First online date I had many years ago we could barely hold a conversation, just not remotely a good pair. At the end he seemed to think it had gone well and asked me out again. I let him down gently and his response was to shout “RIGHT. FINE” and immediately get up and walk out. Didn’t even give me a backward glance let alone say bye.

Can’t think why he was single.

Removed by mod

I went on a blind date years ago with someone a work colleague set me up with. The date was perfectly fine, but when we left the restaurant to leave—I was going to drive her back to where she was staying—it became clear that I had parked in a tow zone and my car was no longer present. This was around midnight, and so I had to drag this poor girl around as I called my father to come pick us up, get a bunch of cash from an ATM (he had to get it because I didn’t have 300 in my bank acct, yep lady I’m broke!) and go over to a very sketchy part of town to reclaim the car from a towing company. We offered to drop her home first, but I guess she was intrigued by the adventure and elected to come along.

Anyhow l was suitably embarrassed, having to call in my family to bail me out was something I was fairly sure was a romance-killer, not to mention having to go to a very sketchy part of the city at 1 am to deal with surly impound guards. But turns out she found it amusing and I guess it never hurts to show a little vulnerability, because we ended up dating for a year after that. We broke up based on distance and life directions, not any real conflict or dislike of each other. It definitely taught me to not sweat about macho crap as much, and just to be genuine, since surprise surprise, potential partners like honesty and knowing who you actually are!

I met this girl working for the summer in a resort town (both employees at the same place). At first I didn’t think she was my type, but we kept getting into conversations no matter what we were doing. An acquaintance suggested that I ask her out and we could all hang out watching a movie (we were all just out of highschool). That was a mistake because it was ghetto af. Turned out the friend (ok she was an ex, but she was in a relationship) was interested in getting back with me and was trying to sabotage my chances with this girl. That night I leaned in for a little hug as I dropped her off at her doorstep (next door to my own). She aggressively shoved her hand out to shake mine. I was full of red flags and she was right to push back.

We’ve been married for 20+ years now.

Obviously there is a lot more to that story but seriously looking back I cannot understand how I ended up with this amazing woman. I was an absolute mess of a person and she sort of saw through that and gave me something to work for. But I caution anyone thinking they can fix someone or use my experience. It just flat out doesn’t work that way. My marriage had the odds of working that winning the lottery has. It did, but it was absolutely wreckless for us both at the time and we are incredibly fortunate we didn’t destroy our lives and our kids lived in the process.

Edit: autocorrect nonsense

In my 20s I talked to a girl on a dating site for week or so then decided to meet up. She had kind of a slow slur to her speech that I tried not to let bother me but then she enthusiastically revealed that she got hit by a car and got brain damage, basically permanently mentally locking her at 17 years old.

Nice girl, albeit noticeably immature. We did not go on another date.