Date 12

TINY HOME
As with the prior man, this one did not "like" me first; rather, I left a comment on his profile asking if there is such a thing as a bar where everybody knows your name. Look, his photos clearly indicate that he is or was a bartender so I'm not just pulling random questions out of my ass. Well, not this time anyway.

PRE-DATE
I start talking to bartender guy, who turns out to be ex-bartender guy, but make no mistake- he is still extremely confident in his beverage crafting ability and has all of his gear to prove it. Conversation is easy breezy and plenty of jokes and lols are exchanged so homeboy asks for my digits and we move on over to texting.

We make plans to meet on Friday night. I'd like to say right here that I made a terrible mistake and vastly overestimated my ability to hang out late at my age. Additionally, I had my second Covid  vaccine shot that morning but I felt fine so I went ahead and agreed to grab some drinks with ex-bartender guy.

What? Just cause I'm old doesn't mean I make good decisions.

DATE NIGHT
I don't know why, but the second I arrived and parked, I started to feel real uneasy. Butterflies in my stomach? Naw, more like the kind of feeling you get when you agree to do something and instantly regret that you agreed to do it. But fuck it, I'm here now, so I let's do this.

I see ex-bartender guy roll up in his truck and park. At least, I'm pretty sure it's him, I think. He steps out and I get a better look at him and realize that he reminds me of somebody but I can't quite put my finger on who. This bothers me the same way it bothers me when trying to identify an actor in a movie and the name is right on the tip of your tongue but you just can't remember it and so you end up making up a name instead. 

Him? Oh that's um, what's his name..... Butthole Martinez. 

We met at an arcade that had a vast selection of arcade games, a handful of consoles with monitors set up, a bar and some shitty food available for purchase. On paper, it sounded like an alright place- gaming and booze, seems legit to me. In reality this place looked like a grimy paradise for bacteria to raise a family. I’m not sure they ever wipe down the equipment. Some of the Xbox controllers were so greasy and oily that if I had tried to pick one up it would probably have slipped right out of my hand. Gross. I should take this moment to remind us all of the time period here- we are still in the middle of a goddamn pandemic. At the timing of this date, vaccines are just starting to become more readily available but it’s not over yet. This place didn’t get the memo.

We played a few of the arcade games and I'll be honest - he kicked my ass in all of them. Arcades were before my time, alright? I started gaming in the 90's on the PC and moved on to consoles from there. Both are pretty different from using the giant buttons and joysticks on a typical arcade game machine. I'm not making excuses. 

Alright maybe I am.

We moved over to the non-greasiest looking controllers I could find, which unfortunately were for  Nintendo (not my preferred console but at least I might have a chance here). I did beat him once in Mario Kart, specifically on Rainbow road because I am queen of rainbow road. He hardly acknowledged my win but was sure to harp on all of the games he beat me in. Typical dude though, amiright? Competitive as a mofo.

Yes, you beat me twice in Mortal Kombat, you want a trophy or somethin'?

YOU'RE VERY PRETTY
We head over to a pizza joint in the area to get some dinner, though admittedly, I didn't eat much (another terrible decision on my part). We talked (he did a lot of it) and had a couple of drinks, you know, the usual date stuff. He tells me about his current situation and over-explains his occupation, including a lengthy description of the science behind installing insulation. And then he mentions that he lives in a tiny house. I'm imagining an actual house that is very small. And pink with white trim for some reason.

Nope. He lives in a very small trailer that is parked in a trailer park. More on that later.

Let's talk about negging. My understanding is that negging is when a person insults another person but it is disguised as a compliment or used as a flirting technique when the reality is that person is just being a dick. 

Any time I would say that I didn't know about a certain topic he would pause, look me in the eyes and say "you're very pretty" while smiling. The way he said it, it came off as more of a "well at least you're fun to look at" .... you know, implying that I'm stupid or some shit. 

Listen bitchboy, not caring to learn about Doge coin is not equivalent to being an idiot.

HOW HAVE I NOT BEEN MURDERED?

Back to the tiny trailer. Time has passed and the restaurant is closing up and kicking us out. I'm still feeling good, as in, not experiencing any flu-like symptoms as a result of the second Covid vaccine, so I make yet another poor choice. 

He offers me a tour of his tiny home (trailer) and my morbid curiosity gets the best of me. "Sure, let's go, I probably won't get murdered at all!" I get in my car and follow him to the trailer park. This is basically the first rule every woman is taught when it comes to dating, especially when it comes to dating strange men off of a dating app, and I totally broke it. I might as well have given myself a roofie and provided an assortment of blades for the guy to chop me up with. I know. I am not proud of my choices here.

I have the least consideration for my own wellbeing.

Obviously he did not murder me, otherwise I wouldn't be writing this. We got to the trailer park around 11pm and that Covid shot was really starting to hit me. Suddenly my ass (literally, my ass cheeks) was sore, then my back and legs began to hurt. Eventually my entire body felt bruised; I've never fallen down a flight of stairs before, but if I had to imagine what that would feel like, I'd say this is it.

Thankfully this man not only did not murder me, but he also refrained from taking advantage of this situation. Instead, he just continued to talk and overexplain things to me while I sat on the little bench in his trailer, wrapped in a blanket because suddenly I was freezing.

He wasn't kiddin' about his place being tiny. This man is 5'10" (an entire foot taller than me) and even I felt cramped in this little box on wheels. He told me that he was doing this to save money and pay down some debt. Look, I get it- sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do, but this lifestyle is most definitely not for me.

NO THANK YOU
Ex-bartender guy is more of a free spirit, moving from job to job and making money on multiple investments like Doge coin and renting out a house--like a real house. I am somebody who looks for a little more stability and lower risk opportunities. 

Also he offered to make me a drink so I could get a taste of his amazing beverage crafting skills. I said sure and then he proceeded to exit his trailer, leaving me a bit confused. He returned a moment later holding a duffle bag containing his bartending supplies which he used to make said drink. 

C'mon man, I don't want to drink anything that came out of a duffle bag that was stuffed in a storage bin of a trailer.

So it was around 2am when I decided to fuck off and get outta there before he changed his mind about killing me. I did get away unscathed, which I give the man credit for. He didn’t even attempt to molest me, not even once! Afterward, our texts back and forth became less frequent and eventually stopped. I’m gonna say this one ended with a mutual ghosting.

And so we begin this journey in another app- Bumble. And this time I do pay for the upgraded version, which I fully regret.