Ways to End a Bad Date: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

Recently a friend was telling me about a horrible date she had been on.  She excused herself to go to the ladies’ room however she took off faster than the wind and texted the guy when she was safe in her car that she had left. 

It seems that I have been hearing more about bad dates. I am assuming that bad dates usually outnumber good ones and are the ones we remember most.

I had a lunch date with a guy I had met while I was working at Barnard College.  He was a Columbia University student. The date was okay, no major sparks but decent enough conversation.  When the bill came I offered to split the check figuring he was a student and I was working. He agreed and I put down my $5 for my lunch. He then paid for his lunch with a $100 bill.

That was the date’s huge deal breaker. I figured if the guy had a $100 to spend he could have spent it on my $5 lunch. I let all his calls go to the answering machine until he got the hint I wasn’t interested.

Another bad date I had was a fix-up with a friend’s brother.  He showed up an hour late.  His hair looked like Sideshow Bob and he entered my apartment asking where my bathroom was because he had to pee.  While he was in the bathroom my roommate ran into her room and shoved her face in her pillow to smother her hysterical laughter.  I figured how much worse can this date get?  Well it got worse. Sideshow spent the rest of the night saying, “You go girl!” after I made a comment or ordered a drink or took a bite out of my food.  He truly lived up to his sideshow image by actually becoming a sideshow at the restaurant we were at.  I faked a bad stomach and ended that date.

After a bad date, is there a good way to end it? Since my bad dates were before caller id, emails, Facebook, Twitter and universal cell phone use, ignoring their calls by letting all calls go to my answering machine was my best bet.  Today with all the technological improvements that make it virtually impossible to hide from an unwelcome suitor, how does one say goodbye? I was listening to the Train song, "50 Ways to Say Goodbye”, it went through 50 different ways to break up with someone but are there really 50 ways to say goodbye?

I told my friend who left the guy in the restaurant that she should have whipped out one of my website business cards and told her date that it wasn’t going to work out between them but that he should join her friend’s dating site.   I figured she could kindly turn down the guy while doing a little marketing for a friend. 

Aside from the dine, dash and text approach or my “kiss off” cards, what are other ways people have said “goodbye”.  Are standard date-enders such as a headache, the early business meeting, you have a friend staying with you, you have had long day at work, or “I am sort of in a relationship right now” still used?  Is honesty the best policy in these situations?  Is it best to say, “Thanks for the date, but I don’t think it is going to work out? Probably, but it is not always easy to say that to someone’s face.  Maybe you can just text it…..

If you have any funny or bad date experiences to share, post a comment.  If you have a dating experience you would like to share for a future blog topic, feel free to email me at friend2friendnetwork@gmail.com.