Rude Is the New Black

Picture this:  you meet a guy online and, and after some witty banter via email and a titillating phone call or two, you make a date to meet in person later in the week -- Saturday, afternoon, will call with details.  Thursday rolls by.  So does Friday.  No, problem, you say to yourself, we'll play it by ear on Saturday, decide day-of.  In comes Saturday morning.  And out it goes again. No call.  You begin to wonder if you've been played for the fool.  By the time Saturday afternoon ushers in Saturday evening, you're pretty sure of it.  You rant and rave to your girlfriends, lamenting your bad luck in finding the lone prick who would stand you up like this. 

But, then it happens again.  Is it me?  No, because then it happens to J.  Is it just self-centered attractive guys? No, because then it happens with merely average-looking guys.  Is it an online thing?  No, because then it happens with someone you met in person and had a good time with.  If it's not just me and it's not symptomatic of online daters, then what the heck is up with this new trend??  After careful analysis with my similarly rebuffed commiserators, we determined only one common thread -- a behavior that I am calling "The Reservation."  All of the men guilty of this disappearing act did the same thing when setting up the date -- reserved the day (and maybe even the time) but did not set specific plans for the content of the date, leaving them up to a last-minute decision.  Do they really think that just because they leave us standing alone in our living rooms as opposed to a crowded restaurant or bar that they have saved us any humiliation?

Now, my girlfriends and I, we are not unreasonable.  Life happens.  Things change.  If you need or want to cancel, then go ahead and cancel.  But for crying out loud -- CANCEL!  Have the decency to make up an excuse.  To let us know we can and should make other plans.  To truncate any hopes we have at the earliest possible point rather than letting them sink into indignant rage at the pure rudeness of your evasive maneuver.  From a strategy perspective, leaving us hanging is pretty much the worst possible move.  A bona fide cancellation can be rescheduled.  Or at the very least, understood.  But a pure unadulterated stand-up scenario can hardly be repaired.  I was actually really excited about the last guy that did this to me, and even that was not enough to save him from the shit list.  That wound runs deep, and I doubt most men are physically capable of the amount of grovelling it would take to stitch it up.  Even if the guy had decided he is not interested, isn't it better to make a clean get away than a messy one?  You never know when the world will suddenly become very small and the only thing standing between you and your new object of desire will be the girl that you unceremoniously ditched without explanation.  Pretty hard to dig yourself out of the role of the bandit unmasked.

The one thing about this phenomenon that continues to elude me, however, is why now?  I struggled through some rather tumultuous boy-crazy high school and college years and more than my share of inconsiderate jerks since then, but never in all that time (over a decade!) was I so unequivocally ditched (for lack of a better term).  Why now -- when we are approaching thirty, an age when men are finally supposed to start to get their strategy down and their crap together, do we see this regression into non-communicative, indirect, passive-aggressive avoidance techniques?  Perhaps I will never know. 

One final word of advice -- and this is for the men, not the ladies -- if you are decent guy who wouldn't dream of the incivility of the acts described above, seek these suckers out.  Kick their asses.  Seriously.  They are really tearing up your playing field.  The apparently prevalent and expanding employment of this tactic means that more and more women are touched by it each day.  And each of those women move forward knowing for sure and certain that a great date with a great guy doesn't mean he won't completely abandon you the next time.  The guys that verify for women that men are, in fact, assholes set you all back a few pegs.  The Great Disappearing Date does no one any favors, including himself.  We already expect rudeness on the sidewalk, in the subway, on line for lunch, and crossing the street -- do we really need to add it to the canon of dating norms as well?  If we do, just don't be surprised if the business of men and women ends up tasting just a little bit more bitter. 

As usual, I am noting below the site of my most recent rant session with J -- who also seems to run into more than her fair share of douchebags.  Note to self however, excessive consumption of champagne does not make one feel better in the morning...

Lasagna Ristorante
8th Ave between W 19th and W 20th Streets

This place lured us in from the street with its giant "Ladies Drink for $5" sign.  And for $5, we were able to get some pretty decent glasses of pinot grigio and vigonier.  If you're a lasagna fan, this place might be quite an adventure, as it had the longest menu of just lasagna that I have ever seen.  Being the "ladies" that we are however, J and I just chose to split a salad and a lighter pasta dish.  The Arugula Salad was just ok -- nice light dressing, but skimpy on the goat cheese.  The pasta with chicken and broccoli was pretty tasty, but I would issue the warning that their "pink sauce" is not pink.  It's red.  Just sayin'.