Each week, we lure two singletons to The Captain Cook Hotel, give them food and drink, then wait for their reports to arrive in our inbox. If this sounds like you, email critic@critic.co.nz. 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.
Mulder
My day started out just like any other, heading to a couple of leccys in the morning followed by handing in a uni assignment late. After completion of said assignment, instead of continuing with uni work, I decided a much more productive way to spend the day was play “guess my blind date” out of the central library potentials. All guesses were unsuccessful. After being told that I would need help to dress myself for the evening, I enlisted the help of some friends and swigged down a few supplementary bottles of liquid courage to prep myself. Once sufficiently saucy and stylized I trotted down to the Cook a few minutes behind schedule, with my date arriving not too long after me. With the introductions and formalities out of the way, drinks were ordered while the mains were decided. My date was a lovely yarn and had some great first date questions up her sleeve. Now reader, what happens after this point in the date is up to you:
Option A: When the Cook started to shut down around us, I caught her staring longingly at me across the table and knew what was instore for me. En route back to hers we stopped in an alleyway for a pash. Upon arrival back to her house we went straight upstairs to her room for a night full of fun and little sleep, which some of her flatmates might not be particularly happy about.
Option 2: Just like coal power, the electricity that was generated at the start of the night was unrenewable and after sometime it time ran out. So being the chivalrous millennial that I am I walked her home, went inside for a cup of Chai and then gave her a kiss on the cheek before I was on my merry way home.
Option 3: After we finished up the bar tab at the Cook and had set out walking back to my flat, we suddenly both noticed a strange light shining down on us and realised we were being abducted by aliens. Long story short, the aliens needed some new humans for their intergalactic species display at the Universal Museum of the Universe, we managed to escape their capture and find a small spaceship that we commandeered back to my place.
Whatever option you chose, I had an epic night!
Cheers to the critic and my date.
Scully
Well, if all else fails, at least I’m having salmon, I told myself as I walked (not entirely in a straight line) towards the Cook on a crisp Tuesday evening. We arrived both pretty much at the same time, a couple of minutes late, taking a seat in a booth in the corner. It kicked off sufficiently awkwardly with me still trying to keep a handle on my vision, which was slightly spinning, and instantly forgetting his name (he said it again later in conversation thank god). I’m glad I looked sober enough for the waitress who promptly produced a bottle of wine. I had looked at the menu for a few days now and knew exactly what I wanted. Salmon. I hadn’t been able to afford it all year and probably won’t be able to for the next seven. However, he was keen for a platter, probably thinking more romantically. Unfortunately there was nothing romantic about the way I got greasy hands and dropped crumbs of battered prawn all over the table. But, the salmon and the whole seafood platter was excellent, even better, he didn’t even like salmon so I got more than my fair share! Despite this fundamental and nearly unforgiveable difference in taste, we agreed on more things than not.
Tramping was a shared love of ours along with a hatred of the carbonated monstrosity they gave us in the guise of water. As the evening went on the awkward pauses became fewer and farther between, probably because of me talking more than I should have. After a while we were the only other table of people left and it was clear the wait staff wanted to get home. However, we were determined to make the most of our time there so we asked for another cocktail each, both excellent. Cursing that it was a Tuesday and there was nowhere to go to dance out my drunkenness I decided I just needed to go home. To my surprise, he walked with me. Knowing that he didn’t live in town I asked where he planned to spend the night to which he replied “you tell me”. I think my slightly shocked expression gave him his answer. Even though it had been a lovely evening I had forgotten the original romantic intentions of a ‘blind date’ and in my head had begun to treat it like a dinner out with a friend. He came in for a cup of tea because we had just entered a new line of conversation but as the conversation digressed into more awkward pauses I think it became quite obvious our intentions were different and he left soon after.