Love Is Blind | Issue 08

Love Is Blind | Issue 08

Critic’s infamous blind date column brings you weekly shutdowns, hilariously mismatched pairs, and the occasional hookup. Each week, we lure two singletons to Angus Restaurant / Moon Bar and ply them with alcohol and food (in that order), then wait for their reports to arrive in our inbox. if this sounds like you, email news@critic.co.nz or FB message us. But be warned – if you dine on the free food and dash without sending us a writeup, a Critic writer will write one under your name. And that won’t end well for you.

Young Master Punctual

Dressed to impress, I left the flat after a couple of beers to settle my nerves. Strolling into Velvet burger at 7:30 on the dot, I was feeling pretty good. Being told I was at the wrong place wasn’t the dream start, so I rushed down the block to where I was meant to be.

Luckily for me, the girl was far later then I was. After sitting at the small table alone for around 30 minutes, and reading the 3 page menu about 100 times so as to not look like I’d been stood up, I decided it was no longer rude to dig into the bar tab. As I was about to text my flatmate to pretend to be my date, and to join me for a free feed, my date arrived, apologised for her lateness, and said that she had forgotten all about the date. I was a little disappointed, as she had not really put too much effort into what she was wearing. It looked as though she had just come from the library, in all her comfortable clothes.

We ordered our meals, and got talking. Conversation was pretty easy between us. She was a local girl, and a first year. The look on my face must have said it all. She was studying forensics. I used to watch a lot of CSI, which it seemed, was about all we had in common. She was an animal lover, I work summers as a slaughterman. In saying that, I was so engaged in the chat that I didn’t even notice my flatmates enter the bar and make several trips past the table to check the girl out.

She told me she couldn’t drink much, as she had a test on the Saturday she needed to study for. We were in such dire straits that we needed a quick shot each to even finish our bar tab before we took off. I walked her back to Cumby, we swapped numbers, and I was on my way, not even a peck on the cheek to show for it.

Little Miss Forgetful

So it was 7.50pm on Thursday night when it became apparent that I’d forgotten I had a blind date, and was now 20 minutes late. I ran out the door in the same clothes I’d been wearing all day, no makeup, and undone hair. I was walking to Moon Bar when it started raining. I eventually arrived. My date was sitting patiently, having a beer and not mad at all – which was a surprise considering I was half an hour late at this point.

I sat in the seat facing the cash register, which would later prove to be a mistake because a friend was working in Moon Bar that night and proceeded to make faces at me the entire time. Anyway, conversation was flowing, and it didn’t seem to be awkward at all until he chose to tell me that he’d been talking with his flatmates earlier and when they’d talked about what he didn’t want his date to be, they’d said no freshers. Well, that was awkward considering I am a first year. And then when he told me he’d worked in a slaughterhouse I started to hear my mum’s voice in my head telling me to “be careful.”

We began talking about cats and Japanese language, and I think we both surprised each other. I seemed to know everything about his cats, which freaked him (and me) out. And he seemed to be surprised when I knew a few Japanese words. We ordered our food, and when it came I struggled to eat any of it considering I’d already had dinner.

When the time came to leave we decided it would be a good idea to do a cheeky wee shot. Of Patron. I’d never done Patron in my life, so didn’t know what to expect, but it proved to be the most horrible thing I’ve ever tasted and pushed me over the ledge into the land of the tipsy. We left and discovered he was walking home to his flat, past my hall, so we walked together. I purposely made it so we didn’t get to the door to say goodbye, because I had told an RA on duty that I was going on a blind date, and didn’t want to be made fun of.
This article first appeared in Issue 8, 2013.
Posted 5:13pm Sunday 21st April 2013 by Lovebirds.