Continuing Saga of "The Date" - The End

Again this is a repost of a piece from another blog, part two of yesterdays post.

07/03/04 1:50 PM
The Ending

I’ve been meaning to update all week to fill you all in on what happened with mystery man when I ignored all those (flags) and went out with him anyway.

Let’s just say that my (flagging) system works very well.

He had said he would call me on the following Sunday, and I had told him I would be out of town, but he could call because I always have my cell with me. I was leaving my friends place at around 7:30pm and he had left me a voice mail message. I didn’t hear my phone ringing. I thought that was a good sign that he actually called when he said he would. I called him back and he asked if I was at home. I said no that I was just leaving Cambridge. He then told me he had already called my house 3 times and then left a message on my cell (flag). We then decided to continue the conversation when I got home. Later when we talked we made plans to get together on Wednesday night. I told him that I would be finished work at 6:30pm. He said he would call my cell. I really expected to have a message from him when I got off work. There was no message so I called him. He didn’t answer his cell, so I just left a message saying I was wondering what was up. He didn’t call me back until 8:20pm. I didn’t answer the phone. I let him leave a message and then called him back an hour later because my curiosity got the better of me. We made plans to get together Saturday night.

I told him that I was working overtime and he was to call me after 3:00pm. It’s funny because at the last minute on Friday, I decided to go into work when everyone else was at 6:00am so that I would be done at 1:30 and then could go home for a nap and be rested for Sat night. He called me at 2:00pm, which I thought was odd, because as far as he knew I would still be working. He told me that he was up in Wasaga Beach, working and would be back in the city around 7 or 8. He would call. I was ready for 8:00pm and never heard from him until after 11:00pm.

It starts to sound ridiculous when I recount the events like this. I must admit that I am embarrassed for how I handled this situation and can only hope that the next time (not with him, but with whomever) I will remember this and react differently. When he called I did not immediately express my irritation for sitting for 3 hours waiting. He was talking really fast, jumping from one subject to the next with all of his apologies, probably hoping that he would not have to listen to what I had to say. Before I knew what was happening I had agreed to meet him on Sunday for coffee. We planned to meet at 12:30pm in the infamous Dominion parking lot and he was emphatic that he would BE there.

I did call him back before I went to bed a couple of hours later and told him how rude he had been and that it did make me angry. Then continued to firm up plans to meet on Sunday. I know, weird. I should have used that precious moment to tell him to jump off a ledge somewhere.
Sunday at 12:40pm, I pull into the parking lot at Dominion. He is nowhere to be found. The weather is perfect. Sunny and warm. My car looks like it’s just been through a desert storm, the black is covered with salt sludge that makes it appear grey. A nice afternoon at the car wash is really what I would have preferred to be doing. I seriously consider calling him and cancelling if he is still far away. I call him to see where he is and he tells me he is at Dominion. Asks me where I am. I say Dominion and then he said, well I’m at the traffic light, I’ll be right there. So he was lying when I asked him where he was. I cannot stand liars.

He arrives, again apologizes for the evening before and asks me where Alice Fazoolis restaurant is because that is where he is taking me to lunch. I suggest that he come with me in my car and he is hesitant about leaving his van at the parking lot. I then tell him to follow me so he can park at my building. I know that was stupid. In fact, there is so much stupidity of mine in this story it’s almost like I was a victim of some UFO body snatching scheme.

The alien and mystery man drive to the restaurant. He uses this time, not to talk or get to know the alien better but to make business calls on his cell phone. As irritating as this can be, it’s a great way to learn some other fascinating things about somebody. Listening to one half of a telephone conversation can sometimes tell you more about that person then they would ever admit to you personally. I know, you want to know like what? Well, sometimes the information is not fully realized until later, which is the case here. So I’ll leave this until I get to the moment of realization and revisit what I already knew about him because I had listened to his phone calls.

We go into the restaurant and just like the first time, he had to choose a different table to sit at. Not satisfied with the Hostess’s choice. He maintains that they are not good at reading their customer’s and determining where that person would like to sit. I say, they don’t care what the customer’s want, they just want to seat them in the area where the next waiter/waitress is supposed to get the customer. I can tell he has never worked as a waiter/waitress. I have. I used to hate customer’s like him.

We order salads, which I may add was a big ordeal and required lots of concerted brain effort to make the decision on his part. I already had decided that I was not hungry for a heavy meal and the Cajun Chicken Caesar sounded perfect. He opted for the Baby Bocconcini Salad. Naturally I had made the better choice. He knew it too when our salads arrived, but that’s what happens when you don’t listen to a more experienced Alice Fazooli diner’s recommendations.

He ordered a bottle of red wine, which was very nice. Ok so he did one thing right. :o) To be honest, the lunch was nice. Except for the interruptions of his cell phone. We had good food, good wine and the conversation was great. I was perplexed at how somebody could be so engaging one minute and infuriating the next. He certainly was mysterious or rather curious.

An hour and a half later, we walked out into the bright sunshine again, and I asked him directly if he had other plans, needed to be going somewhere or what was on his agenda. He said he had no plans whatsoever for the whole day. So I suggested a little browse in the bookstore. He seemed ok with that until we were in there and I could tell that he was not in the least bit interested looking at all the glorious books. It’s my idea of a perfect hour or two. I love looking around music stores and book stores. Feeling his boredom, I suggested we leave. We were just outside the door and he said "I have to find a computer with internet access by 2:30pm." I said, well, you could go to the public library. That was not suitable. Apparently the library Internet would not have the site he required. He asked if I had high speed internet and a microphone. I said yes. Then he asked if I would let him use my computer and he promised he would leave when he was finished. I hesitated and then said I guess so.

In the back of my mind I thought it was work related. Pertaining to the business calls he had taken during lunch.

Anyway, it turned out that he wanted to voice chat on my computer, which he did. In his own language, I might add, for friggin 3 hours. The whole time I thought it was business. When he finally shut it off and said "Ok, I’m done", I asked him if that was all business. He said in a kind of incredulous tone of voice, "No, that was a social chat."

Let’s just say my blood pressure rose dramatically and quickly. I was stunned speechless and then he sat down in the chair opposite me and asked what I wanted to do next. I told him that I was going to visit my mother. Showed him the door and to myself said, Goodbye and good riddance.

No, I have not heard from him since. If he is smart he will lose my number. I am still furious just thinking about it.

Ok, so to back track and let you know what I learned from listening to his calls. He had promised one person to call back in half an hour and arrange a time to meet so he could pick up some product that he required. He never called back. Another person called and needed him to activate a phone. He sells cell phones, phone cards etc. to businesses. His promise to that person was five minutes. He never called them back either. The entire time he was at my place his phone went off every other minute incessantly and he neither turned it off or answered it. Finally the person gave up.

The person he had promised to activate the phone for was the reason I thought he needed to use my computer. I really thought in my mind that he had to activate it via a computer connection to the internet. He never told me what he needed my computer for, and really led me to believe it was work related. Especially with the urgency that he was expressing.

So his phone calls showed me that he is an unethical business man. A person that is unethical in business is not likely to be any different in personal relationships and not the type of person that I want to associate with. In retrospect, it certainly has made me nervous about what was being discussed during that voice chat and with whom. His rudeness and arrogance makes the possibilities of what that chat entailed even more scary.
It took me two hours Monday night to uninstall the voice chat platform and all of it’s little spyware crap that it had put onto my system.

I am fed up and finished with the dating game. My new theory is that I am going to enjoy this time of ‘singleness’ to spend time with my family and friends and that is good enough.