Blind Date: Take Three

Well, folks, I did it. I went on my third blind date of the year. When you get to be an "old maid" in the dating world, people are just dying to set you up. Sometimes being set up on a blind date by a mutual friend can actually be pretty successful...or not (see early posts about blind dates). This time, my friend, who joined the church about a year ago, wanted to set me up with one of the missionaries who taught her. Of course she is going to think the best of this guy no matter what, but once again, I figured it was worth a shot.
When I heard this boy was asking about me, I asked my friend what he thought about this whole situation.
"He's not thinking this is eternity material, right? I mean, it's one date," I said.
"Of course not," she responded. "Well, you never know..."
Great.
My friend and I decided to invite over the guy, who we'll call Spencer, for Sunday dinner. He also brought a friend, who we'll call Eddie, to set up with my friend. She was worried that Eddie would look like Shrek, although I suggested that maybe he looked like Shrek AFTER he turned human.
As we were concocting chicken and rice and salad, I looked out the window to see two dapper young gentlemen walking up to the door. They looked so cute and return-missionary-like...because they'd both just returned from their missions a month earlier. Yes, this means that Spencer was about THREE YEARS YOUNGER than me! I guess once you get to be a ripe old age, that doesn't matter as much, in fact, I have heard of many a couple that has about 10 years between them. Still, it's hard to go on a date with someone about the age of my younger brother. Besides that point, I was excited that Eddie was sporting a BYU shirt and they were both smiling with that good old return missionary spirit.
Spencer was indeed very nice and easy to talk to. Since he served his mission where I grew up, we found that we knew a lot of the same people. There were only a couple awkward silences as we conversed over our delicious dinner.
After dinner, we decided to watch "The Best Two Years," which is a movie about missionaries, so of course Spencer and Eddie would pick that to watch. Oh well. The situation got a bit awkward when we found that there was only one couch, so we all had to squeeze onto it until we were practically sitting in each other's laps.
After the movie, we made s'mores in the microwave. Then we said goodbye to Spencer and Eddie at the door, which was weird because the whole thing was more like a group activity than a date, and was probably the first "date" they had been on since being back from their missions. Spencer gave me an awkward hug goodbye and they left.
Then my friend immediately exclaimed, "He's not Shrek-like at all! He's soooo cute!" One minute later, they knocked on the door again. They forgot something.
Well, that's that. The third blind date...a mild success. Fun, but probably not eternity material. Fourth, anyone?

The Saga of Rob

I've hesitated writing this post for quite some time, because the situation is still a bit awkward and confusing. But also pretty much over. So I noticed in the last post I wrote about dancing with my friend Rob. Well, after the dance, things pretty much took off from there...maybe took off isn't exactly the right phrase, since they took off and then crash landed.
But anyway...so after our evening, Rob sat next to me at a church meeting and was firing compliments at me left and right. Which was weird, but made me think that I may actually have feelings for him. Shortly after that we were both at a dance class. Since as I mentioned Rob is a great dancer and fun to dance with, we kept gravitating toward each other as partners. After the class, they kept playing music and Rob just grabbed my hands and we started to dance some more. Everyone in the class left except for us as we continued to dance. Romantic, right? Maybe.
I started asking Rob to do things with me, because that's what you're supposed to do to subtley pursue someone. I went over to his apartment quite a bit and he taught me new songs on guitar. Well, the problem was that Rob wasn't initiating any activities. And then he started to act weird around me. I'm pretty sure I wasn't imagining his interest at the beginning, but perhaps he realized that his feelings were reciprocated, which as an inexperienced dater kind of freaked him out and he backed off. As I got to know Rob better, though I still appreciated our friendship, I decided that actually I probably didn't want to date him. We just weren't on the same page with some things.
So I swore off Rob, went out of town, and didn't think about him anymore. Alas, now that I'm back he is back to flirty Rob again. But I already made my decision that he's not right for me. The whole situation just leaves me a bit annoyed and confused. And still VL.