January 23, 2003

Last night I got the following e-mail from the Republican I went on a date with last week:

“Am frankly surprised I have not heard back from you after an email, a phone call, and an enjoyable dinner. You seemed to have indicated or I seemed to have believed you had a nice time meeting and wanted to meet up again for something healthy and fun. Should I take this to mean you are happier ‘doing the slut thing,’ as you refer to it?

“For someone who professes to be such a unique individual, you exhibit the ultimate clichéd gay boy response. I certainly hope your musicals are more original than your response, or lack thereof.”

I’m actually in awe of how cruel and bitchy he felt the need to be. Let’s ignore for the moment that I was doing exactly what Miss Manners says to do in this situation. What did he want me to say?

“Thanks for your e-mail and call. I’m writing to let you know that I was actually just pretending to have a nice time and that in fact I found your person almost as repulsive as your politics and would sooner be forced to live the rest of my life in a Family Circus comic strip than spend another evening with you. 🙂 Have a nice day!”

I mean, come on.

Though it would almost have been worth sending that response to him simply to use the smiley face emoticon in that way.