it is. trust me on this. she just went to the bathroom, she's waiting in line for it, she's like second in line, so we have a few minutes, maybe more, but at least a few, so time's kinda of the essence here.

you've ruined the date, your first date, it's over. cause you ruined it. she came here first, she sat at the bar, and she was excited. you could just tell. the trill, the tee-hee, the twitter in her voice when she snuck in a call to her friend. (when they call their friends right before, that's a good sign, one of the best.) hushed breathless anticipatory tones. you showed up, and the look in her eyes, the sparkle the gleam the glint. i've seen that look. not directed at me, but ... at others. that's the look of 'this could be something here.'

it could have been but now it's not.

what killed it - no, not killed it, but ... struck it a crippling blow - was when you made damn sure the coupon you had was valid and could be used on your dinner. you could have asked but you didn't. you said i CAN use this coupon, CAN'T i? i'm ten feet away and i heard you crystal clear. you said it too loud. i don't think that impressed her very much.

did you see anything on the menu that was super expensive? you couldn't've. it's not possible, cause everything's comparatively cheap. that's how we stay in business. we don't exactly thrive, but we sure as shit survive. i was able to buy a car thanks to this place, a car.

and in my experience, this place is a bad idea for a first date and a bad idea made EVEN WORSE by using a coupon in a haughty tone. hey, hey hey hey, i don't make the rules, i just live by 'em, as we all must.

and just for your information, i was stone broke once. shit, first five years after college, shit, paycheck to paycheck? i know what that's like. lucky for me i never had any dates. lucky for me, a woman wouldn't've touched me with the ten foot pole of their worst ENEMY. so i didn't hafta worry bout seducing on a shoe-string. but if i DID, i wouldn't've used a coupon. i woulda found a way to woo 'em without looking like scrooge mcduck. (i used to promise myself i would were i ever given the chance.)

and your haughty tone. she didn't care for that. (tone accounts for a lot, it speaks to character.) where'd you get that haughty tone, finishing school? you go to that school that's in gossip girl? that where you made your tone so haughty? you're not so big. i imagine you get your ass beat, a regular basis, you talk to someone like that, with that tone. (steve, he knows how to handle that tone. there's these regulars who he doesn't like very much and they don't like him either, but they keep requesting his station, then they use that tone on him.)

hey, don't get all kill the messenger with me. I'M not the one sounds like george plimpton in high dudgeon. I'M not the one sounds like buckley taking umbrage.

but, that's not even what killed this date. no sirree bob, the thing that killed it, the coup de GRACE was when you ordered for her, a medium new york strip with mashed on the side. she didn't want that. know how i know? cause she was trying to tell you she didn't, that's what all those uhhs and umms and actuallys were for, and how she kept perusing the menu. but you cut her off, with a dismissive wave of the hand and then your boorish insistence that no no no the new york strip is a good steak (it is, but ... you know ... that's not exactly germane to this here discussion).

that, dear boy, is the death knell. the presumptuous ordering for her then ordering the wrong thing. ask not for whom the bell tolls, or whatever, cause you're done.

she's in the bathroom right now, so she'll be back momentarily then we'll see if i'm right or if i'm wrong (i'm right).

look, okay, look, i know what you're trying to tell me, you're ... all right, good, you just told me, fine, you can tell me to 'i go on plenty of dates and i am doing fine, it goes swimmingly well' all you want, you really can, but wait and see. she'll come back icy as an iceberg. (dollars to donuts, she didn't really have to pee or whatever. she just wanted to get away from your boorish haughty ass, if only for a moment or two.) you'll be all like, shall we continue this elsewhere? a few drinks? i know of a place that is perfectly charming (you probably have a two for one drinks coupon for it, especially if the place you're talking about is that faux irish hunka crap that's going under, and boy is that place ever not charming). she'll say something like hell no, something of that nature. you will, most likely, misinterpret that as a desire on her part to just head back to yours or hers for at the very least the removal of a few interesting, randy articles of clothing.

(this is not what she has in mind.)

make no mistake, she wants to go home. her home. alone. without you. or to a place where some of her friends are so they can give her words of encouragement, tell her to hang in there, there's someone out there who doesn't have an upper crusty nasally voice and who'll let you order the broiled walleye (if that's what she wanted to order).

i do hope, though, that when she opts to just hop in a cab right out front, you go in for the kiss. i'd love to see that, and i will be waiting inside, at the front window, watching. cause she will drop you like a safe and i wanna see how she does it, what manner she chooses. could be the flinch, could be the look away, could be the offered cheek, could be the pity peck, could be the wave off and subsequent handshake, could be the smile-and-shake-my-head-and-chortle-at-your-thinking-i-was-gonna-kiss-you. fact is, i don't know how she'll do it. i'm dying to find out.