following Monday for a Holiday! Of course, I got super excited thinking “YAY, more time with my man!” We worked out the details over the next couple of days and agreed he was going to come back to my house for the weekend. This time he planned on coming Saturday evening and staying till Monday evening. At this point… I am back to full blown, “he’s perfect and can do no wrong” phase, so the lingering financial and DF issues I had previous, were long gone in that moment. All I could see were hearts.

Yes- This happens to the best of us. Nothing to be ashamed of ladies. I like to call it our obliviously smitten moments/phases. You know that moment we are planning our wedding with a man we don’t even know the middle name of yet. Speaking of… I don’t recall ever getting his. Hmm… Either way, sometimes we tend to think with our hearts and not those incredibly useful and intelligent brains of ours.

This was one of my moments.

Anyways, Wednesday came along and we are on our nightly 3-hour chat. Mid conversation he starts talking about the new Avengers movie. He is just dying to see it! He goes on and on about how his favorite character is Iron Man.

Now as he is talking about his love for Iron Man as a grown ass man, something hits me like a solid wood table leg to the little toe. The entire time we had been hanging out I had noticed his Douche Flute looked familiar. It was red and looked like it was a little man wearing a suit with gold markings and even had lines across the front, almost like a 6 pack.

It was in this moment I realized that his damn Douche Flute was in fact, the shape of Iron Man himself. (See below)

Yes ladies- I snagged myself a real winner! (Eye Roll)

Now I have already seen this movie with my kids but because us women have to compromise at times, I say, “Well hey, why don’t I get tickets for the movie this weekend and you can pay me back when you get here.”

(Like how I made sure to point out he was in fact paying this time.)

I only thought I was one upping him!

He had pure joy in his voice. It was like a young boy and his first time “reading” a Playboy.  Just bliss. He replies, “Yeah babe that sounds great…and after we can go to that burger joint you have been telling me about.”

We have a plan!

The next day as I am driving home I give him a call. He seems frustrated and stressed to say the least. I (being the comforting person I am….HAHA) ask what is wrong with him. He proceeds to tell me something came up and he had some unexpected expenses come out he wasn’t expecting.

Now in this moment I am thinking to myself “Yeah you and me both.”  However, I politely say “Well if things are tight right now you don’t have to come up this weekend, we can always reschedule, and I am completely okay with that. I understand things happen.”

This was his shot! This was his chance to do the right thing but instead…

He replies “No babe, I am coming to see you. Money is tight this weekend, but it will work itself out.”

Boy was he right, little did I know he meant for himself.

The next day I decide to make a grocery list. I figured if I plan things right that weekend, it would be less stress on both of us financially. So, I make a meal schedule for the days he will be in town and go shopping. I made it a point to cover dinners, lunches and breakfast so he wasn’t in that awkward position where he had to take me out with money he did not have.

Pretty damn spectacular of me if I do say so myself!

Later that evening I told him what I had got and what the plan was. He seemed grateful and excited for me to cook for him!

Things were coming into place. 

IT’S TIME! The weekend was upon us and he was on his way! I am cleaning and getting all pretty for him and anxiously awaiting his arrival. He calls me when he is only a short distance from my house and ask’s, “What’s for dinner? How about when I get there we head into town and grab something.”

Confusion. That is what I was feeling in that moment. Just confusion. Maybe his broke and my broke are two different things.  I know when I say I am broke.. that means I got 4 pennies in my wallet and maybe another 6 in the floor board of my car, and that is it! Broke is broke people!

I go with it however and ask what he was in the mood for. He throws around some ideas and lands on pizza. Now in the moment it didn’t hit me at how convenient this was for him. ME order pizza, ME pay for that pizza and HIM just walk into another free dinner. So due to my obliviously smitten phase I was still in, I agreed. I got his order, hung up and immediately start ordering this man’s dinner.

He FINALLY arrives. As I am hugging up on him… all is right in the world again.

Ding dong.  Pizza has arrived.

We cuddle on the couch eating our “free to some” dinner and start to watch a movie.

The next morning the sun is out, and the birds are chirping. At this point in the morning I already know I have food to make for breakfast, so I start getting around and head to the kitchen to start cooking. He plops down on the couch and says, “You want to head into town for breakfast?”

Um… I sure as hell don’t!!!!!!!! “No baby, remember, I bought stuff to cook breakfast for you.”

Now I wish you guys could have seen his face at this point. It was like realizing you could never eat your favorite candy bar again. He looked completely unsatisfied and distraught at the thought we weren’t going out to eat and were staying in.

Either way, he was not going to put another dent in my wallet this weekend.

HAHA Or at least I thought.

I ignore his ridiculous face and start making breakfast. Besides his constant schooling me on how to properly make bacon (because you know it’s SOOOOO hard to fry up some bacon) I was having a fairly good morning.

The rest of the morning we took it easy, ate breakfast, watched some TV and just enjoyed each other’s company.

But then…

He gets up and goes and grabs his keys. At this point I am just watching… waiting to see what happens. He goes out to his car and brings back in a cooler. And I don’t mean a small cooler. I mean a, have to carry with two hands, cooler. He sits it on the counter and pulls out a beer.

Yes ladies and gents, that’t right. I said a beer, at 10:30 in the morning.

Part 2

Over the next few days we talked more and more. Hours and hours’ worth of conversations. Good morning text, good night text, and even phone conversations lasting 3 hours at a time. We were getting pretty serious if I do say so myself!

We decided with the distance between us he would come up to me for the following weekend and stay at my house. Normally I wouldn’t have agreed but I was really into him at the time. 

The weekend came and next thing I knew, he was walking through my front door. I was so excited to see him again! I could not wait to see where this was going with him.

We hugged and kissed, everything was just right in that moment.

We started discussing dinner plans. I thought to myself, “Hey, he just drove 2 hours to come see me, so I should get dinner tonight.” That seemed fair, right? So, as we started discussing different places around town, I just mentioned “Hey I will get dinner this evening since you drove all this way.” His response. “Sounds good.” Never missing a beat!

Now let me point out, I was not use to this. I have offered to pay for dinner many times before on dates  however, I have never actually been taken up on the offer. I am old school, I do believe the man should be financially responsible for the dating period. I am not saying I won’t pick up a check here and there, but I am a firm believer that I shouldn’t have to until I am official with someone and we are doing things as a “couple.”

Regardless I offered to pay for dinner and had every intention of upholding that.

We finally decide on a place and head out the door, we take my car since I am more familiar with the area and about 2 minutes into the trip, it happens. He pulls out that Douche Flute again. He even starts blowing that damn cloud in my car! MY CAR PEOPLE! All I can think to myself is “I am going to cut this dude, he is dead!” I take a few cloud infested deep breathes and as I am coughing out his second hand vape smoke I say to myself, “Drive, just drive Katie, don’t say anything, you are almost there.”

We arrive at the restaurant,  and as I open my doors I am that person. The person that releases a cloud of douche smoke as I exit my car.  Utter embarrassment to say the least. Regardless… I continue on.

Beggars can’t be choosers.

We get inside and get seated. The waiter approaches and I order a water, this man I am with however, orders a 32-ounce beer. That’s right… 32-ounce beer! You might ask “What is wrong with that?” Nothing if you are paying for it your damn self. Again, though I tell myself, “Katie, don’t say anything, don’t be that person.” We order our dinner and like before our conversation just started to flow. We are having another great time together despite my pure annoyance every time he picked up that keg of beer. I even got a little excited because he hadn’t got up and left the table to go vape.

Maybe things weren’t so bad…Right?  

Then, the second 32-ounce beer gets ordered, and all I could focus on now is the ridiculous bill he is racking up at my expense.

Then, the third.

I imagined myself jumping over the table and strangling him.

How rude!

Finally, the check comes and of course they set it beside him. A word is a word, so I grab the check. I think to myself after opening it and seeing a $74.36 bill... “This damn man better be worth a $70 dinner, I better be getting ALL the damn attention tonight!”

Now ladies, you know what I am talking about. We are all adults here! No judgement! 

We get up and I head to pay, he conveniently heads to the bathroom. Figures.

We load up in the car and vape our way home.  

Now I won’t go into all the details of the evening, but we had an “okay” evening.

The next morning, we wake up and I realized I had nothing for breakfast! I totally failed that weekend on prepping the house with food for company. I suggest we head to the local donut shop and get some breakfast. His response, “Yeah you should go get us something. What do they have?”

Again, “WTF!” My thoughts, “Oh so I am paying again?” But again, “Katie, don’t say anything.”

If you can’t tell I legit have the Devil on one shoulder and an Angel on the other!

Look, I am not saying I am not an independent woman. I am not implying that I can not cover my own self financially (but if I am being honest here…. barely) and I am not saying I am too good to pay for things but let’s get real here. I am a single mom of 2, I basically work to support their habits. I live in an overpriced crackerjack box and I drive a car that I pay entirely too much for so yes, I am conscious of my money and where it is going!

Regardless of his lack of understanding and consideration of my financial situation, I go get breakfast. We eat and enjoy the remaining morning and early afternoon watching movies and cuddling.

Time passes, and it is getting closer to time for him to head home. He turns to me and says, “Hey let’s go get lunch before I leave.” I don’t know, maybe it was the fear of financial doom in my eyes that he saw at the time but to my surprise he says, “my treat this time.” I am screaming in my mind, “DAMN RIGHT your treat, I have been fronting the bill this entire damn weekend for your broke ass.” However, I smile at him and say, “Thanks babe.”

We picked up lunch at a local pizza joint and headed back to the house after.

Shortly after returning home we are once again left parting ways. Despite the bumps financially and the lingering DF, I was still pretty excited to see where it was going to go. I know not everyone is perfect and overall, we had a good connection. I also know I am the queen at nitpicking and dwelling on things that are fixable! So I continued to push that angry little devil off my shoulder and focus on the good qualities.

As I watched him drive off I thought to myself “we might really have something!” I was obliviously smitten.

                                                                                 Total Time Lapse- 27 Days

Part 1

This one seemed like a real prospect from the beginning. He seemed like he possessed all the qualities I was looking for in a man, or at least I thought he did!   

After about a week of talking via text and phone for hours at a time, we decided to move forward and meet for dinner. Now he lived about 2 hours away from me, so I agreed to meet half way.

(If you continue reading future post you will understand this was WAY against my better judgement because of past experiences.)

Although I was skeptical, the date went great! And that takes a lot for me to say. We met at a local sports bar in a town about half way for us both. I remember getting out of my car walking towards him, he was leaned up against his car with this back towards me. I remember thinking to myself, “Please be the height you told me” because in that moment he seemed fairly short.

Now I know what you are thinking…. “What kind of thought is that?” but let me explain!

Women lie about their weight on dating sites…. Men lie about their height. Although I am not tall by any means, I’m actually fairly short coming in at a whopping 5’3 (5’2 1/2 if I am being honest) I prefer taller men. I have learned though through my experiences that a man that says he is 5’7 is closer to 5’4 and a man that says he is 5’10 is closer to 5’7 in most cases. 

So to my excitement he was one of the few who did not add a few inches on his height. He stepped away from the curb, turned and looked at me and smiled from ear to ear! It was cute and endearing. I had a few slow-moving dusty butterflies moving around a bit inside. He approached me and was a good 5’10. I was happy. He looked like his pictures, he was well dressed, he smelt good, and he was taller than me. We were already off to a great start. He gave me a friendly hug and we proceeded into the restaurant.

We were seated upstairs where a live band was setting up. Usually this wouldn’t have been an annoying occurrence for me however, we were right next to the stage and it was a first date. I wanted to talk and get to know him more. In his defense though, he was unaware of the band that night, so I decided to not let it ruin the evening.

So, the date started. We ordered drinks and food and started engaging in conversation. I was comfortable right away with him which does not come easy for me. He was kind and a bit shy at first, but later warmed up and even did the all to cheesy but perfect holding hands on the table move. It was adorable. I was into him! 

(That adorableness didn’t last long after the first date).

At this point, the food had come and gone, the hands were intertwined, eye gazing in full lust mode at each other, and  the drinks were flowing, well for him at least. I chose to only drink one drink as I do not drink a lot and had a long drive home. He on the other hand had plenty of drinks for the both of us, 6 to be exact. Now if I am being honest the alcohol consumption did bother me a little. Being a woman who does not drink a lot, it seemed a little excessive for a night out with an hour drive home after, but I told myself not to nitpick. I decided I wasn’t going to let it bother me, I figured it was nerves on his part and I was into him and needed to be open minded.

But then, something changed. I could tell he was flustered and not his calm self he had been most the evening. He seemed on edge. I didn’t understand until he finally asked, “Do you mind if I go outside and vape for a minute?”

Um? I’m sorry what?

Now in this moment I am trying to be sweet and not say what is in my head-”WTF!” I mean I wanted him to like me obviously, but this habit had not been disclosed of prior, so he caught me off guard. I chose to go with it and smiled and said “Sure, whatever you need to do.” However, I did not know it was going to be a reoccurring thing that evening.

He proceeded to go outside 3 times for about 15 minutes each time to suck on that douche flute. I mean come on! It was our FIRST date and this man chose to leave me, looking fine as hell in a crowded bar, at the table by myself to go outside and blow ridiculous sized clouds in the air with his douche flute. I was annoyed to say the least.

The first time it happened, he got up and started down the stairs and I said to myself, “Well shit, he just left me here with the check and is NEVER coming back.” He did come back though obviously, and at the time I was excited, now I am kind of wishing he never had!

Dinner wrapped up, he paid for the check, I thanked him for dinner and we made our way out of the restaurant. At this point I was overlooking the DF (Douche Flute) and was trying to enjoy my evening because overall, I was happy with him and how everything was going.

Beggars can't be choosers! Right?.......WRONG!

It was raining that night. We stood outside for a while talking and continuing to enjoy each other’s company. We just weren’t ready to end the evening just yet. It was romantic. We hugged and kissed in the street with the rain coming down around us like a fairy-tale.  

(But ladies, let’s be honest… there is not such thing as fairy-tales.)

He put me in my car and we went our separate ways. It was perfect. I was smitten.  

Too much of my surprise he called me shortly after I left. I was excited. That is a good sign in the dating world. This man that I was pretty into, was into me too!

Online dating, or should I call it the rabbit hole from HELL! Let’s be honest here, dating now days is not how it use to be. Now days everything is centered around the internet, including dating! It is basically man shopping as I like to put it. My girlfriends tell me all the time, “just let it happen natural… stop looking.” Mind you…these bitches are married! They don’t know jack shit of what we single ladies are dealing with out here! And all you single ladies know exactly what I am talking about! There is nothing more awkward than trying to make “sexy eyes” with the guy standing next to you picking out his paper towels while you are picking out which toilet paper to get!

This is not what I signed up for!

It’s like having a kid. Everyone tells you how much you are going to love it, how beautiful it is, how it will change your life. What they forget to mention is the horrific pain you go through bringing that child into the world, how you are a prisoner in your own home for years because your shit of a toddler can’t contain their self in public, or how you basically just want to drop kick your teenager every waking minute of the day! Nope, never read any of that in those parenting books! 

Dating is much like having a child!

I started this journey about 3 years ago. I was married for almost 10 years. Was my ex-husband horrible to me? Not exactly. We drifted apart and were never truly able to get back on track. After my divorce was final I thought to myself, “this is my time.” This is my chance to start fresh, date, put myself out there, find everlasting love and in the meantime… have a little fun. It was going to be beautiful! I mean at the end of the day I was only 29 when I got divorced! I had PLENTY of good years left in me… or at least I thought. What no one told me was DATING SUCKS! Nothing like what it was 10 years ago. To put it lightly, it makes you question society at its best!