Date 97 - Surprise Swordplay and Moons Over His Hammy

We'd been emailing for awhile and I looked forward to meeting J. With my travel and social schedules, it took weeks to synchronize. We finally met for drinks and dinner at Mesa Hills Cafe.

My first impression: He was cute, but much more casual than I expected, especially since we talked that afternoon and he said he was going home to shower and change for our date. I felt a bit overdone in my jersey dress. Engineering school evidently had not impacted him too much -- there was nothing remotely geeky about his appearance or demeanor.

A former cook, he's definitely a foodie, but he made deciding what to order and enjoying the food lots of fun. He invented some kind of fruity drink with a ridiculous number of liquors called the Soprano. (I had two during the evening and I gotta say I was more than sufficiently socially lubricated!) We moved on to appetizers and talked about politics, religion and generally all the stuff you're not supposed to when you first meet someone.

At one point the conversation turned to youthful antics, drugs, tatoos, etc. He took a plastic sword from his drink's garnish and demonstrated his formerly pierced septum. I was simultaneously startled, creeped out and amused.

It was a fun evening and he asked me to make room in my schedule to see him the next weekend.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
The Second date with J- live music downtown Sept 3

J is totally laid back about our plans for the evening, which is awesome because I was exhausted from working on a really intense home improvement project for the past several days (also known as pergo-tory).

Since he's more central, I picked him up and we headed downtown to catch some live music. We scored a perfect and FREE parking spot and head to a low key bar on 6th with some live blues. Obtained a couch in the back where the music wasn't ear splitting, then switched to a different couch that was actually made for adults instead of midgets. Stupid Eurway furniture and their elfin magic!

We had a few cocktails, some interesting conversation and a couple of nice smooches too. As the bar filled, we realized we had a great spot and probably couldn't top it, but we moved on to another bar to play some pool. I'm horrible at pool. Truly talentless. The way I play it's a contact sport. Helmets are de rigeur. Despite that, he's encouraging and patient.

More drinks. More fun! Two games and we called it a night, but not before grabbing a slice at the goth pizzeria on our way to the car - yum! All's well until 8th and Congress when he decides to take his shirt off to show me his ink. I knew he had tattoos from our previous conversations, but this is his entire back. OK. I'm cool. ...and now he's "dropping trou"... on 8th and Congress. I'm not OK anymore.

I'm trying to go to my happy place....
and I'm not succeeding.

La, la, la!