Clarification

Okay, I think I must have been a little less than eloquent when I wrote my last post regarding Rick. While I made it sound that I was annoyed at always having to make the plans, it's more that I'm always taking the initiative to do anything at all. Like when I made him cookies for Christmas, I mentioned that I needed to drop them off at some point before I went out of town for the holidays. His response? "Okay." Not "okay, why don't you come by after work tomorrow" or even "this is a rough week, would you be able to just drop them on my doorstep." Does that make sense? All of this pretty much left me with the feeling that He's Just Not that Into Me. Which is why I decided to give the reins to him.

As of right now, this is sort of a moo point. After not initiating contact with him, he sent me some texts yesterday, followed by an email this morning, inviting me over after work to watch a football game. I had plans and couldn't make it, but it was nice to see him doing some asking.

I thought boys were supposed to be simple?

Isn't that how it works? Boys are easy and simple, and girls are crazy and hormonal?

Things with Rick are going well. Well, they are going. I still enjoy hanging out with him, that much I know. Remember at the beginning how he was such a great plan-maker? Now, I sort of feel like I'm always the one making plans. I spent three years in a relationship as the one who almost always had to take charge, and it's not something I'm looking for again. One of the things that initially attracted me to Rick was that he seemed to be a take-charge sort of guy. But I don't see that at all anymore.

Last night we went to the movies (my suggestion). We did the usual hand-holding and kiss good night, but I wasn't really feeling it from him. So I vowed to not contact him until I heard from him- you know, put the ball in his court. Sure enough, he sent me a text this morning. I'm fairly confident in saying that he's interested in me, I think it's more that he's not wanting to scare me off. Or something like that. Or maybe the opposite of that. Wait, I don't even know what that would be.

As of now I have no set plans for New Years. I'm hoping he'll ask me to do something, or ask what I'm doing, or something like that...because I would like to spend it with him, but I just don't want to be the one to bring it up.

Have any of my loyal readers been in a situation like this?

On another note, I've been emailing a new guy from Match. He's actually someone I heard from a long time ago, but for some reason we never met up. I'm going to call him Stretch, because he's 6'6". How awesome is that? I'm a sucker for tall guys...

I hope I look good with drool on my chin.

I've had to go in to see my dentist three times in the past few weeks. I'm in the process of getting Invisalign, so there are impressions to be made, fillings to get, etc. In my experience, the dentist has limited involvement with the patient...the hygienist does everything, and the dentist simply comes in at the last minute to poke around. Not my dentist. Nope, he is very involved. Pictures needed to be taken? He used those shoe-horn looking things to keep my mouth open while the hygienist took pictures. Impressions? He kept his fingers in my mouth to hold them down...for five minutes! That's a very long time when I can't speak and he is having a "conversation" with me (side note: why do they always do that?). Then, he pulls the tray out and following it is a bunch of drool which is then on my chin, and he wipes off with my bib thing. Nice. Oh, did I mention the trays needed to be done twice, once for the top and once for the bottom? So that's 10 minutes of his fingers in my mouth. There was even one time when I really had to refrain saying "that's what she said" when he mentioned something that could have been taken the wrong way. It was hard, really hard. That's what she said. See, can't help myself!

A week of updates

Sorry for being a slacker and not updating this thing...I have no excuse, other than pure laziness. Which really I see more as a reason than an excuse. So that's my reason. Anyway, lots to update:

*I invited Rick to my work Christmas party. It was quite the internal debate- on one hand, I thought it would be fun to have a date, but on the other hand, was it too soon for that? I decided to throw caution to the wind and invite him, and he accepted. It turned out to be a fun night. He got approval from all of my work peeps. I will also say that he looked very good in his little outfit. Yummy.

*My brother's work Christmas party is this Saturday. Apparently the party will be ridiculous, LOTS of money is spent on it. I told him, half jokingly, to find out if any of his coworkers need a date. Sure enough, one does, and I'm it. Yep, sort of a blind date...with my brother and his wife. It should be fun.

*Saturday was my date with Evan. I was really looking forward to this, because he sounded really promising. On paper. Key there is the on paper. I got to the restaurant first. Wait, let me back up. I had to go to Rick's Saturday morning because he had my ID and my debit card (ahhh, so nice to have a date to carry stuff around for me) from the night before. I ended up hanging out there until about 30 minutes before my Evan date. I sort of felt bad about it...but not really. Maybe like 5% bad. Or 10%. Definitely not more than 10%. He wanted to hang out and I had to decline, so I could go meet another guy. Oh well. Anyway, back to Evan. If you took the Pillsbury dough boy and bred him with a serial murderer, that would be Evan. Yep, a pudgy guy with beady eyes. He was fairly boring. Not even boring, just blah. He was only 30, but I would have believed it if I had been told he was 40. Needless to say, we did not exchange contact info.

*Saturday night I hung out with Rick. We went to dinner and then back to my place to watch a movie. It was fun, very much like the other time we *ahem* watched a movie together.

I think that's all of my updates...um, yep.

Oops

This morning I sent Rick the following email:

Okay, 5.25 hours of sleep is not enough. Than God I stopped at Starbucks on my way to work. But the lack of sleep? Totally worth it :)

All was good...until I was skyping with my mom...and accidentally pasted that message and hit send. OMG.

NOT an SRV

Don't read too much into this statement, but Rick is not an SRV. No, it's not something I discovered first hand; it's something I deduced by the fact that he's an awesome kisser. That's right folks, we've made it to first base. And it was fantastic, definitely worth the really long wait...Not the way I would imagine an SRV to kiss...at all. I mean, it could just be that he is an SRV, and all of his "focus" has gone into mastering the kiss, but I'm going to assume not. Actually, at this point I don't even care if he is or isn't, because I've got enough to keep me *ahem* occupied for a while.

I would normally fill in the date details here, but really, do you even care? Okay, okay, short version: he won at Trivial Pursiut (damn world travelers who read the news every day...I mean who knows what country borders Denmark?), we watched Top Gun, started off sitting next to each other on the couch, ended up in a less vertical position. Got home at 1:30am.

Test

This is a test
Sent from my iPhone

**See what's written above? Yep, I can send an email to an admin address and it automatically posts it to this blog...which means, if the mood strikes, I can now update this thing while still on a date! This could be bad...Oh, and it will post pictures as well :)

I think it's all figured out...

I spent half of Friday fretting about the previous night. My friends all offered their advice. The most popular opinion was raised by J, who is positive that Rick is a "socially retarded virgin." So much, in fact, that his nickname amongst my "friends" is now SRV. Charming, I know.

After our usual texting back and forth Friday morning, I asked Rick what the stakes were for our impending Trivial Pursuit challenge. He said he'd have to think about it. A little while later, I got this text (warning- please swallow any liquid that is currently in your mouth, as to avoid spitting it all over your computer screen):

"If I win, you have to watch either the Godfather or Rocky, and I get a kiss on the cheek."

Did you catch that last part? Yep, on the cheek. I could barely read it out loud without laugh hysterically. Not that it was all that funny, just a little unbelievable. On the cheek? After six, yes 6, dates, he is aiming for a kiss on the cheek? Hmm. Maybe SRV is a good name after all. I decided to sack up and use this opportunity to put it on the line:

"Okay, but if win we are watching either Pride and Prejudice (the short version) or Sex and the City, but I want a real kiss."

He then responded that if I'm raising the stakes then he is too, to both an actual kiss and being forced to watch either the Rocky or Godfather series in their entirety. I countered by adding in the 5 hour BBC version of Pride and Prejudice.

It seems that all is well. Our Trivial Pursuit challenge is on Tuesday night, and assuming we don't tie, I should finally make it to (drum roll, please) 1st base. I'm thinking I might just get it over with as soon as we meet up...I would hate for the impending event to impact my trivia skills. Since, after all, that's what is important.

Let's just say that J owes me a Starbucks

The bad news:

Rick came over last night. We went across the street to play pool, then back to my place to watch The Office. No move was made. At all. None.

The good news:

J and I had made a bet, if he kissed me I buy her a Starbucks, if he doesn't, she buys me one. So at least I have that to look forward to.

The weird news:

He texted me after he left and wants to know when we can get together again. I don't swear, but I think a WTF is in order.

The hypotheses I've heard so far this morning:

1) He's gay (unlikely that he would have signed up for a matchmaking service, a heterosexual matchmaking service)
2) He's just really really shy (he was student body vice president in college, and in a frat)
3) He's really really nice and doesn't want to move too quickly (maybe)
4) He's a 28 year old virgin (see #2)
5) He's socially retarded (see #2)

Now what?

I don't know what to do now. After the last date, I said I'd give him one last chance to make something happen, and if he didn't, I would move on. But the thing is that I like him and enjoy spending time with him and I really want to get over this "hump." So now I am considering emailing him and confronting him. But how do I word that? I want to make it so I can say what I want, without making it too awkward the next time we're together. Help!

Date 3.5 + .5

Okay, so tonight I had my 4th date with Rick. I was at 3.5 before, and tonight's events qualify as a half date, hence the #4. I would like to preface this post by saying I've had a bit to drink, so I apologize for any incoherence or misspellings.

Blogger J came over to accompany to the bar-like establishment across the street from my new place. I invited Rick to join us, which he did. We were a few drinks in before he arrived. Once he got there everything was fine. We were having fun playing pool and darts, not to mention the eating and drinking. The time came when J's boy arrived to drive her home. So, it was just the two of us (I'll skip the part where J breaks my brand new iphone). Everything is fine. We leave. I ask if he is going to drive me home, since I don't want to walk across the street by myself. He drives me home. I get out of the car. That's it. He doesn't walk me to my door, reach to hug me goodnight, anything. Nada. Fast forward 30 minutes, I fix my iphone. I text him, something to the extent of "home you made it home safe." He texts back, immediately: "Yep! That was fun...I want a rematch." Oh, did I mention I beat him at pool?

If there was ever the perfect opportunity to try fot 1st base, that was it. I was somewhat tipsy and could have used an escort up the stairs to my place. But he didn't even offer. So, to my readers, what in the world is going on? I'm getting fairly frustrated by the whole thing. He is a really nice guy and I get along with him really well, but it's getting ridiculous. What do you think?

Match #2

I got a call from the IJL people today (only a few hours after I called them, which was awesome) with my second match. The date coordinator is out of town until Wednesday, so I won't find out when we're meeting until then. For now, you'll have to settle for his stats:

His name is Evan, he's 30, he has brown hair and blue eyes (my favorite!). He is 6'. He has a degree in finance from Princeton. He's the VP of Business Development for a company here in town. And that's all I know...

Welcome to 7th grade

Rick and I had originally planned for a Sunday evening date- he was going to come over and I was going to cook for him. This was partially because my parents were staying with me for Thanksgiving and originally weren't supposed to leave until Sunday. They ended up leaving Saturday morning, and after having spent the previous three days with lots of family, some non-family social time sounded great. Plus I really didn't feel like cooking. We decided on dinner and a movie.

The movie started at 6:00, and I wanted to get there early so I could buy the tickets. But he beat me and had the tickets in hand. Darn punctuality. We saw Four Christmases which was hilarious. I recommend seeing it, it's worth $10. Anyway, as we were sitting in the theater, he was super fidgety. Finally, after about 20 minutes, he grabbed my hand....hence the name of this post. I totally felt like I was in middle school...not that I had a boyfriend for any period longer than two weeks, but you know what I mean.

After dinner we went next door and had sushi. As usual there was no trouble conversing. End of the night came, and I got (drumroll, please).......a hug! Yeah. That was date 3.5. I understand the awkwardness of a busy parking lot and stuff, but still, I just want to get the whole first kiss thing over with (I know, I'm quite the romantic). I think our next date will be at one of our houses, so that should do the trick.

On a side note, I've noticed something sort of odd. Every time we've met we've driven separately...and not once has he walked me to my car. He's an extremely polite person, so it was just something that I found strange. We always walk to the parking lot and part ways and walk to our respective cars (And Haley, I'm not making a big deal out of it, just something I noticed!). We haven't set up our next date yet, we just said we would figure it out.

Also, I had to call It's Just Lunch to give them my new phone number (I finally broke down and got a local #), and while I was at it, I told them I was ready for my next match. Yes, I 'm going to keep dating Rick, because I really do like him and think we're a good match...but I also paid for this service and would like to see what else they have to offer.