I'm with you two: what's the point of being able to kick people's butts if you can't do this?
I understand her previous "why I don't ask guys out" position (too lazy to find the link but it was essentially that she plans awesome dates and is afraid some guys will stick around for the awesome dates instead of her) and, for her stated reasons, think that makes sense for why it wouldn't make sense to make the move for the second date. But the first date? He could just be clueless about picking up on the signals. She should ask him out.
Disagree. She should stay at home reading David Copperfield and drinking scotch.
Emerson, I've talked to you about sock-puppeting before. Just don't do it.
He could just be clueless about picking up on the signals.
Or, more likely, very shy. I mean, the dude's an English professor, ffs. See Justus's comment at Megan's.
Or with that kind of opening, should I expect that he would ask me out if he were single and interested?
Really, she shouldn't care about this question. It's not at the outer bounds of propriety for her to ask him out, and that's really the only issue. Putting much more thought into it misunderstands how important the date should be. He might be Mr. Right, but he might be just a pleasant few hours of conversation. But it's a mistake to make a potential date into more than it can or should be. (I should note that I'm not great at behaving this way myself, so I'm sympathetic.)
I mean, asking pages for their screennames is probably not at the outer bounds of propriety...
Petra saw that guy's profile on some dating site
She, and we, need to hold out until we've seen this profile.
14: Betty. Who is Petra, and where are you finding that snatch of conversation?
I think the key to this is that he *already* asked her out.
It's fair that for a first date for people who vaguely know each to be a "why don't we try talking to each other at this event that we're both going to?" date. Dinners, movies, and passionate love making can come later.
16: Follow the link -- it's in the full post at her blog.
17: Yeah, there's some of that, and knowing you're going to see the person at another event lets you kick the can down the road a little about asking them out explicitly.
Actually, LB, FL is invoking baa.
As for the body of the post, while it's true that I have blue eyes, I'm not sure about "hottie".
"This is totally suck-it-up-and-make-the-move territory, right?"
Exactly so. SCMT @ 9 says it all, this shouldn't be thought of as a negotiation involving the fate of the universe. It's just a possible date.
We should encourage Idealist to go over there and tell Megan the story about his superior officer in the towel and all that did not ensue . . .
We should encourage Idealist to go over there and tell Megan the story about his superior officer in the towel and all that did not ensue . . .
My life is filled with object lessons in what not to to.
Which is to say, what's happened so far is in no way any indication that the guy ISN'T interested in Megan, so she should totally ask him out if she wants to go out with him.
Also, I agree that SCMT @ 9 is entirely correct.
My life is filled with object lessons in what not to to.
Your comments too!
Your comments too!
I am a full-service object lesson.
Agreed with everyone else -- asking about Pub Quiz was his way of testing to see if she was actually flirting with him. Whack him with a cluestick and ask him out.
OK. That was my inclination anyway. The only hesitation is whether he is dating someone, and you're right. It doesn't matter. If he is, he can turn me down and go home rueing that when he has a girlfriend, women hit on him constantly and where were they when he was single?
I haven't seen his profile myself. But you could look for a 30ish, English professor, 95816, maybe on Yahoo Personals? That was a year ago.
But it'll probably be three-four weeks before I see him.
All I have to say is, whatever you do, don't take Pais/ley Pas/sey's advice.
Actually I read
He asked a couple times if I would be at Pub Quiz this weekend. (No, I'll be at Hardly Strictly Bluegrass, and are you sure you don't want to hang out for dinner one night?)
as him implicitly asking if he would see her again...and she said NO.
It isn't that he was oblivious, it's that she was oblivious. She sent a signal by going up and chatting with him, and he sent a signal by asking if she'd be back, and she apparently (I can't tell from reading the blog post) signaled that he wasn't good enough to go out with her by saying she wouldn't be back.
If she did ask him "and are you sure you don't want to hang out for dinner one night?" and he said no, that means either 'no' or 'too pushy'.
If she was actually interested and she want to ask the dude out, the right response to 'Will you be at Pub Quiz on Sunday?' is 'Yes, can I sit with you guys?' or 'No, I have a date but I'm coming to the one on Thursday. (Can I sit with you guys?)' Or something like that.
If the genders are reversed and a guy comes up and starts chatting a woman up, and she asks if he'll be back and he says 'No', but doesn't elaborate or indicate if he would be around at some point, I'm pretty sure she would start wondering exactly why the hell this guy was talking to her. Especially if he then preceded to wander off.
max
['People, sheesh.']
30 is just wrong.
But now I'm curious. Megan, did you suggest to him hanging out at dinner some night? I think I just figured that was you wishing he would say that, but it's not clear.
LB's so right: Suck-it-up-and-make-the-move.
Making the move has two results: "No thanks", hence no date/ relationship/ whatever or "Yes, please", hence date/ relationship/ whatever.
Not making a move has only one result: no date/ relationship/whatever.
Never waste a blue-eyed academic hottie. Never. It's ecologically unsound.
If the man in question is an academic hottie, asking if you were going to be at Quiz Night pretty much counts as wooing you with flowers and asking you out for dinner. But it's Quiz Night! Why hasn't her bra fallen off?!?
Academic guys are a bit clueless in the signals department, and it's not like you'll end up with a scarlet A for asking him out, so go for it. Worst case, you lose a Quiz Bowl buddy and can join FL in his solitary reading group sessions.
Hm. I feel for Megan right now. Stakes are higher when it's someone you'll see around.
Cala, that hurts me. I'm in my study, crying quietly in the dark. Good work.
But that's the normal state of the junior faculty member, to cry in the dark. If I had truly hurt you, you'd be unable even to cry in the dark or the light.
Megan would do well to go to Quiz Night and see what develops.
Quiz Night is fun, especially if you're good at quizzes because then you get all the answers right even if you don't score with the Blue-Eyed Hottie.
I'm also guessing the blue-eyed fellow was quite blindsided.
I ought to go to Quiz Night some time. I bet I'd be good at it.
I won Quiz Night once. $40 bar tab. It was truly thrilling.
Good point, Cala; I'm pursuing my natural state excellently. On the other hand, it's not like Megan coming to my house for scotch and Dickens would be such a bad thing.
So by "home" in 5 you meant your home rather than hers?
See? No need for tears, FL.
I either find trivia boring ('cause I know all the answers) or maddening ('cause the reason I don't know the answers is due to lack of exposure rather than lack of memory.
So why all the hating on Cala? She's just looking out for you, man.
I'm confused about the maddening part: asking about topics which you've never learned about is a bad thing?
There's an implied "the host of a trivia contest" before "asking." And yes, presumably it would be bad if all questions were on such topics. Smart-ass.
Cala's claim that triva contests which aren't optimally-Cala targeted are maddening to her.
On an impulse, a friend and I went to quiz night in Bay Ridge, thinking we'd kick ass. However, all the categories were things like "The NFL", "Stephen King" (we actually did well at that one), and the music category answers were things like "Angel Baby" by Rosie and the Originals. The bar had sort of an older clientele.
We didn't even come close to winning.
Trivia Night (as it's called here in the real America) used to be fun, but now everyone cheats by using cell phones to call someone sitting in front of an open internet connection. That said, one time we tied another team, leading to best 3-out-of-5 Rock Paper Scissors. We totally pwned.
Competitive contests are more fun than those with a foregone conclusion? or Learning is fundamental?
I'm just defending the honor of the trivia night I go to every two weeks as it being the kind of thing that the reasonable unfogged-commenter would find maddening or boring.
I dunno, man, being asked questions to which I don't know the answers tends to frustrate me too.
yep, ask him out.
Trivia nights are never dorky enough trivia for me.
Maybe I'm confused, maybe you just mean to say, that this type of competition isn't for you, but I read it as saying that unless you're more or less guaranteed to always win, it wouldn't be fun. And speaking for myself and what I take Cala to be saying on her boring point, that also wouldn't be fun.
So I understand why it being all questions on topics you know nothing about and aren't being given clues that make it possible to guess the answer isn't fun, and why it being all questions on topics you know cold isn't fun, but don't understand why you (and possibly Cala) are denying that it's possible to have a mix of these lead to an enjoyable experience.
It depends on the balance. I'm not saying every question has to be something I know, but if like half of them are about (say) cricket results from the 80s I'm going to lose interest pretty fast. It's boring to always win, but it's just as boring (and much more frustrating) to always lose.
Maybe, I'm using, commas indiscri,,minately.
I agree whole-heartedly with 59 and I was reading earlier comments to deny the possibility of balance.
I'm pretty sure that's not what Cala meant (see 38), and it's certainly not what I meant. Comity!
7: Ahem.
20: It actually crossed my mind, "could it be Ben? He has startling blue eyes," but then I clicked over and read "English professor" and realized nope, it's not.
You're a professor of some sort?
20: It actually crossed my mind, "could it be Ben? He has startling blue eyes," but then
Thanks for coming through on the one count of hottieness, B.
"Scotch and [a ]Dickens" is ripe for adoption as a euphemism.
65: Since I didn't think it wasn't you until I clicked over, it should be obvious that I don't contest the "hottie" designation, but for the record:
Ben is a hottie.
63: Oh, you put on a front, B, but you're a total wallflower at heart.
I'm just not going to say whose heart.
I think he's just pointing out that you, like all English professors, routinely steal people's hearts and hang them on walls.
HAH! I don't need a blue-eyed professor. I already have plans with hottie Ben for this Sunday.
Yes, I did get the impression that he was asking me if I would be at Pub Quiz to hint at seeing each other in the future. I told him accurately that I wouldn't be there this week, but was all smiley when I said that I go fairly often. (I wouldn't ask to be on his team, because they are full and real serious.) We closed with some exchange about see you at Pub Quiz.
The exchange was encouraging enough that I'll ask him out next time. Maybe he'll turn me down, but if he's a decent guy he'll do it straight and politely. It can't be that awkward to see him around after. If he's not a decent guy, fuck what he thinks of me.
This isn't really all that much of a dilemma, but I do think that men should get on the ball about asking out women who make a point of coming over to chat them up.
But how can you tell that they're talking to you with being-asked-out intent? Isn't it a bit much to assume that anyone of the opposite sex who comes over to talk to you completely out of the blue wants nothing more than to be asked out?
How did you come to be talking to someone at a triva night not from your own team, I ask not out of any slef-regarding reasons.
73, 74: Obviously Megan and Ben are made for each other.
75: I also think it's a bit much so blatantly to ogle any slef.
75: Doesn't anyone follow the links? She wasn't talking to him at Trivia Night.
I've always wondered what those blue underlined thingies were.
Ben and I may be made for each other, but he was made for me about a decade too late. He's, like, twelve, and I don't plan to molest children until after I am elected to office.
***********
Isn't it a bit much to assume that anyone of the opposite sex who comes over to talk to you completely out of the blue wants nothing more than to be asked out?
No. It is completely appropriate to assume that someone of your preferred gender who walks over to where you are in a cafe to chat with you wants nothing more than to be asked out. If s/he asks for the time or directions and walks away, s/he did not want to be asked out. If s/he reminds you of another occasion when you interacted and gratuitously hangs around for several minutes, offer to get her a chair and some coffee.
Teo, strange women at the laundromat, starting conversations? They want to be asked out. Ben, women approaching you at cafes? They want to be asked out.
85 to 83. 84 doesn't really ring true to my experience; that laundromat girl definitely didn't want to be asked out.
You know, I went over to Foley's IMs to see if I could find something to make you feel molested, but I couldn't bring myself to repeat them. Sorry Ben. I got nothin'.
You'll never get elected with that attitude.
That's ok. I'm sure you'll come up with something on Sunday.
Yes, I did get the impression that he was asking me if I would be at Pub Quiz to hint at seeing each other in the future. I told him accurately that I wouldn't be there this week, but was all smiley when I said that I go fairly often.
In other words, you blew him out. "I go fairly often" in this context, 99 times out of a hundred, means "I used to go fairly often but now I'm going to avoid the place, and you, like the plague".
I told him accurately that I wouldn't be there this week, but was all smiley when I said that I go fairly often.
As a data point, I would not have been encouraged by that response either.
you blew him out
Here's an expression I've only heard used to describe a hairstyling.
I have never heard "give him a hairstyling" used as a euphemism.
(The equivalent American idiom is "blew him off".)
95: Be careful how you employ that idiom if you visit Britain.
58: I'm not denying that it's possible, w/d, nor am I declaring that everyone must hate on trivia games. Just in my experience there's usually not a good enough balance of questions to be entertaining (your 49): it's no fun if you know all the answers, and it's not fun if you don't have a chance because all the questions are about the history of curling. More fun if trivia night is done with teams, because that addresses the balance issue.
But Trivial Pursuit always feels like homework to me.
Should we not expand the range of available constructions to include blew him about, blew him around, blew him in, and blew him atop? Obviously, we should.
I have a very, very hostile attitude toward the term trivia as it's often used, because useful and in some cases vital cultural knowledge is often so-called, thereby telling you all you need to know about the speaker. Similarly, people who have ingenuously said to me "You ought to be on Jeopardy" must often have been confused over the years by my reaction and the fact that I never want to have anything more to do with them.
IDP, why is that bad? To me, "you ought to be on Jeopardy" sounds like "wow, you know a lot of stuff." It's a compliment!
I think a lot of people who use the term "trivia" don't think about what it really means, it's just the preferred term for "questions as you see in trivial pursuit or Jeopardy or what have you."
98 -- also "blew him" simpliciter.
99 -- "trivia" does not distinguish between important knowledge and unimportant -- they are treated equally.
Also, I think everyone agrees that some of the categories of "trivia" knowledge aren't really "trivial." For example, Trivial Pursuit has a geography category (incidentally, my favorite) which has a lot of question which anyone living in the world should know the answer to. Yeah, some people think geography knowledge is unimportant, but I don't think everyone who uses the term "trivia" does.
To me it seems coy, and something like passive-aggressive about the very idea of knowing. And I grade this by age: the younger the person, the more forgiving I am. But years of philistine contempt, not very subtly expressed, have hardened me against this usage, and I return the favor.
I just meant 'trivia' as 'things you might get asked in a trivia game.' And if I think of it more than that, the information asked is usually Subject 101 sorts of questions; no indepth questions about epistemology or biology, but maybe you have to know how Socrates died or who invented the microscope.
Megan, you will go insane if you take seriously even half of the advice on this thread. Nobody knows anything. Don't worry too much about clues. Things will remain uncertain. Ask him out if you want.
73: working on it. Also operating on the assumption that giving one one's phone number, accompanied by the phrase "call me up some time if you want to go out" is a fabulously subtle expression of a desire to be asked out.
Just to finish this, since it's not a pleasant topic for me and I may not be making myself clear: all my life I watched my father be patronized by self-important, ignorant people when he tried to introduce facts and ideas into conversations. And "trivia" is an important, signifying term for people like that. Another one they used on him all the time is that he had a "radio voice." I saw the context of that, and felt the intended meaning often enough not to be mistaken about its meaning; it's meant to imply an unreal and ethereal, hence discardable quality. Change the channel.
I know many people without an anti-intellectual bone in their bodies use these terms innocently and carelessly. I'd just like them to be aware that it isn't always so, and if they've never encountered this they should count themselves lucky, or maybe thicker-skinned.
I figure that the idiotic pursuit of the Ph.D. should probably count as evidence that I'm not using 'trivia' to denigrate learning and knowledge.
Yeah but by your thoughtless, heartless use of the term "trivia" you are totally enabling a philistinic culture. Bad Cala!
That's ok. I'm sure you'll come up with something on Sunday.
I don't want to be a third wheel, Ben.
Dagger Aleph, we can totally include you, IYKWIM.
In the kitchen at my old co-op, I watched a very clean and neat woman dress down someone who called her "anal". No, she said, I am neat and methodical. Those are good characteristics that more people should acquire.
I've never called anyone or thing "anal" since. I should be more neat and methodical.
I'm sure we'll work out a way to involve you as well, da, as a first-class citizen of depravity.
Molesting children in the park can get you arrested. Or so I'm told.
Then why did they plant all those bushes?
Then the children will have to molest the adults.
Molesting children
Ben, you mean? That's kinda cold.
Why have Ben, Megan, and Dagger chosen to publicize their threesome on this particular venue, given the very real possibility that rude, suggestive remarks might be made? Someone should talk to those kids about discretion.
I don't play trivia games per se, but I love trivia more than anyone in the world. For example, did you know that in New Ulm, Minnesota, there's a large statue of Aminius / Herman, who defeated the Romans in the Battle of Teutoburg Forest and made the Rhine the permanent demarcation line between Rome and Germany? That's some pretty intense identity politics there -- I wonder what happened to it during the World Wars. (It's still there).
I don't want to be a third wheel
What about a fifth or a seventh wheel?
I've never called anyone or thing "anal" since. I should be more neat and methodical.
Ahh, this explains all those Craigslist ads seeking "neat and methodical sex."
119: You know, I had the sense that there's something weird about "third wheel" while I was typing that comment.
I also used "third wheel" yesterday while watching an old season of "The Office." Jim and Pam are so frickin' annoying I feel like I'm right there in the room with them and can't escape. They don't act like friends with semi-secret crushes on each other; they act like they hooked up for the first time the previous night. Gah. TV shouldn't make you feel like a third wheel.
Why have Ben, Megan, and Dagger chosen to publicize their threesome on this particular venue
In hopes that other Bay Area people will join us and we can escalate all the way to orgy. (An orgy of sitting around and listening to bluegrass in the lovely park.)
A friend and I had a weeks-long winning streak at a pub quiz held in an Irish bar in Paris. Our secret weapon was a non-descript muscly man with an American accent but excellent French who claimed to be a mercenary soldier between engagements. He was really good at the geography questions.
Very little bluegrass is actually on the schedule.
(And molesting children!)
Very little molesting children is on the schedule.
Don't you mean 'Very little molesting children are on the schedule?'
128 led me to produce a most unseemly snort.
Don't you mean "Don't you mean 'Very few molesting children are on the schedule.'?"?
Unless of course it's the children who are very little. Though the point about the question mark still stands, thank the lord.
Don't you mean 'Very little molesting children are on the schedule?'
There's only going to be Ben, as far as I know.
Not to derail the train but RE 83. I actually read most of the comments on that link (I don't know why. It's like the ingredients panels on cereal boxes, I have to read them!) and while most of them are as juvenile as the original question I found this jem.
sweetheart u dont need to make ur self look hotter he is with u isnt he so dont worry about ur looks he loves u for u dont change anything unless he really asks for it ok sweetie!!!!!
This one comment says so much about the girl who made it.
Hate to comment and run, but I'm gone for the weekend.