$ingle Lady #1: The merits of bar dating

Contrary to the experiences of $L#dos, internet dating is a sober business. Most of my eHarmonizing is done at 10 pm curled up in my pjs while watching Grey’s Anatomy. Granted, most “dates” happen at bars, and particularly post-happy-hour-impromptu dates are likely to have an element of enzyme-processing-liver overdrive, but most of the get-to-know-you process is done without a drop. This leads to an interesting boredom conundrum. Everything is preprocessed, so no one has to be original.

Bar dating, and more specifically bar meeting, is much more exciting. Maybe it’s just me, but typically I end up with a fantastic story of meeting guys in bars. Disclaimer: I’m a bar prancer. I pretty much believe that it is everyone in the bar’s job to entertain me, willing or not. I will always, always, ask the bartender to teach me a new trick. I am exceptionally good at slicing a crisped dollar bill stacked with four quarters off the mouth of an empty beer bottle so that the quarters fall, still stacked, on top of it. Try it, it’s pretty hard. I will also always, always dance. In NYC, bars actually have to have a Permit to Dance to allow it, so I have thus been kicked out of bars before for such ghastly behavior. I also always, always make besties with the creepy old guys sitting in the corner. They’re regulars, and therefore are the kings of the bar and their power must be respected.

Case in point, for a bit of time when I was young and still enjoyed Thursday nights as a weekend, I used to frequent a certain Mexican bar in midtown which served $3 margaritas on Thursday nights. One night there at happy hour, I was demonstrating my strut (side bar: I strut. Not on purpose, it’s just how my hips go. It’s not a particularly sexy thing – I do it walking to the printer—it’s just a weird physical trait), and the bartender started mimicking me. We chatted a lot and my friends and I all got free drinks for the rest of the night. The following week, we were back, he was there; we chatted, drank for free, and after he got off work, ended up walking around the corner to grab a burger at like 2 am. Turns out he was 34 (I was…not), and made a wildly successful career taking jello shots off of girls’ belly buttons. We casually hung out for a few more weeks until he up and moved to Africa to become a documentary film maker.

Case in point two is a more relevant adventure. A month or so ago, I was actually leaving a bar (sadly, none the wiser with any new tricks), and was just getting in a cab when a tall and attractive man said, “Wait, come have a drink with me!” Completely befuddled, I looked around at who he could possibly be talking to, and he repeated the question. I must have looked appropriately wary for a $ingle girl alone on a street corner, because he then added “come on, there’s a great Italian wine bar right here, let’s just have one drink.” Eh, why not – only in New York does this story not end with me cut up in pieces in a gutter somewhere. Super excited about my bold move accepting such a last minute date offer, I order my glass of Pinot Grigio and wait for him to place his order. Alas, it wasn’t a real date invite, for he was actually the host of the restaurant, outside drumming up new business. After a quick high five for how well he managed to bamboozle me, I decided to stay, and in fact, order a full Italian meal by myself at the bar – think bread, dipping sauce, wine, pasta-- the whole nine yards. When I’m through, I pay and get up to leave, only to have him ask me to stay until he got off work so he could take me on a proper date. The phrase, "fool me once, shame on you…”starts formulating in my head and I politely decline, to which he replies by bringing me a rose. Feeling a little gutsy, I fling it back towards him and announce that a single rose isn’t good enough- I won’t even consider his proposal for less than a dozen. He complies, and we end up going to play chess at a bar around the corner until late into the night. This happened months ago you say, and isn’t relevant, liar. Yet strangely, we’re back in touch, and I will likely meet him for a drink within the week. He must have sniffed out that I’m looking to date…

xo,
$L#1