Meeting Curby

Here is the (long) story of how "Tiff met Curby"

My friend Jessica told me I needed more dates. And then she said, "Just sign up for this site - OKCupid.com."  We were gchatting on St. Patrick's day. I was disappointed because this guy I had gone out with a couple times had turned out to be a dud and I had no plans that night nor for the weekend ahead. I had also had two beers.

So I did it. While she and I gchatted, I filled out my profile, answered 200 questions and then let the math algorithm of the site do its work.

And it found me a few matches. There were a few highly matched men, many in the mid-to high 90's. Then there was this one guy who was a 99.4% match.

He looked pretty cute, and as I read his profile, I thought, "Hmmmm, he seems pretty cool and thoughtful. He seems to love Jesus and have a good sense of humor, and I think he's pretty smart." So I emailed him.

This is what I said that evening (Thursday):
Hey there Cap, 
I enjoyed your profile for the following reasons: 
1) your overuse of the letter I to the point of your keyboard failing. 
2) your affection for HP7 - though I'll be honest that 5 was my favorite because I felt like the spiritual idea of fighting for something good was so clear. 
3) you made me smile while simultaneously made me think that my (newly created) profile was not nearly cool or thoughtful or funny enough. 
So check out my profile - and consider that in reality I am much more um, cool, thoughtful, and funny than that... Unlike most recent movies, I am much better in 3d than in 2. :) 
Lets talk. Tiffani


I emailed some other men, too. And then I waited.

I heard back from Curby early Saturday morning:

If you are more cool, thoughtful, and funny than your profile, I'm going to have to stockpile more electronics ... I almost launched coffee onto my keyboard when I read about your gchat studying! 
I like you, let's talk indeedy :) 
Curby

So I wrote him back a long email with some random conversation starters and stuff, later that day. And he wrote me back a long email on Sunday and totally "got" my sense of humor. He sent me his phone number in case I wanted to call him. I wrote him back that night and included my phone number, saying "I appreciate you giving me yours though, so now I'll know its you if you call/text."


He called me on Monday night. We talked for an hour and it was so fun and easy. Before the end of the conversation, he asked me out for the following Saturday. I had made tentative plans for that Saturday, though, so had to say "maybe." My friend, Jenn, and I had talked about going to this Salsa dancing thing some friends were putting on, but when I talked to her the next morning, she said she was unable to go.

Curby had asked me for a movie, but when I mentioned what Jenn and I had planned to do, he said, "That sounds fun, even though I'll be really bad at it, and would be a much better first-date story than a movie!" So we decided on dinner and salsa. Right then, I knew that he was going to be a pretty cool guy - how many guys WILLINGLY go dancing on a first date?

We texted some, and talked on the phone the next few days, and it was just fun and easy. Even talking to him on the phone was something I looked forward to and felt like we were really learning about each other, not just making conversation. His texts made me laugh and I learned he had a great, goofy sense of humor and was really thoughtful and intentional about his life.

Saturday arrived and I was nervous. I had woken up that morning and remembered the tail end of a dream I had where I was an old lady telling the story of my life and I said, "From then on we were Tiff and Curby." I scolded myself, "Tiffani, settle down! You are putting way too much pressure on this first date!"  The thing was, I liked him A LOT on "paper" - what if one of us didn't like the other when we met in person?!?! So I asked some of my friends to pray that our feelings - whether for or against - were mutual.

He arrived to pick me up, with flowers, and after about 15 seconds of akwardness, it was clear that he was great and that we were going to have a terrific time. It was like peas and carrots. Like we had known each other forever.

We had dinner and danced and we had a great time. Curby asked me out for a second date for the following weekend, while we were dancing, and I said, yes. Afterward, we walked all around Santa Monica and ended up down on the pier. It was beautiful and we talked about our lives and family until it was almost 1am. At that point we decided, "wouldn't it be fun if we just stayed up all night and kept talking? that would be a great story!" So we did. While we were hanging out at my apartment, Curby said, "Saturday is too long to wait to see you again, I would like to take you out sooner."  (I swooned and said, "Well, I'm only free on Monday." and so Monday it was.)

We had breakfast at Marie Callendars' (next to my apartment) and he left for his church, and I got ready for mine.

And that was that. From then on we've been together, like chocolate chips and cookies, like shoes and socks.

More to come on this, I'm sure. But now you know one of the reasons why I've been so absent on the blog lately!

In the meantime, please join me in my rejoicing and in praising the Lord for this good thing. We have both been so grateful and thankful for God's goodness in bringing us together. He has done more than either of us could ask or imagine. I am learning a lot about myself, about God, about my assumptions and my heart, and about what things I knew before this relationship and what things I realize now I didn't know. I'll have a post on my transition from adult-singleness to adult-coupleness soon. But other posts will likely come before that.

Thanks for reading, friends. :)

Curby and I on our first date.