It's the most wonderful time of the year...

I've been really busy as of late.

First and foremost, at the beginning of this past week, I went out on my first date. As the time approached, I was really nervous, but thankfully when it came to crunch time, all the worries evaporated. I'm telling you, I was smooth as silk. The charm was turned up to "eleven". But seriously, I thoroughly enjoyed myself, and I think the girl had a good time as well. She said no to a second round, but what can you do? I don't think here's was anything personal; maybe she just felt it wasn't meant to be. Either way, I had a good time, and tried my hardest to ensure she had a good time too.

I did lean one thing from the experience: take what the shadchan ( the matchmaker ) has to say with a serious helping of salt. Apparently, in today's day and age, if a girl isn't a size 0 or whatever, she's considered to be fat. Before I said yes to the shidduch in the first place, my mom calls me up and asks me if I have any problem with dating a big girl. When I ask her to clearly define what "big" means, she can't. Trying to put things in perspective - the shadchan herself is a very petite woman - I told my mom to tell me everything else about the girl. Obviously, everything sounded really good. I told my mom I'd think about it.

In the end, I decided that I definitely can't be so shallow as to say no based on something I heard about the girl's physique. Personally, I don't find myself attracted to really thin chicks. Fit is one thing, but below a certain point? Not for me. On the other hand, if the girl is too big, she's too big. I called my mom and told her to give the go-ahead to the shadchan; I would have to see the girl myself to decide.

Meanwhile, throughout the days leading up to the date I had two songs constantly floating through my head: "Fat Bottomed Girls" by Queen, and "Baby Got Back" by Sir Mix-A-Lot.

Zero hour came, soon enough, and I found myself sitting in my car in front of the house where the girl was staying ( she's not from New York ). I got out of the car, made my tie, put my jacket on, and pumped myself up. A lot of guys say that the worst moment is walking up the front walk and knocking on the door. I took a deep breath, muttered "okay, let's sweep this chick off her feet" and before I knew it, I was up the walk and in the front door.

After a minute, the girl came into her room. Relief flooded through me; not only wasn't she horribly fat, I didn't even think she was all that overweight. Not to mention that she was very pretty. The rest of the date went smoothly.

What the hell was the shadchan talking about? This girl wasn't fat; I'm scared to see what this particular shadchan thinks thin is! I think I learned a valuable lesson from my first experience. Of course, it's possible that it's better this way; the more they up-play something like weight, the lower your expectations are, allowing you to be pleasantly surprised...

Originally posted Friday, 22 December 2006