Date #20 Sunday Night Stroll with a Poetic Canadian

Don’t tell my most recent ex-boyfriend this, but I met a better version of him with Date #20.  After the horrific experience of Date #19 (Don’t lie Melissa, you loved it!) I decided I needed to cut weirdos if they said anything offensive, stupid or creepy and not to meet anyone who looked suspiciously tiny. My Tinder prospects immediately dwindled.

Enter Date #20. I have zero recollection of actually swiping on him but since I was notified at some point on Sunday that I had a match, I guess we had done so during one of my mindless swipe sessions.

Date #20 went for the bold first move and said “Hi Melissa, how’s life going?”. His Tinder profile made me think that he looked like my most recent ex (which wasn’t disastrous, just a solid meh of 10,) with the exception that he was Canadian.

AND REMEMBER HOW MUCH I LOVE CANADIANS?!

Seriously.

Since I love Canadians and hate chatting on Tinder, my first reply was: “Good. Would you like to go for a coffee or a drink now?”. He seemed a little taken aback by me coming on to him at 5.30pm on a Sunday evening and said “Just please don’t be an axe murderer, that would be the fastest request to meet on Tinder.. so yes”.

S u c k e r.

I assured him that I would leave my axe at home before proposing we grab a hot drink and walk along Oriental Parade (so that I could take my dog for a walk… I was becoming really resourceful with these Tinder dates!).

I insisted that I pick him up in the Barina in 20 minutes, before asking what sort of drink he would like. He said he wanted something good for recovery, so I chose some sort of fruit juice to ease his hangover.

After I initially messaged him at 5.26pm, he was sitting in my car by 6.43pm. Now that’s what I call efficient! (And potentially desperate).

Date #20 was quite similar to my ex on quite a few fronts. He was a little shy, rather lovely and seemed like the kind of sensitive soul who would find love at the end of a movie but whose scenes would end up on the cutting room floor, so no one ever found out.

I learnt that he worked in I.T and was here on a working holiday, just like my previous lover. It was nice that he had travelled, it meant we had a little more to talk about than basic bitch topics. We tried to find our common interests, and at this point there wasn’t a lot to go off.

Things got interesting when I found out he wrote poetry. I take back what I said about finding love at the end of the movie which no one cared about, this guy was smooth. He was real. I like the idea of a man who can express his feelings in more ways than the post-coital chat.

He was sweet and genuine, I’ll give him that. I don’t think our spark went off because I was talking too much about myself to make the time go by. After our moonlit walk along Oriental Parade which was a cute setting for any first date – until Richie went for a wee poo – we walked back to the Barina and I must have driven him home. I was busting to pee by this stage and could barely string sentences together.

He messaged me at 7.47pm to thank me for the spontaneous weekend. I said that it was so lovely meeting him as well and then never met up with him again. Although he did suggest it four more times after that.

… Of course he did.