How To Lose A Guy on A First Date
10 Days? Pleeeeeease. Here’s how to send him packing in hours.
It’s a Saturday night, and I have a first date with Peter.* I walk into the restaurant and find him sitting at the bar. He’s tall, handsome, and giving off enough bad-boy heat to scare away hell’s demons.
But then he makes a tragic mistake. He opens his mouth.
In the first three minutes, Peter complains about how hard it is to find a Tesla charging station.
Oh, it must be hard.
He then alternates between bragging about his vacation homes to his various work accomplishments. He’s got a carnival barker sort of energy. He talks fast, doesn’t ask questions back, and keeps making me wonder what is really behind the curtain. The conversation leaves me cold.
Now, if you go on as many first dates as I do, you start to feel like your romantic life is one big 80s rerun. Girl meets boy. Boy meets girl. Boy and girl go out on a date.
Girl never wants to see boy again.
I have started associating that time I wanted a second date with remembering there was an impending solar eclipse.
There was no solar eclipse that night.
I excuse myself, head to the bathroom, and prepare my standard rejection text. (I keep this message in my Apple Notes, so I can copy and paste it in at the end of the night.)
“Thank you for a wonderful evening, (insert name). I enjoyed getting to know you, but I didn’t sense enough chemistry to go on a second date. I wish you the best of luck.”
There are three common responses that I get to this undramatic ending. Let’s start with the most popular.
Response 1: The debater
This guy tells me there was a connection and that I am mistaken. He then makes his argument for why I should reconsider a second date. (In all fairness, sometimes he’s right.)
I then ask him to respect my decision, and he wishes me the best.
Response 2: The negger
This guy makes some sour grape(y) comment that he didn’t sense a connection, either. Which is great. But then he proceeds with his ad hominem argument detailing why I suck as a human. I am too old. Too thin. Too stuck up, etc.
Unnecessary. Peevish. And not a good look on anyone.
Response 3: The high-quality man
The third response is the response I get from high-quality men. These are the men who agree with me. There wasn’t a connection. So they do not take it personally.
This guy does not respond. Unfortunately, this response is the least common.
If you have ever wondered why women ghost, the answer is responses 1 and 2. Most people make rejection wildly uncomfortable. So as I took an inordinately long time scrubbing my hands under the harsh bathroom lights, a plan suddenly hatched in my mischievous mind…
What if I don’t have to reject Peter? What if I can get him to reject me? Then no feelings are hurt.
I return to my seat, and Peter has ordered another round of drinks (without asking me). A devious half-smile curls my lips.
“Sooooooo Peter, I don’t want to waste too much of your time, but I can already tell that you and I have the genetics to make some beauuuuutiful babies.”
“Ah, yeah. But I already have two kids,” Peter stammers.
“Two kids. Pleeeeeeeeease. I could pop out another four. I might look like I don’t have the birthing hips, but I am hornier than a rabid raccoon.”
He stirs his drink and shifts in his seat. I have silenced him for the first time tonight. So I go on…
“Of course, we must raise our children under the lord savior Jesus’ guiding light.”
(Note: Peter is Jewish.)
“And I hope we are on the same page with politics too. I am a BIG Trump supporter. The Dems just want to give handouts to the poor. I say let the immigrant children rot in cages!”
(Note: Peter is a second-generation immigrant from Greece and a bleeding-heart liberal. I knew this one would hit a nerve. Now it’s time to deliver my coup de grâce.)
“Do you like cats? I loooooooove cats. I have seven. I named them after all my favorite people. There’s Alex Jones, but I call him Jonesey. Then there is Pence (he loves his mommy), DeSantos, Graham, Gaetz, (he humps my daughter’s leg a lot), McConnell, and my favorite — Dahmer. He will bite your face off and eat it for breakfast, so I wouldn’t pet him.”
A bead of sweat trickles down Peter’s forehead, and he swallows hard before responding.
“Um. I am allergic to cats.”
“Oh, well, you will get over it. My babies sleep in my bed. Jonesey likes to curl up around your scrotum.”
There I did it. I used the word “scrotum” on a first date for the first time. I am shameless.
The date ended soon after this exchange. Peter made an excuse about getting up for work early the next day, and we said our goodbyes.
The following day my phone pinged. It was a message from Peter. I expected a short rejection text. Instead, he sent an 800-word explanation of why we would not be going on a second date. It was actually a thoughtful response about our differing political beliefs, love of felines, and life stages.
You can bet I felt like the most giant arse ever.
Before the trolls start gnashing their teeth, I will fully admit that what I did was horribly immature.
First, most emotionally intelligent people will not be too hurt after a first date rejection. It happens to all of us. And it’s not fun.
But when someone doesn’t want a second date, they are not rejecting you. They can’t. They don’t know you. What they are really rejecting is your story matching their story. Most people are attracted to the familiar. If you don’t trigger that familiar from their childhood or a past relationship, you simply don’t fit their script.
As for Peter, if he ever reads this…I am sorry. I should have copied and pasted my usual ending. You probably would have fallen into response three. I will never know.
But I learned a valuable lesson from my naughtiness. It’s easy to lose the good guys. It’s the wrong ones that make it hard.
*Names changed.
