AndrewB

Every once in a while I stop by my favorite local English pub. They've got over 100 different ales from all over the world and over time I'm trying out a wide variety of them.

A few weeks ago, while sitting at the bar, I'm approached by a guy who proceeds to strike up a conversation and offer to buy me drinks.

Now this isn't just some guy in my age group that I can reject on the grounds of him likely being gay. Far from it: He's around 60, almost bald, gray hair, short, stalky, and he has a raspy voice. He bears a resemblance to Ebeneezer Scrooge or Wilhelm from Seinfeld. As you might understand, presuming that someone like this might be trying to pick me up is almost ludicrous. Not one to be rude or make unreasonable presumptions, I engage. It turns out that he's from the same area where I grew up, so we did have some things to talk about.

A few days later he approaches me again. He decides to buy me drinks yet again. We talk a bit more about friends that we had in common. Then he starts telling some jokes; extremely dirty and barely funny. Then he invites me out for supper. I reject his invitation by making up some excuse about needing to leave early. It's at this point that I suspect that my good-mannered presumptions were failing me.

After almost forgetting about all of this, today I was approached by him again. He pats me on the back, says hello, and invites me to sit down at a table with him. I reluctantly do so. It's probably not too hard to understand that a 23-year-old IS analyst and a 60-year-old Wal-Mart manager only have so much in common worth talking about. One drink, a couple of terrible jokes, and a lot of awkward silence later, I get the F out of there.

Here, I think, are the important points.

1) This guy was so obviously unqualified to be "hitting on" me that I felt I should give him the benefit of the doubt. For as long as I could, I assumed he was a friendly old man who had some interesting things to talk about.

2) As a counter-point to the last one, who invites another person out to dinner (as long as it's not buddies going together, family, or a business meeting) without seriously hitting on them? I know of no examples.

3) When he last invited me to sit at his table, there was almost enough awkward silence to make a complete performance of John Cage's 4'33". Any excuse of having a "casual chat" with a friendly old man has long since been rendered invalid.


If he approaches me again (quite likely) then I'll want to know what his intentions likely are. If he's definitely hitting on me, then I'll want to tell him to get lost. If he's not, then I'll want to (somewhat more politely) stop accepting his drinks and lame invitations because it's not my idea of a good time.