Let’s get one thing straight: I love men. They help us make the world go ‘round. As often as I see women making relationship mistakes, I see men doing it too: they are not exempt. One thing I see a lot of men doing is not giving the women they’re with credit for being as intelligent and “dialed in” as they are. Sometimes I want to say, “Well, she agreed to go out with you, so that’s a start, right?”
Take last night for instance. Mr. SuperYenta and I were enjoying a delicious dinner at Range. Sitting next to us was a couple who were obviously on their first date. (Regular readers will remember that this is a horrible choice for a first date…..a Michelin-rated restaurant is where you go on your eighth date, not your first, but I digress.)
After the couple had time to study the menu, the waitress came by to see if there were any questions. The gentleman said, “I have one, what is a leek?” The waitress, dumbfounded that such an uninformed diner had somehow stumbled into this domain of food excellence, struggled with the right way to describe a leek. “Uh, its green…..its long……” she stammered. After a few awkward seconds, the man’s date piped up, “Its like a big green onion.” “Right,” said the waitress, “its a big green onion.”
Now it is okay to not know what something is on the menu, even if you take your date to a foodie’s paradise and you live in Northern California. But fer cryin’ out loud, dude, ask the beautiful woman you thought enough of to bring with you your question. What a terrific conversation opener. You could have said something like, “This menu is so interesting. I hardly know what anything is on here. What are leeks?” This way, you give your date the opportunity to not only show you how smart, worldly, and gourmet she is, but also you show that you don’t have the answers to everything and that sometimes you like to have help, which is attractive, and you may learn something valuable in the process.
As I witnessed this interaction, I saw a tiny little wall go up between the woman and the man. I could just imagine that poor woman reassuring herself throughout the entire meal, “Well, at least I got a nice meal out of this knucklehead. What is a leek indeed!” Not only did he act like an ignoramus, but he also ignored his future partner to get an answer and start an interesting conversation. Mr. Leek gets an F from SuperYenta. It was all I could do not to slide my card over to him across the table. And next time you go to Range, try the leek appetizer! It was wonderful.
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