Clifford

I'm calling this guy Clifford because its an old man name and because this guy was a good 12 years older than me. We met on OKCupid and corresponded for weeks due to conflicting schedules.

Clifford was a great writer. We wrote about everything. He told me all kinds of flattering things, he told loooooong in depth stories about hiking (snore) he introduced me to new music and bought me an album on Amazon which I thought was very generous and thoughtful. We talked about our families, our childhoods, past relationships, we talked a lot.

I wasn't that attracted to him physically but he was so sweet and such a good writer and an interesting person with a good job. I decided that he would be an experiment of sorts. Maybe I could will myself into liking him.

A few days before our date I realized the date was the same day as the opening NFL game, which usually I wouldn't care about but the Seahawks were playing so....I wore my Richard Sherman jersey to work that day and then to the date after work. If he didn't like the Seahawks, then I didn't like him.

The bar he picked was also one of the number one places to watch Seahawks games. I was 45 minutes early for our date but thought I'd find a booth and read. I was very wrong. All the tables were already full. I found another cute girl standing at the door of the bar and we tried to leverage our looks into getting guys to let us sit at their tables. Eventually the girl, Jennifer, and I found an empty table and claimed it as our own. She and I sat and watched kickoff and discussed how awful dating is. She was waiting for a guy too. We bonded quickly over two glasses of wine each and sneaking looks at the most attractive non-famous man I've ever seen in real life who was sitting nearby.

At this point, I was wishing Clifford wouldn't show up and Jennifer and I could drink and watch football. But of course Clifford arrived. The bar was at capacity so I had to leave Jennifer and our table and meet Clifford out front. Clifford didn't like football. in an effort to find a place to have dinner and talk, we had to walk literally a mile and a half, to find a restaurant that wasn't full of Seahawk fans watching the game. Finally Clifford picked a restaurant.  It was a seafood restaurant and as we sat down Clifford informed me that he didn't like seafood. I was already so over this guy and the date had just started.

When we sat down and continued talking, I noticed his teeth. My god, his teeth. Clifford's teeth looked like he had been using them to make keys. I'm sorry if this makes me shallow. Maybe I am shallow. Clifford works for a large company that I guarantee you've heard of and probably done business with. He was fairly high up in the company, he lived in a swank neighborhood, homeboy has money. "FIX YOUR GODDAMN TEETH," I silently screamed all night.

At least the seafood restaurant had a TV playing the Seahawks game so I could surreptitiously check the score. I had two drinks (in addition to the two I'd had with Jennifer) and not enough food. I drank until Clifford was fun. I asked follow up questions to his stories. In my tipsy opinion, I was a goddamn delight.

After dinner we walked a mile and a half back to my car. Clifford made his move and kissed me. I guess it was his attempt at making out. It was awful. He was shorter than me and a little chubby but I was just so repulsed by his teeth and had checked out of this date hours ago. We went our separate ways and later he contacted me to set up another date. I told Clifford that I hadn't felt a spark with him. Which, while it was an understatement, was true.

At least the Seahawks beat the Packers.