Dating is Fun!

So… I went on a date last night with this guy. We met a few months back online somewhere, and had been chatting on yahoo IM off and on since. When I was stuck in the Lima airport for 8 hrs last Sunday, I hung out in an internet café, and it was then that he and I really started chatting with any frequency. We really seemed to be hitting it off… he seemed nice and interesting, and a little sarcastic and/or snide… a good combo, overall. Worth meeting, I figured. So we made plans to do just that.

Well, the first attempt failed, but we pulled it off last night. I BARTed out to the east bay (West Oakland!), and he picked me up from the station. I really wasn’t too sure what he looked like, since I’d only seen a few small pics… and I tend to be a little overly looks-obsessed (which is pathetic and embarrassing, but I blame it on gay culture, which means it’s not my fault and really, I’m just as much a victim as those I malign). So at first I was worried about what he looks like, and if I’d be attracted to his face, his body, his voice. But then I realized we were just meeting as friends, more or less, and it didn’t matter what he looked like because we got along so well online and on the phone. So anyways, he picks me up, and I jump in his car, and I’m like, oh my lord, he’s hot. He’s almost 6’, well-built, very cute… great voice. And I’m like, oh good, this won’t be a total disaster. Yay!

We went back to his place, because he wanted to keep things low-key and eat dinner in, hang out, and maybe watch a movie. I was totally signed on to this plan (even tho I had to go to the freaking east bay) primarily because he promised to cook me dinner. I’m thinking that he’s one of those people who says how great a cook they are, and how awesome their lasagna is, and then you get there and they’ve made a passable lasagna and opened a pre-packed bag of salad on the side, and then they give you a glass of weird-tasting water and spend the whole meal making faces indicating just how delicious their grandmother’s lasagna recipe truly is, and don’t you agree, and if you’re good then just maybe he’ll give you a copy of the recipe.

Yeah. Well. Check out what he made for us. Sliced, thick, warm bread, served with olives and a melted herbed brie that I suspect he self-herbed. Pesto pasta with a pesto he made from scratch. Mashed sweet potatoes with cream and something else, that he made from scratch. Artichokes that he’d stuffed with whole caramelized garlic gloves, goat cheese, and tomatoes. Yes, made from scratch. And all I showed up with was a bottle of Tempranillo that I was all excited I’d found cause it’s from La Rioja where I visited in Spain this summer. Oh, and he apologizes for how half-assed dinner is, and how he really should have made the bread and pasta from scratch, too.

Holy god.

And it just gets better from there. He’s super sweet and a great conversationalist. He seems genuinely interested in me and my hare-brained stories. He tells me his 5 favorite movies: Transformers (the 80s cartoon version; we both cried when Optimus Prime died), Spaceballs, What Dreams May Come (he still cries when he watches it), Long Kiss Goodnight (go Geena Davis!), and the fucking Disney version of Alice in Wonderland!!!! I have two copies of that last one because I used to watch it ALL THE TIME and one time thought I’d lost my copy, so I had to buy an emergency backup. I have it practically memorized, and occasionally sing songs from it under my breath. So I share with him my favorites, like Clue, Airplane!, Top Secret, Star Trek: First Contact, and more… and he owns all of them and can throw favorite quotes and scenes at me from each one. And he loves Family Guy, and he’s seen the director’s cut of all 3 Lord of the Rings IN A ROW just like I’ve wanted to do for yeaaaars but would be happy to do it again with me sometime if I’d like. He thought 300 was a shitty movie because the storyline was “too simple”, which is BS and a horrible opinion to have, but I guess nobody’s perfect.

He oil paints, he used to DJ, he grows his own bonsais and loves gardening in general. [Apparently Japanese Red Maples are very temperamental when young and can’t go a week without water without dying. Who knew?!] He works for a non-profit related to the homeless, as well as working at a friend’s coffee shop just for shits, as well as editing wedding videos on the side for extra cash. He’s done some personal training, and the 24-hr Fitness he goes to wants to hire him on as a full-time trainer. He’s debating joining the SFPD. He runs 10-20 miles on Sundays, and has done multiple marathons. He’s also a biker, like me (sorta).

In short, I think he may be one of the most interesting people I’ve ever met. No offense to current friends and family. =D

So what happened with the date? He was visibly nervous for, like, the first hour of it (why on god’s green earth I don’t know, it’s just me), but got comfortable with me and/or the date after that. We talked a lot… never ended up seeing a movie, tho we were going to watch the Family Guy movie since I haven’t seen it yet. At one point we started cuddling, which led to making out. And he’s great at that, too. He also found some trigger areas on my neck… suffice to say I had to pull him off, and still walked away with a mild hickey (which I was convinced would elicit snide remarks from coworkers, but miraculously went completely unnoticed). Things progressed, and tho I’m not entirely thrilled with my lack of self-restraint, I don’t really have any regrets. I stayed over and we snuggled overnight, and then he got us up at 6am to get me to the BART so I could get home and down to work on time.

So now I’m more or less besotted with him. He has issues… we all do, right? I got a glimpse of a few of them, and I started getting really angry on his behalf. He’s wary to trust too quickly, and I don’t blame him. So now starts the usual Graeme nonsense where I bounce between 2 extremes. On the one end, I can’t wait to see him again, and I want to text him and talk to him and IM him till I’m blue in the face or fingers or whatever. But then on the other end, I don’t want to come on super-strong and freak him out and then end up screwing up something that might have a chance at lasting more than 2 months. Most likely I’ll proceed as normal, which means random bursts of communications followed by days of silence, as I oscillate between my extremes. I’m pretty sure guys find that sort of mixed-message unpredictability totally endearing, and he and I will be walking the aisle in Massachusetts in no time flat.

Anyways, just figured I’d document this for posterity’s sake. Either he and I will read this in 5 years and laaaugh and laaaugh (hi future us!), or this can serve as a vivid example of just how confused and confusing I am when it comes to relationships.

Either way… wish me luck!