I Went on 33 First* Dates Last Year *and a few repeats from the year before
a look at apps and dating in 2019
Asterisks and strikethrough indicate dates that took place outside of 2019 and/or were ambiguous in definition. 2
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#1: Met on OKCupid, 2 dates total. Early - mid January • Lowdown Brewery • Historians Ale House He explained what he does in email marketing both times and told me he was doing a sober January while we had a beer a few days into the month. #2: Met on OKCupid, 1 date total. Early January • Coffee in Arvada He brought flowers because “that’s what you’re supposed to do.” We talked about art history. I discovered the existence of Olde Town Arvada. I’d thought Arvada was all Olive Gardens and Cheesecake Factories before. #3: Met on Tinder, 1 date total. Early January • City o’ City I learned all about growing up in Alaska in a town without even a movie theater. He said his favorite band to see live was the All-American Rejects and that was hilarious to both of us. 4
#4: Met on Tinder, 1 date total. Mid January • Ogden Street South
#6: Met on OKCupid, 1 date total. Early March • St. Paul Tavern
He took his time getting there and I was finishing my second drink and ready to leave by the time he showed up. I asked the bartender if the green chili mac and cheese had meat in it and was told no. It did. I ordered Postmates when I got home because I’m a true Millennial/Gen-Z cusper that won’t let servers know anything’s wrong with my order.
I hardly remember what we talked about, just that The Dead South was playing a Tiny Desk Concert that was shown on the TV there. While we were leaving I said we could see each other again, even though I was more or less indifferent and just felt like it was the right thing to say to get going. He said he was glad he didn’t have to ask. I got too busy to prioritize making plans with him again.
#5: Met on Hinge, 3ish dates total. Late January - mid February • Coffee in Longmont • First Friday on Santa Fe • Fort Collins and his place He had some good stories about how a girl from his high school had married the school’s football coach right after graduating and how he’d stolen a taxidermy beaver while living in the mountains. I was starting to like him but things tapered off after the third time we hung out. I saw him again twice at the end of the year, but nothing happened.
#7: Met on Tinder, 1 date total. Late March • Improper City He was a financial analyst for an airline and got free tickets, so we talked about traveling. We were both open to meeting up again but never got around to it.
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#8: Met on Happn, 1 date total. Early April • Historians Ale House We texted for way too long and I kind of knew I wasn’t interested by the time we met, but felt obligated to after putting it off so much. I still haven’t figured out how to stop doing that. #9: Met on Hinge, 1 date total. Late April • Sassafras I got a table and she showed up about forty minutes later. She was really friendly and outgoing, and I’m extra awkward around those people. I don’t know how to act around women even in a platonic way, let alone trying to date them. #10: Met on Hinge, 2 dates total*. Mid May - ? • Some rooftop bar downtown • *Wash Park, Fire on the Mountain He’s a civil engineer so I learned what the hell civil engineering is. It went well and we were planning on getting 6
together again, until I thought I saw he didn’t tip at all while we were closing out. We started talking again recently and I asked him about it. He said he always tips and would be extra careful about it in the future, so I couldn’t rule him out after all. We finally met up for a second time about a year and a half later on Halloween and walked around Wash Park. We’ll see. #11: Met on OKCupid, 1 date total. Mid May • The Thin Man We were texting constantly for a few days before meeting, but I was actually hopeful about it this time. I stayed hopeful for the few days after, until our texting became that fun, toxic game of who can leave the other’s message on read first. He texted me out of nowhere this summer with a long apology about reflecting on his life and actions and I’m still not sure what it had to do with me. He left me on read again after I replied.
#12: Met on Tinder, 1 date total. Late May • Syntax Physic Opera (now Roxy)
#13: Met on OKCupid, 1 date total. Late June • My place, food truck/brewery, Wash Park
There was an open mic night and we watched that more than we talked. My I didn’t realize we’d met years before main takeaway was that I wanted to when a mutual friend had brought try standup comedy sometime. him to a party, until he added me on Facebook and asked if I remembered him. I wasn’t sure how to feel about that and took my time making plans. He came over to the house I was starting to move out of, offered to help, and ended up napping on the couch. We went to a brewery with a food truck after, and he left his food and his beer basically untouched. We sat under a tree in Wash Park and he told me about how he was trying to replace sleep with meditation and had been awake for three days straight. That was a dealbreaker. I’ve come to realize some of my pettiest turn offs are people that don’t eat or sleep regularly, and he checked both of those boxes.
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#14: Met on OKCupid, 2 dates total. Early July - late August • The Pig & the Sprout • Joyride Brewing Company I kissed him at the end of our first date without thinking too much of it, mostly because I hadn’t kissed anyone since February. We met up at a brewery about a month and a half later and walked around Sloans Lake, then went to his place. He cooked some frozen vegetables and we watched Harold and Kumar in his basement. He wanted to make out the whole time and I left as soon as the movie ended.
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#15: Met on Hinge, 11 dates total. Mid July - late September • Kinga’s Lounge, 1Up, City o’ City • Botanic Gardens, Sputnik, Wash Park • My housewarming party, Watercourse • Bowling, Civic Center Park, my place • Sushi, karaoke, his housesitting place in Ward, Snooze • Camping • Thai • His place in Boulder • My place, Sancho’s Broken Arrow, 1Up, City o’ City • His place, Himalayan food, brunch • My place, Illegal Pete’s, Alternation Brewing, 1Up, Tooey’s, Sputnik We hit it off and hung out three times in the first week of knowing each other. I finally really liked someone. I found out little by little that he essentially had a long-term girlfriend and that non-monogamy is definitely not my thing.
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#16: Met on Hinge, 1 date total. Early August • First Friday on Santa Fe It might’ve gone better if I hadn’t been more excited to go camping with #15 the next day than I was to meet this guy. He stopped talking to me after a few weeks went by without making plans again. I’d been out of town for a week and then started school, but probably for the best. #17: Met on Tinder, 2 dates total. Mid August - mid September • City o’ City • Some sports tavern downtown, City Park We talked about our roommates and dogs for the most part both times, and a bit about us both being Eastern European. He was really into stargazing and wanted to drive up to the foothills. I wasn’t convinced he wasn’t a murderer yet, so we went to City Park instead and saw a lot more geese than stars.
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#18: Met on Hinge, 1 date total. Late August • Sputnik, Sweet Action
#19: Met on Hinge, 1 date total. Late August • Hudson Hill
I met up with him the same day we matched since I was sad about #15 and needed to get out of my head. I waited almost an hour for him at Sputnik. He talked about his very recent ex that he still lived with, and his issues with alcoholism while we drank at 3 pm. So I also shared and told him I was working on recovering from an eating disorder. He responded by offering to let me know if he thought I was eating too much. I don’t regret ghosting him.
He was a web designer and we both lived in Capitol Hill. That was about all we had in common. #20: Met on OKCupid, lost track*. Late August - ? • Domo Japanese • Clyfford Still Museum, City o’ City • Lunch at a food truck • Dinner at his place • Thai Monkey Club, then my place • Live music at a bar in Aurora, then his place • *His show at Cervantes • *Dinner at his place • *Berkeley Lake Park • *Dinner at his new place • *Making pasta from scratch • *FlyteCo Brewing, *Fire on the Mountain • *Movie at his place I kind of assumed we were just friends until the fourth time I saw him, then got way too invested. Now we’re actually just friends. 11
#21: Met on OKCupid, 1 date total. Late August • Tacos, 1Up It was actually good apart from when my roommate’s dog bit him and I had to superglue his bleeding hand. #22: Met on Tinder, 3 dates total*. November 2018 - early September • *Coffee at Tupelo Honey, a ride to the airport • *Walking around Santa Fe, Black Sky Brewery • The Walnut Room We met twice the year before and then he ghosted me. He reached out again in September and admitted he’d gotten into a relationship and left me hanging. So we met up again, got pizza, and talked about kerning, Chicago, and the festival I was about to go to. He got into another relationship before I saw him again.
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#23: Met on Tinder, 1 date total. Early September • Death & Co, Meadowlark Every time I go to Rino I feel like I’m not really in Denver anymore and think about how people that live or go out in Rino or downtown probably perceive Denver so differently than I do around Capitol Hill and Baker. He had just moved here from Florida and somehow had made the trip fully by motorcycle. I told him if we hung out again it’d be as friends when we were going our separate ways for the night. I felt good about being straightforward about it instead of beating around the bush as usual.
#24: Met on Tinder, lost track*. April 2018 - ? • *Starbucks • *A bunch of times watching movies in his basement • Little Gingko Asian Cafe • *Illegal Pete’s • *Halloween movies We mostly saw each other the year before, then things got weird and I was gone for the summer and we stopped talking for a while. When we met up after that, it was painful trying to make conversation with him over Chinese. I asked him about his classes and job and roommates and I was asked nothing. I mentioned I was leaving town for a festival the next day and he told me about how his his roommate hated concerts and had gotten mad at his girlfriend for moshing. He texted me when I got home, saying he couldn’t tell if I was trying to get him to come to my place after. I certainly wasn’t. For some reason I’ve seen him another few times since then. Our conversations haven’t improved much.
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#25: Met on Bumble, 1 date total. Mid September • Watercourse She was an architecture major, so we talked about design and architecture and school. I brought my dog and he was a great distraction when things went quiet. It was good overall, but still don’t know how to interact with women. We meant to get together again but never did. #26: Met on Hinge, 2 dates total. Late September - early November • Baere Brewing Company Skylark Lounge • Sputnik, 3 Kings, The Irish Rover, his place I brought my dog again and he chewed through his leash. I didn’t notice until this guy said he was impressed with how my dog was behaving off-leash. I couldn’t figure out what I thought about him, but decided I wanted to see him again after we kissed. I still couldn’t get a read on him the second time, but got way too drunk and said I liked him. We tried to hang out again, but I kept 14
canceling plans out of exhaustion until I felt so bad about it I stopped replying at all. #27: Met on Hinge, 1 date total. Late September • Our Mutual Friend Brewing, Odell Brewery It was another one of those times where we’d texted a while first and I had a feeling I wouldn’t be interested, but went along with it just to be sure. Imagine how much free time I’d have if I learned to say “no” instead of “later.” #28: Met on Hinge, 1 date total. Early October • Kaos Pizzeria I brought my dog this time too. He chewed on his leash again and I spent too much time trying to get him to stop. I passed the guy at the store a few weeks later and it took me a few hours to realize why he looked familiar.
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#29: Met on Hinge, 1 date total. Mid October • Public School 303
At least I’d had all this practice getting through a few hours of conversation.
I had deleted all my apps at this point and decided to take a break by the time he got back from some trip to the east coast and reached out. I remember more about my conversation with the hosts at the restaurant than I do about him. He said he was just looking for friends at the end.
#32: Met on Facebook, 1 date total. Early November • Prohibition We met at the place I’d met my most recent ex the year before and our server was one of his friends. We didn’t have a lot to talk about and I said I had to get home to let my dog out after one drink.
#30: Met on Tinder, 1 date total. Mid October • Park Tavern He accidentally went to another bar with a similar name but made it there eventually. He looked a lot like my ex from a few years before and was a cook like him too. #31: Met on OKCupid, 1 date total. Late October • Tacos, Retrograde He was yet another that I’d texted for a while and just felt obligated to meet. 16
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#33: Met on Tinder, 2 dates total. Early - mid December • Somebody People • Broken Shovels Farm Sanctuary, Empourium Brewing Company We had matched and started talking months before, but fell out of touch and didn’t get a chance to meet until December. We got lunch at Somebody People. It was pretty empty and the host asked if I was there to see #33 (with his name, of course). He was on a first-name basis with every vegan place in town. We bonded over our habits of spending way too much money going out to eat all the time. We had fun both times, but I think we both felt more like friends. He moved back to Maryland anyway.
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final thoughts
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Driving an hour to see someone can be worth it, but is not ideal and probably won’t work for long. Always meet people in public for at least the first time. Not just for safety, but for a neutral escape from awkwardness. Giving people you have doubts about a chance often just confirms the doubts. Straightforward rejection is better for everyone than ghosting constantly delaying. But that still hasn’t stopped me. It can be hard to know what’s supposed to be a “date” or something else. It can be hard to know anything without directly talking about it. I’ve been to way more breweries than I thought.
Conversations just click with some people, but there are ways to fill an hour or two with just about anyone if absolutely necessary. Can people meet organically anymore at all? I have no idea how. People generally make it clear when they’re interested. Those who don’t probably aren’t. Attraction can grow to some degree, but if you have to question it that much, it probably won’t. Trying to prove red flags, incompatibilities, and gut feelings wrong only postpones the inevitable. Denver has been ranked one of the worst cities to find love several times, so there’s always an excuse to fall back on.
Bringing my dog along isn’t a good idea unless I end up really needing a distraction.
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