Dating: the follow-up

It’s been a year since my last (and only) post on dating, so I figured it was time for a follow-up. Here it is:

I have stopped dating.

Over the past year I’ve met a lot of interesting people, had some fun, had some not-so-much-fun and learned a lot about social interaction, myself, others, and how likely someone is to show up with bad breath. I may write a book on my experiences.

But for now, I am taking a break from the dating game to recharge and take stock.

Admittedly, this is not much of an update, so I now present pig eating cake:

There be tin men here

Today as I was enjoying a beverage with a date at Melriches on Davie Street I had a guy come up and ask me if I liked hip hop. I asked him to repeat the question because my brain was pretty sure he had not just asked me if I liked hip hop. He repeated it and sure enough, he had asked me if I liked hip hop. I don’t really think of myself as the hip hop type but I was wearing a black baseball cap. Maybe that’s some code I was unaware of that says “big fan of hip hop here!” It turns out he was trying to sell or generate interest in his own CDs, several of which he held out for me to see. I truthfully told him that no, I was not into hip hop, so he moved on to the nice old ladies at the next table.

After having said beverage, we strolled down to Stanley Park because it was another gorgeously sunny and warm day. It’s weird because I normally expect June to be largely soggy (that may happen this coming week). We ventured as far as Third Beach then instead of reversing back along the seawall we cut across the park, following one of the main trails (mostly a service road, from the looks of it) to Lost Lagoon. Along the way we passed women pushing strollers, joggers, bikers, all the usual sorts you’d expect to see. And then off to the left I noticed some tin foil wrapped in sections around a tree. There was a large video camera resting on the ground nearby and someone with a shirt that read “Stunt Crew” on the back was holding a container of tin foil and was wrapping it around a person standing in front of him. By the time we arrived, this tin man was almost completely covered from head to toe. As we walked by and looked back, the wrapper looked to us and we all kind of chuckled and kept walking. The wrapper, well, kept wrapping.

I have no idea what they were doing. Were the strips on the tree just for practice? Did the guy getting wrapped up lose a bet? Was it the world’s lowest budget science fiction movie? The worst part is I had my camera in my man purse* but totally forgot about it. Then again, if I had taken pictures, they may have come after us with ray guns or something.

After leaving the park we found ourselves in the middle of the Denman Car-free day, featuring an assortment of festivities ranging from a band performing “Only the lonely” to kids playing chess on the street using pieces about half a meter tall to a Hedy Fry re-election booth. Since there is currently no election, perhaps she knows something and isn’t telling. Either that or it was just easier to haul out the election stuff rather than make new “Hedy Fry Denman Car-free Day” signs. Lord knows with all the elections the paint on those signs is probably still tacky.

It was a pretty good day, in all.

* I am told this is the correct nomenclature, although some will also accept “murse”. It’s really just a small shoulder pack. A manly shoulder pack.

Dating sucks

Yes, it’s been scientically proven — dating sucks! I have been gathering objective, empirical evidence to support this theory and will be presenting my findings here soon.