Dating: Hell is Other People

[Ded As Ned]

11 hours ago, Arkhangel said:

I thought Deadpool Girl was quite a recent thing, but you guys were meeting each others' kids two years ago?

Well, it's kind of a long story.  We first met on PoF about 2 years ago when my ex-wife had basically left me for another man.  Without sitting down in the therapists' chair and writing a novel... we jumped right in to serious intense rebound/validation/(whatever you want to call it) for a few months.  The new wore off... she was working full time and going to nursing school, I was working full time and learning how to be a single dad and getting my shit in order.  We kinda left it at that and drifted apart.  A no hard feelings kind of thing.  We kept in touch here and there, a phone call to catch up every few months or so, a few texts here and there.  She finished nursing school last month, we started talking more, ended up with the date 2 Saturdays ago.  I like her, she's cool, but we're taking it slow this time around.  I'm in a good place where I'm able to dip my toes into this whole pool of "feelings" again, but definitely not diving in head first.  So that catches everybody up on Deadpool Girl

As to the kids... she has a 5 year old and a 15 year old (never met the 15 year old)... I suppose the youngest was 3 when we went out before.  My boys' mom is very much around for them and it never occurred to me that her kids might be missing having a dad... so when I met her youngest I treated him pretty much like I treat my own boys... gave him attention, high-fives, played with him.  After just a couple hours he was snuggling up to me and calling me dad.  Freaked both me and his mom out a bit to say the least. 

[Lily Valley]

I have a rather good date tomorrow.  Army surplus shopping, crawfish and season 4 of...ya know.  I also got to tease the hell out of the whole "netflixandchill" thing.  This is an old friend of mine.  I hope it goes well.

[Ded As Ned]

Hope it goes well LV! 

[lessthanluke]

3 hours ago, Knute said:

Where did you go then? If you went to Oslo then of course it's going to be more expensive as it is in every capital city. Every other place in Norway most definitely has pints the price I said.. you must be going to the wrong kind of bars.

Yup Oslo. Can get a pint for 3 pound in Cardiff. 

[Lily Valley]

2 minutes ago, Ded As Ned said:

Hope it goes well LV! 

Thanks.  It will.  As far as long term prospects go I am very uncertain.  I don't want to ruin the friendship, but I am aware of the possibility.

 

 Pleased for you that you've hooked up again with deadpool girl.  I know you're totally doing the single dad thing right now, but I am really glad to hear that you're keeping yourself open to the possibility of future romance.  

The 5 (then three) year old sounds super intense.  Try not to blame her for the little guy's hunger.  Your post broke my heart for him.  From a single mum, I couldn't bring my son around any suitors unless I was very, very serious.  It just hurt everyone like hell when people got attached.  I did wind up in a 10 year relationship that was very good for my tiny family until it ended.  The way the ending part was handled was all on my ex, the 10 good years of love and support are not something I will ever regret.  I wish with all of my heart that they had stayed in closer contact.   I don't think you are capable of abandoning a child the same way, so don't be scared to love the little guy.  He's going to just love you right back and you lose nothing there.  

BTW, please tell the boys that my son stole one of my Christmas candles and used it to cover the aroma of unwashed socks.  Got my kid out of laundry for a whole week and smelled amazing.  (He's nineteen, so that was a regular Christmas miracle.)

Good luck.  I have my fingers crossed for ya.  This gal sounds awesome.

[Lily Valley]

21 hours ago, Liffguard said:

Over a tenner a pint last time I was there. Ridonculus.

What?  10 POUNDS for a BEER?  What?  What?  Why does NOLA have any competition for Worldcon?  $2-$3 here.  That's what?  Pound and a half?  2#?  Christ on a Crab Crutch!  How does anyone get laid?

[Knute]

8 minutes ago, Lily Valley said:

What?  10 POUNDS for a BEER?  What?  What?  Why does NOLA have any competition for Worldcon?  $2-$3 here.  That's what?  Pound and a half?  2#?  Christ on a Crab Crutch!  How does anyone get laid?

Haha they're only like £7 in Ålesund. I can believe that they'd be around 10 in Oslo though.

[lessthanluke]

11 minutes ago, Lily Valley said:

What?  10 POUNDS for a BEER?  What?  What?  Why does NOLA have any competition for Worldcon?  $2-$3 here.  That's what?  Pound and a half?  2#?  Christ on a Crab Crutch!  How does anyone get laid?

NOLA isn't competing against anyone in Norway is it?

Plus America is too far away. 

[Lily Valley]

4 minutes ago, Knute said:

Haha they're only like £7 in Ålesund. I can believe that they'd be around 10 in Oslo though.

7 POUNDS?  OMFG.  I am just dying over here.  Seriously.

1 minute ago, lessthanluke said:

NOLA isn't competing against anyone in Norway is it?

Plus America is too far away. 

California, the Norway of the US.

[lessthanluke]

7 minutes ago, Knute said:

Haha they're only like £7 in Ålesund. I can believe that they'd be around 10 in Oslo though.

Only 7 pound?! You can get a pint for less than 2 in most Wetherspoons in the UK. Alcohol talk takes over the dating thread.

[Knute]

29 minutes ago, lessthanluke said:

Only 7 pound?! You can get a pint for less than 2 in most Wetherspoons in the UK. Alcohol talk takes over the dating thread.

I'm sure the expansiveness of things limits tourism somewhat which is a pretty bad thing.

[Liffguard]

53 minutes ago, lessthanluke said:

Alcohol talk takes over the dating thread.

In fairness, you can't have one without the other.

[Red Tiger]

58 minutes ago, Liffguard said:

In fairness, you can't have one without the other.

Which now that I think about it is one of the reasons I dont date much.

[Ded As Ned]

4 hours ago, Lily Valley said:

Thanks.  It will.  As far as long term prospects go I am very uncertain.  I don't want to ruin the friendship, but I am aware of the possibility.

 

 Pleased for you that you've hooked up again with deadpool girl.  I know you're totally doing the single dad thing right now, but I am really glad to hear that you're keeping yourself open to the possibility of future romance.  

The 5 (then three) year old sounds super intense.  Try not to blame her for the little guy's hunger.  Your post broke my heart for him.  From a single mum, I couldn't bring my son around any suitors unless I was very, very serious.  It just hurt everyone like hell when people got attached.  I did wind up in a 10 year relationship that was very good for my tiny family until it ended.  The way the ending part was handled was all on my ex, the 10 good years of love and support are not something I will ever regret.  I wish with all of my heart that they had stayed in closer contact.   I don't think you are capable of abandoning a child the same way, so don't be scared to love the little guy.  He's going to just love you right back and you lose nothing there.  

BTW, please tell the boys that my son stole one of my Christmas candles and used it to cover the aroma of unwashed socks.  Got my kid out of laundry for a whole week and smelled amazing.  (He's nineteen, so that was a regular Christmas miracle.)

Good luck.  I have my fingers crossed for ya.  This gal sounds awesome.

The ability to break up quotes into multiple sections and reply to them piecemeal still eludes me in the new forum.... so... I'll go in order lol

Friends is not a bad place to start.  Lets you kind of skip the whole breaking the ice thing, but yeah if the friendship is valuable you have to tread carefully.  FWIW, my ex-wife and I were good friends for several years before anything happened, we ended up happily married for 5 of the 7 years before she sat me down and told me the marriage was over (it was) and she was going to move out and start seeing the guy she's with now (a bit of a bombshell, at the time).  We're still close, although we've had to draw new boundaries.  People always jaw-drop when I tell them we divorced with no lawyers and no disputes and everybody is happy with the arrangement.  So I get that's a rare thing.  But if I had to do it over, I'd go through it again.

As to DpG's youngest... I don't blame her, I blame the deadbeat dad.  He's a good kid, and I'm not opposed to being a father figure in the long run... but at the same time I didn't want her son to get that attached to me (and vice versa) if I wasn't sure I was going to be around for awhile.  That kind of thing isn't good for anybody. And fuck the dad for not making his son any kind of priority.  I might just punch him in the face if we ever end up in the same place at the same time.  

Re: Candles: that is too funny!  Glad to know they were miraculous!  I told my oldest about that and he said "Wow that was smart!"   

ETA:  And also, your ex totally dicked out by not keeping in touch with your kid after 10 years, regardless of what happened between the two of you.  I might punch HIM in the face too if I ever find myself in the same place at the same time as him.  Just sayin'.  I have a soft spot for kids who have father figures who tap out. My dad tapped out on me when I was a teenager, even though he & mom reconciled later and even more later he & I reconciled and ended up being close before he passed.  Still, a few broken noses I forsee in my future at some point lol. 

[Ded As Ned]

1 hour ago, Liffguard said:

In fairness, you can't have one without the other.

[Arkhangel]

5 hours ago, Lily Valley said:

What?  10 POUNDS for a BEER?  What?  What?  Why does NOLA have any competition for Worldcon?  $2-$3 here.  That's what?  Pound and a half?  2#?  Christ on a Crab Crutch!  How does anyone get laid?

Dude, Norwegians. Have you seen Norwegians? Beer goggles not required.

[Ser Arthur Hightower]

On 3 March 2016 at 1:44 AM, Knute said:

Not really a fan of online dating, which I guess limits my options somewhat. I'd much prefer to meet someone on a night out but it's pretty hard with me currently being in the UK and everyone on "nights out" being drunk.

As a native of the UK this is my main reason for avoiding going out.

[Knute]

30 minutes ago, Arkhangel said:

Dude, Norwegians. Have you seen Norwegians? Beer goggles not required.

you're too kind

[Datepalm]

I was out with a friend yesterday and sat at a cafe table next to some guy she vaguely recognized from something, so we all struck up a chat which seemed to go fairly well. She found him on facebook and egged me into a friend request, which was duly reciprocated a few minutes later. So...now what? Give it a few days? Ask him out? Try to end up at some event in common and talk a bit more first? Let it be, don't stress about it and what happens happens (yeah, right)? What?

It occurs to me that this is a perfectly uncomplicated situation requiring no overthinking and possessed of incredibly low stakes...and yet. Nothing's ever 'just' an experiment, is it? I wouldn't be considering what to do with this guy if I didn't feel like there was some vibe, and there being some vibe, it can no longer exist merely as an entirely consequence-free, neutral learning experience within a space somehow magically removed from myself as such. I resent this.

Also, guy is a physicist. Counter-intuitively, therefore, my experience of terrible flirting with men in academic disciplines now runs, roughly, physics<chemistry<biology<economics<history in increasing order of total nerd cliche awkwardness. If anyone has further research to contribute, I suspect I know the people who will take it seriously.

[Ded As Ned]

7 minutes ago, Datepalm said:

I was out with a friend yesterday and sat at a cafe table next to some guy she vaguely recognized from something, so we all struck up a chat which seemed to go fairly well. She found him on facebook and egged me into a friend request, which was duly reciprocated a few minutes later. So...now what? Give it a few days? Ask him out? Try to end up at some event in common and talk a bit more first? Let it be, don't stress about it and what happens happens (yeah, right)? What?

It occurs to me that this is a perfectly uncomplicated situation requiring no overthinking and possessed of incredibly low stakes...and yet. Nothing's ever 'just' an experiment, is it? I wouldn't be considering what to do with this guy if I didn't feel like there was some vibe, and there being some vibe, it can no longer exist merely as an entirely consequence-free, neutral learning experience within a space somehow magically removed from myself as such. I resent this.

Also, guy is a physicist. Counter-intuitively, therefore, my experience of terrible flirting with men in academic disciplines now runs, roughly, physics<chemistry<biology<economics<history in increasing order of total nerd cliche awkwardness. If anyone has further research to contribute, I suspect I know the people who will take it seriously.

As a degreed physicist myself (even though my day job is in engineering, because bills to pay), I think that it is a perfectly uncomplicated situation with no overthinking required.   And I will correct your post as you obviously hit the wrong key.  Physics>Chemistry>Biology>Economics>History>(Art History).  Give the guy a fair shake.