Date 14- Rock Lobster

Despite the Chilean-induced hangover, I drag my carcass to the couch on Sunday morning, order cheesy scrambled eggs and french fries from the diner, and eventually run 7 miles because I am paranoid and afraid to gain weight. I have a date with the Tree tonight. He has been texting throughout the week, very cute perky nebbish texts and I am optimistic, if not entirely physically attracted to him. Being a man of manly habits, he sends an Uber to pick me up, which of course my girlfriends find to be impossibly gallant and romantic. Its a lovely touch, but I keep feeling like this is evidence of a habitual serial dater. I wear a blue menswear shirt (Marcello is obsessed with how I look in this shirt so I want to see if it works on other men....are they just imagining how I look wearing their shirt post coitus?), tight black jeans and black ballet slippers. I feel like Audrey Hepburn if she had been 60 lbs heavier with a bushy blonde weave. We have casual lobster rolls and beer at Red Hook Lobster Pound which doesn't strike me as a bona fide date spot, but the conversation plods along pleasantly. I wish alcohol wasn't always the key to success in dating but it sure helps.

We move on to a bar around the corner, where the conversations rolls a bit faster as the wine flows. His schtick remains but he loosens up a bit, and we discuss business, music, his vegan ex girlfriend. He pulls me into a feathery little butterfly kiss, and says he wants to book the next date immediately. I actually find him to be totally pleasant, and refreshing change from the last few men I have been out with. He explains to me that after the Vegan, he needed to take a few years to work on his career and not stress about the dating scene; I unfairly wonder why at the age of 40 this man isn't married yet.

DATE FOURTEEN- LOBSTER ROLLS DON'T MAKE UP FOR SPLINTERY PICNIC TABLES.

NEIGHBORHOOD WATCH- BEWARE OF 40 YEAR OLD TINDERFELLAS TRYING TO MAKE OUT ON CORNERS IN GREENPOINT.

MENTAL STATE- RUNDOWN. NEED TO GIVE UP MY HARD LIVIN' WAYS.

Date 13- A Latin Lover

Saturday night in the East Village, and the natives are restless. My tribe is having sushi and 2-for-1 bottles of Pinot Grigio, but there are hordes of New Yorkers in the streets, looking for adventure, cocktails, love, or all of the above. Saturday night brings with it endless possibilities to meet the right man, or possibly have a few thrilling hours with the wrong one.

After dinner, my posse and I retreat to Eileen's nearby apartment for more cocktails and chit chat. I tell everyone what has been happening in my life lately, relating the Marcello blow off in gruesome detail and the Vanilla Boredom. Marcello has texted throughout the week, with cryptic messages saying, "Still so sick!" but I ignore him and move on. Tonight he wants to see me, and despite that fact that I am wearing the most bewitching and painfully tight black dress with a deeply set lace vee, I know I can't. I am tipsy and will want to fight and talk about how devastated I was to be blown off, and I never win with him even in the best of circumstances; additionally I would like to be my loveliest self and I fear too much wine and sushi might have already set me over the edge. But I am restless and hungry; I want a handsome man to tell me I'm beautiful tonight. I call in a secret reinforcement plucked from my former life as a bartender at an upscale Italian restaurant, a handsome Chilean manager names Juan Carlos who salsa dances well and is almost as tall as I am...but not quite.

As a single girl, I find the Juan Carlos types to be useful in a pinch and incredibly liberating; he is an impossible match, which means I can text him when I feel like it and never worry about the games. He could never be a boyfriend because our worlds and long term goals are so different, but for a sip and twirl he is perfect. I sneak out of my friend's apartment, telling her I am heading home on the subway to be a good girl and get back to clean living ways. About two minutes after I walk out of her apartment, a taxi pulls up and a dark eyed South American beckons to me with a smile. I hop in and we head to the Lower East Side for Negronis. He talks about opening a restaurant in Queens and we both know he will never open this restaurant in Queens because he is a good looking man living for the good times. While this might be a debauched Saturday night for me, this is every night for him, as he loves the ladies. He confesses he has a 10 year old child, and from his tone I gather he isn't particularly thrilled about this. He plays the role I needed him to play, holds me close for a dance, tells me I am gorgeous in two languages and looks good. Our conversations are casual and open, because his opinion matters very little to me and I am not worried about impressing him; he says "You are incredibly sophisticated". I don't recall what prompted the comment, but thought to myself, "Yes, I am sophisticated as shit, and I gotta move on". And that's what I did.

DATE THIRTEEN- EL AMOR PROHIBIDO

COCKTAIL LIST- STRONG NEGRONIS AND HANDSOME MEN OF WEAK CHARACTER

PARTING GIFT- WICKED HEADACHE

Date 12- Playing House

Vanilla, in his broken state, throws himself a small birthday gathering at his friend's bar in the West Village. He casually invited me at our last date and I felt pressured to say yes, but as we near the date, I feel increasingly reluctant to a) spend time with him, and b) negotiate the tedious landscape of introductions to his friends. What will he say? I have already stepped on a few landmines with him, including his discovery that I "unmatched" with him on the Tinder app. A friend advised me that once you go on a date with a gentleman and they are in possession of your actual phone number, you should unmatch with them so you and your information (and updates as to how often your skanky self is trolling for dates) is invisible. I'm not sure Vanilla is as conniving as other people I know, and he seemed totally alarmed by it.

"I was trying to show your photos to a friend of mine but you disappeared. Did you delete Tinder?" he asks with a hopeful gleam in his eye.

"Uh, um, ah, well...my friend told me you are supposed to unmatch after the first date. Is that not what the kids are doing these days?" My weaseling was fairly obvious and I could tell he was disappointed.

Isn't dating a study in raised expectations and disappointments? One fantastic opening cocktail, which is always a surprise because Tinder forces you to walk in expecting the worst possible outcome, and you think to yourself, "I broke my unlucky streak! I met someone normal/interesting/not obviously homicidal! I might not die alone and miserable!" This is when it all goes downhill, because no one is as sweet and innocent as they seem, even people who are sweet and innocent.

I stay at work late on this Friday night, and tell Vanilla that I can't make birthday drinks, but I'm happy to have him over when he gets back to Park Slope. He mentioned the last time I saw him that he had a fantasy of me making him breakfast, which shows that he is a) deranged and begging for food poisoning, and b) desperately needs to get himself wifed up. I haven't seen a man in years that so obviously wanted an immediate girlfriend; poor fool shouldn't have gotten himself tangled in my web. I tell him that I will make him a birthday breakfast to make up for missing his cocktail hour, and he happily agrees.

This is the part of being in a relationship I love the most, so I will pretend briefly even if it is for the wrong man: shopping for groceries the night before, planning a little menu to impress, having a reason to pull out all the lovely little kitchen things I've been buying. I can practice on him, as I can't really get out of this birthday situation now without looking like an asshole to a man who is having a rough time. He comes over and I'm freshly showered, and try and put on a cheerful show. We kiss lightly, discuss work a bit, then get back into the never ending discussion of his family matters. My visceral attraction to him is fading quickly, and I'm having a difficult time pretending I have the remotest patience for his physical limitations.

In the morning, I wake up early and leisurely make breakfast: blueberry muffins, Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee, scrambled eggs with avocado and tomato, bacon. I ignore that I don't really want the man I am making breakfast for, and just enjoy this moment. I hope desperately in my heart it won't be long before I can do this for someone I am crazy about; I miss taking care of a man, even in my selfish and limited way. After we eat, I encourage him to get moving and pretend to have plans; its time to delete this man and move on to newer prospects. If I am honest with myself, I used him as a placebo for Marcello. I am not afraid of Vanilla because a man like this can be easily controlled, but I can't trust myself with Marcello, nor can I trust him.

DATE TWELVE- You snooze, you lose.

BRUNCH OFFERING- The freshest, if not the friskiest ingredients

VERDICT- UP THE FOOD CHAIN.