New Girl: Wendy. Last night I had a first date with a woman named Wendy. I didn't know Wendy very well prior to asking her out. I'd met her a couple of weeks ago and learned that she was single, friendly and close to my age. The date was fairly simple: dinner at a nice, but not fancy, restaurant followed by a couple of drinks at an outdoor bar with nice views of the city's skyline. From start to finish we got along really well. She's very easy to talk with. She looked really nice as well. That said, something was missing. There didn't seem to be a romantic spark. It was more like being out with a friend. But, I'm not ruling out romance, it just didn't happen on the first date.

 
Bombshell. Blond-mom dropped a bombshell on me last night. But first let me say that she looked fantastic. The date started with a dinner and during the meal I had the feeling that something wasn't right. I dismissed the feeling as the product of two weeks having passed since our last date. But my instincts were right, trouble was just around the corner.

Later that night we were having a couple of drinks in a bar and she brought up the topic of "us". She's often referred to "us" as dating, which we are, but it seems an odd description given that I only see her twice a month. Anyway, I'd been meaning to talk with her about the infrequency of our dates so I took the opportunity to express my thoughts. In a nutshell I told her that I was very attracted to her but didn't see how we could ever advance if we didn't find a way to spend more time together.

Turns out that she'd had a few things on her mind as well. She began by saying that she doesn't think she's the right one for me. Oh boy, we all know what that usually means. I took this as going in the direction of "I'm breaking up with you and this is my way of letting you down easy" and I almost went along with it to try to make it as easy as possible for both of us.

But as she continued to talk I began to realize that it was something else. Long story short, she's worried that a carefree, happy-go-lucky guy like me couldn't handle the chaos that would be involved in a serious relationship with her. She's reluctant to let a relationship develop with a man who hasn't previously experienced the ups-and-downs of living with kids.

She's got a good point. What could I say? I believe that I could handle such a change in my life but I've got no track record to support my assertion. It was clear that she wasn't looking for me to make an off-the-cuff affirmation but instead wants me to spend some time thinking long and hard about the inherent difficulties of dating a single mom.

Not surprisingly, this conversation made for an uncomfortable end to the date.

 
Dating. I have a date tentatively set up for Saturday with blond-mom. It had been set for Thursday but she's got to catch an early flight Friday morning so I told her we should push it back to the weekend. I think the next date may be critical and I don't want it to be rushed.

I met a new woman recently that is single and may be interested in a date with me. If there is a window of opportunity then I don't think it will be open long so I'll have to make a decision pretty quickly. The good news for visitors to this blog is that after two weeks of nothing I may soon have something to blog about.

 
Talking Points. I've heard this twice on the news recently: "Dean has raised more money through the internet than ever before in the history of elections."

Is that really impressive? The internet's only been around on a grand scale for about 10 years. Anybody wanna bet that four years from now another candidate sets a "new record" for fundraising through the internet?

 
Blond-mom. No date with the blond-mom this week. She's got her kids this weekend and we aren't at the "meet the kids" stage yet.

 
The Clueless Directing the Clueless. Yesterday while walking from my office building to my car an asian man drove up alongside of me. He was lost and asked for my help. He handed me a piece of paper that contained some hand-written directions to someone's house. I studied the paper and then confidently told him to go to the top of the hill and take a right and then to follow the directions as written.

Walking the remaining steps to my car I had a "Seinfeld" moment where I mentally complimented myself on taking the time to help a stranger. But then I realized that I had confused some street names and given the man very wrong directions. I'm sure that I added at least another 20 minutes to his trip.

Biking. Over the summer they closed part of my normal route for repaving. But, it's open again and I've been able to ride a few times in the past week. My latest Big Hill times: 7:51, 7:41, 7:38, 7:53 and 7:38.
Time for full route today: 1 hr 16 minutes. Looking back at my times in June and May it appears that although I've knocked 30 seconds off of my time on the big hill, my overall time for the 22 mile route hasn't budged. That sucks.

 
Dave Barry's readers upset the telemarketers. My favorite is that people called the telemarketer's 1-800 number to ask for assistance on getting on the governmet's "do not call" list.

 
This post (at Shark Blog) about Seattle resident protesting a proposed tax on espresso is hilarious. Check out the Boston-Tea party reenactment.

 
Through overlawyered.com I found this sad story of a young woman in Cape Cod whose car wouldn't start. She borrowed the cell phone of a stranger and called her father, who called AAA. The towtruck driver that AAA sent to help said he couldn't take the woman or her car to Boston for 3-4 hours. So, the woman accepted a ride from the cell-phone stranger. He raped and murdered her. Now the family is suing AAA.

 
Another dinner with Blond-mom and a *kiss* I went to dinner with the blond-mom Thursday night. She went out of town for the weekend so it was our only chance to get together. When I picked her up she apologized and said she had to be home by 8:30 because her ex was dropping off the kids that night. I didn't ask but I think he usually keeps them overnight and that this was unusual.

We went to a close-by restaurant of her choice. Unfortunately, I didn't like my dinner and later that night it displayed its dislike for me.

Blond-mom continues to surprise me with her willingness to reveal very personal details about her life. I'm not sure if she's testing me to see what I can handle or simply feels comfortable enough to open up to me. Also, this was the first of our dates where I felt sure that she was developing a real attraction towards me. It was something in the way she looked at me or subtlety sought my approval when telling me things. I liked it.

Driving back to where we'd met up that night she asked me whether I thought it was weird that she had kids. I told her no. I told her how on my trip to South Carolina in July I'd spent some time thinking about whether I could really handle getting involved with a woman with two kids. My conclusion was that I could. I told blond-mom that if things didn't work out between us it would not be because she has kids.

A few minutes later we pulled up next to her car:

Her: I'm sorry, i really do have to go
Me: it's ok, I understand
Her: (smile) so are you going to kiss me goodnight?
Me: of course

It was nice. I hope there'll be a lot more of that in our future.